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Is it strange Bayonetta outsold Vanquish?

I think there's also the fact that Bayonetta, even before marketing kicked into high gear, had A LOT more hype surrounding it than Vanquish did. From the moment it was unveiled, Bayoneeta had hardcore gamers talking about while many thought Vanquish looked generic and uninteresting. Even the OT thread on GAF was pretty lifeless for the most part.
 
duckroll said:
I'm not making it up either. They had it, but they took it out.

http://blogs.sega.com/europe/2010/08/05/vanquish-blog-5-the-ars-system/

[img/]http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4143/4862135227_d2e6a67813_o.jpg[/img]

I would pay $80~800 for robot missile dog DLC. They don't even have to animate the dog; just have a floating mass of unshaded, vaguely dog-shaped polygons shooting pixel missiles and one of the programmers say "woof desu" as a sound effect placeholder when he moves. Why doesn't platinum games want my money?
 
MomoPufflet said:
I would pay $80~800 for robot missile dog DLC. They don't even have to animate the dog; just have a floating mass of unshaded, vaguely dog-shaped polygons shooting pixel missiles and one of the programmers say "woof desu" as a sound effect placeholder when he moves. Why doesn't platinum games want my money?
just play dead 2 rights and pretend
 
Bayonetta was hyped to hell as the next great action franchise, came out post Christmas when nothing was really going on, and had a cool commercial.

I didn't even know Vanquish was out.
 
Dr. Kitty Muffins said:
If these games had been first party published, they would have easily sold 3 million each.
If you think they'd sell as well ad first-party mass market games like Infamous and Fable 2 you're mad.
 
Can't we all agree that they're both amazing games? They are easily my two favorite games of the year, and maybe of this generation of consoles.
 
Played the Bayonetta demo: "This is cool, I will probably buy this."
Played the Vanquish demo: "This isn't that cool. I will probably not buy this."

That's my reason.
 
Zeouterlimits said:
No. Why would I have? I played the first demo, the one for the main campaign and wasn't impressed.

Bobs - Your passion is admirable. But I just didn't see it. Whenever I inevitably pick up Vanquish, I'll post my thoughts.
FYI, you haven't been so much selling as trying to ram it down my throat, not appreciating I might be different to you.
If you would have paid attention, even people that were not impressed with the first demo, changed their minds after the challenge demo.


Can't see how you thought the game was boring. It's so pumped full of energy that I had an adrenaline rush. If you thought it was boring you're the problem not the game. the game doesn't let up and keeps pushing the player.
 
CartridgeBlower said:
This is what I'm talking about, though. How was Bayonetta any different? Wasn't it's story generic, albeit in a different way? It was wacky as hell, sure, but I don't know if that made it more recognizable. Wacky can be generic, too. Also, I thought a lot of people said the fact that it was so strange hurt it's sales, not increased them.

"Witch with glasses kicking people with guns" stands out a lot more then "Beefy dude in space armor"


CaptYamato said:
If you would have paid attention, even people that were not impressed with the first demo, changed their minds after the challenge demo.

I played through the first demo and it just felt like a difficult slog.. not "hard" just.. the boss had so many hp, I actually ran out of available ammo before his health went down. Is the 2nd demo better than that at that?
 
webrunner said:
I played through the first demo and it just felt like a difficult slog.. not "hard" just.. the boss had so many hp, I actually ran out of available ammo before his health went down. Is the 2nd demo better than that at that?


You were just not familiar with what the game had to offer. Depending on the weapons and strategy you used you could have taken out the boss in less than a minute.

5 minute speed run

You didnt need to be a pro or to use this exact strategy to do it. You could have used the turrets to take it out or you could use ARS mode to give you more time to line up your shots. or you could have used the walking mechs.
 
hatchx said:
Wait a second,


What is the context of this discussion?


Bayonetta LTD is higher than Vanquish? Well it's been out for an extra 9 months?

Bayonetta sold better than Vanquish in the same time period? How do we know, didn't Vanquish come out Oct. 22 less than a month ago?


Where are the numbers? Is it a drastic difference? Are we jumping to conclusions?
Vanquish underperformed. Just accept it. It won't do magic numbers in US when it bombed everywhere else.
 
Chris1964 said:
Vanquish underperformed. Just accept it. It won't do magic numbers in US when it bombed everywhere else.
Bayonetta didn't even chart in the top 10 on Jan 2010's NPDs despite releasing on the 5th. But the word of mouth has been positive so it had steady sales, which allowed it to break 1.5 million earlier this year. Vanquish sales are likely going to follow a similar pattern.

I also think people throw the term bomb around a little too casually.
 
Vanquish seems to be another polarizing game in the same way that Crysis is. People that play it the same way as other games (straight run-and-gun shooter for Crysis; Gears of War for Vanquish) aren't as into as those who were able to understand the unique mechanics and make their own style of playing. Similarly, people who haven't played either game often have ignorant criticism because the videos don't really capture the unique ways people play them.

Bayonetta is easier to grasp. It's an action game in the style of Devil May Cry games, which makes considering the talent behind it. There is less (bad wording here) "work" you need to put in to see why it is so much fun. You can play through the Vanquish demo like Gears of War and be fine, so it isn't apparently that there is more to it. The challenge mode did a better job at showing why you'd need to use all your abilities, but I don't even know if that was released in America.

That said, I'm down for Kamiya making Vanquish 2. Kamiya making the sequel to a Mikami game turned out awesome in the past.
 
Didn't Bayonetta sell 1m across all platforms worldwide?
 
FlashbladeGAF said:
You were just not familiar with what the game had to offer. Depending on the weapons and strategy you used you could have taken out the boss in less than a minute.

5 minute speed run

You didnt need to be a pro or to use this exact strategy to do it. You could have used the turrets to take it out or you could use ARS mode to give you more time to line up your shots. or you could have used the walking mechs.

I'm apparently an idiot, then. I already used up most o the ammo having fun with them mowing down bad guys. (I mean, it's a pretty obvious thing to do in a game) but I didn't even know there were mechs to be had.
 
Linkzg said:
Vanquish seems to be another polarizing game in the same way that Crysis is. People that play it the same way as other games (straight run-and-gun shooter for Crysis; Gears of War for Vanquish) aren't as into as those who were able to understand the unique mechanics and make their own style of playing. Similarly, people who haven't played either game often have ignorant criticism because the videos don't really capture the unique ways people play them.
Exactly. What made me love the Vanquish demo is that I felt like I did when playing the Crysis demo. That I had real choices in how I completed things, and that the route I would take and what I would do wasn't being directed so much. It still relatively straight-forward, but the mechanics open the gameplay up wider than most games trust to the player.

I just wish the melee was treated as a more viable combat technique.

I haven't bought the game yet, but the gameplay from just the first demo (I played the second one too, but I won't regard it here) blows away pretty much every other TPS out there and sets a higher standard for the whole genre. Crysis did the same for the FPS.
 
It is, if you use it properly.
I never figured it out. I was boosting up to people and using it and it'd drain my shit immediately. The tutorial didn't really say anything about it except that it will destroy your energy reserves almost instantly if you do use it.

If I used it it was only on the last dude in a group and only for the flashiness of it.
 
Chris1964 said:
Bayonetta sold nowhere close to 1,5 million.
What most people don't realize is that the 1.1 mil number that Sega was tossing around in February only covered sales through Dec 31st 2009, when the game was only available in Japan. Jan NPD put it at 1.3 and it debuted in the top 5 in the UK, which easily gives it 1.5 before the Spring.
 
SapientWolf said:
What most people don't realize is that the 1.1 mil number that Sega was tossing around in February only covered sales through Dec 31st 2009, when the game was only available in Japan.
What exactly is your point? That number includes initial shipment for West.
 
Chris1964 said:
What exactly is your point? That number includes initial shipment for West.
The company's highest-selling title was, alarmingly, Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games, with 5.6 million units sold (and probably counting). Bayonetta, which was only available in Japan (released October 29) during the period covered by the report, came in a distant second with 1.1 million units sold.
http://www.joystiq.com/2010/02/05/bayonetta-moves-1-1-million-units-in-sega-fiscal-q3-2010-results/

Here are the official Sega Sammy financial statements up to March 31st, 2010.

http://www.segasammy.co.jp/english/pdf/release/20100514_hosoku_e_final.pdf

Bayo is listed as selling 1.35.
 
Bayonetta sold 300k in Japan. The 1,1 million figure includes initial shipment for west.

You can't really believe Sega shipped 1,1 million in Japan.
 
BobsRevenge said:
I never figured it out. I was boosting up to people and using it and it'd drain my shit immediately. The tutorial didn't really say anything about it except that it will destroy your energy reserves almost instantly if you do use it.

If I used it it was only on the last dude in a group and only for the flashiness of it.

The tutorial tells you every weapon has a different melee attack.
For example the Heavy Machine gun's melee attack is a flip kick that knocks the target into the air.

If you are hiding behind cover and you want to use slow mo to take out targets, but dont necessarily want to jump out of cover, you can just do the HMG melee attack to do the flip kick. Then, while in the air, you can go into slo mo, take out the targets and land safely back into cover.

Its not necessarily what you want but there are other uses to the melee techniques than just brawling
 
Rez said:
I think we can assume that all the people who know the name Kamiya also know the name Mikami, so let's just assume that developer awareness was a total non-factor in the sales of these vidya games.

I think its a factor, the thread title is "Is it strange Bayonetta outsold Vanquish?", not "How come Bayonetta did COD numbers and Vanquish didn't??" because neither of these games did those numbers. These games sell to a very hardcore niche audience. The types of people who go onto video game forums and argue whether DMC or Ninja Gaiden had a better battlesystem, and have avatars of Japanese pop Idols. I think alot of people may have known that Bayonetta was made by the guy who made DMC, I'm pretty sure they focused on it in the marketing as well. The only big game mikami has under his belt is RE, which is a very slow paced shooter/survival horror, doesn't translate to Vanquish. And no Godhand does not count, even most of these "aware consumers" don't give a fuck about that game.
 
I'm not an expert at either game, but I enjoyed Bayonetta more because I felt like I was being rewarded for playing better, whereas Vanquish punished me for not playing as efficiently as possible.
 
Chris1964 said:
Bayonetta sold 300k in Japan. The 1,1 million figure includes initial shipment for west.

You can't really believe Sega shipped 1,1 million in Japan.
Ok, even assuming that this is shipped and not sold, and the 1.1 mil includes the initial NA, EU, and AU shipments they still managed another 250k after that. That would be pretty hard to do if they already stuffed the channel. There was also no Bionic Commando-esque price collapse that would indicate that stores had problems moving copies in the intervening 9 months.

I think your position is really weak based on the evidence, so you either have inside information about the actual sales (which would fit your tag) or you're wrong in saying that Bayo didn't sell anywhere near 1.5 mil (which would also fit your tag).
 
Vanquish's slow mo mechanic will not work in multiplayer, and removing or alternating it into turbo mode (much like what stranglehold did) will not be vanquish. I don't understand why people keep bitching about no multiplayer modes for it.
 
Astery said:
Vanquish's slow mo mechanic will not work in multiplayer, and removing or alternating it into turbo mode (much like what stranglehold did) will not be vanquish. I don't understand why people keep bitching about no multiplayer modes for it.
I used boost much, much more than I used slow motion, and that's clearly the mechanic that really sets Vanquish apart.
 
RSLAEV said:
I'm not an expert at either game, but I enjoyed Bayonetta more because I felt like I was being rewarded for playing better, whereas Vanquish punished me for not playing as efficiently as possible.


wha?


Using the weapons, the boost and the timing of the slow mo is the exact same mentality you had for Bayonetta. Why are you not carrying that over into Vanquish.
Like Bayonetta Vanquish is at its best when your pushing yourself to the limits in dispatching your foes as efficiently and as flashy/fast as possible.

Apply the same focus into Vanquish like you did for Bayonetta and you'll be rewarded

Bayonetta also punished you for not playing as efficiently as possible. If you mashed the buttons and didnt pay attention to the timing of your techniques you got your ass handed to you... unless you were on casual auto.
 
badcrumble said:
I used boost much, much more than I used slow motion, and that's clearly the mechanic that really sets Vanquish apart.

yea, i like to boost sliding around enemies while shooting at them, which it will auto go into slow motion. If multiplayer is implemented (and taking out the slow mo), I don't think it's possible to aim with such speed, while the other player is boosting as well.:lol
 
_dementia said:
If you think they'd sell as well ad first-party mass market games like Infamous and Fable 2 you're mad.
I disagree, I think footage from the train level of Vanquish alone could really make people go 'holy shit'. If given an ad campaign on the level that first-parties bring, it could definitely have been a pretty big deal. The game is way better-looking than either of those games, nevermind juggernauts like GTA or CoD, and 'it looks amazing' is the best weapon you can have for a TV ad.
 
I loved the Bayonetta launch trailer, featuring La Roux; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1L8-KZhW04s


I don't own Vanquish, mostly because I think it looks stupid. It's like Lost Planet, but with a even more crappy story.

Bayonetta was so bad that it was good. But like anyone who is a fan of bad movies will tell you, not all bad movies are so bad/bad enough, to be hilarious to watch.

But maybe I will try it one day though. I thought Resident Evil 4 was really boring and tame as well, so maybe it's just his style.

When RE4 came out, the only thing that was on my mind was Ninja Gaiden. Not being able to move while shooting has to be the cheapest f**king gimmick ever to create suspense/tension. I'll take survival horror games where the enemies spawn out of nothing in the corner of a room over that lame RE4 QTE combat.>:(

None of this is as faulty as Leons hair. That character is the worst designed character in humanity. They could have replaced him with Tingle, and he would have had a more bad ass factor than Leon. At least they could have gone for a subplot halfway through where Tingle tries to molest the presidents daughter. That would at least have been believeable and interesting.

Mikami is just annoying to me. Van reminds me of N03... But I never got around to playing that, which was a shame.


But Bayonetta is so good. Dodging in slow-mo, is so nice. Its like orgasmic. I love being rewarded for playing offensive with a defensive aspect. *sexy slurp all the way to church*
 
Vigilant Walrus said:
I don't own Vanquish, mostly because I think it looks stupid. It's like Lost Planet, but with a even more crappy story.

Bayonetta was so bad that it was good. But like anyone who is a fan of bad movies will tell you, not all bad movies are so bad/bad enough, to be hilarious to watch.
You could always skip the cutscenes if you wish.
 
_dementia said:
You could always skip the cutscenes if you wish.

True. And you know what, I am double morale contradicting, shiteating son of a gun, because I love Metal Gear Series, and I know half the world cant take that shit seriously either.

So in truth I got no right to open my mind about Vanquish plot. I praise NG too but forget to remember how dense that plot was.


I'll try Vanquish. Thanks mate:)
 
I decided to pick up Vanquish as part of the amazon buy 2 get 1 free deal, dunno how I feel about it. The game looks very bland to be honest. A lot of white and gray to the environments, but I'm still on the level and stage 3 I think. Maybe it gets better? Hasn't wowed me so far.

Bayonetta, on the other hand, wowed me from the beginning. From the way the game looks to how it plays. Even Bayonetta herself is a cool character to control. To me Vanquish feels a little too samey in the world of shooters, whereas Bayonetta felt like a more unique experience. This might have to do with the sales, as Bayonetta seems like the more interesting title.
 
Mrbob said:
Bayonetta, on the other hand, wowed me from the beginning. From the way the game looks to how it plays. Even Bayonetta herself is a cool character to control. To me Vanquish feels a little too samey in the world of shooters, whereas Bayonetta felt like a more unique experience. This might have to do with the sales, as Bayonetta seems like the more interesting title.


Vanquish's enjoyment depends on how you play the game.

If you play it like most shooters your not gonna get much out of it aside from the set pieces. The real joy is in combining everything at your disposal to take out as many of the enemies you can while keeping your boost/ARS gauge from depleting

Basic Strategy

And then when you get used to everything, you can kick it up a notch and do it as fast as possible

Speed Run
 
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