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[Oblivion]

Yep, that was the one.

Didn't MK: DD go over a million too?

 

[Saitou]

They could do it in 8-bit sprites for all I care. I just when them to get FFVII and FFVIII out of the way so I can get to play FFIX again.

We both know that's never happening, chum.

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

Didn't MK: DD go over a million too?

Not in Japan. Looks like it was the #3 game at 826K.

 

[CTLance]

Gunpei Yokoi was awesome.
I love the Wonderswan (Crystal). It may not be super ergonomic for my paws, but it's flat, efficient, the control concept is highly interesting - and some nice features like digital volume control Nintendo should've used for the DS. That linear resistor is just so... bleh.

Also, I am perfectly fine with "Wonderswan". I mean... consider "Gameboy".

 

[BishopLamont]

for those who wonder what happened:



What the fuck, really. it is so incredibly suspicious.

I really doubt it was an accident.

EDIT: I also read that the wonderswan did not take off until 1999, 2 years after his death.. Maybe if he had been there to direct the development of the handheld, it would have been a success?? Who knows.

LOLOL wtf wedged by two cars either side, if that's not foul play, I dunno wtf is.

 

[jgwhiteus]

LOLOL wtf wedged by two cars either side, if that's not foul play, I dunno wtf is.

OK, I know that people like to joke about Yamauchi ordering a hit on Yokoi like some yakuza boss or something, but seriously - if Yamauchi ordered hits on people he carried grudges against...there would be a lot less people in the Japanese gaming industry.

The WS was never a threat to the GBA, not with Pokemon on Nintendo's side. As the sales numbers before show, even the FF1/2 remakes couldn't save it. Who knows - maybe Yamauchi really had a personal grudge against Yokoi or maybe he just considered him to be yesterday's news and of no use to him anymore. But he seems like more of a boardroom-ruthless type than a gangster-ruthless type.

 

[justchris]

for those who wonder what happened:



What the fuck, really. it is so incredibly suspicious.

I really doubt it was an accident.

Hmmm, I wonder where Kiso is now. I wonder if he knew at the time Yamauchi was willing to sacrifice him to get the job done.

 

[Pureauthor]

We both know that's never happening, chum.

What, the 8-bit or the FFIX port/remake?

 

[Segata Sanshiro]

OK, I know that people like to joke about Yamauchi ordering a hit on Yokoi like some yakuza boss or something, but seriously - if Yamauchi ordered hits on people he carried grudges against...there would be a lot less people in the Japanese gaming industry.

The WS was never a threat to the GBA, not with Pokemon on Nintendo's side. As the sales numbers before show, even the FF1/2 remakes couldn't save it. Who knows - maybe Yamauchi really had a personal grudge against Yokoi or maybe he just considered him to be yesterday's news and of no use to him anymore. But he seems like more of a boardroom-ruthless type than a gangster-ruthless type.

Though he's a boardroom-ruthless type with Yakuza ties, so that only adds to the mystique of the events.

 

[justchris]

OK, I know that people like to joke about Yamauchi ordering a hit on Yokoi like some yakuza boss or something, but seriously - if Yamauchi ordered hits on people he carried grudges against...there would be a lot less people in the Japanese gaming industry.

Half of the people ranked director or higher at Square would have been dead by now, and Kutaragi would have been buried before the first Playstation ever hit retail shelves. :lol

 

[Grecco]

Speaking of Yamauchi Has anyone read Game Over? That old book about Nintendo thats pretty much out of print. ?

 

[Segata Sanshiro]

Speaking of Yamauchi Has anyone read Game Over? That old book about Nintendo thats pretty much out of print. ?

I've read it in a couple of editions. It's a really good read.

 

[Man God]

Speaking of Yamauchi Has anyone read Game Over? That old book about Nintendo thats pretty much out of print. ?

It came bundled with my Gamecube. Seriously.

3 Games

Two years of some shitty magazine

A shitty 3rd party controller

An offical Memory Card 59

A Gamecube

And Game Over.

Actually a pretty decent value. The book was the best surprise besides Luigi's Mansion actually being good.

 

[ShockingAlberto]

Speaking of Yamauchi Has anyone read Game Over? That old book about Nintendo thats pretty much out of print. ?

I liked it, but I thought Power Up was quite a bit better. Sheff gets some things flat out wrong. While the book as a whole is enlightening, the things that aren't right (which, stupidly enough, I can't even remember right now) grate on you while you read it.

 

[donny2112]

I still can't believe SE supported a system called WONDERSWAN.

I mean.. Like a marvelous sort of bird?? it sounds like a joke or something.

Square games for Wonderswan > 20K:

WS Final Fantasy - 377K (20011230)
WS Final Fantasy II - 242K (20011230)
WS Romancing SaGa - 37K (20011223)
WS Final Fantasy IV - 30K (20020414)

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

Table news. First, table capabilities have been added to the hardware shipment line generator. Second, I added a second table mode for both it and the Japanese hardware sales line generator. I was stuck between a cleaner look or a slightly more detailed look and decided: to hell with that. If &html=1 can give it the simple look, &html=2 can give it the more detailed but cluttered look. If &html=1 just shows what the week number is in a comparison, &html=2 shows which actual date that means for each of the lines in the comparison. It behaves similarly for the hardware shipments.

linecompare image
linecompare &html=1
linecompare &html=2

shipmentcompare image
shipmentcompare &html=1
shipmentcompare &html=2

 

[DeaconKnowledge]

Speaking of Yamauchi Has anyone read Game Over? That old book about Nintendo thats pretty much out of print. ?

You can get a used copy pretty cheap off of Amazon. That's how I read it.

 

[EDarkness]

Today I went back out into the wild to figure out what to get for gifts and the shopping areas were full of people. More than last week. Apparently Wii Fit has been restocked all around town and people are out in force to pick them up. The local Bic Camera even had people outside the store and near the station with signs telling people it was available. Should be another good week for it.

The same Bic Camera also moved No More Heroes to the front of the Wii section. I guess they're trying to add some awareness of the game and I actually saw someone buy a copy. I feel bad for We Love Golf, though. No one even looks at it. The Power Pro baseball game seems to be moving well enough on both the PS2 and Wii, too.

PS3 seems to be hitting a slow point as I didn't see anyone buy one the couple of hours I was in the store looking around. However, the PSP, Wii, and DS are selling like crazy. For some reason the red PSP is getting lots of love. Sadly enough, not many people buying games. They had a person there trying to convince people to pick up games for their new PSP, but that didn't seem to be working...unfortunately. Wiis are flying off the shelf and this seems to added new life to some games. I doubt it's going to make much difference when the new numbers are released, but I'm sure store owners are happy with the performance of some of the games. Especially Umbrella Chronicles and Mario and Sonic.

Oh...and it looks like the reason Wario is back on this list is because it has recently received a price drop to about 1900 yen. I saw a few copies get purchased while I was looking around in different stores. Not sure if this is everywhere, but at least a few I went to had it marked down.

I noticed that Trusty Bell has taken a dive in price, too. It's now a little over 1900 yen. I didn't see it in the bargain bin the last time I was there, but I saw a few copies there today.

Anyway, one store I went to was auctioning off Wiis starting at 100 yen. I considered trying for one, but figured my wife would give me grief if I tried. Knowing my luck, I'd end up paying more than full price for it. There were many people standing there bidding, so I just watched for a while. Had to leave before the auction finished, though.

 

[Pope Benedict XVI]

Fuck Nintendo/Yamauchi for what they did to Gunpei Yokoi. I'm not talking about his death, but the fact that he was belittled and pushed out of the company after the Virtual Boy debacle. Nintendo would be nothing if it weren't for him.

 

[BishopLamont]

Fuck Nintendo/Yamauchi for what they did to Gunpei Yokoi. I'm not talking about his death, but the fact that he was belittled and pushed out of the company after the Virtual Boy debacle. Nintendo would be nothing if it weren't for him.

Companies only care about success/profit, alot of people resign or get fired when a major product bombs.

 

[nextgeneration]

Thanks for the observations, EDarkness. Can't wait to see the next Famitsu and Media Create. Should be very interesting.

 

[Taurus]

Thanks EDarkness, always nice to read these reports.

 

[Stumpokapow]

Fuck Nintendo/Yamauchi for what they did to Gunpei Yokoi. I'm not talking about his death, but the fact that he was belittled and pushed out of the company after the Virtual Boy debacle. Nintendo would be nothing if it weren't for him.

Dude, this shit happens. Look at Sakaguchi getting the boot from Square after The Spirits Within. Hell, next year Bob Shaye will get the boot from New Line Cinema over The Last Mimzy and The Golden Compass despite also greenlighting the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Austin Powers, Rush Hour, American History X, etc. Judith Regan literally invented the celebrity autobiography but got the boot over the OJ book despite all of her success.

Politicians also regularly get forced out or lose an election after one failed policy even if they have a distinguished career of public service and it's clear that the failed policy was isolated and unlikely to happen again.

Yokoi also understood this. He was perfectly able to move on with his life. It's not like he became homeless and was destroyed by this. He kept right on going. That's what Sakaguchi did and Judith Regan did, and Bob Shaye will do, and everyone does. Sometimes people get fired over their bad decisions, even if they made a lot of good ones. It's okay.

 

[Pope Benedict XVI]

Dude, this shit happens. Look at Sakaguchi getting the boot from Square after The Spirits Within. Hell, next year Bob Shaye will get the boot from New Line Cinema over The Last Mimzy and The Golden Compass despite also greenlighting the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Austin Powers, Rush Hour, American History X, etc. Judith Regan literally invented the celebrity autobiography but got the boot over the OJ book despite all of her success.

Politicians also regularly get forced out or lose an election after one failed policy even if they have a distinguished career of public service and it's clear that the failed policy was isolated and unlikely to happen again.

Yokoi also understood this. He was perfectly able to move on with his life. It's not like he became homeless and was destroyed by this. He kept right on going. That's what Sakaguchi did and Judith Regan did, and Bob Shaye will do, and everyone does. Sometimes people get fired over their bad decisions, even if they made a lot of good ones. It's okay.

I don't really get your point. I mean, people get kicked in the nuts every day, and they move on with their lives. So it's okay to kick people in the nuts?

 

[Stumpokapow]

I don't really get your point. I mean, people get kicked in the nuts every day, and they move on with their lives. So it's okay to kick people in the nuts?

Great analogy. My point was not that all suffering in the world is perfectly fine, and I'm pretty sure that a mouldy banana could have read my post and determined that. I will congratulate you for not using genocide as an example, though, because you could have said "DARFUR HAPPENS SO R U 4 GENOCIDE?!?!"

My point was that in the corporate and political worlds, someone's long-standing reputation can be easily undermined by one spectacular failure. I gave you several examples, one in the video game industry, of this happening.

The reason why I mention this is not to say it's okay, but to say that it's understood by everyone who participates in these spheres of living. It's a rule of the game. You can't just look at the corporate structure and say "Corporations would be great if they still had all their advantages but nothing bad that they did happened anymore", because that's unrealistic and tautological.

This particular behavior is a manifestation of the corporate structure; short-term thought, an eye to profit, accountability to share-holders, and very very short product development cycles. If you want this to stop, the answer isn't to say "FUCK NINTENDON'T!", because it's not a problem that stops at Nintendo or even one that is notably endemic to Nintendo (in fact, I'd honestly say that Nintendo has been more accommodating than average to large-scale failures and Yokoi is a rare exception), it's a problem with the corporate structure.

The reason why I mention moving on is because it's bizarre to see a person who has never met or known Gunpey Yokoi get more angry about Gunpey Yokoi being fired than Gunpey Yokoi was. I'd say the same thing about a political support that gets more angry about his/her candidate losing than the actual candidate does.

If you want to bitch and moan, do so in an intellectually consistent manner or not at all. You're not mad about the fact that people are fired for fucking up colossally. You're mad because a guy who seems cool was fired for fucking up colossally.

 

[Pope Benedict XVI]

Jesus dude, relax. I'm not really angry. Isn't over-reaction like "FUCK NINTENDON'T" understood by everyone who participates at Neogaf to be part of the game? So what are you getting all hot and bothered about?

 

[apujanata]

Jesus dude, relax. I'm not really angry. Isn't over-reaction like "FUCK NINTENDON'T" understood by everyone who participates at Neogaf to be part of the game? So what are you getting all hot and bothered about?

How could Stumpokapow know you are not really angry ? AFAIK, he couldn't read mind like Matt (in Heroes), and your post didn't have any indication that you are not serious.

If answering your question is interpreted as "all hot and bothered", don't blame us if we didn't respond to your post in the future. If you did not see the value of his explanation, it is your lost.

And to answer your question, "FUCK NINTENDON"T" is not part of the game. It is only done by people who sooner or later get banned. Do you want to get banned ? Keep this thing up and you'll get it soon.

 

[Pope Benedict XVI]

How could Stumpokapow know you are not really angry ? AFAIK, he couldn't read mind like Matt (in Heroes), and your post didn't have any indication that you are not serious.

If answering your question is interpreted as "all hot and bothered", don't blame us if we didn't respond to your post in the future. If you did not see the value of his explanation, it is your lost.

If I thought he could read minds then I wouldn't have told him that I'm not angry. That doesn't mean my post wasn't serious though. It was a genuine expression of annoyance about what happened after I just read up about it.

"Bitching and moaning" in an inconsistant manner is as commonplace on neogaf as treating people like shit is in the world of commerce. So why is he taking issue with a particular instance of it? Becuase it's perfectly natural for it to bother him even if it is very common. Just like Gunpei's story bothered me. No big deal

 

[cvxfreak]

Wow. I was on the train earlier this afternoon on the Tozai Line. At the Iidabashi stop, 4 women holding big Bic Camera bags walked into the train. All of them bought Wii Fit, while 3 of them bought Wii systems. The 4th woman had a PSP system in her bag.

I've been to various stores throughout the week and there's always someone buying Wii systems and Wii Fit with it. Wii Sports and Wii Play prove to be very popular too. Super Mario Galaxy's doing well, as well.

 

[Mithos Yggdrasill]

Not translated by me: (shipment within parentheses)

FF4 DS (DS) : about 180k (about 400k)Naruto: Shippuuden N-Ultimate Accelerator 2 (PS2) : about 45k
Card Hero DS (DS) : about 30k (about 50~60k?)
Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Matsuri: Kakera Asobi (PS2) : about 23k
Dora Base (DS) : about 20k (about 40k)
Powerful Pro Baseball 14 Final Edition (PS2) : about 17k
Time Crisis 4 (PS3) : about 10k
Myself;Yourself (PS2) : about 6k (about 10k)
Hajime no Ippo (PSP) : about 6k
The Prince of Tennis (DS) : about 6k
Patapon (PSP) : about 5k
Powerful Baseball Wii Final Edition (Wii) : about 4k
Survival Kids (DS) : about 3k
Medal of Honour: Airborne (PS3) : about 2.5k
The Legend of Heroes: Sora no Kiseki Complete Edition (PSP) : about 1k (about 3k)

Not a bad start for FFIV DS. But the shipment i kinda low for the first week. Most of all if compared with Dragon Quest IV.
Patapon bombed

 

[Sagitario]

Wow. I was on the train earlier this afternoon on the Tozai Line. At the Iidabashi stop, 4 women holding big Bic Camera bags walked into the train. All of them bought Wii Fit, while 3 of them bought Wii systems. The 4th woman had a PSP system in her bag.

I've been to various stores throughout the week and there's always someone buying Wii systems and Wii Fit with it. Wii Sports and Wii Play prove to be very popular too. Super Mario Galaxy's doing well, as well.

Anything else selling too?

 

[*Guaraná]

Anything else selling too?

your avatar scares me.

 

[apujanata]

Wow. I was on the train earlier this afternoon on the Tozai Line. At the Iidabashi stop, 4 women holding big Bic Camera bags walked into the train. All of them bought Wii Fit, while 3 of them bought Wii systems. The 4th woman had a PSP system in her bag.

I've been to various stores throughout the week and there's always someone buying Wii systems and Wii Fit with it. Wii Sports and Wii Play prove to be very popular too. Super Mario Galaxy's doing well, as well.

As I predicted, Wii Fit are popular with women (who almost always think they are fat, even when they are almost anorexicly thin). Is the PSP red color ?

 

[Furoba]

Went to Yodobashi in Shinjuku on Christmas eve, crazy lines going all the way outside.
Wanted to buy a 20GB PS3, but those were all sold out. They still had 3-4 60GB PS3 units so I went for one of those. 40GB PS3's were well stocked but I saw a few of them being sold. Xbox 360 bundles also all seemed to be sold out when I was waiting in line.
Wii and Wii Fit seemed the most popular present though. It has people totally uninterested in games hooked.

Sales are really going to skyrocket IMO.

 

[cvxfreak]

Went to Yodobashi in Shinjuku on Christmas eve, crazy lines going all the way outside.
Wanted to buy a 20GB PS3, but those were all sold out. They still had 3-4 60GB PS3 units so I went for one of those. 40GB PS3's were well stocked but I saw a few of them being sold. Xbox 360 bundles also all seemed to be sold out when I was waiting in line.
Wii and Wii Fit seemed the most popular present though. It has people totally uninterested in games hooked.

Sales are really going to skyrocket IMO.

The nature of the Yodobashi game store in Shinjuku is why I would rather shop at Bic. Don't feel like waiting in line outdoors in cold weather or in the rain.

 

[McLovin]

Wow PSP is selling almost as good as the wii. They should advertise Japaneses PSP ads here

 

[Furoba]

The nature of the Yodobashi game store in Shinjuku is why I would rather shop at Bic. Don't feel like waiting in line outdoors in cold weather or in the rain.

The downside of having a point card at yodobashi and not at bic. ;p

 

[Neo C.]

Fuck Nintendo/Yamauchi for what they did to Gunpei Yokoi. I'm not talking about his death, but the fact that he was belittled and pushed out of the company after the Virtual Boy debacle. Nintendo would be nothing if it weren't for him.

I'm pretty sure even Yokoi himself didn't want to stay longer on Nintendo after this debacle. When you are responsible for such a waste of investition, your reputation doesn't help you to get new projects in the same company.

 

[Moor-Angol]

Merry Christmas to all Sales-Age guys !!!

 

[Smiles and Cries]

are numbers going to be late this week because of the holiday?

I can't wait to see last weeks charts and next weeks

 

[test_account]

DMC3 cast Raise on the franchise. Nobody would be caring about DMC4 if DMC3 had been as bad as DMC2, I can tell you that much.

Ok, going to be interesting to see how it does

My point is, the determining factor for big success on Wii is going to be from decisions by 3rd parties to actually develop their biggest properties with their best teams exclusively for Wii and then in turn use their best teams to create new games for the system.

While they're content with ports, spin offs and new IPs in saturated genres they run the risk of tanking. AFAIK the first big 3rd party game is going to be MH3, and I expect many developers have now shifted/shifting major resources over to Wii (as the report from the international game developers association Japan said in May of this year). So, more announcements should be seen next year.

However, I don't think we're going to see these games until late 2008 and 2009 onwards and I believe this was always Nintendo's intention, to cover the system with games for the first couple of years until 3rd parties caught up.

That is a good point. I wonder how many developers that will release their main games (i.e Monster Hunter 3 as you mentioned) on the Wii, or if they will stick to PS3 and 360.

Both things you say here are pretty much right, but PS1 was also only available in Japan for its first 9 months, so "the first year world wide" isn't saying much extra.

Ok, but still, if you take Japan only it was pretty slow in the start

Merry Christmas to all Sales-Age guys !!!

Merry x-mas to you too

are numbers going to be late this week because of the holiday?

I can't wait to see last weeks charts and next weeks

I hope so atleast. Tomorrow we'll know There havnt been too much new releases that i'm excisted to know the numbers about though, i think Time Crisis 4 is the biggest. But its going to be interesting to see if any of the "old" games will chart again.

 

[papelnabangka]

Re: MH3 as the big Wii third party

As far as I know, the console MH were poor market performers, even on the PS2. It was the portable ones that made MH such a powerhouse franchise.

Call it preemptive damage control or whatever, but it is what it is.

 

[test_account]

Re: MH3 as the big Wii third party

As far as I know, the console MH were poor market performers, even on the PS2. It was the portable ones that made MH such a powerhouse franchise.

Call it preemptive damage control or whatever, but it is what it is.

True, Monster Hunter for PSP have been more popular than the Monster Hunter for PS2. Monster Hunter Freedom 2 for PSP is the latest release though, so it might be that the popularity of the serie have grown. It might also be that its more of a portable game though, that people dont find it that interesting on a console.

This makes me think of something, have there ever been a Pokémon game for a console? Sure, i know of the Battle Coloseum stuff etc. but what about a "main" Pokémon game that is just like the handheld ones, more of a RPG game. Afaik there hasnt, i wonder why they havnt made a console version like this.

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

Re: MH3 as the big Wii third party

As far as I know, the console MH were poor market performers, even on the PS2. It was the portable ones that made MH such a powerhouse franchise.

Call it preemptive damage control or whatever, but it is what it is.

Certainly Monster Hunter has been no Dragon Quest, but I think it's the biggest new franchise the PS2 has seen in the last 3-4 years. The other PS2 biggies were either established franchises (Final Fantasy, Gran Turismo) or started earlier in the system's life (Onimusha, Kingdom Hearts).

 

[EDarkness]

That is a good point. I wonder how many developers that will release their main games (i.e Monster Hunter 3 as you mentioned) on the Wii, or if they will stick to PS3 and 360.

Based on some recent announcements, I get the feeling not many companies have moved over assets to the Wii. Seems more and more announcements are PS3/360 which doesn't bode well at changing the Wii 3rd party landscape. I think the Wii will spend the rest of its life covered in ports and low quality software overall with the occasional token franchise spin-off hitting the system. The situation is fairly sad, to be honest.

 

[ethelred]

Based on some recent announcements, I get the feeling not many companies have moved over assets to the Wii. Seems more and more announcements are PS3/360 which doesn't bode well at changing the Wii 3rd party landscape. I think the Wii will spend the rest of its life covered in ports and low quality software overall with the occasional token franchise spin-off hitting the system. The situation is fairly sad, to be honest.

Agreed.

 

[schuelma]

Based on some recent announcements, I get the feeling not many companies have moved over assets to the Wii. Seems more and more announcements are PS3/360 which doesn't bode well at changing the Wii 3rd party landscape. I think the Wii will spend the rest of its life covered in ports and low quality software overall with the occasional token franchise spin-off hitting the system. The situation is fairly sad, to be honest.

Other than ToV, what big 3rd party gamess have been announced for PS3/360 lately?

 

[Lobster]

Based on some recent announcements, I get the feeling not many companies have moved over assets to the Wii. Seems more and more announcements are PS3/360 which doesn't bode well at changing the Wii 3rd party landscape. I think the Wii will spend the rest of its life covered in ports and low quality software overall with the occasional token franchise spin-off hitting the system. The situation is fairly sad, to be honest.

Nah. Wii will continue to piss of the gaming world and take yar exclusives.

:lol :lol :lol

IT IS A WII FUTURE!

:lol :lol :lol :lol

Monster Hunter 3 is only the beginning!



Besides..its not like Ps3 is being treated well..other then its first party games its been getting ports of 360 games.

 

[Satter]

Fuck Nintendo/Yamauchi for what they did to Gunpei Yokoi. I'm not talking about his death, but the fact that he was belittled and pushed out of the company after the Virtual Boy debacle. Nintendo would be nothing if it weren't for him.

Nintendo's not the only one who's done this. Look what Sony did to Ken.

 

[Lobster]

Nintendo's not the only one who's done this. Look what consumers did to Ken.

fixed.

We already have a thread about someone being shocked about Ps3s media capabilities..Ken told him about it..he just didn't listen..now Kens fired.