Blast Processing
Member
X-2. The game might have been fine, but the business decisions behind its creation were the first signs of the rot that was to come.
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NPD Sales Results for February 2012 [Up 3: Kingdoms Of Amalur, Syndicate, Asura]
- Thread starter EviLore
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X-2. The game might have been fine, but the business decisions behind its creation were the first signs of the rot that was to come.
Meccanical
Member
FFX and FFXIII are exactly the same design and quality wise.
ViewtifulJC
Banned
XIII's backlash, and XIV didnt help either. They created XIII-2 as if people were begging for more from XIII's Universe. Trollyama and Kitase need to wake up, but SE might ignore all the signs and make XIII-3.
Father_Brain
Banned
Yeah, I can believe that 3DS games are selling under the radar, but that list isn't terribly impressive unless it's referring to the individual SKU chart. Which I doubt.
I'm not sure you can say that there was any particular point where it happened, just that forces converged in the mid-2000s to make it less relevant.
I think it started with FFXII, even though that game has quite a defense force that's built up over the last few years. XII came at the tail end of a generation, when people were looking toward the future, and though it sold well (5 million copies?), it didn't translate into some video game cultural phenomenon the way VII, VIII, and even X did.
FFXIII really damaged the brand in two ways. First, because it was universally considered to be a crappy game (I liked it but whatever), but also because it came out way too late in the generation to really be a relevant part of the debate. Western RPGs (and western studios in general) had a huge head-start this generation defining certain gameplay tropes and tastes that by the time XIII came out, the world had already passed it by. You can't let four years pass without a game and not lose some cultural awareness as a result.
But, maybe more generally, I think the HUGE backlash against anime over the last decade or so really has hurt FF the most. What used to be new and different to a lot of gamers in the 90s has revealed itself to be just as cliche-ridden and childish as what a lot of us were already used to.
Plus, the advent of cutscenes and storytelling in most non-RPGs has taken away a significant chunk of what made the genre so appealing in the PS1 era for some people.
Myself and plenty of other people felt that FFXIII-2 was a major improvement over XIII... improving many of the flaws the original game had (although it's in no way perfect). If S-E considers it a bomb, I am personally worried the will try to change everything around once again, perhaps using lots more awkward western RPG tropes in an attempt to appeal to western audiences... though ideally they will go back to what people loved about the series back in the days of 5 and 6.
I'd love for an FF15 to come out early on in next generation, impressing everyone again with its storytelling and graphics and setting the standard for next gen console RPGs. But I doubt it will happen...
yankeehater
Member
I have no idea what this means. Was there some auto-play option in X that I missed some how?
Fire Walk With Me
Banned
I never thought of this. I believe you are right. Personally, thats where a lot of my backlash comes from.
Sammy Samusu
Member
Yay! Individual or multiplataform format?
Count Dookkake
Member
8/25 of the list is 3DS?
That's pretty great, right?
That's pretty great, right?
The Emperor
Member
I clearly missed the autoplay option in FFXIII too.
This entire generation is hilarious in hindsight
Combined SKU format makes more sense
Perfo
Thirteen flew over the cuckoo's nest
How can a game that barely 200k people played damage a series that usually is bought and played by an avarage numbers of 6ml+ players per main entry?
Fire Walk With Me
Banned
Pretty sure you answered your own question.
John Harker
Definitely doesn't make things up as he goes along.
it's not
Eh, effectively we must know if they're referring to individual top 25 or multiplatform. The fact is that, since we know that the tenth position was Skyrim 360 with 135k, and since both MK7 and SM3DLand did just above 100k, there's a possibility it was referring to the individual. But then it refers to Golden Abyss which is in top 20, just like said for the multiplatform chart. We must ask Joystiq what are they talking about, since if they're referring to the multiplatform chart, it's a sort of a useless article.
I think Fifa gives away that those are combined SKUs.
Perfo
Thirteen flew over the cuckoo's nest
The point is: that game didn't even get enough feedback from users to damage anything. X, XII, XIII and the numerous spin-off + a general lack of interest for japanese gaming and specifically japanese RPGs damaged on long term this series. I simply guess there are many reasons, XIII just being the main one but not just the only one.
Fire Walk With Me
Banned
200K users on a FF is telling enough on its own. Speaks volumes.
Die Squirrel Die
Member
Because it's a game in a series that averages 5-6 million sales that barely 200k people played.
The Emperor
Member
We need to stop using XIV as a scapegoat.
Hardly anyone played it so hardly anyone could "hate" it.
6 Million people got FFXIII...and only 1 Million or so have come back so far.
FFX-2 & XII of course damaged the brand too but FFXIII did the most damage and XIII-2 hasn't fixed anything but just made the damage apparent.
To many people FFXIII told them that they are "over" JRPG's, even though it barely resembles the JRPG genre...but it's what it told them.
Those people need to be attracted to an FF once again, dunno how that's gonna happen!
creamsugar mentioned that no new 3DS games were over 100k. That means REvelaitons
EDIT: I'm not disagreeing with you, just adding to what you said
Sammy Samusu
Member
For what it's worth:
NPD Jan 2012
8. Skylanders (Wii, 3DS, 360, PS3, PC)
Second best selling version.
NPD Jan 2012
8. Skylanders (Wii, 3DS, 360, PS3, PC)
Second best selling version.
The Emperor
Member
No no no. Barely 200K people were always going to play it as it was an MMO.
FF is known for it's single-player games and the disappointment of those is what damaged the brand...not a MMO hardly anyone ever cared about. (Many FF fans I know don't even know about the existence of FFXIV)
What exclusives are you referring to?
Gears of War 3 launched last Fall.
Forza 4 launched last Fall.
Halo 4 is coming
Fable 4 is supposedly still coming even without Molyneux.
These have probably been the top 4 exclusive franchises on the 360 since it launched.
What exclusives have all dried up since Kinect was released?
Perfo
Thirteen flew over the cuckoo's nest
I think for now there's no way to get those numbers back, but this doesn't mean FF can't keep being profitable. They have to start releasing good main FF and keep the core audience with them, trying one day in future to expand it again when the chance is there.
creamsugar mentioned that no new 3DS games were over 100k. That means REvelaitons
EDIT: I'm not disagreeing with you, just adding to what you said
It seems from various reports here on Gaf it was just shy of 100k. LOCK said it basically talking about The Darkness 2, Revelations, GA and FFXIII-2, when we combine it with what creamsugar said about GA.
@Sammy: But I'm asking again ( maybe Harker can answer me ): does the order in the elencation in the multiSKU charts represent the actual sales order between the single platforms SKUS?
Kotetsu534
Member
Did we play the same games? FFX is very different from a design perspective. It had the first turn-based combat in an FF since the NES, while FFXIII had the fastest ever (so fast that they felt they had to include an Auto-Battle option to let people keep up). There's a lot more control offered to the player in the Sphere Grid than the Crystarium. The SG was designed with the explicit intention of letting players control how their characters developed and what roles they would play in combat (to be fair, this is more visible in the Expert Sphere Grid, offered in the PAL/INT versions of the game, than the Standard Sphere Grid, where they gave players strong directions).
In terms of world building, FFX features tens (hundreds?) of NPCs with screeds of dialogue that changes as events happen, while FFXIII features a handful. There's plenty of towns and cities to offer a break from the battling, while in FFXIII there's virtually none.
Story-wise there's a bit of similarity in that they both focus on the nature of their worlds, and both use narrative structures that deny the player important infortmation till late on, but FFX (arguably) gives equal focus to the Tidus/Yuna romance, while FFXIII has little else. The quality of the writing (or translation) is much weaker in FFXIII, I'd argue.
The only genuine design similarity between the two is that there's limited exploration in both... but there's so much more to games, especially RPGs, than the linear/exploration dichotomy.
Blast Processing
Member
Perfo
Londa 2.0
(Today, 12:08 PM)
Serious answer: universal negative word of mouth. FFXI was/is well regarded, and even that game did more harm than good to the FF name just by being what it was. FFXIV is a gaping hole in the face of FF.
It's pretty much sold out, so Namco is probably satisfied. But they didn't ship much to begin with.
Blast Processing
Member
I wasn't offering it up as a scapegoat, merely as another example of a bad FF game. This was in response to a post claiming FFXIII was the only one in recent memory.
The Emperor
Member
It's sad but true. Very hard to accept that FF went from being a massive system seller + called the "Mother of RPG's" (on all the gametrailers most anticipated lists before FFXIII released) to barely being barely relevant in the span of one generation.
I mean even RE5 got a backlash but clearly not a big one as the RE6 trailer created more buzz than XIII-2 and has millions of views on youtube already.
It's sad to see one of the gaming giants fall & crumble.
I guess we need an FF that can unite fans instead of creating controversy, and a few of those in a row for recovery then maybe FFXX can be the FFVII of that generation!
FF12 and 13 exist in a world where Mass Effect, KOTOR, and Skyrim already exist in. I'm sure that there are people who like the throw-back feel the JRPGs give them, but they are (in my eyes) vestiges of a bygone era.
TheNatural
My Member!
Yeah I think its BS that Kinect took anything away from real games. Shit game makers make those games, no one that would have otherwise made something anyone would care about.
BassForever
Member
I think because it is Final Fantasy everyone is blowing up it's flaws and issues more then it would have been were it called anything else. Watch when FFXV is announced and the hype train begins again it'll probably sell millions of units again when it finally comes out (in 2020).
Fire Walk With Me
Banned
When I played XI with 2 million other people was that not an MMO?
WAS would be the more appropriate term. After the mega patch yesterday that brought the classic jobs into the foray, new instances that have excellent gear in them, drastically improved interfaces and streamlining (even more so coming in 2.)), and a renewed userbase, FFXIV is now on the right foot and has finally become a quality game. The push for 2.0 this summer and the continued improvement will reverse the game's horrific (but deserved) launch response.
Fire Walk With Me
Banned
XIV's problem was that it was a XI reskin with less. According to your post they are just now trying to be XI without apologizing. 'Is a gaping hole' still an appropriate response, even to the not-so-well informed. Sorry mang.
I don't think it's any one thing. It's just the way SE has handled things recently. Versus XIII has been in development in forever, with little to no information about it, Type-0 hasn't made it's way over to the west, and no information about when or if it's happening, XIII-2 was an obvious cash-grab business decision in order to re-purpose XIII assets and make a game that could come out this quarter, and of course FFXIV.
Just general baffling idiotic decisions concerning the FF brand.
That is -exactly- the point. If things that are as abysmal as Kinect or Asura's Wrath are successful, they will inevitably either influence other products I do like or they will take precedence and reduce the amount of products I enjoy. This happened with Kinect, it happens even in small ways with even tiny successes like Heavy Rain. It's the motivation for wanting something to fail. You want that something to fail because it might infect something you like; this isn't a conspiracy theory, it happens all the time. People love to act like they're above such basic things, but I see it all the time.
More than likely what will actually happen is that the poster in question will be unable to disconnect criticism of a game from criticism of their person, and will whine for eighteen posts about how calling out a game as casualtard garbage somehow is an assault on their personhood and everyone who ever enjoyed these games.
As always, though, if you (or anyone else) don't appreciate well salted commentary on games, there's always eighty billion other GAFers to talk to. I'm not shedding tears, I can assure you, no offense.
Well, yes, maybe. That's the problem. If I think Heavy Rain is garbage I obviously don't want it influencing products I do like. That is the very idea behind desiring for a product to fail. Since this happens all the time, it makes logical sense that one would desire a bad 'experiment' to fail, so that others don't get infected with the rationale behind said experiment.
It did "interesting" things, I just think those 'things' happened to be a terrible dead end for gaming and that there is no way to improve the concept into something good. Even if the story was not trash, we'd be stuck up against that extremely awikward QTE gameplay, and that's basically nowheresville. Naturally, I'd rather developers not waste time and resources trying to go down dead ends.
If we're all going to act surprised that I'm going to want gaming tailored toward my tastes rather than, say, your own, then once again I don't know why this is surprising to anybody. Almost everyone feels this way about their own tastes, whether they want to admit it or not. People want games for them, and they don't want games that aren't for them impacting the ones they enjoy. When they do impact the ones they enjoy, that's where the complaints begin. It's only natural.
It's not like there isn't a foundation in the series. But FFXIII-2 continues to double down on why this experiment with FFXIII went off the rails in the first place. I'm fully aware there are those that like it (there are huge hardcore segments that camp down on every FF game, considering how different these titles tend to be from game to game), but I think fundamentally it is a experiment in how to enhance a failure rather than create success. It allows you some more flexibility in how you proceed with the story, but it still has the same foundational issues with its combat system (game plays itself; set up a paradigm deck, sit back and paradigm shift occasionally during battle to proceed. I can do it with a blind fold at this point and I'll almost always autowin with 5 stars), it made the combat ridiculously easy (FFXIII wasn't exactly hard to begin with, but FFXIII-2 just makes it like cake) and the story is somehow getting just offensively worse. It's essentially insulting to my intelligence at this point it's so bad.
But my opinion on FFXIII-2 aside, I hope SE views this is as a failure or an indication they need to rejigger the series to appeal to the audiences across the world in a better fashion. They don't need to go western.
As I said, adopt the atmospheric heft of FFVI with a next-gen technological edge (drop the japanese pop obsessed trash since FFVIII. FFIX, FFXII and MMO style is appropriate. MMO atmospheric style - not gameplay style - would be rad for a full offline game actually) format and modify the amazing foundation of FFV gameplay/job system for FF15 and bring back the quality voice acting again ala FFXII and more careful consideration toward writing quality as FFXII (excepting the last third of the game, which is just as bad as every other FF game, but just seems out of place by comparison to the rest of FFXII which was finally, refreshingly relevant again).
Also: Bring back fully explorable world map (maybe even ala DQVIII style), airships. Keep Masashi Hamauzu sure, drop the IWANTTOROCKYOURCHOCOBO
FF has plenty of titles and aspects that are great, it's just SquareEnix can't seem to get the world to align again on all the features at once.
Sho_Nuff82
Member
I said this a while ago, but given the sales of 3DS and the historic sales of Monster Hunter Portable, Dragon Quest 9, and each Pokemon release, don't be surprised if the next mainline Final Fantasy game is a) portable and b) based around local multiplayer.
Square's PSP output has been much more consistent than their HD work, and their programmers seem to be more comfortable outputting games in that range.
The current franchise path is a dead end. Final Fantasy XIII sold well off of hype, but failed at sustaining faith in the franchise. Final Fantasy XIV is dead. Final Fantasy vs. XIII has got to be infinitely more expensive than XIII-2, it's not even a mainline game, and it's probably never going to release on 360 or PC in the West. Every other game announced has the FF branding, rendering it utterly redundant. Madness.
Square's PSP output has been much more consistent than their HD work, and their programmers seem to be more comfortable outputting games in that range.
The current franchise path is a dead end. Final Fantasy XIII sold well off of hype, but failed at sustaining faith in the franchise. Final Fantasy XIV is dead. Final Fantasy vs. XIII has got to be infinitely more expensive than XIII-2, it's not even a mainline game, and it's probably never going to release on 360 or PC in the West. Every other game announced has the FF branding, rendering it utterly redundant. Madness.
Speedymanic
Banned
don't forget live arcade. Some of the best, exclusive games released on 360 are LA titles.