Sony should pay for the localization for ishin. They are not really getting many exclusives for ps4 compared to xb1. They don't even have that many Japanese games coming out in contrast to Microsoft partnering up with platinum games, realizing. Phantom dust, killer instinct etc. at least ishin would add to the catalog and diversity on ps4. I would love a samurai game.
It's funny that you attack other people based on their number guessing when you are doing exactly that. Can you give me reliable figures for the lifetime sales of all the Yakuza titles in the US/West? Same for the minimum budget for localization and distribution of a Yakuza 5 in the West?
Pretty sure you can't, so please stop pretending (and this applies to more people in this thread) you know more than the fans begging for Yakuza 5 translations just because you consider your point of view more "realistic". We are all expressing our opinions in an opinion forum and, for all the data we have, we all could be "right".
Sony should pay for the localization for ishin. They are not really getting many exclusives for ps4 compared to xb1. They don't even have that many Japanese games coming out in contrast to Microsoft partnering up with platinum games, realizing. Phantom dust, killer instinct etc. at least ishin would add to the catalog and diversity on ps4. I would love a samurai game.
Why don't they do a kickstarter to bring it to the West. If it reaches it's goal to cover fees to localize it for the fans then they can go for it. If not then they don't really lose anything.
1. Yakuza is better than Shenmue even though they aren't really comparable games (Semi-linear detective game with limited fighting vs. open world adventure where brawling is the focus)
2. SCEA localization begging
3. Letter writing campaign/Kickstarter suggestions as if that would do anything
Yakuza is dead in the west but I can't blame Sega for that now. If it was worth the localisation they would do it, sadly it obviously isn't profitable enough to do so.
Sonic can sell no matter how bad it is so they keep pumping them out...
The thing is smaller studios like ATLUS, XSEED, Aksys, NISA can make a profit by localizing text heavy games, because they have an efficient process in place (that's the core of their business after all).
SEGA simply do not have such process in place any more and that's why their costs are probably higher and estimated returns are below what they consider profitable.
They really are a shadow of their former selves in more ways than one...
And of course, they will rather have those IPs "rot" in Japan than consider any licensing deal with other publishers.
It's funny that you attack other people based on their number guessing when you are doing exactly that. Can you give me reliable figures for the lifetime sales of all the Yakuza titles in the US/West? Same for the minimum budget for localization and distribution of a Yakuza 5 in the West?
Pretty sure you can't, so please stop pretending (and this applies to more people in this thread) you know more than the fans begging for Yakuza 5 translations just because you consider your point of view more "realistic". We are all expressing our opinions in an opinion forum and, for all the data we have, we all could be "right".
So, I actually looked for sales numbers to reference before I made my post. Did you also do that for your post about them "missing out on more profit by not localizing?"
The most quoted sales figure for Shenmue on the Dreamcast is 460,316 units in America.
Yakuza 2 pushed about 40,000 units in America according to this Eurogamer story citing an Examiner article that's unavailable now.
Yakuza 3 sold 52k
Yakuza 4 sold 26k
Yakuza: Dead Souls sold 6k
Oh and the first Yakuza did double the second one so that's at 80k
That's 204k between five games spread across about eight years. But hey, how much can it REALLY cost SEGA to do a complete text-only english translation, get the games certification and approval to be released on the PS4, and either remove all Japanese specific brands or license them for foreign markets?
Wait, they've already done pretty much all that before and still didn't sell enough? It must be because SEGA doesn't release them at the same time worldwide. Or Eliza Dushku. Or because Yakuza 3 had content removed and was "butchered." Or the name. Or Sony should do more for the series. Or bad marketing. Or an ancient curse placed on Toshihiro Nagoshi after Jaleel White lost his job as the voice of Sonic.
SEGA gave it a go for almost a decade, even developing a game in the series that was tuned towards popular western trends at the time, and it simply didn't pan out for them. It sucks for those few fans but from a business standpoint, it clearly makes more sense to focus on the Japanese market only.
And selfishly, SEGA's time would be better spent doing Binary Domain 2, because Binary Domain is fuckin' ace.
That is the main reason why the current Sega sucks so much.
They refuse to localize the games themselves which is fair enough, but yet won't allow other companies have a shot in case other companies actually do a better job with the localization and marketing.
So, I actually looked for sales numbers to reference before I made my post. Did you also do that for your post about them "missing out on more profit by not localizing?"
The most quoted sales figure for Shenmue on the Dreamcast is 460,316 units in America.
Yakuza 2 pushed about 40,000 units in America according to this Eurogamer story citing an Examiner article that's unavailable now.
Yakuza 3 sold 52k
Yakuza 4 sold 26k
Yakuza: Dead Souls sold 6k
Oh and the first Yakuza did double the second one so that's at 80k
That's 204k between five games spread across about eight years. But hey, how much can it REALLY cost SEGA to do a complete text-only english translation, get the games certification and approval to be released on the PS4, and either remove all Japanese specific brands or license them for foreign markets?
Wait, they've already done pretty much all that before and still didn't sell enough? It must be because SEGA doesn't release them at the same time worldwide. Or Eliza Dushku. Or because Yakuza 3 had content removed and was "butchered." Or the name. Or Sony should do more for the series. Or bad marketing. Or an ancient curse placed on Toshihiro Nagoshi after Jaleel White lost his job as the voice of Sonic.
SEGA gave it a go for almost a decade, even developing a game in the series that was tuned towards popular western trends at the time, and it simply didn't pan out for them. It sucks for those few fans but from a business standpoint, it clearly makes more sense to focus on the Japanese market only.
And selfishly, SEGA's time would be better spent doing Binary Domain 2, because Binary Domain is fuckin' ace.
I'll just rhetorically ask again why Xseed, Aksys, NISA, and their own Atlus is able to publish niche Japanese games that probably do equivalent numbers and still stay in business.
I can't imagine that something like Hyperdimension Neptunia or Xblaze is doing gangbusters.
In a perfect world, to solve not only Yakuza but any Japanese game without translation, would be a translation site like addic7ed.com, where the original lines of dialogue are posted, and users help each other translating it.
the original transcript could be uploaded by the devs (I know Sega would never do this), and the community join forces to translate it.
each line has a credit for the user that helped there, or even corrections and reviews. And the japanese version of the game should have a option like: check for translations online?
They don't have to explicitly state so, the implication that Sega should do things without considering a potential profit is ignorant and assumes Sega isn't profit motivated aka a charity
I'll just rhetorically ask again why Xseed, Aksys, NISA, and their own Atlus is able to publish niche Japanese games that probably do equivalent numbers and still stay in business.
I can't imagine that something like Hyperdimension Neptunia or Xblaze is doing gangbusters.
The Yakuza Studio team is a fixed size, and we have to choose between forging ahead with the next game or localising the one that just came out. This time the size of the game was so large, so rather than localising that game we chose to focus our manpower on the new game.
Sega would rather have their staff working on a 400k seller than a 40k one. A localization could be a profitable venture, but the opportunity cost is clearly too high for Sega.
Smaller companies like Idea Factory and Arc Sys don't have bigger fish to fry.
So, I actually looked for sales numbers to reference before I made my post. Did you also do that for your post about them "missing out on more profit by not localizing?"
The most quoted sales figure for Shenmue on the Dreamcast is 460,316 units in America.
Yakuza 2 pushed about 40,000 units in America according to this Eurogamer story citing an Examiner article that's unavailable now.
Yakuza 3 sold 52k
Yakuza 4 sold 26k
Yakuza: Dead Souls sold 6k
Oh and the first Yakuza did double the second one so that's at 80k
That's 204k between five games spread across about eight years. But hey, how much can it REALLY cost SEGA to do a complete text-only english translation, get the games certification and approval to be released on the PS4, and either remove all Japanese specific brands or license them for foreign markets?
Wait, they've already done pretty much all that before and still didn't sell enough? It must be because SEGA doesn't release them at the same time worldwide. Or Eliza Dushku. Or because Yakuza 3 had content removed and was "butchered." Or the name. Or Sony should do more for the series. Or bad marketing. Or an ancient curse placed on Toshihiro Nagoshi after Jaleel White lost his job as the voice of Sonic.
SEGA gave it a go for almost a decade, even developing a game in the series that was tuned towards popular western trends at the time, and it simply didn't pan out for them. It sucks for those few fans but from a business standpoint, it clearly makes more sense to focus on the Japanese market only.
And selfishly, SEGA's time would be better spent doing Binary Domain 2, because Binary Domain is fuckin' ace.
Why don't we get a price quote from 8-4 about how much a game like this would cost to translate? They would know best.
Also Y4 doing 26k units in America? Doesn't include Europe right?
Well assuming its 26k units at $25 each (assuming some full price and some were on sale), the developer probably gets about half so about $12.50 a copy... That's about $325,000 dollars. So not a huge amount, but im sure you could do it so it wasn't a loss. I'm talking barebones subtitle translation of the story scenes only, no graphical changes of any sort. You could even patch it into the Japanese version with English subtitles. Charge $100 for the digital version. Fans will still pick it up. OR ask for the money upfront Kickstarter style. I just think Nagoshi just doesn't give a shit about western fans at the moment.
Why don't we get a price quote from 8-4 about how much a game like this would cost to translate? They would know best.
Also Y4 doing 26k units in America? Doesn't include Europe right?
Well assuming its 26k units at $25 each (assuming some full price and some were on sale), the developer probably gets about half so about $12.50 a copy... That's about $325,000 dollars. So not a huge amount, but im sure you could do it so it wasn't a loss. I'm talking barebones subtitle translation of the story scenes only, no graphical changes of any sort. You could even patch it into the Japanese version with English subtitles. Charge $100 for the digital version. Fans will still pick it up. OR ask for the money upfront Kickstarter style. I just think Nagoshi just doesn't give a shit about western fans at the moment.
or they could do the class of heroes method.. a kickstarter tier for a physical copy and mid tier donations gets digital copy downloads.. then they could just leave the game up for sale on psn for anyone willing to bite
(if i'm not mistaken that's how it worked with the CoH KSTarter)
Sony should pay for the localization for ishin. They are not really getting many exclusives for ps4 compared to xb1. They don't even have that many Japanese games coming out in contrast to Microsoft partnering up with platinum games, realizing. Phantom dust, killer instinct etc. at least ishin would add to the catalog and diversity on ps4. I would love a samurai game.
See I don't understand this, they have translated four games in the main series, surely they would have made some money in the west for them to try it FOUR times right?
So, I actually looked for sales numbers to reference before I made my post. Did you also do that for your post about them "missing out on more profit by not localizing?"
The most quoted sales figure for Shenmue on the Dreamcast is 460,316 units in America.
Yakuza 2 pushed about 40,000 units in America according to this Eurogamer story citing an Examiner article that's unavailable now.
Yakuza 3 sold 52k
Yakuza 4 sold 26k
Yakuza: Dead Souls sold 6k
Oh and the first Yakuza did double the second one so that's at 80k
That's 204k between five games spread across about eight years. But hey, how much can it REALLY cost SEGA to do a complete text-only english translation, get the games certification and approval to be released on the PS4, and either remove all Japanese specific brands or license them for foreign markets?
Wait, they've already done pretty much all that before and still didn't sell enough? It must be because SEGA doesn't release them at the same time worldwide. Or Eliza Dushku. Or because Yakuza 3 had content removed and was "butchered." Or the name. Or Sony should do more for the series. Or bad marketing. Or an ancient curse placed on Toshihiro Nagoshi after Jaleel White lost his job as the voice of Sonic.
SEGA gave it a go for almost a decade, even developing a game in the series that was tuned towards popular western trends at the time, and it simply didn't pan out for them. It sucks for those few fans but from a business standpoint, it clearly makes more sense to focus on the Japanese market only.
And selfishly, SEGA's time would be better spent doing Binary Domain 2, because Binary Domain is fuckin' ace.
#truthbombs I think people are taking for granted the amount of money needed to localize a game like Yakuza and for it to not sell that much is just bad for business.
What I do wish for is that Sega include English subtitles to their games so that importing wouldn't be a problem seeing as ps4 is region free anyway.
Rather than petition for a localization, petition to just put subtitles on the game and english text. Because Japanese VA >>> English VA anyway.
6k? Wow. I guess a numbered sequel would do a little better, but seeing the decline from Y3 to Y4, it can't be all that much either. I wonder why this series doesn't get more attention, it doesn't strike me as that "niche" as many of the other Japanese stuff localized, and that stuff does better numbers.
i'm also in that camp that they could and should just add the english text option to the first build they make in japan and not bother in releasing it in the west at all.
that 20k fans that the series apparently has know and will order it online from japan and therefore pay for the translation costs. implementing a dual language text system to the engine from the get go would lower the development costs.
Sony should pay for the localization for ishin. They are not really getting many exclusives for ps4 compared to xb1. They don't even have that many Japanese games coming out in contrast to Microsoft partnering up with platinum games, realizing. Phantom dust, killer instinct etc. at least ishin would add to the catalog and diversity on ps4. I would love a samurai game.
I really think that part of the problem here is some kind of arrogant Sega, ok the don't want translate Yakuza games, but pretty sure some companies like Xseed or Atlus (pre Sega's Atlus) talked with Sega in the past.
Sega releasing another console centric game in a region where console gaming is being overtaken by the mobile market with the unlikely chance of actually localizing the game to a region where console gaming is STILL flourishing.
I know it's a rather disingenuous point, but it's just doesn't make any sense, despite the fact the Yakuza series is a Japanese-centric series, despite Open World games doing particularly well in the Western Market.
So, I actually looked for sales numbers to reference before I made my post. Did you also do that for your post about them "missing out on more profit by not localizing?"
Very nice if you actually did, not many people here do that. It is a shame that you failed to apply the same degree of thoroughness when reading posts, because it wasn't me who wrote "missing out on more profit by not localizing".
Actually, is probably worse than that. Based on some NPD leak back in January 2009, the life-to-date sales of Yakuza and Yakuza 2 were as follow:
Yakuza 1: 56K
Yakuza 2: 24K (5-month sales)
[Source brought back from the dead]
Despite selling just 24K (or 40K if you believe the Examiner article) in the US, SEGA still decided to take the risk and release Yakuza 3 in the West, a physical release with modified code. All that people are asking is for SEGA to do the same now with Yakuza 5, maybe digital release only, with just the changes needed for an English text translation.
Let's not ignore the fact that your only reference is just a post from an unproven source that mentioned getting this out from NPD threads (which are usually not lifetime sales) but couldn't even link his source, referencing another post for the 6K number of Dead Souls which was gathered during its first week in the US (hardly lifetime numbers).
It is my personal feeling that SEGA wouldn't lost money releasing Yakuza 5 in the West, but for a company that lacks the manpower and money bandwidth of old times, that is the lowest of its priorities at the moment. But again, only SEGA really knows.
Sega would rather have their staff working on a 400k seller than a 40k one. A localization could be a profitable venture, but the opportunity cost is clearly too high for Sega.
Smaller companies like Idea Factory and Arc Sys don't have bigger fish to fry.
A) They own a company that specializes on localizations now.
B) It was pretty much confirmed that several companies wanted to license the game from them. In fact, that was the reason why Yakuza 3 was released. This feels very much like a company unwilling to let someone else potentially make money from their IP and is probably similar to all the wrangling that had to happen before Disney would let Double Fine put out a remake of Grim Fandango.
Sony should pay for the localization for ishin. They are not really getting many exclusives for ps4 compared to xb1. They don't even have that many Japanese games coming out in contrast to Microsoft partnering up with platinum games, realizing. Phantom dust, killer instinct etc. at least ishin would add to the catalog and diversity on ps4. I would love a samurai game.
Would be nice if they helped but honestly if the game doesn't sell well enough for Sega to justify localization costs it's not like things would be different for Sony.
Yeah I guess they might see it as an investement for their platform to provide more exclusives and more varied support....but if less than 50k people care in the whole US market they're not gaining much here.
Yakuza games are really good and I was hoping that with the PS4 launch and the new games being cross platform they would give it a try...so far it hasn't happened :/
Imo the only chance at this point is if Sega lets an other small publisher step in and take care of the localization, something like Xseed. But if they're stubborn and they feel they would be robbed of profits they don't care enough about in first place....it's not going to happen.
I'll just rhetorically ask again why Xseed, Aksys, NISA, and their own Atlus is able to publish niche Japanese games that probably do equivalent numbers and still stay in business.
I can't imagine that something like Hyperdimension Neptunia or Xblaze is doing gangbusters.
Every game we publish does better than those 4/Dead Souls numbers, and many of them do better than those 3 numbers. (Which I have no reason to doubt, since they're sourced from NPD.) SMT does better. Etrian Odyssey does better. Conception II did better. Persona does way the hell better. (From what I know anecdotally of Hyperdimension Neptunia, so does that.) Those Yakuza numbers are the data of a series in freefall, and Sega is right not to put out a sixth game that can only do worse than the last two entries.
I'm not just talking about SOA, either. Nagoshi has already explained why other companies don't license the game out, and it has to do with the best use of his team's time. The original developers would be tied up from 3-4 months working on localization programming/QA of the game (not an estimate; this is how long things take at minimum) which is seemingly a third to a fourth of the amount of time it would take them to develop a new entry in the series that would sell much, much better in Japan. There's no percentage in it for anyone involved.
Every game we publish does better than those 4/Dead Souls numbers, and many of them do better than those 3 numbers. (Which I have no reason to doubt, since they're sourced from NPD.)
They are sourced from a guy that said he got them from NPD threads, and that when asked to do so, couldn't even link such threads, then just referenced another post that only mentioned the 6K figure for Dead Souls, which was what it sold during just the first week, not lifetime sales.
Unless someone more trustworthy than that poster confirms those numbers I'd take them with a HUGE grain of salt.
