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[shuyin_]

It seems obvious to me that if they want to cut their losses, they'd make more money with a PC version than without after the cost of developing a PC version.

Obvious to you but it seems not obvious to them. And i bet they know more about business than you, no offense.

Consider this: they put millions of $ in the development of the game, paying 2 or 3 developer (i don't even remember how many teams worked on I Am Alive, but more than 1 anyway).
Why should they put another 100k or so into a PC version that might not even make that 100K (not the original development money; just the PC port money) back?

For a niche-genre game with 0 hype every version would sell poorly, regardless of platform. So after losing millions, you'd be willing to lose more just because you know for a fact that the pc version would sell what, 5-10K more copies than the XBLA version?
You'd make a terrible business man and you'd probably bankrupt a game-company

 

[dLMN8R]

Absolutely. This list is so minute and selective, it cannot be taken seriously.

Here's the known list for games that actually had a quality Pc release, where the Pc version sold 10x worse:

-Call of Duty from the last 3-4 years

Please feel free to add to the list!

 

[TouchMyBox]

I don't really care if Ubisoft sees the PC fit to keep developing for.

All of their PC ports have been unoptimized, and they haven't released a great game in ages (I've yet to play Rayman Origins, so their streak may have ended)

But for some reason they go and buy out awesome PC developers like Nadeo and let them do their thing.

Ubisoft is looking like a company with multiple personality disorder, which is cool because their complaining is being drowned out by the sea of incredible games that doesn't seem to stop flowing on the PC.

 

[Atomski]

Not sure I'd call that game quality .

 

[Draft]

The French are notoriously bad at business. This is a waste of time.

 

[Corto]

Is any of the games on the OP published by Ubisoft?

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

Is any of the games on the OP published by Ubisoft?

Ubisofts level of effort with the PC version of cross platform titles is directly correlated to the level of sales they receive.

So, no.

Which is partially the point of this thread.

 

[Barrel Cannon]

I think the problem is they are paying execs way too much money for any gaming project whether it be small or large. You rarely see ubisoft make a game unless they know its gonna sell 100's of thousands

 

[angular graphics]

Is any of the games on the OP published by Ubisoft?

Most of the games in the OP sold well because the developer put some effort into the PC version AND didn't put terrible DRM in them AND didn't release them months after the console versions.

So how could an Ubisoft game make it to the list?

 

[RooMHM]

Absolutely. This list is so minute and selective, it cannot be taken seriously.

Major games ports and release dates generally can't be taken seriously AT ALL. (Price also)

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Is any of the games on the OP published by Ubisoft?

No, but everyone knows Ubisoft PC games sell bad. But they do it to themselves where something like Assassin's creed which would seem like a big franchise with them has seen months and months long delays before releasing the PC version and two have had an "always online" DRM that you had to be continually online to play the game at all. Guess what I'm not going to pay full price for let alone buy for more than $5? I bought the first one for 360 and at the time they weren't even sure if it was getting a PC release when it came out. So I would have to double dip to get it, not exactly setting yourself up for success.

 

[Metalmurphy]

Just an heads up, that Bad Company 2 number does not represent correct sales, more like a close estimate

You can have up to 5 soldiers on the PC.

 

[Guerrillas in the Mist]

I wonder why no publisher, as an experiment, takes the next instalment of a beloved franchise, suddenly delays the 360 version by six months a few weeks before release, and then eventually releases it with an additional "service platform" on top that nobody wants?

Oh yeah, it's because it would be terrible for sales! But obviously they know PC gamers love that stuff, and that pirates are specially coded not to pirate games older than six months.

 

[Blackface]

Absolutely. This list is so minute and selective, it cannot be taken seriously.

Lots of games don't sell as well on the PC because people on the PC don't buy a bunch of fucking garbage. For most games, no marketing is done for the PC. The games end up being ported piles of shit you need to use a controller with. They are often filled with huge amounts of bugs, and run like crap on even high-end machines due to lazy coding. Many games are also released LATER on the PC then on console. So the hype has died down, and PC gamers may have already played it somewhere else.

If a game is designed with PC in mind, it often sells extremely well. Unfortunately, shitty publishers like Ubisoft love to count shipped to stores as "sold". Nobody on the PC buys games from a store anymore in most cases.

PC gaming and gamers are advanced, both in how it gets it's games, and the games people who own a PC enjoy. Which is another reason why PC gamers support indie games so much.

League of Legends, a PC game, has 12 million concurrent players, 39 million registered players, and is arguably one of the top 3 biggest games in the world right now. It's numbers make MW3 look like shit. The company behind it, are making tons of money. Why? because they were innovated and went for a better pricing model. They understood what the PC market could do and ran with it. The same goes for Minecraft.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

No, but everyone knows Ubisoft PC games sell bad. But they do it to themselves where something like Assassin's creed which would seem like a big franchise with them has seen months and months long delays before releasing the PC version

In fairness to Ubisoft, the first Assassins Creed game was massively pirated on the PC.

However, I would argue that the fact that a final copy was available as a pirate download literally months before the official retail release was available to consumers wanting to pay money for it probably helped those piracy figures for it, and Ubisoft must take at least some of the blame for those piracy figures for having a finalised product ready to go, but held back for arbitrary marketing reasons.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I wonder why no publisher, as an experiment, takes the next instalment of a beloved franchise, suddenly delays the 360 version by six months a few weeks before release, and then eventually releases it with an additional "service platform" on top that nobody wants?

Oh yeah, it's because it would be terrible for sales! But obviously they know PC gamers love that stuff, and that pirates are specially coded not to pirate games older than six months.

:lol If a company actually did this I think I would be willing to pay a premium for the PC version to compensate just to see the result. That would be amazing.

In fairness to Ubisoft, the first Assassins Creed game was massively pirated on the PC.

However, I would argue that the fact that a final copy was available as a pirate download literally months before the official retail release was available to consumers wanting to pay money for it probably helped those piracy figures for it, and Ubisoft must take at least some of the blame for those piracy figures for having a finalised product ready to go, but held back for arbitrary marketing reasons.

Wasn't that because the demo was the full game or something and you could do a glitch to get the full game or am I thinking of something else? And piracy or not delaying it months and months before release it for PC is not helping sales in any possible way. Much of what I remember about the first assassin's creed for PC was the handling of it was a complete clusterfuck.

 

[fernoca]

Though, lets be fair; many even on this forum don't buy Indie games (ignored Cthulhu and Breath of Death) yet got them on Steam, (and saved $1). Same way, many avoid Live Arcade games because of the price, but get the same games on Steam for less. Many just prefer Steam, over other services; doesn't mean that the games per se sold more in one or the other; but when there's an alternative they usually go for the ones that fits them the most.

Again talking about Cthulhu, many even didn't bought Cthulhu because it costed $3 and they weren't going to pay $3 for it because: 1. lol Xbox indie game and #2. The spiritual prequel (Breath of Death) was released at $1. While on Steam both were bundled for $3, making it a more "attractive package".

In the case of indies, though, they're not available in all regions; so that also has some effect in sales. Or the people that don't buy 360 games, just because their PC can run them better (60 frames, anti aliased, hi-res, etc.).

There are multiple factors that affect sales, not to mention that Ubisoft themselves sabotaged their own released on PC either by delusional DRM, late releases..or both. In the case of what that Ubisoft guy said, is just PR talk. Through years we've heard the PC is dead, console gaming is dead..and heck more recently how iOS is killing console, PC and handheld gaming.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

Wasn't that because the demo was the full game or something and you could do a glitch to get the full game or am I thinking of something else?

Nope. Pirates were playing it 2 months before legitmate customers were.

 

[Makoto]

League of Legends, a PC game, has 12 million concurrent players, 39 million registered players, and is arguably one of the top 3 biggest games in the world right now. It's numbers make MW3 look like shit. The company behind it, are making tons of money. Why? because they were innovated and went for a better pricing model. They understood what the PC market could do and ran with it. The same goes for Minecraft.

These are poor examples in respect to Ubisoft's position. LoL and Minecraft are both titles that are reliant on longevity and persistent updates to the core gameplay. They're not the "traditional" games like Ubisoft's I Am Alive. In that respect, it's understandable why Ubisoft wouldn't bother making a PC port of I Am Alive since it's a new IP and probably lacks the mass market appeal that would make the additional costs of a PC port viable.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Nope. Pirates were playing it 2 months before legitmate customers were.

Well, that's even more stupid. How is that even applicable then?

 

[x3sphere]

Absolutely. This list is so minute and selective, it cannot be taken seriously.

Compiling an exhaustive list is basically impossible. Very few publishers release PC sales data, and when they do, it often only represents the retail channel.

 

[TheChewyWaffles]

Major games that sold 10x worse on PC would be more interesting list

3rd post wins this time.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

Well, that's even more stupid. How is that even applicable then?

I'm pretty sure Ubisoft execs saw massive piracy and decided PC gamers are all pirates and began implementing their shitty DRM and PC delays as a result of that.

Them not selling a (pretty shitty port) product for 2 months that was easily available for free so that they didn't have to redo their marketing schedule was, of course, definitely not a factor for its vastly lower than expected sales when it finally was released.

 

[cooljeanius]

Starcraft greatly outsold Starcraft 64.

I don't think that should even count.

 

[user_nat]

So only 8 games (and some of them could be stretching it). I can see how that will have Ubisoft changing their minds.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I'm pretty sure Ubisoft execs saw massive piracy and decided PC gamers are all pirates and began implementing their shitty DRM and PC delays as a result of that.

Them not selling a (pretty shitty port) product for 2 months that was easily available for free so that they didn't have to redo their marketing schedule was, of course, definitely not a factor for its vastly lower than expected sales when it finally was released.

Ya, that's what I mean it's just handled like such a colossal clusterfuck. This isn't Ubisoft exclusive there are a lot of publishers who do this or have only recently stopped doing it. It just blows my mind how they would never do that for a console release but they see it as unfathomable to not do it to the PC version. Mind numbing.

So only 8 games (and some of them could be stretching it). I can see how that will have Ubisoft changing their minds.

So he has to have a list of every PC game ever made? His list isn't the best but at least it's something and it's getting harder and harder to do it recently with vast majority of sales being DD and those numbers aren't recorded/released.

 

[Valnen]

People are actually upset that Ubisoft doesn't want to make PC games? After trying to get Rainbow Six Vegas 2 to work on PC I never want anything to do with them again on the PC. Worst purchase I've ever made.

Let them go console exclusive.

 

[Chairman Yang]

Obvious to you but it seems not obvious to them. And i bet they know more about business than you, no offense.

Consider this: they put millions of $ in the development of the game, paying 2 or 3 developer (i don't even remember how many teams worked on I Am Alive, but more than 1 anyway).
Why should they put another 100k or so into a PC version that might not even make that 100K (not the original development money; just the PC port money) back?

For a niche-genre game with 0 hype every version would sell poorly, regardless of platform. So after losing millions, you'd be willing to lose more just because you know for a fact that the pc version would sell what, 5-10K more copies than the XBLA version?
You'd make a terrible business man and you'd probably bankrupt a game-company

Judging by Ubisoft's frequent yearly losses and their poorly-performing stock price, it's possible their leaders are terrible businesspeople.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

People are actually upset that Ubisoft doesn't want to make PC games? After trying to get Rainbow Six Vegas 2 to work on PC I never want anything to do with them again on the PC. Worst purchase I've ever made.

Let them go console exclusive.

Well, the hope is that they open their eyes that the PC versions sell more than 2 copies total that they would put more effort into their points also. They don't even see it as a market and their effort shows that.

 

[amrod]

Hey guys, Ubisoft are going to reverse their decision and release I Am Alive AND Rayman: Origins on Steam starting next week!

You did it, guys!

Link?

 

[RedSwirl]

The trend seems to be that XBLA titles seem to do close or better on Steam than they do on XBL (Dungeon Defenders, Super Meat Boy, Bastion, and probably the XBLIG too).

That's what I noticed too. It seems that console gamers just areb't as aware of digital distribution yet. Understandable since the PC has been way ahead of the curve in that area.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

People are actually upset that Ubisoft doesn't want to make PC games? After trying to get Rainbow Six Vegas 2 to work on PC I never want anything to do with them again on the PC. Worst purchase I've ever made.

Let them go console exclusive.

Just use a crack. Ubisoft do.

 

[user_nat]

So he has to have a list of every PC game ever made? His list isn't the best but at least it's something and it's getting harder and harder to do it recently with vast majority of sales being DD and those numbers aren't recorded/released.

Obviously I don't expect him to list every game ever made. Although it would be nice.

I just don't think listing 8 games presents a very convincing argument.

 

[charlequin]

Why should they put another 100k or so into a PC version that might not even make that 100K (not the original development money; just the PC port money) back?

Okay, let's say the original development budget was "millions," that is, $2 million.

Scenario one: XBLA only release. At $15, with 30% to the publisher per sale, they need to sell 444,444 copies to recoup.

Scenario two: XBLA/Steam same-day release. The port budget is $100,000. Let's say the Steam version does exactly that 50,000 unit figure, which would put it at about 1/10th of their needed XBLA figures. At 70% back to the publisher, that's $525,000 -- enough to not only recoup the port costs, but also knock their XBLA target down to 350,000.

Scenario three: The Steam release does 5,000 units total. Their $2,000,000 hole is now a $2,047,500 hole -- in other words, they've added 2% to the budget the XBLA game has to recoup.

I don't see how numbers like these remotely support the scenario where the PC port is a bad idea.

(That's not even getting into the long-tail benefits of a Steam release, or the existence of PC outlets besides Steam.)

 

[Strife91]

You're using BFBCS as a source for BC2 numbers? Account numbers doesn't equal number of units sold. You can create how many accounts you want.

 

[Sean]

This list reminds me of Gamecube fans a few years ago saying "Resident Evil 4 sold a million, why is every other third party dropping support for the system? If they put lots of effort in and make an AAA exclusive it'll sell well!"

No offense, but a list of just eight hand-picked titles doesn't prove much of anything. Half of those are smaller (<400k) indie games which don't mean much to these mega-publishers, and the other half (with the exception of Portal 2) are long running PC-oriented franchises like Battlefield that are vastly superior to the console versions.

Ubisoft and all these other third party publishers know exactly how much their games have shipped and sold. They pay a massive amount of money to get NPD results and all sorts of other statistics too. Surely when they make decisions about where to focus their resources, they have already done their research.

 

[Big-E]

This list reminds me of Gamecube fans a few years ago saying "Resident Evil 4 sold a million, why is every other third party dropping support for the system? If they put lots of effort in and make an AAA exclusive it'll sell well!"

No offense, but a list of just eight hand-picked titles doesn't prove much of anything. Half of those are smaller (<400k) indie games which don't mean much to these mega-publishers, and the other half (with the exception of Portal 2) are long running PC-oriented franchises like Battlefield that are vastly superior to the console versions.

Ubisoft and all these other third party publishers know exactly how much their games have shipped and sold. They pay a massive amount of money to get NPD results and all sorts of other statistics too. Surely when they make decisions about where to focus their resources, they have already done their research.

But the game in question is an indie game so comparing it to other indie games makes sense and proves that Ubisoft is just plain stupid if they want to leave money on the table.

 

[Woo-Fu]

In fairness to Ubisoft, the first Assassins Creed game was massively pirated on the PC.

Most PC games are massively pirated, yet there are many successful PC games. Clearly there is room for success even with piracy. With that being the case there has to be other problems, problems that other companies are successfully addressing while Ubisoft is not.

If you can't make your make money going digital only with Steamworks then quite frankly your game isn't good enough for the pricepoint you've set. Knock the price down which will increase volume which will then increase word of mouth which will in turn help you sell more copies. You have to reach that magic pricepoint where people on Steam see X number of their friends playing a game and decide that it is worth their time and money as well.

 

[Criminal Upper]

Totally respect your intentions here dude, but aside from Portal, I don't see that being a very convincing/impressive list.

 

[Angry Fork]

I'm a PC gamer but I always kind of shake my head at these things. People just keep listing exceptions to the rule here and there. Ubisoft are bunch of dickheads but you're really naive if you think PC sales are blooming and are anywhere near console versions for the majority of multi-plats.

I think if you really do go all out on the PC version in terms of visual options, make it work as good or better than the console versions, no glitches etc. all that shit then you're going to sell more. PC gamers are smarter than console ones in the sense that they don't like to accept bullshit (except in the case of COD apparently). Overall they know when you're fucking them over and they'd rather not deal with that. If you appeal to them from the start like Battlefield 3 which is an obvious PC-centric game then people are much more inclined to want to get it. The problem is how much does it cost to get the PC version the same as console and what are you going to get back on that? If you sell 100k copies of a shitty port job that costs 1 million, and 140k copies of a good version that cost 2 million, then it doesn't really make sense to make a good version (or make one at all). This isn't crazy talk or evil shit it's just basic business. However I don't know how much it costs and what their games do sell. If it turns out they're just being cheap assholes and actually do get a return + profit then there's no excuse really, but if that were the case I'm sure they'd be more open to making decent/good PC ports.

As far as Gabe and Valve go, they're amazing and I love them but they are exceptions (in terms of treating fans very well). They're independent and Steam has given them the luxury to take risks and do their own thing. Granted they deserve all the success they get for creating Steam, I'm just saying it's a bit silly to keep screaming Gabe's logic to a big 3rd party company who is just interested in making short term money rather than building a userbase and keeping them happy which makes things better in the long run. If you want to argue that they should go for the latter option then make that argument instead, but shouting that PC games sell as well as console versions or that there's nothing wrong with piracy etc. just isn't true.

 

[Makoto]

Link?

I'm sorry.

 

[dLMN8R]

I'm still waiting for a list of PC games that were developed and released with quality on the PC, but the console versions massively outsold the PC versions

Please, I'm seriously interested to hear about these games.

People are saying that this list is incredibly limited, but well, it's limited only because there aren't concrete sales numbers or information about many games. If you have evidence that I'm wrong, or evidence that some PC games that don't have horrible DRM, that are release simultaneously, and that are of high quality, sell like shit compared to the console versions, I'd love to hear it!


Besides, most people seem to be missing the overall point here - showing a limited list isn't supposed to prove that all PC games sell well. It's supposed to show that it's possible for PC games to sell well. I'm not sure why people seem to be arguing against this fact. It's possible to do so, which directly proves wrong everything that Ubisoft holds as their core values.

 

[Makoto]

It's supposed to show that it's possible for PC games to sell well.

Yes, we needed your thread for this to be proven. We absolutely and undoubtedly needed this thread for you to tell everyone this.

And it looks like Arkham City PC didn't sell many units just by seeing it's lackluster opening on the Steam charts. Edit: I also think too many people are taking Ubisoft's words too literally. What they're saying is that they've done the forecasts. Their games don't sell great on PC (and this is the part where someone is about to reply, "Because they make shit games/awful ports." Okay, yes, we understand) so why should they invest a new IP on a platform that's nowhere near as secure as XBLA and PSN and will probably not turn a worthwhile profit?

 

[Dresden]

It's just a dumb decision because you can hardly lose money by having a good pc port on release.

 

[specialguy]

Threads about how developers are missing out on huge gobs of cash by ignoring the PC remind me of the same type of people who claim devs are missing out by not bringing hardcore games to the Wii (not sure if those people are still common, but they used to be earlier this gen).

In both cases it hugely begs the question. I'm pretty sure devs like money, and arent dumb, at least not that dumb when it comes to such a binary decision as "release on platform X, dont release on platform x".


So, yeah.

 

[DiscoJer]

What I find irksome is that someone the suggestion that "only" selling 50,000 copies of a game ported to the PC is somehow bad.

If that's just on Steam (or at least DD), that's basically $1.75 million (@$50 each and taking out 30% for the DD platform's cut)

I just don't see how they could possibly lose money on a port. Sure, maybe not rake it in, but make back any costs.

And the great thing about the PC is that games on it have a longer tail. MS/Sony are finally getting into the act, but you can buy PC games that were made 10+ years ago.

 

[subversus]

And it looks like Arkham City PC didn't sell many units just by seeing it's lackluster opening on the Steam charts.

the game is made for a controller and it's a console game in its spirit. Let's release Starcraft on 360 and see how it fares. And you can't judge numbers from Steam statistics because ony Steam version is Steamworks.

 

[Gaspode_T]

There are some things that raw sales numbers doesn't tell you, if a game sells 200K on Xbox with MS taking a lower royalty cut and higher average sales price than Steam it might work out about the same even if PC sold 300K, also it's not clear how much they pay for advertising and the cost of porting etc. So really only the publishers can tell if they will make or lose money doing things and usually they choose to do things that make money because it would be stupid to do otherwise...

 

[AcceptableGhost]

Put some effort into the port so it scales alright and has proper M/KB support. Put steamworks in your game (or atleast in the Steam version). Put your game on sales at the proper times. Watch as you make decent money on your game.

Although at this point is almost too late for Ubisoft to make money on the PC. Their name has been shoveled into the fucking dirt with all these terrible ports.

 

[Gen X]

Here's the known list for games that actually had a quality Pc release, where the Pc version sold 10x worse:

-Call of Duty from the last 3-4 years

Please feel free to add to the list!

Gears of War? Halo CE?

Not a troll and didn't look any numbers up, just taking a wild guess that these two massive games on Xbox didn't sell so well on PC?