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No. Video games weren't like that by and large 20 years back.
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Why some people consider souls/bloodborne games niche?
- Thread starter FATALITY
- Start date
No. Video games weren't like that by and large 20 years back.
SiegfriedFM
Member
According to trophy statistics, about 30% finished Dark Souls on PS3. That's not too bad. I can't check any CoD games but I don't think it's better.
They're not exactly niche anymore, though they were in the start. Obviously they don't have the entire casual population's attention but just about anyone into the gaming scene knows about them now.
And they did have an influence on gaming.
Games like COD and GTA are the exceptions. Even AC barely sell over 10, despite their giant teams and marketing.
And they did have an influence on gaming.
Games like COD and GTA are the exceptions. Even AC barely sell over 10, despite their giant teams and marketing.
Because people arbitrarily assign that category or figure it is a "cult" title and therefore niche.
Or people say anything that's not GTA or COD is niche.
Me, I say everything is niche given even GTA only sold 30 odd million against an install base of 150 million or more HD consoles.
The question is how niche.
Oh I should add some clearly call BB niche to indicate they don't believe it'll boost console sales.
Or people say anything that's not GTA or COD is niche.
Me, I say everything is niche given even GTA only sold 30 odd million against an install base of 150 million or more HD consoles.
The question is how niche.
Oh I should add some clearly call BB niche to indicate they don't believe it'll boost console sales.
0coolclimate0
Member
It can be whatever it wants. I LOVE these games!
In regards to the fan base, It has changed a lot since Demon Souls and the early days of the western release of Dark Souls. Part of the base now is more into calling someone a dirty casual or trying to troll them.
Where as my first experience with Demons was people trying to help me within the game or extensive ps3 tip messages and we all know how long it can take to write a psn message.
A lot has changed since June 2010(Aus release) in gaming but i'd like to think there are "White Knights" & Sunbro's helping out new gamers in Bloodborne.
Where as my first experience with Demons was people trying to help me within the game or extensive ps3 tip messages and we all know how long it can take to write a psn message.
A lot has changed since June 2010(Aus release) in gaming but i'd like to think there are "White Knights" & Sunbro's helping out new gamers in Bloodborne.
I actually didn't know they sold that well. I agree that while not totally mainstream, they're not niche either. Niche is stuff like Ys or, I don't know, those games that sell 500k and it's considered a massive success.
BTW I liked Demon's Souls and I feel like I'm in for a treat once I buy the other Souls games
I'm just sad that they're open world-ish now. Bleh.
BTW I liked Demon's Souls and I feel like I'm in for a treat once I buy the other Souls games
I'm just sad that they're open world-ish now. Bleh.or because it appeals to a pretty specific demographic, so much so that the main thing the game is known for. i think it's pretty fair to say that any game that is known for its difficulty foremost/mainly is a niche title.
I actually didn't know they sold that well. I agree that while not totally mainstream, they're not niche either. Niche is stuff like Ys or, I don't know, those games that sell 500k and it's considered a massive success.
BTW I liked Demon's Souls and I feel like I'm in for a treat once I buy the other Souls games
P4G did 700,000+ on Vita which everybody considers a failure in terms of sales, would you call Persona niche?
Herbspiceguy
Member
Everything from the gameplay, art and atmosphere is designed for a niche audience who truly appreciates a punishing, hardcore challenge with methodical mechanics.
It's design is the opposite of catering towards the lowest common denominator.
Compare it to games that are made for the lowets common denominator and can you spot the differences in game design? It seems very obvious to me.
It's design is the opposite of catering towards the lowest common denominator.
Compare it to games that are made for the lowets common denominator and can you spot the differences in game design? It seems very obvious to me.
I like the description of the souls series being "old school"
As someone who has been playing computer games for 31 years, I can say there is nothing old school about them at all.
What they ARE is part of a hand full of games across the years that have been excessively difficult and obtuse for a mass audience.
To say they are "just like the good old days" would be wrong, a more appropriate statement would be they are "just like a couple of games used to be in the good old days"
As I don't remember the majority of the games I was playing 30/25/20 years ago being really really hard.
As someone who has been playing computer games for 31 years, I can say there is nothing old school about them at all.
What they ARE is part of a hand full of games across the years that have been excessively difficult and obtuse for a mass audience.
To say they are "just like the good old days" would be wrong, a more appropriate statement would be they are "just like a couple of games used to be in the good old days"
As I don't remember the majority of the games I was playing 30/25/20 years ago being really really hard.
lol, do you really think that's a fair comparison? and true, action RPG is a popular genre but Borderlands, Mass Effect, Fallout, Skyrim, etc. are in there and those are popular, mainstream games; Bloodborne/DS isn't. It appeals to a very specific part of the action-rpg audience.
slavesnyder
Member
Because they feel superiour not to be Mainstream. It's like some widely popular music-bands still carrying the indie-label.
I understand niche as opposed to mainstream, so obviously most games are going to be niche.
I don't think a game selling around 2 millions being niche is all that controversial, especially since it's in a genre that is relatively sparsely populated to boot. Doesn't mean it's small potatoes it just means outside of enthusiasts few are going to know it.
Sanctuary
Member
i mean both dark souls 1 and 2 sold at least 3 million copies maybe even more.
so how many copies a game needs to sell to not be considered a niche title?
PS: my first thread and im not a native english speaker. please dont kill me
Total sales don't necessarily dictate what is or isn't niche. The Souls games are still very niche, even if their following seems huge. They don't have mass market appeal.
With how much "Souls like" has been seen lately, that may as well be the new genre name since it's basically a cross between Fighting, Action/Adventure, RPG and Horror.
slavesnyder
Member
This is an oxymoron.
Sanctuary
Member
No it isn't. Mass market appeal has nothing to do with the fanbase of a particular genre unless it's a genre specifically aimed at the mass market. Even if each Souls game sold 10 million, that doesn't make it less niche. Out of the 2 million who bought Dark Souls, how many do you think completed it, let alone made it half way through? Dark Souls 2 by all accounts should have sold even more, but it didn't. Why? Partially negative word of mouth and partially because some of the 2 million that played the previous game didn't like it, or thought it was too difficult so they didn't bother with the sequel.
Mass market appeal anymore implies "pick up and play", or "mash X to win", or "throw everything AND the kitchen sink in since at least a few things will stick with everyone" which the Souls games are not.
Earthpainting
Member
The Souls games and Bloodborne probable feel a bit more niche than they actually are for a few reasons.
The most obvious one is that when you read interviews, the goal of the developers really was to make a niche game. They basically wanted to make a game in a specific type of style of game that was no longer being made, and the audience was unproven for at the time. This, paired with very mixed early impressions (I think it got a score in the mid to high 20s from Famitsu), slow Japanese sales, and the very awkwardly title "Demon's Souls", made Sony pass on it for a western release. The game had a higher than normal difficulty, punished mistakes and revelled in obscuring information. That's pretty much where the official marketing of the game also died. The game then slowly but surely gained positive word of mouth and people started making guides on how to play. The game was being marketed, and documented by the fans, giving it a very grassroots feel. When import-friendly copies proved that an audience did exist abroad, Namco graciously bit the bullet and brought it over.
The other Souls still enjoyed some of these community elements, but by then the games were already living off the legacy of Demon's Souls. People knew what the games were about, and that the steep investment in the games would pay off. Knowing what to expect, and having guides available to tell you what things are and what to do really increases the audience of this game. The difficulty is really not all that intimidating or punishing if you're a bit prepared, while still retaining the niche and elite reputation.
This is probably the best possible scenario From could have hoped for. They made the games they wanted, reached an audience that was far bigger than they ever could have imagined and it's an audience that is motivated to overcome the obstacles for e-pride. On the whole I see the Souls games a bit like Simon's Quest and The Adventure Of Link in terms of design, and I wonder how those games would have been received today.
The most obvious one is that when you read interviews, the goal of the developers really was to make a niche game. They basically wanted to make a game in a specific type of style of game that was no longer being made, and the audience was unproven for at the time. This, paired with very mixed early impressions (I think it got a score in the mid to high 20s from Famitsu), slow Japanese sales, and the very awkwardly title "Demon's Souls", made Sony pass on it for a western release. The game had a higher than normal difficulty, punished mistakes and revelled in obscuring information. That's pretty much where the official marketing of the game also died. The game then slowly but surely gained positive word of mouth and people started making guides on how to play. The game was being marketed, and documented by the fans, giving it a very grassroots feel. When import-friendly copies proved that an audience did exist abroad, Namco graciously bit the bullet and brought it over.
The other Souls still enjoyed some of these community elements, but by then the games were already living off the legacy of Demon's Souls. People knew what the games were about, and that the steep investment in the games would pay off. Knowing what to expect, and having guides available to tell you what things are and what to do really increases the audience of this game. The difficulty is really not all that intimidating or punishing if you're a bit prepared, while still retaining the niche and elite reputation.
This is probably the best possible scenario From could have hoped for. They made the games they wanted, reached an audience that was far bigger than they ever could have imagined and it's an audience that is motivated to overcome the obstacles for e-pride. On the whole I see the Souls games a bit like Simon's Quest and The Adventure Of Link in terms of design, and I wonder how those games would have been received today.
Sanctuary
Member
Not really debating the rest of what you wrote, since it's mostly accurate, but the above is not. They didn't set out ot make a "niche" game. They set out to make a game in the then current gaming culture that played much more like how games did in the previous generations. They didn't set out to make it niche at all, and even in one of the more recent interviews, Miyazaki talks about how they didn't try to make the game "harder" and his main goal was simply to make a game that people would want to play. That's all. They were not specifically targeting a certain group of hardcore players.
I guess though if you look at it from the perspective of the gamers who were pretty dissatisfied with most modern games at the time as being "niche" then it makes sense, even if they had been gaming for decades prior to the 2005 explosion. In the end though, the games are niche regardless.
There's a lot of "mainstream" games that have sold around Dark Souls 2 numbers. These probably aren't Super Accurate, but they're ballpark enough that we can make some comparisons:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games
The Souls series is filling a mainstream niche with an ever growing fanbase. They certainly aren't comparable to super niche games like Hyperdimension Neptunia. Shit, DS2's overall sales are comparable to an Uncharted game. And someone brought that it was laughable to compare the two.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games
The Souls series is filling a mainstream niche with an ever growing fanbase. They certainly aren't comparable to super niche games like Hyperdimension Neptunia. Shit, DS2's overall sales are comparable to an Uncharted game. And someone brought that it was laughable to compare the two.
top 5% of what exactly?
geordiemp
Member
Agree, and the hard action genre is no longer niche, 3 million and over it is now popular, even if it is amongst people who like the genre.
Probably means console sales. Souls is not niche neither will be bloodborne.
A niche game is something that is well known or even AAA, but did not achieve any mainstream appeal on consoles and for me struggles to sell 0.5 million.
martino
Member
of best selling games for its generation
Dark souls must have sell more than 3 million now and dark souls 2 must be over 4 if not 5(with remaster it will reach it for sure). Even demon souls was over 1.5 million last we got number...
Not a lot of games can do that even less niche ones
Sanctuary
Member
Some of you are seriously deluded. You can have a fanbase of one million or twenty million, but unless it has something that everyone who plays games can find something to enjoy, it's still niche. Niche has nothing to do with sales and everything to do with the target audience. Despite World of Warcraft being one of the most successful videogames in history, it's still niche.
You are out of your mind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Xbox_360_video_games
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games#PlayStation_3
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games#Wii
But what makes DS "niche" other than its difficulty? Besides that it has all the elements to attract a bigger audience. Hence the comparison to older platformers.
geordiemp
Member
No I am not, the genre is no longer niche in my opinion. I have never played a souls game on 360/Ps3 and now I have pre ordered Bloodborne. Lots of people in bloodborne threads have not played Souls....
To me that indicates there is something in a Souls game that was off putting but seems OK in Bloodborne. To me it was as if the had to die / soul / random person summoning in Coop. It was too convoluted. I still don't get it...lol
They changed it, now I can summon a friend and they will definitely come with a password. And your both alive....This to me is huge, I can play coop easily and effortlessly. I cant speak for others.
Once coop becomes understandable and easy, these games will be mainstream as ultra hard is OK with mates...
I think it's down to the investment in time spent mastering the mechanics that attracts a 'niche' audience of gamers who are also likely to post on gaming forums, and thus form a fanbase, and little to do with sales.i mean both dark souls 1 and 2 sold at least 3 million copies maybe even more.
so how many copies a game needs to sell to not be considered a niche title?
PS: my first thread and im not a native english speaker. please dont kill me
Monster Hunter also notches up decent amounts of sales and is incredibly niche outside of Japan, despite pretty much everyone on this board having heard of it and it getting regular articles, good reviews etc in the media.
Other games can be 'niche' for plenty of other reasons though, I just think Dark Souls and MH are of 'niche' intererest to the wider gaming community in the same way.
Well then "technically" everything is niche, because there's not a single game in the world that appeals to everyone (not even Call of Duty or Fifa). There's a "target audience" for every single game.
Sanctuary
Member
Okay, so your opinion is, because something was hyped up enough or had enough word of mouth, or actual advertising so that you actually knew about it ahead of time that it's no longer niche?
LMAO.
If you really want to take it to the absurd, then that's right. But that's really not how it works.
that's just incredibly wrong.
what elements does it have when it seems like most of the game design is revolved around difficulty? that barrier is huge. can you tell me a game that came out for the PS4/XB1/last gen that was known mainly for its difficulty and wasn't a niche title that sold poorly (in comparison to mainstream titles, not in the sense of turning a profit)? the comparison to older platformers makes no sense considering the humongous change in game design from there to now.
That sounds like a commercial bomb, not a niche title. Like I said earlier, P4G did 700,000+ on Vita, but there's no way I would say that title/series isn't niche.
martino
Member
Yeah i probably hyperbolized it (but not too much)
martino
Member
Ok can you profide me link saying otherwise (with recent number)
Sanctuary
Member
If you're talking about 80s games yeah, but FROM wasn't specifically talking about that kind of game and it was more of a general "You know, before every game was playable by grandma" type stuff. There hasn't actually been much of a change in design since the PSX/PS2 eras. Most FPS games have played about the same since Quake 2 and 3.
Eliciel
Member
this proofs your observation wrong. Demon's Souls was niche.. for a while. Dark Souls wasn't anymore the same goes for DS2 and BB. If DS, DS2 and BB is niche then nearly every game except Call of Duty etc. are niche. In general hard games would be a niche then and that's just a stupid explanation of a niche. Deep RPG's would be niche...that's a bad explanation for a niche at least for my taste..
just look at the top 5 lists for each console. they sold more on one console than DSII did on 3. there is literally no way for it to be top 5%.
Have you played any FPS games recently? and there absolutely has been a change in game design since the PS1/PS2 era.
Earthpainting
Member
I guess I was connecting dots in advance and making some assumptions, so that's a fair comment.
Sanctuary
Member
Eh, I wasn't actually referring to the console versions of Quake, so I guess my bad for not being specific about that. But aside from the more cramped levels (which is the opposite of innovation) and ushering, the basic gameplay is actually the same. Tweaked maybe, but there's not been a "humongous" change to them as your original post implies. This goes for all genres ever since the late PSX/early PS2 eras when it was possible to do more with polygons. The only games that really tried to do something somewhat new last gen would be the AC games, but only with the first. After that, they just milked the shit out of the same game over and over (just like the majority of FPS/TPS). Different maps and skins don't really make the gameplay different.
I guess you could claim that Minecraft was "innovative", but seriously? What kid never played with Legos?
StrongBlackVine
Banned
It maybe niche in design, but maybe not so much in appeal any more. They have done a remarkable job of expanding interest in this sub-genre IMO. Wouldn't be surprised to see this turn into major Playstation IP in the future.
martino
Member
yeah 5% was exagerated.
But how many multiplat sells multimillions copies ? on game library counting 800-1k games ...not a lot...
So what ? there is 50 popular game and everything else is niche ?
DS is more in a between (this between targeting more popular than niche)
Actually, that is how it works. Call of Duty has a very specific niche target audience of Males age 13-35. There just happens to be a whole lot of those that buy the games. It certainly doesn't try to sell to anyone except for those people nor appeal to everyone that games. There is absolutely not universal appeal to that series.
The only game that ever has gotten close to entire market mainstream appeal was Wii Sports and those numbers are horribly skewed because it came with every single console.
Taking a step back to more common usage of the term - For me, any series that has games that sell multiple millions of copies each has hit mainstream. That's more than recognizable enough to plenty of people. It's mainstream to gamers, it doesn't have to be a household name to the world to be mainstream. If that were the case then you could probably count the series that are on one or two hands (excluding mobile/fb games).
I think because though the franchise sells well by individual unit standards, the games themselves don't have broad market appeal (I.E. the rank and file on social media). It is a bit funny though how they sell as good or better than games people would never make such a claim about.
StrongBlackVine
Banned
Forza immediately comes to mind.
sure, in the sense that they're fps' and they all have to have some similarities to fit into that genre. but besides everything else, would you say Quake and CoD have more similarities than differences? If there are more differences, which one is the prevalent design most FPS games follow?