Topic: Major publisher to stop supporting PS3?

[Chozo Ghost]

I always thought the point of a company was to create profit. If 3rd party developers are being childish and being motivated by emotional and illogical egos their bottom lines are going to suffer for it. And indeed, they already are...

[Mop it up]

Or maybe it is because of one of the reasons they jumped ship from Nintendo so quickly, because they don't want to compete with Nintendo's games which are almost always the top sellers?

I don't understand that either, because Nintendo's titles tend to be top sellers period, like in general.  Like say... Super Mario Galaxy has outsold RE5, regardless of the fact that it isn't on Wii too.  Pokemon will outsell FFXIII, despite the fact that the DS, too, "can't handle" it.

That's just a reason I've heard as to why third-parties make games for XBox 360 and PS3 but not Wii, I don't know the logic behind it. I guess the question is, would those games have sold less if they were on a Nintendo platform? I'm not sure if it's possible to answer that...  although Final Fantasy didn't become a top-seller until FF7 which was released on the PlayStation and Metal Gear didn't fare well either until Metal Gear Solid on PS1. But I suppose that could be contributed to the fact that the games were released on improved hardware which gave them more appeal.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Those games sold well based on the fact that they were being advertised by their FMV and not the actual game.

[broodwars]

Or maybe it is because of one of the reasons they jumped ship from Nintendo so quickly, because they don't want to compete with Nintendo's games which are almost always the top sellers?

I don't understand that either, because Nintendo's titles tend to be top sellers period, like in general.  Like say... Super Mario Galaxy has outsold RE5, regardless of the fact that it isn't on Wii too.  Pokemon will outsell FFXIII, despite the fact that the DS, too, "can't handle" it.

That's just a reason I've heard as to why third-parties make games for XBox 360 and PS3 but not Wii, I don't know the logic behind it. I guess the question is, would those games have sold less if they were on a Nintendo platform? I'm not sure if it's possible to answer that...  although Final Fantasy didn't become a top-seller until FF7 which was released on the PlayStation and Metal Gear didn't fare well either until Metal Gear Solid on PS1. But I suppose that could be contributed to the fact that the games were released on improved hardware which gave them more appeal.

I think those game didn't really catch on till the PlayStation era because Square and Konami hadn't hit on a way to sell them properly yet to a mass audience (i.e. FMVs and cinematic cutscenes/music).  I don't think it had anything to do with the platform.

[Mop it up]

But would those games have sold as well had they been released on a Nintendo system? That's the question which can't be answered yet.

[BlackNMild2k1]

It would've been if the N64 cart had enough room to store the FMV's so that they could advertise the game using nothing but FMV's like the Playstation era is famous for.

[broodwars]

It would've been if the N64 cart had enough room to store the FMV's so that they could advertise the game using nothing but FMV's like the Playstation era is famous for.

Exactly.  Square would have done just that if the N64 could actually have handled 4 CDs worth of FMV, and it probably would have sold just as well if not more so because Nintendo at the time was still considered the household name in gaming.

[Chozo Ghost]

It would've been if the N64 cart had enough room to store the FMV's so that they could advertise the game using nothing but FMV's like the Playstation era is famous for.

It could have been done, it just would have been VERY expensive. The N64 carts couldn't hold as much as a CD even in the best of times, but they were able to include some FMV stuff in the RE game, IIRC. The thing about carts is you can pack more memory in them to expand their capability, which is something CDs simply cannot do. So you can get 128mb carts and maybe even 256mb carts, which isn't as much as a CD but probably suitable for most purposes and would allow FMV.... but it would also make the carts much more expensive.

Nowadays we have flash memory that is capable of greater storage than even Blu-ray discs, and for not much more in cost. So I believe very strongly that optical formats are on the way out, and that's probably even true when it comes to movies and music as well. CDs and DVDs aren't in danger of becoming extinct anytime immediately, but they will fade away and Blu-ray won't be the format that replaces them because it will fade away too. I predict eventually movies and music will be sold on SD cards, or something similar. The "compact disc" really isn't compact at all by today's standards, but SD cards are. The electronics of today as as tiny as they can possibly be, so in order to have removable media you need to use cards because an optical drive will just bloat up the size greatly.

[BlackNMild2k1]

I think we all know that if Nintendo wanted to, they could have shoved 1 GB of memory in an N64 cart, but and sane 3rd party would easily choose a CD over that because of cost issues. Back in 1996 a 128-256mb (16-32 MB) cart was costing them like $15-$20 vs a CD which was costing them $3-$5. Its easy to see why carts weren't the choice for bloated FMV games as a $3-$5 CD gets you 700MB or a $15-$20 cart that only get you upto 512mb (64MB) (which only 2-3 games ever used)

You had to use sooo much compression and a 512mb cart to get a decent amount of FMV, that it wasn't even financially possible until late in the N64's life. The N64's largest cart (RE2) was only 64MB and thats not even 1/10th the size of a CD that the PS was using. So yes, it technically could have been done, but it wouldn't have made financial sense.

[TJ Spyke]

1GB cartridges (if they could have been made that big) would have been WAY too expensive. 64MB cartridges were about $20, 1GB  ones probably would have cost well over $100 for consumers.

A minor point, 64MB is slightly more than 1/10 of a CD (which holds 600MB max).

[BlackNMild2k1]

All my CD's are 700MB/80mins & have been for as long as I have been paying attention(many many years).

& that was my point, that even if Nintendo could put 1GB in the cart it was still a helluva lot cheaper to go with a 700MB CD's for a fraction of the cost.
If FF7 or MGS could include all the FMV, that sold those games in the first place then, in a N64 cart, then yes they would have sold the same.