Topic: Official Sales Thread

[BranDonk Kong]

The "All Play" moniker is what killed Madden 09. Madden 07 and 08 sold much better.

[vudu]

I can see a developer saying, "I want to make a kart racer, but why on earth would I want to go head-to-head against Mario Kart Wii?  There's no way I'm going to out-Mario Kart Mario Kart.

They seem perfectly content to release tons of FPS on 360 that compete with Halo 3.

[NWR_Lindy]

Maybe they thought that Red Steel was a fluke, and sold mainly because it was a launch title and there was nothing else out there.  Maybe they thought that Metroid Prime 3 actually underperformed when compared to the popularity of its license.  And maybe they thought that Medal of Honor only sold because it's the only FPS out there for Wii that has a recognizable brand attached to it.  All of these things may not mean anything to you, but to somebody putting hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars down on a project, they might think about this stuff.

And I'm not saying these genres aren't viable on Wii.  That's twisting my words.  I'm saying that I can see, based on the evidence in front of them, why certain publishers/developers ignore certain genres on the Wii platform.

As for Madden, there's no reason why it shouldn't do Sony and Microsoft numbers on Wii.  This "traditionally" stuff is bunk.  The Wii has a massive userbase, right?  Then why isn't a title as universally recognizable as Madden selling gangbusters on Wii?  It defies logic.  Maybe it says something about the audience on Wii, which is what developers and publishers look at, and that's what I've been saying all along.

Yes, companies bring out first-person shooters that compete with Halo 3, but I'm willing to bet that  Microsoft also gives them marketing dollars as well.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

"I really hate this sort of attitude and it's a complete flip-flop of the typical attitude of a Nintendo fan from only a few years ago."
>> A-ha.  Those whiny hardcore.  Yeah I don't identify with those guys.

"It's all about the blue ocean market share which NONE OF US are actually a part of."
>> Yet we still directly benefit from it.  It brought us the Wii.  I have a Wii.  You have one too, so what's your excuse?

"A developer's relevence is based on the quality of the games they make.  Not the popularity, not the sales figures."
>> Sales are significant to staying in business.  Good luck being relevant without business.

"Or at least that's how any true gamer should see it."
>> Yeah, good luck with defining what a "true gamer" is to the rest of us.  It's probably not one of those "nintendo fans".

"Like I said, developers and publishers don't want to incur risk.  For example"
>> For example, starting the peripheral-based Guitar Hero on the matoor hardcore prostitute-killing PS2.  It was the market leader, so it was only logical... UHH WAIT, huh?

"Maybe they thought that Metroid Prime 3 actually underperformed when compared to the popularity of its license."
>> Metroid isn't really that popular (subtract maybe 15-25% of what it's thought to be).  Thank Matt C. for being so vocal about the series and inflating its perception on the internet.

"Then why isn't a title as universally recognizable as Madden selling gangbusters on Wii?  It defies logic."
>> The "all play" version wasn't really advertised, only the visually-intense HD versions, so "all play" is apparently some alien offshoot of the franchise that EA doesn't want the public to know about, particularly that it's a Wii title with Wii sensibilities.  Good job, EA.

"Yes, companies bring out first-person shooters that compete with Halo 3, but I'm willing to bet that  Microsoft also gives them marketing dollars as well."
>> Bribery, fantastic.  Apparently publishers don't have to sell games on their own resources and merits.  This makes complete sense, covers 3rd party behavior this generation, completes the discussion, and wins the thread.  Good show.

[MaleficentOgre]

The "All Play" moniker is what killed Madden 09. Madden 07 and 08 sold much better.

wrong. marketing is what killed madden 09 on wii.
Almost all sales on wii are a result of marketing. It's a self fulfilling prophecy. They don't market the game. It doesn't sell. They say all wii games aren't selling. They sometimes put less effort into the game making it not as good and then it doesn't sell and so they don't make anymore wii games. It's pretty obvious. When's the last time you saw a commercial for a third party wii game? Boom Blocks?
Marketing is the absolute key to everything in the gaming industry. Marketing first, quality second. The way people find out about wii games is by looking at store shelves. They're not pointed in one direction. That's why game sales are spread out. Wii and DS sell more games than anyone, but you don't see many of them in the top ten because they'll sell five thousand copies of two hundred different games.
The way you find out what's good on xbox360 and PS3 is by watching tv, reading magazines, reading comics, listening to the mainstream gaming podcasts, reading their sites. Why do Wii Fit and guitar hero crank out sales? They're on tv all the time. Not just commercials but GMA and the daily show and on sitcoms. You can find them in commercials for other products. Madden is all over the sports world. Watch ESPN and they talk about it all the time. They use it in their shows. That's extra commercial time that sam and max is just not going to get. and I don't see lucas arts pushing it either. and it's not going to sell.

[Flames_of_chaos]

I've seen plenty of deBlob commercials and Samba De Amigo commercials well until PETA forced Sega to take the commercial off the air because monkey's trained for that kind of stuff are treated cruelly. And plenty of Wii Music commercials.

[GoldenPhoenix]

Lindy you are forgetting something about businesses. They can be just as stubborn about changing as any person. Perhaps some of the factors you listed are true but much of it more that likely hinges on them being more comfortable in what they know and sticking to it even if it isn't the smartest move. It happens all the time in the business world where companies don't change with the times because they remain stubborn until something disastrous happens where they either hemorrhage money or come close to filing bankrupt (Usually the trigger).

[MaleficentOgre]

Where are these DeBlob and Samba commercials. just curious. I haven't seen any.
Wii music is first party. Nintendo supports themselves. They know how to sell their games.

[Ian Sane]

Yet we still directly benefit from it.  It brought us the Wii.  I have a Wii.  You have one too, so what's your excuse?

What do you mean it brought us the Wii?  Core gamers giving Nintendo business for 20 years brought us the Wii.  Like Nintendo wasn't going to release another console anyway.  I bought a Wii because Metroid Prime 3 and Super Mario Galaxy are must own titles for me.  For me I don't directly benefit from the blue ocean market group.  All that ever mattered to me was third party support.  The third party support is no better than the Cube's so Nintendo's success with the Wii has had no positive effect from my perspective.  If anything the blue ocean group has done the opposite as Nintendo's focus is no longer 100% on my demographic.  I don't consider "no good games for Christmas 2008" as a benefit.

But my point is that none of us are in the blue ocean group.  If we were we wouldn't be on a Nintendo fansite forum talking about videogames.  Therefore Nintendo success with said group should not matter to us at all aside from how Nintendo's financial situation affects us and affects the quality of games they release.  This isn't like some greater good thing after all.  It's a company that wants our money so our attitude towards them should be somewhat self-serving in nature.

So when Nintendo has a really lame ass E3 and I complain I don't consider blue ocean related excuses as appropriate.  What do I care?  I want Nintendo to focus on my demographic.  A good third party is refusing to adapt to the blue ocean market by releasing good games on the PS3 and is losing money?  That's not good.  That's gaming losing a talented developer.  We should want them to succeed and hopefully support the Nintendo console we own and continue to make quality games without compromising them based on market trends.

All gamers should want their console of choice to be supported by quality developers and for those developers to be successful releasing quality games so that they are encouraged to release quality games in the future.

[BeautifulShy]

Ian 3rd party support is improving. Last year it started and this year is better.
Ian what 3rd party games have you played?
Ian we got lots of great games in the first half of the year from Nintendo.

You bring up E3.Did you miss Nintendo's Fall event and the TGS?Lots of games were announced.

[BranDonk Kong]

The "All Play" moniker is what killed Madden 09. Madden 07 and 08 sold much better.

wrong. marketing is what killed madden 09 on wii.
Almost all sales on wii are a result of marketing. It's a self fulfilling prophecy. They don't market the game. It doesn't sell. They say all wii games aren't selling. They sometimes put less effort into the game making it not as good and then it doesn't sell and so they don't make anymore wii games. It's pretty obvious. When's the last time you saw a commercial for a third party wii game? Boom Blocks?
Marketing is the absolute key to everything in the gaming industry. Marketing first, quality second. The way people find out about wii games is by looking at store shelves. They're not pointed in one direction. That's why game sales are spread out. Wii and DS sell more games than anyone, but you don't see many of them in the top ten because they'll sell five thousand copies of two hundred different games.
The way you find out what's good on xbox360 and PS3 is by watching tv, reading magazines, reading comics, listening to the mainstream gaming podcasts, reading their sites. Why do Wii Fit and guitar hero crank out sales? They're on tv all the time. Not just commercials but GMA and the daily show and on sitcoms. You can find them in commercials for other products. Madden is all over the sports world. Watch ESPN and they talk about it all the time. They use it in their shows. That's extra commercial time that sam and max is just not going to get. and I don't see lucas arts pushing it either. and it's not going to sell.

'

Exactly my point. The added the "All Play" crap and based all of the marketing around that - I didn't even know it had almost all of the other modes in it until after I read a few reviews. If they said, this is the exact same Madden as the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions, only it has these other modes for kids that suck at football games, and your grandmother, then it would have sold like hotcakes, instead, it sold like a 3rd party bullshit "my first game system" game.

[KDR_11k]

1. There is a market for first person shooters on the Wii, it just needs MORE GAMES.
2. The approach "I'm making this genre, where will it sell?" is wrong, it should be "I'm going for this console, what sells there?". Or more generally, instead of "I'm making a product, who will be the customer for it?" it should be "There's this customer I want to reach, what can I sell him?".
3. Review scores are the suitability towards the internet audience, not the Wii audience. Nintendo's biggest Wii sellers didn't receive very good reviews.

I can't help but fear that the animosity to the Wii you can find in some places will prevail, and I can't help but worry that the American penchant for "bigger, better, more explosions" will have a deathgrip on large swaths of the community.

The ones demanding that are just the whiners on the internets, there are large numbers of people who don't want that in every market. Also the biggest, best and most explosive games are the EDF series

And maybe they thought that Medal of Honor only sold because it's the only FPS out there for Wii that has a recognizable brand attached to it.

To me that sounds like an opportunity for anyone with a recognizable brand at hand.

That's extra commercial time that sam and max is just not going to get. and I don't see lucas arts pushing it either.

BTW, Lucas is no longer in charge of Sam & Max, they cancelled the second game years ago, claiming there's no market for games like that and that they need to churn out more cookie-cutter Star Wars games. The recent Sam & Max games are made by Telltale, the one developer that actually manages to handle episodic gaming.

[MaleficentOgre]

no no no no. Madden on wii didn't exist. All Play didn't kill it. Not knowing it existed killed it. If you're not looking for madden and you go to best buy to pick up a wii game and don't know what you want you may completely miss Madden. Seriously. I've seen it happen. But if you're on tv and you see madden that has all play tacked all over it with the wii box on the commercial you'll know what's up and what to look for.
Remember, people aren't like you guys. You are a small small minority of gamers. The dreaded casuals aren't slouching around the internet following previews and first looks and reviews on random small websites like Planet gamecube. No disrespect.
And fringe fans that pick up podcasts and such don't ever hear anything positive about the wii or wii games. Other games get nothing but free press all over the gaming industry. Wii games, not so much. Not ever really. IGN tried with de blob, but that didn't go far.

also, whoever is publishing this taletale sam and max isn't marketing it either. I had no idea it was coming out soon. Way to sell your game guys. How the hell am I suppose to buy your game if I don't know it's coming out. Tell me please. I want to know. It's no secret why some games sell millions and other games don't. I promise you if you put sam and max all over tv people will buy it.  Instead you'll hear in a few months how wii isn't a good platform for two year old point and click adventure games cause it sold 30,000 copies total.

[Mario]

Most games just aren't worth heavy advertising, and some games people just don't give a crap about no matter what.

The problem with All Play is they made the Wii version the "sub" game rather than just Tiger Woods or Madden. It sounds inferior.They should have called the 360 and PS3 versions "all-pay" instead and given Wii the proper franchise evolution. It's like they are ashamed of Wii.

[BranDonk Kong]

You don't need to advertise Madden. EA does because they have more money than God. Everyone knows a new Madden is coming every August. The people who own Madden 07 knew 09 would be here in August, the people who had 08 knew it was coming, and then they pull this "let's just add easier controls - people aren't refusing to buy it because it's ****, it's because it's too hard" bullshit, and finally the previous Madden purchasers either ignored it, or bought the real version for Xbox 360 or PS3. If you had a Wii and another system, and haven't decided which system to get Madden 09 on, then see the box with Bret Favre getting tickled by some dude (cropped out of the photo) and look at the back and see some bobbleheads throwing a giant football in a toy store (maybe not the exact situation, but you get the idea), and then "ALL PLAY" written all over the box, you're *probably* going to put that box back down and get the real game.

[MaleficentOgre]

you need to advertise madden. People don't know when the next one is coming out. sometime in august, but no advertising means no one is heading to wal mart at midnight. That commercial was an absolute stroke of genius.
The problem with all play is market confusion. If they loaded the tubes with commercials telling people why all play was the best thing ever it would've sold. Instead they just let it out there without telling anyone. Thus, no sales.

[nickmitch]

But then, it's not the game your advertising, it's advertising the midnight sale.  People will know it's the middle of August and Madden should be coming out.  Most can either check online or check when they head to store.  So, Wal*Mart, advertises the midnight sale, so they can sell you a bunch more **** at the same time.  (Need extra controllers?  Hungry from the line?  Need something to keep you up? Got it ALL.)  EA doesn't really give a **** if you buy it launch day because they still make the same money, the only real benefit they gain is from retailers trying to maintain instocks and NPD saying the **** sold out first week.

[BranDonk Kong]

Again, you don't need to advertise Madden. Unless you only go to Wal-Mart, Target, Best Buy etc., only when you know it's a video game launch day, then you're going to walk in and see the game on the shelf, regardless of whether you've ever seen an ad. Zelda - need to advertise, Madden, which comes out at the same time every year, and is available on every system (including the original Xbox still) - don't need to advertise. And the problem with All Play is it's crap.

[Flames_of_chaos]

Where are these DeBlob and Samba commercials. just curious. I haven't seen any.
Wii music is first party. Nintendo supports themselves. They know how to sell their games.

I've seen plenty of them on cartoon network, saturday mornings, and some other random channels in the afternoon and occasionally evenings. Like I said you can't see the Samba commercials anymore because of PETA.

[MaleficentOgre]

I'm done. you need to advertise everything. End of story. No advertising means no sales. Regular people don't follow games the way you think they do. Games don't hit millions in sales without advertising regardless of what you think. It's the simple truth in anything. Why do you think wal mart  has commercials? According to you they don't need commercials because everyone knows where wal mart is. That's not the case. Marketing makes the world go around. It's the only reason people know about anything.

[NWR_insanolord]

And the problem with All Play is it's crap.

This is completely and totally untrue

[Flames_of_chaos]

And the problem with All Play is it's crap.

This is completely and totally untrue

I can understand Branddog's reasoning, why do you need a special marker only on the Wii version?? Also I think Activision's Wii First initiative is as equally dumb. Just look at the Wii box arts from Activision, how will those little designed exclusively for Wii marking will exactly help them generate sales?!?!

[NWR_insanolord]

If he's just saying that calling it All Play is crap, I agree, but the game itself is great.

[Flames_of_chaos]

If he's just saying that calling it All Play is crap, I agree, but the game itself is great.

I also think it's stupid as well that EA made a specialized boxart for the Wii versions where the athletes had a happy demeanor instead of the "action shot" boxart.

And this quote is an article from Eurogamer where Peter Moore is describing the reasoning behind the All Play label and the EA Sports Freestyle "casual" brand.

"As we look at the make-up of the new consumer coming in, it's very important to us at EA Sports that we have the ability to have something for them that really allows them to pick up and play and have fun immediately, while at the same time not forgetting our core consumer," Moore observed.

"Our games can be too hard sometimes. And while we have no intention whatsoever in dumbing down the experience we all love and that is driving a multi-billion dollar business for us here at EA Sports, we still have an issue here of approachability."

As a result of this thinking, EA is launching the new All Play range later this year. The first batch of games will be Wii-specific versions of FIFA, Tiger Woods, NBA, Madden and NCAA. In Madden, you'll be able to use Mii characters and direct your team's movements by 'drawing' paths with the Wii remote.

"We're still an intimidating entertainment experience and we have to break down the barriers," Moore stated. “The idea of accessibility - when you've got the controller in your hand, it doesn't look like a foreign object of buttons and d-pads and sticks and triggers, and allows people to get in and instantly have fun."

He also unveiled new EA Sports brand Freestyle. Again it'll have a casual focus, but will cover "IP that isn't normally what you'd see from us, that isn't fully licensed, that isn't a full, authentic simulation of the game experience itself".

Like Facebreaker, for example - the cartoon-style boxing title set to be released under the Freestyle brand later this year.

"We want to present a different persona for some of our games - looking at this new consumer, bringing in more pick-up-and-play, more inclusive, more social games," Moore continued.

[BranDonk Kong]

I meant All Play, as in the mode, is crap. Madden for Wii is actually pretty great, but you wouldn't be able to tell from the "this game plays itself" idea behind the All Play brand.