By on 12 Feb, 2013 at 12:00 PM
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Could Games Be Getting Harder To Sell?

Could Games Be Getting Harder To Sell?

Perhaps consumers, as in gamers, are just toughening up a bit. That would be something.

Last week I discussed Ninja Theory and Capcom’s DmC: Devil May Cry’s poor sales and the dangers the franchise may be facing as a result. What was significant about DmC is that usually, despite all adversity, gamer complaints and hatred, controversial triple A games still go on to sell incredibly well, and this was a rare case of the negativity actually dramatically affecting sales performance. Many gamers said that all the negativity wouldn’t matter once the game was out and ended up being a financial success regardless, but that didn’t seem to be true here. And it could be happening again.

Recently, I learned something about Dead Space 3 from CVG, and again it’s to do with sales. While Dead Space 3 is currently enjoying the number one spot on the UK charts, Chart-Track, a retail monitor, revealed that the first week sales for the game were down 26.6 percent compared to Dead Space 2, its predecessor, which also debuted at the top of the charts. Of course not all gamers who purchase or even like a game will necessary run out to buy its sequel, but a noticeably large drop like this is a cause for interest. Furthermore, the retail monitor revealed that the Xbox 360 version of the game made up 65 percent of sales, while the PS3 version accounted for 31 percent of sales, which left the PC version making up four percent of sales. Just for the sake of interest, Dead Space 2 was closer with 56 percent of sales being on Xbox 360, and 40 percent on PS3, with the last four being for PC.

Now, if you’ve been following Dead Space 3, you’d know that many fans and gamers reacted quite badly to the game’s heavy emphasis on action and cinematic, explosive moments. Like DmC, there is controversy here, and perhaps even more so with the business of the microtransactions and eleven items of day-one DLC thrown in. Admittedly, despite those horrible little things, I expected Dead Space 3 to kill the sales because its action approach would be more widely appealing, and I also expected the game to be thrown inflated review ratings like they’re free candy. Yet, the game currently sits in the seventies on Metacritic, and we’ve learned that its sale performance in its first week is significantly below that of its predecessor. Of course, we’ll only know the real situation a week from now, because the proper sales figures usually get released two weeks after the game’s launch, but right now it looks like it’s the second triple A game this year to not be getting the royal treatment by any means.

This has lead me to wonder whether games could be getting harder to sell. And obviously since the cost of them hasn’t changed it doesn’t have anything to do with that. Are consumers toughening up and smartening up, not throwing their money at just anything? Are expectations and standards rising? Will triple A games need to work harder to achieve the level of success they used to enjoy? These are all questions that may not be able to be answered until far later in the year, as we only really have had two triple A games this year, both of which were controversial. But they are questions, and they have me intrigued. Personally, I’d hope that consumers are toughening up, as some publishers and developers need huge kicks up the backside, but only time will tell. Cue me laughing evilly.

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Name: Azhar Amien
Location: Cape Town
Position: Editor, Reviews

Azhar has published 2511 posts. Read all of Azhar's posts.
  • Tammercred

    Well for Dead Space and DmC, there are several factors as to why they didn’t sell as well as expected. Aside from the fact that we are both in a worldwide rescission and the end of the current console life-cycle DmC and Dead Space 3, both had the problem that many of the core gamers who enjoyed the previous entries did not care for the most recent entries. I know many who own both Devil May Cry 4 and the first two Dead Space games, but decided against buying these new games as they no longer appealed to them.

    • http://egamer.co.za/ Azhar Amien

      Great comment :D Those are definitely factors as well, but I also trying to point out that fan negativity doesn’t often affect the success of a game. Sometimes controversy even boosts sales and interest. And I did slightly bring up the issue of fans not necessarily buying a sequel to any game they’ve played. But for DmC and Dead Space 3 (so far) it has been interesting to see how fan negativity has really affected the sales.

      You have raised a great point, and after playing Dead Space 3 myself, it’s absolutely not what I signed up for when I first took an interest in the series and loved the original. DmC I still enjoyed, but I can really understand why the hardcore crowd wouldn’t find it appealing.

  • D2Exp

    I agree with Tammercred, I think the fact that the games didn’t appeal to the core fanbase is the greatest factor why both DmC and Dead Space 3 performed poorly. The fans they gained with the new formula simply couldn’t compensate for the ones they lost. Especially when fans of more action oriented games (DS3) and fan of easier action (DmC) probably have better alternatives than already established games which were revamped to appeal to them.

    It’s an interesting thing about the inflated reviews though. All hate aside, I do believe DmC’s reviews were inflated (not too much, but they were) and I’m really curious as to why this happens with NT and not with other developers. I think it’s an interesting subject to ponder on.

    • http://egamer.co.za/ Azhar Amien

      Nice comment! =) See, I did take that into slight consideration in the article, that not everyone who plays a game or sequel is necessarily going to purchase the next game, but these drops were quite significant. Usually controversy isn’t enough to damage sales by that much, but this time with DmC and Dead Space 3 (so far), it really did end up harming sales, because the fans were very negative about it.

      Inflated reviews happen a lot more than you think. The easiest to spot and most common example are magazine publications that get early reviews out. Take a look at the first magazine score for a big game. For example, recently Game Informer gave Dead Space 3 a 98 percent review score, and being a game critic myself and having played the game myself, I would be confident enough to say that it’s literally impossible to give the game that high a score. That’s like praising it to be Portal or Half-Life or Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater level. Magazines get exclusive rights to an early review copy in exchange for a positive review, and many review outlets can (not always) receive bonuses for high review scores as well.

      I’m sure you remember the Gamespot dilemma where a writer was fired for giving the first Kane & Lynch an average review score (which it deserved) and Gamespot was mass marketing the game at the time, so you can see where you have to be cautious.

      That’s why it’s dangerous to judge by Metacritic, early Magazine reviews and such. You should always have a review outlet(s) or source that you trust, and generally stick to them.

    • D2Exp

      Thx :)

      I agree that it’s usually not enough, though in DmC’s case the outrage was really big (I haven’t really been following DS3, so Idk how it went there). In my opinion though, DmC just isn’t anything special enough to appeal to a huge audience out of the core fanbase, which it alienated.

      Granted, I really haven’t been following a lot of games closely to know for sure how reviews go :D I’ve noticed that in the past years a lot of games are getting high scores easily, while there was a time when games rarely got over 9 and I know it’s not because quality got super good lately xD I guess I was comparing DmC’s reviews to thinking of RE6′s.

      Of course I remember Greg’s story. A sad day for gaming and journalism.

      That’s some good advice :) I’m always careful when making a game purchase, because I think of it as encouraging game quality over all else. I usually wait for reviews and fan reaction before deciding for sure. Last two games I’ve preordered were ME3 and Diablo III and though both games got their fair share of hate and controversy, I think I definitely got my money’s worth. Next game I’ll preorder is Bioshock: Infinite, I have pretty much no doubts it’ll be great :P

    • http://egamer.co.za/ Azhar Amien

      Yeah definitely, DmC’s outrage was huge. I wrote about it (and what happened with it) extensively as well as the very poor sales performance here: http://egamer.co.za/2013/02/dmc-the-devil-kind-of-cried/

      Dead Space 3, if you are interested in how it got there, can be explained quite briefly :P It was the massive change from survival horror to loud action and cinematic set pieces, it was the introduction of a co-op partner announcement which was the nail in the coffin for the horror element, it was the 11 pieces of day-one DLC, it was the ridiculous microtransaction system, and one or two things I may be overlooking, but those were major.

      Definitely, what you’ve noticed is exactly what has been happening, and there are hundreds of reasons for it that differ for each game. You have a lot of unprofessional or casual reviewers (casual is not necessarily a bad thing, but it does contribute), you get inflated or paid off reviews, in harsh cases you get reviewers afraid of getting flak (even from readers) for hating on big games, you get what I call Triple A Immunity, where triple A games don’t get criticized objectively even for things other games do, you get publisher influence and much more.

      I’m not saying it’s a black hole of despair or anything, but I am saying that in today’s world, the consumer has to be more cautious than ever before, and that’s why my line of advice would be stick to your sources and outlets that you generally trust to be right. Whether it be your friends or favourite website, that’s who you should go with! =) If you don’t have an outlet (hehe or friends :P) then it becomes a bit harder, but I believe if you’re cautious in terms of how you read review content, and do a bit of thinking on what the review has said and combine it with your own knowledge, you can make a better more informed decision :)

      That’s a great thing =) Being careful is much needed today, and game quality is vital to me as well. BioShock: Infinite, wow I can’t wait for that :D Hope it is great :P

    • D2Exp

      Hehe, I know, I just read it today :P

      Haha, I get it now :D I was never too much into Dead Space precisely because of the increasing emphasis of action over horror, I see that finally got to more people xD

      That’s a pretty sad practice and I don’t think it’s doing anyone a favor. The industry will suffer from it in the long run. DmC and DS3 are most probably only the beginning.

      I know :P And thx for the advice :P Actually, most my friends don’t play games at all xD But I’ve gotten good in telling what will suit my tastes, so it’s all good :D

      I’m pretty sure it will be :D Still, fingers crossed :D