And a lot of people overuse the term "Capbomb" relative to sales.
Alright, the following will make me sound as if I'm Shinji Mikami himself, but yeah--some Capcom defending will go on below.
If you actually look at how some of their games are doing, not bad at all.
DMC3 broke 1.1 million sold in under a month (average time).
RE4 broke 1 million in a little over 2 months.
Onimusha 3 broke a million.
The Maximo series has done around 750,000 (roughly...)
Megaman on GBA sells a shit load.
Viewtiful Joe 2 didn't sell that much, but c'mon, how much $$$$ do you think went into that game? Still was able to surpass 250,000 with both versions.
Now you might be saying, "well C-warrior, nobody here is saying DMC3 or RE5 bombed, it's uh--all other of their bajallion games that are selling like crap?"
Well, which?
Monster Hunter and Monster Hunter G sold over 500,000 in Japan.
Killer 7 will do around 50,000 in Japan, yet Capcom only expected to sell 330,000 units worldwide for that title.
Capcom made a profit this year. And even still--they made some mistakes. Making DMC3 too hard (we see enough bitchers here on GAF, this limits the audience), and RE4 on GC. Now, not to piss of any Nitendo fans, but I think Capcom could have at least done another 150,000 if they released it on PS2 instead of the GC.
Now, also--if you look at the actual sales (net sales). It's not like Capcom games did magically superior than lets say the sales of their titles a year or two ago, it was mostly business changes. Closing down unprofitable arcade stores etc. that brought Capcom over.
Next, they have a decent concept riding off of 360's launch. Dead Rising. Not only does the game have a sense of familiarity that Jaffe so highly speaks for (the references to zombies, hollywood movies, and Resident Evil itself) AND the fact that it's a launch (or near launch title) bodes that it should perform well. Most decent launch games do peform well. And due to which, bam--we have Dead Rising 2.
There are two more Resident Evil movies planned.
A Devil May Cry movie planned which mind you, regardless if it will suck or not should do well at the box office. A stylistic "matrix-esque" movie advterised the right way should really rub off well on audiences around the world.
An Onimusha movie.
They have a Viewtiful Joe anime.
And lets not forget DMC4 and RE5 in development for next-gen.
And to cap it off, Okami should be an amazing game this year. If Capcom wises the fuck up and puts an Okami demo in RE4 and maybe the GH re-release of DMC3, than the game could sell half decent.
Obviously I'm playing Capcom's support bitch right now, but it seems every damn developer is making a damn metallic looking 30 frame per second FPS game running off the damn Unreal Engine.
I enjoy a company like Capcom with some throwback gameplay elements. And plus I felt DMC3 and RE4 were one of the best games I played this generation easily.
Now, I make Capcom sound like the greatest thing since sliced bread. But they are not, yes--sometimes Capcom does make you wonder WTF is wrong with them (i.e, making DMC2 suck donkey balls despite the high critical and finicial success of DMC1).
Making RE Outbreak 2 a shitty a game. Not porting over some kickass franchises over to PSP immediatly out the gate. Yes, but it's not like Konami is any better... Castlevania LOI anyone? Nanobreaker? Rumble Roses? ....yeah
PS: All sales stuff is from Capcom's official Fiscal 2005 Year End Report.
