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Famitsu and Media Create Sales: 12/22 - 12/28

jesusraz said:
- Wii is still somewhat of an unknown for the genre - with Zelda, Dragon Quest Swords and Tales of Symphonia the main examples. But support for the genre is increasing, which could mean if VI came out quick enough it could jump on the bandwagon at just the right time to ride the coat-tails of other big releases.

With the Wii selling like it is I'm sure that it has a diverse enough userbase to support almost any genre. Certainly a JRPG. I can imagine the game coming out after Tales of Mothership and riding the hype train or possibly launching during a short drought.
 

jeremy1456

Junior Member
I really couldn't see Konami putting Suikoden VI on PSP.

I can't imagine them being comfortable with the horrendous sales of Suikoden I+II, and the release of Suikoden Tierkries for the DS makes me think they're not too eager to put another on Sony's handheld.
 

donny2112

Member
Flying_Phoenix said:
With the Wii selling like it is I'm sure that it has a diverse enough userbase to support almost any genre. Certainly a JRPG.

Decent/good hardware sales do not necessarily translate into being a fertile land for "almost any genre." In particular, Wii does not have a good track record with RPGs (Some of that would be do to lack of RPGs, and Dragon Quest X will change that somewhere down the road. Up until now, though, it's not doing so hot), and most Japanese RPG fans have been led to believe that the 360 is the system of choice outside of SCEI and FFXIII games.
 

jeremy1456

Junior Member
donny2112 said:
Decent/good hardware sales do not necessarily translate into being a fertile land for "almost any genre." In particular, Wii does not have a good track record with RPGs (Some of that would be do to lack of RPGs, and Dragon Quest X will change that somewhere down the road. Up until now, though, it's not doing so hot), and most Japanese RPG fans have been led to believe that the 360 is the system of choice outside of SCEI and FFXIII games.

The only RPG I remember bombing on the Wii was Opoona.

Tales of Symphonia 2 did very well especially for a Tales spinoff (outselling every Xbox 360 RPG, including Tales of Vesperia by nearly double), and Dragon Quest Swords is currently the best selling next gen RPG.

That's a better track record than both the PS3 and Xbox 360, so I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say.
 

donny2112

Member
jeremy1456 said:
The only RPG I remember bombing on the Wii was Opoona.

Tales of Symphonia 2 did very well especially for a Tales spinoff (outselling every Xbox 360 RPG, including Tales of Vesperia by nearly double), and Dragon Quest Swords is currently the best selling next gen RPG.

That's a better track record than both the PS3 and Xbox 360, so I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say.

One thing that the 360 and PS3 had going for it is that, up until the DQX announcement, third-parties seemed to want users to look to those consoles for RPGs in the console-space. Post DQX announcement, things could be end up being different. As far as sales, Tales of Symphonia: KOR didn't do as well as I expected, and I usually think of Dragon Quest Swords as a very non-standard RPG. It's not that I think that PS3 and 360 are actually better for RPG sales in Japan (despite what third-parties seem to want), but just that the Wii's track record isn't particularly good on its own. As I said, some of that is do to a great lack of games to form a long track record from.

At the very least, it's not safe to assume that since the Wii is selling decent/good that it automatically has the right userbase to support a Suikoden VI release. Core games haven't been faring great in Japan for the Wii, and RPGs typically have some of the most hardcore followers outside of Dragon Quest and Pokemon.

Does that make more sense?
 

markatisu

Member
donny2112 said:
As far as sales, Tales of Symphonia: KOR didn't do as well as I expected,

I wonder what it will end the year at, wasnt it approaching 300k? I know when it last charted it was doing about 60-65% of what ToS did on a much smaller GC base
 

donny2112

Member
markatisu said:
I wonder what it will end the year at, wasnt it approaching 300k?

200K at the end of August, IIRC. We should see what its (probably) final number is with the 2008 Top 100 being released in a few weeks.
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
markatisu said:
I wonder what it will end the year at, wasnt it approaching 300k? I know when it last charted it was doing about 60-65% of what ToS did on a much smaller GC base

I dont think is was anywhere near 300k
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
I bought RE4 on PS2 today just because it was 8 bucks. Why not? It made me think of CVXfreak.

2vlwm5s.jpg
 

Link

The Autumn Wind
Y2Kev said:
I bought RE4 on PS2 today just because it was 8 bucks. Why not? It made me think of CVXfreak.

2vlwm5s.jpg
I hope this isn't your first time owning the game.
 

ThatObviousUser

ὁ αἴσχιστος παῖς εἶ
jeremy1456 said:
The only RPG I remember bombing on the Wii was Opoona.

Tales of Symphonia 2 did very well especially for a Tales spinoff (outselling every Xbox 360 RPG, including Tales of Vesperia by nearly double), and Dragon Quest Swords is currently the best selling next gen RPG.

That's a better track record than both the PS3 and Xbox 360, so I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say.

Whoah, really? Dawn of the New World did that well? DQS did that well??
 

jeremy1456

Junior Member
Andrex said:
Whoah, really? Dawn of the New World did that well? DQS did that well??

I believe DQS is just short of 500k in Japan, whereas Dawn of the New World is somewhere in 200k - 250k.
 

ThatObviousUser

ὁ αἴσχιστος παῖς εἶ
jeremy1456 said:
I believe DQS is just short of 500k in Japan, whereas Dawn of the New World is somewhere in 200k - 250k.

And no current-gen JRPG has sold 500k yet?
 

jeremy1456

Junior Member
Andrex said:
And no current-gen JRPG has sold 500k yet?

Nope, not in Japan.

EDIT: Just ignore what I had previously typed here - I forgot for half a second we were talking about consoles.
 
donny2112 said:
One thing that the 360 and PS3 had going for it is that, up until the DQX announcement, third-parties seemed to want users to look to those consoles for RPGs in the console-space. Post DQX announcement, things could be end up being different. As far as sales, Tales of Symphonia: KOR didn't do as well as I expected, and I usually think of Dragon Quest Swords as a very non-standard RPG. It's not that I think that PS3 and 360 are actually better for RPG sales in Japan (despite what third-parties seem to want), but just that the Wii's track record isn't particularly good on its own. As I said, some of that is do to a great lack of games to form a long track record from.

At the very least, it's not safe to assume that since the Wii is selling decent/good that it automatically has the right userbase to support a Suikoden VI release. Core games haven't been faring great in Japan for the Wii, and RPGs typically have some of the most hardcore followers outside of Dragon Quest and Pokemon.

Does that make more sense?

Some notes:

- Tales of Symphonia:KoR didn't meet your expectations? It was a spin-off if you set it any higher then you're setting yourself up for dissapointment and just unrealistic expectations. I mean the game has sold more then any other Tales game on any current gen system in Japan.

- Core games in Japan haven't been fairing well on ANY system. There are successes as well as failures. Just look at the bombs the DS has been having as well as the roses. I can say the exact same with the PSP and PS3 as well. The Wii has it's success's (Tales of Symphonia KoR, 428, Dragon Quest Swords, One Piece) and it's failures (Tatsunoko vs Capcom, Tenchu IV, Bleach Versus). And looking at these titles closely it's easy to see why the ones that failed failed. Tatsunoko vs Capcom contrary to popular belief was more of a budget title then a blockbuster as it was Tatsunoko who asked Capcom to make the game not the other way around. Not to mention that the game was very poorly marketed hence why it didn't do well in the Wii nor in the arcades. I don't know the story about Bleach Versus (but it IS a Treasure game and we all know how those usually pan out) but do these failures mean that the Wii can't sell fighting games? Of course not because while Bleach Versus bombed an enhanced port of the Gamecube fighting game did fairly well in the charts (especially for what it was). The game was probably marketed as it was probably advertised correctly and came out during the right time. Hell if I was just focusing on flops = game can't sell I could have said that casual rhythm games can't sell on Wii because of Let's Tap's market performance however that one Drum game is lit up the charts.

I'm not saying that the Wii is some core software selling machine. What I am trying to say is that it's up to the publisher to decide how well the game does. And well yeah due to the fact that the Wii has such a huge userbase the higher amount chance that it will have a certain userbase on it. I am aware that some consoles with significantly smaller userbases sell some genres better like how the 360 sells shoot-em-ups better then the Wii (similar to how the SEGA Saturn did compared to the Playstation) but for a genre as broad as JRPG I'm certain that the Wii would do fine. Also let's not forget about the "World-Wide Factor".

Andrex said:
Whoah, really? Dawn of the New World did that well? DQS did that well??

Yep. Not to mention that it has the best selling console Fire Emblem since the SNES versions (so better then both the Gamecube ones).
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
Flying_Phoenix said:
Yep. Not to mention that it has the best selling console Fire Emblem since the SNES versions (so better then both the Gamecube ones).

So wait. The handhelds magically dont count, and Radiant Dawn sold more than a non existent second GC Fire Emblem?

You dont say?
 
donny2112 said:
One thing that the 360 and PS3 had going for it is that, up until the DQX announcement, third-parties seemed to want users to look to those consoles for RPGs in the console-space. Post DQX announcement, things could be end up being different. As far as sales, Tales of Symphonia: KOR didn't do as well as I expected, and I usually think of Dragon Quest Swords as a very non-standard RPG. It's not that I think that PS3 and 360 are actually better for RPG sales in Japan (despite what third-parties seem to want), but just that the Wii's track record isn't particularly good on its own. As I said, some of that is do to a great lack of games to form a long track record from.

At the very least, it's not safe to assume that since the Wii is selling decent/good that it automatically has the right userbase to support a Suikoden VI release. Core games haven't been faring great in Japan for the Wii, and RPGs typically have some of the most hardcore followers outside of Dragon Quest and Pokemon.

Does that make more sense?
It done more better then ToV and is a spin-off, considering most DS RPG's besides the FF's, DQ's and Pokemons do 100k-200k, don't you think it sold to expectation? Even other third party games in general haven't done quite well.
 
I love how Tales of Symphonia 2 is now just a spin off and has done wonderfully, and also how it is close to 300k or doubling Vesperia, such a stellar milestone btw. Sure guys, whatever floats your boat. "TOS2" is another disappointing performance in a dying series, but hey, its on the Wii, in the kingdom of blind men the one-eyed is king.
 

cvxfreak

Member
Link said:
I hope this isn't your first time owning the game.

Nah, Y2Kev is awesomer than that. :D

RE4 PS2 is indeed super cheap now in the U.S. It's shipment total increased last quarter out of the blue.
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
Kurosaki Ichigo said:
I love how Tales of Symphonia 2 is now just a spin off and has done wonderfully, and also how it is close to 300k or doubling Vesperia, such a stellar milestone btw. Sure guys, whatever floats your boat. "TOS2" is another disappointing performance in a dying series, but hey, its on the Wii, in the kingdom of blind men the one-eyed is king.

All hail the words of the truth teller!
 

Vinnk

Member
Kurosaki Ichigo said:
I love how Tales of Symphonia 2 is now just a spin off and has done wonderfully, and also how it is close to 300k or doubling Vesperia, such a stellar milestone btw. Sure guys, whatever floats your boat. "TOS2" is another disappointing performance in a dying series, but hey, its on the Wii, in the kingdom of blind men the one-eyed is king.

But isn't it a spin-off? Not done by the original team, lower budget, etc.

I will not argue that it's sales were steller (they were not) but most signs point to it being a spinoff. Calling it TOS2 is giving it more credit than even Namco Bandai gave it (they didn't put a "2" after it, unlike other Tales of sequels).

And of course that is why I am a lot of other Symphonia fans were less than excited with it. We all wanted a sequel and we got a spin-off.

But I agree with all your other points. It should have sold better due to the larger base and a lot of people are trying to spin it as more of a success than it was. But it can also be seen as spin to say it was the next main game in the tales series and that it flopped (because it was on the Wii?).

But I guess wether you call it a main game or spin-off depends on you bias.

Wii fans: Just a spin-off and sold great for that.
PS3 fans: It's a main game. Tales of fans don't want it on the Wii
360 fans: TOV did good for the 360 userbase

There is some truth and some spin to all of these.
 
Kurosaki Ichigo said:
I love how Tales of Symphonia 2 is now just a spin off and has done wonderfully, and also how it is close to 300k or doubling Vesperia, such a stellar milestone btw. Sure guys, whatever floats your boat. "TOS2" is another disappointing performance in a dying series, but hey, its on the Wii, in the kingdom of blind men the one-eyed is king.

This game doesn't seem to follow closely in the footsteps of the last one in some ways -- for example, the fact that you can have monsters in your party. Why change things, particularly when Symphonia was one of the most popular games in the series so far?

TG: From a gameplay standpoint, there were a lot of new elements that we really wanted to try and implements, such as the monster recruitment mechanic you mentioned. While these would be seen as a radical shift of focus in a traditional Tales game, approaching the title as a spin-off gives us the confidence to freely attempt these new systems.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=19327
 
Vinnk said:
But isn't it a spin-off? Not done by the original team, lower budget, etc.
Indeed it is, I said 'now' because before the release, there were quite a few people who still tried to argue what it was to those like me who said it was a spin-off from the start, and they suddenly changed their argument when it was released and it sold like it did. I don't think those are series fans but platform fans to be honest, just trying to pick up things to throw.

I always use "TOS2" now because of that, the official nickname is TOS-R and its a spinoff following the story of TOS, no doubt there.
 
suikoden VI would bomb on wii, its the wrong userbase.

tierkreis isnt doing that well, so i doubt theyll bring another for DS anytime soon. i hope VI gets announced soon.
 

Vinnk

Member
Augemitbutter said:
suikoden VI would bomb on wii, its the wrong userbase.

tierkreis isnt doing that well, so i doubt theyll bring another for DS anytime soon. i hope VI gets announced soon.

What platform do you think it would be a hit on? Not a sarcastic question, just wondering.
 

Pachael

Member
Did Let's Tap sell LESS than last week? (5,400) Hopefully Sega/Prope don't make too much fuss about the number of sales and/or the game was cheapass to make.
 

Link

The Autumn Wind
Kurosaki Ichigo said:
Indeed it is, I said 'now' because before the release, there were quite a few people who still tried to argue what it was to those like me who said it was a spin-off from the start, and they suddenly changed their argument when it was released and it sold like it did. I don't think those are series fans but platform fans to be honest, just trying to pick up things to throw.

I always use "TOS2" now because of that, the official nickname is TOS-R and its a spinoff following the story of TOS, no doubt there.
So aren't you just doing exactly the opposite of what you're accusing others of? Before you were insisting on calling the game a spin-off (to discredit it, perhaps), but now you're content with calling it a sequel to fit your own agenda.
 

Link

The Autumn Wind
While DQ may be the only franchise that "officially" follows that line, it's only common sense that other games will do this, especially concerning lower- to mid-tier franchises.
 

jesusraz

Member
Augemitbutter said:
suikoden VI would bomb on wii, its the wrong userbase.
As I said before, until Wii gets a few more RPGs under its belt it's hard to tell just how VI would do on it.

As some have already pointed out, DQS and Fire Emblem sold well. ToS: KoR didn't fare too badly, depending what side of the fence you sit on, and even Zelda wasn't a massive disaster considering it was a launch game and was released on GC as well (albeit online-only).

So you can't exactly come out with a sweeping statement like 'it's the wrong userbase'...not just yet anyway :)
 

DarkMehm

Member
Link said:
So aren't you just doing exactly the opposite of what you're accusing others of? Before you were insisting on calling the game a spin-off (to discredit it, perhaps), but now you're content with calling it a sequel to fit your own agenda.

He is still calling it a spin-off, don't know where you get that from.
 

Spiegel

Member
Link said:
While DQ may be the only franchise that "officially" follows that line, it's only common sense that other games will do this, especially concerning lower- to mid-tier franchises.

We are not in 2000-2007 when third parties had the PS2.

Now we have franchises spread and doing well in PS3, PS2, PSP, Wii and DS. It's not that simple.
 
Oh, Tabris. You don't remember you were kicked out of all Sales-Age threads including M-C, NPD and Famitsu, for essentially not knowing what you're talking on about?

Silly, silly Tabris.
 

Eteric Rice

Member
Augemitbutter said:
suikoden VI would bomb on wii, its the wrong userbase.

tierkreis isnt doing that well, so i doubt theyll bring another for DS anytime soon. i hope VI gets announced soon.

The userbase will follow it.

At least, if enough RPGs hit the Wii.

Dragona Akehi said:
Oh, Tabris. You don't remember you were kicked out of all Sales-Age threads including M-C, NPD and Famitsu, for essentially not knowing what you're talking on about?

Silly, silly Tabris.

Wat.
 

kswiston

Member
JoshuaJSlone said:
Using Japan-GameCharts's list as reference, it still seems a pretty exclusive club. I may be missing some that I don't recognize by name, but I note 6 non-Square non-Enix RPGs over 400K; 3 of which are Tales.

Tales of Destiny (Namco) 829 K
Arc the Lad II (SCE) 817 K
Tales of Eternia (Namco) 669 K
Tales of Phantasia (Namco) 550 K
Breath of Fire III (Capcom) 435 K
PoPoLoCrois Monogatari (SCE) 406 K

If we're a bit more lenient there are a few more in the 350K-400K range, though.

True, but lets not discount Square and Enix entirely, and lets look at all PS1-era Rpgs which hit 400K+ without the help of the Final Fantasy/Dragon Quest names:

SaGa Frontier - 1.09M
Parasite Eve - 994K
Xenogears - 892k
Tales of Destiny - 829k
Arc the Lad II - 817k
Legend of Mana - 707k
Star Ocean: The Second Story - 700k
Chrono Cross - 689k
SaGa Frontier 2 - 675k
Tales of Eternia - 669k
Brave Fencer Musashi - 649k
Valkirye Profile - 635k
Tales of Phantasia - 550k
Front Mission 2 - 496k
Breath of Fire III - 435k
PoPoLoCrois Monogatari - 406k

16 titles that I recognize from 13 non-Final Fantasy/Dragon Quest series. On top of that, 4 titles (all over 600k) are completely new franchises.

Discounting Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, and Pokemon games, how many Rpgs have been released to >400k sales in the past 5 years for all consoles? I'd be willing to bet the list is shorter than the one above which only represents the PS1. Also, when was the last time a new jRPG franchise broke 600k? Kingdom Hearts?

Discounting the big three from S-E and the Pokemon games, there seems to be 1/2-1/3 as many gamers interested in jRPGs (in general) currently as there was in the PS1 era. Numbers from nearly every series have been on a downward trend since then.
 
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