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[thefro]

The other factor in the equation besides publishers expecting PS3 to be as big as the PS2 and Microsoft's moneybags is that the DS has been so successful, it also took a big hunk of the PS2 Japanese 3rd Party Support pie that might have gone to the Wii otherwise.

Granted, the PS3 would have probably benefited more than Wii from that, but the fragmentation of that support in another direction has also hurt the Wii.

 

[Vinci]

I'm just gonna sit back on this one because it seems to me we're all mincing words.

Yeah, I think we're all basically saying similar things - we're just not looking at it from the same point of views and it's causing some confusion.

 

[test_account]

Several months before The Conduit came out, I predicted that it would sell 300-500K first month with a LTD over 1 million (including the eventual budget release) in the U.S. For the NPD software predictions, I kept with that previous prediction and said 325K. According to NPD, it sold 72K on a max shipment of 150K for June.

Ah ok, thanks for the answer The Conduit was suppose to be a rather big titled release, at least in my opinion. The Conduit was an exclusive title to the Wii and the Wii hardware sale has been really good in the US, so i think that your prediction could have become true

EDIT: I added some text.

 

[charlequin]

there's no inherent bias to direct the entirety of a 3rd party's resources towards HD development.

I agree with that too. I think that there are factors that make individual systems better-suited to individual genres that differ across the board, but they only really come up when a given genre doesn't seem to be appearing on a given platform because of those factors, e.g. Wii doesn't really get much Western development that looks like "core games" because the popular genres with Western developers are the ones least well-suited to the system. A lot of the time they might point the other way (I think Wii is much better suited to RPGs than the 360) but some external decision or luck of the draw makes them irrelevant.

This is a really super-academic distinction, as DeaconKnowledge suggests; my actual relavant-to-the-new-info-at-hand position is that MH3 is doing pretty great, I'm glad it's doing pretty great, and I hope it leads to some new announcements for Wii the same way it did for PSP.

In my opinion, Xbox was the lead for FPSs last generation with Halo 1/2. However that didn't stop PS2 from having a FPS sell over 2 million on its console. Wii doesn't have to be the leader to still have a favorable environment for particular genres.

Sure, but if the idea is to move an environment that's lopsided away from Wii (which we unquestionably have) into one where the system gets development suited to its install base, I'd say focusing on better-suited areas is a better strategy, whether implemented on the Nintendo or third-party side.

 

[Nuclear Muffin]

So what other excuses are left now? MH3 is selling in line with the PSP games so far and the majority of those who bought the game already owned a Wii (So this "hardcore" audience has been there all along!)

There is no sales related reason for JP devs who make games primarily for their domestic market to ignore the Wii anymore. As long as the game can run on Wii without significant compromises to the gameplay, any excuse would seem to be bogus.

 

[schuelma]

So what other excuses are left now? MH3 is selling in line with the PSP games so far and the majority of those who bought the game already owned a Wii (So this "hardcore" audience has been there all along!)

There is no sales related reason for JP devs who make games primarily for their domestic market to ignore anymore, as long as the game can run on Wii without significant compromises to the gameplay, any excuse would seem to be bogus.

For big budget mainstream games like Monster Hunter I agree. As for those lesser, more niche titles, I think Wii has a lot to prove. The other 3rd party games coming out should be interesting- they obviously aren't as big as Monster Hunter, but they *should* do well.

 

[Nuclear Muffin]

For big budget mainstream games like Monster Hunter I agree. As for those lesser, more niche titles, I think Wii has a lot to prove. The other 3rd party games coming out should be interesting- they obviously aren't as big as Monster Hunter, but they *should* do well.

How so? The argument was that the "core" audience was not there on Wii, MH3 is just the final nail in that coffin. RE4Wii, Tales of Symphonia DOTNW (outselling the mainline Tales of Vesperia despite being a low quality spinoff) and even Taiko would fall under the niche category. I don't see any real way to argue against it, the Wii is as healthy a platform for any quality title, with decent marketing, as the PS2 was.

Now we just need the devs to make some damn games for the platform! The audience is there and are hungry for quality 3rd party "core" titles.

 

[schuelma]

How so? The argument was that the "core" audience was not there on Wii, MH3 is just the final nail in that coffin. RE4Wii, Tales of Symphonia DOTNW (outselling the mainline Tales of Vesperia despite being a low quality spinoff) and even Taiko would fall under the niche category. I don't see any real way to argue against it, the Wii is as healthy a platform for any quality title, with decent marketing, as the PS2 was.

Those are all relatively mainstream I.P's. I was talking more about even smaller stuff like the marvelous games, Fragile, and others.

 

[markatisu]

Those are all relatively mainstream I.P's. I was talking more about even smaller stuff like the marvelous games, Fragile, and others.

Those games sell like shit everywhere though :lol

 

[Nuclear Muffin]

Those are all relatively mainstream I.P's. I was talking more about even smaller stuff like the marvelous games, Fragile, and others.

And these games are selling roughly in line with what they would've done back in the PS2 era. That is not the problem since the Wii has been getting quite a bit of niche stuff, its the mainstream stuff that is really lacking. MH3 proves that these mainstream "core" titles will sell and those past titles that I mentioned prove that they don't need to be as big as MH to sell (And sell better than on the 360!) What is left that doesn't appear to sell on Wii? I see no reason why any game, whether it be on the scale of Star Ocean 5 or Final Fantasy 15 can't come to Wii!

 

[oldie-newbie]

Peharps an old news but it seems that Famitsu gives a perfect score 40/40 to Monster Hunter 3 (Tri)

http://www.gamekyo.com/newsfr32077_monster-hunter-3-un-nouveau-40-40.html

 

[Liabe Brave]

I don't see any real way to argue against it, the Wii is as healthy a platform for any quality title, with decent marketing, as the PS2 was.

I'd say there's a very cogent argument against that position: Nintendo is the most successful publisher in Japan by a huge margin. Unlike with PS2, there's a monstrous first-party gorilla grabbing a big share of the money the console's owners spend on games.

Now, I've argued in the past that this is partly perception. In many cases it's more that Nintendo games overperform on their hardware, rather than that other publishers' games underperform. But nevertheless, the devotion Nintendo products receive represents a good proportion of all software spending for the installed base, and that's not a concern to lightly brush away, especially in trying economic times.

 

[donny2112]

Unlike with PS2, there's a monstrous first-party gorilla grabbing a big share of the money the console's owners spend on games.

If the Wii were near capacity (whatever that is) on the throughput of games on the console, that might be a concern. As it's not, anywhere, not so big an issue currently.

 

[test_account]

I think I predicted 100K but deep down I thought that was low. It's interesting though..the perception was clearly that there were not a lot of Wii owners that would get into Monster Hunter, yet, even with a new color the hardware bump wasn't really that impressive.

I am a bit late with this question, sorry, but out of curiousity, but why was 100k for Wii hardware sale low and how much did you think the Wii would sell? Isnt 93k (and an about 70k bump) in hardware pretty good even with a release like MH3 and a new colored Wii? Or did you expect higher hardware sales because of the perception that there were not a lot of Wii owners that would get into Monster Hunter as you say? I hope that these questions doesnt sound rude or anything, because i dont mean to be rude. I am just curious

 

[Dalthien]

Expected higher, honestly. Wonder of many if the purchasers were actually already Wii owners?!?

If you don't mind me asking, how high did you expect? And why?

I was thinking that 75k would be a nice number, so 93k is very solid.

The PS3 went from 11k to 75k (Media Create) with the release of MGS4. MGS4 came with its own hardware bundles as well (white PS3, black PS3, and silver PS3, with a bonus DualShock thrown in along with the usual Sixaxis). MGS4 sold almost 500k its opening week as well.

In this regard, the Wii was actually at a disadvantage because a number of Monster Hunter fans had already purchased a Wii for MHG, whereas there had not been any MGS releases yet on PS3.

I'm curious why you would find 93k to be disappointing. As I said previously, I find it to be a very solid number.

Hell; between N64, GCN, and Wii, Taiko no Tatsujin and now Monster Hunter 3 are the only things to hit half a million. I believe DQ Swords is the only additional one to be over 400K.

Actually, Naruto 3 on the Cube topped 400k.

 

[schuelma]

Re: hardware sales.

2 reasons- One, it was the first new color since launch. Two, I really thought that between the reports of the bundle selling out and the lack of hardware bump after MH G that a lot of the buyers 1st weekend would be those that didn't have a Wii yet.

 

[donny2112]

Be prepared for a shocker. thedrill blog (always off, usually close) has MH3 at 523K. That pretty much kills any chance of Media-Create putting the game over 600K. On the bright side, they have Wii hardware at just over 102K. :lol

 

[cvxfreak]

Actually, Naruto 3 on the Cube topped 400k.

So did Biohazard 0 (and barely at that).

 

[vicissitudes]

Yeah, new color + a lot more hype for MH3 than MGS4. (oh and MHG didn't really boost Wii hardware)

93k is good, but not an amazing bump. If it has DQIX/DSi-like legs though, I'll eat my words.

 

[Shaheed79]

You all go on for pages about whether a game will have legs or not. DQIX will be the highest selling DQ game in Japan within 5 weeks and will continue to do 20k+ for some time. I still remember when some of you thought MKDS wouldn't break 1 Million in Japan because of it's first few weeks of sales and after it proved to be the highest selling game in the series how the Wii version would not be able to replicate that success.

MH3T is already a big success on the Wii. Arguing whether it could have sold as much on the PS3 is rather pointless since the game would have cost 3x more to make on an HD console. Wii was the perfect choice to build this franchise away from the PS2 and has already out performed its predecessor. Worldwide it will do over 1.5 Million which it never achieved on the PS2 and would have had to sell well over 2 million on the PS3 to achieve the same amount of profit.

 

[test_account]

Re: hardware sales.

2 reasons- One, it was the first new color since launch. Two, I really thought that between the reports of the bundle selling out and the lack of hardware bump after MH G that a lot of the buyers 1st weekend would be those that didn't have a Wii yet.

Ah ok. The console popularity seems to have gone a bit down in general in Japan and that the handhelds have been becoming a bit more popular than the consoles, but ye, when MHG for the Wii was released, there wasnt exactly a too big Wii hardware bump indeed, and this was also the first new color release for the Wii as you say, so i can understand that you expected a higher Wii hardware bump. Thanks for the answer!

I wonder if the standalone black colored Wii sales were hurt a bit because that the MH Wii hardware bundle also included a black colored Wii. I am looking forward to see how the Wii sales will be in the upcoming weeks. If the Wii hardware sales keeps to remain rather high, and if the MH Wii hardware bundle is sold out, maybe the black colored Wii is one of the bigger reasons if the Wii hardware sales remains rather high in the upcoming weeks?

By the way, regarding the MH3 Wii hardware bundle, was it reported how many that were made and sold? I mean i read something about that 75k bundles were made, but was that confirmed, a rumor or a guess?

Be prepared for a shocker. thedrill blog (always off, usually close) has MH3 at 523K. That pretty much kills any chance of Media-Create putting the game over 600K. On the bright side, they have Wii hardware at just over 102K. :lol

That is a bit of a difference from the MH3 Famitsu numbers indeed, so MH3 didnt get over 600k :\ I guess that the Dengeki numbers can still be over 600k? Do we still get the Dengeki numbers by the way?

MH3T is already a big success on the Wii. Arguing whether it could have sold as much on the PS3 is rather pointless since the game would have cost 3x more to make on an HD console. Wii was the perfect choice to build this franchise away from the PS2 and has already out performed its predecessor. Worldwide it will do over 1.5 Million which it never achieved on the PS2 and would have had to sell well over 2 million on the PS3 to achieve the same amount of profit.

I do agree that a PS3 version of Monster Hunter 3 probably would have cost more to develope compared to the Wii version of Monster Hunter 3, but do we know how much more? I am under the impression that the rather common phrase "it cost so much more to develope for the HD consoles" seems to be more of a "missunderstanding" in some cases ("missunderstanding" might be a poor choice of word, but i dont really know what it is called in english, but do you know what i mean?).

Capcom have developed a game engine, MT Framework, which was used in for example Devil May Cry 4, which i think was released 31st of January in 2008 in Japan. From my knowledge, this is the first PS3 game that uses the MT Framework engine, and Devil May Cry 4 was released about 1.5 years ago, so i would guess that the MT Framework engine was up and running on the PS3 maybe like 3 years ago or so, but that is just my guess.

The reason why i mention the MT Framework is because that if Monster Hunter 3 would have been released for the PS3 instead, then Capcom might have used the MT Framework engine for MH3. And if much work is already done with the game engine, maybe this could have cut back on the development costs for Monster Hunter 3 for the PS3? The MT Framework engine seems to still be under development though (for example Lost Planet 2 will use the MT Framework 2.0 engine), but at least i would guess that Capcom did have a game engine available for the PS3 some years ago.

But i do agree that a PS3 version of Monster Hunter 3 probably would have cost more to develope compared to the Wii version of Monster Hunter 3. And maybe Capcom used some of their technology from their previous Wii games and/or even Gamecube games and built further on this, which might have saved Capcom some development time and costs compared to if they would have to start everything from scratch (or was MH3 for the Wii developed from scratch?), but do we know much cheaper it would cost to develope MH3 for the Wii compared to how much it would cost to develope MH3 for the PS3?

When i said "even Gamecube games" i dont mean anything negative about this at all. I just mentioned this since i was under the impression that the developers could use some of their Gamecube technology and port it easy over to the Wii and then built further on this technology instead of starting all the way from scratch, or have i missunderstood something?


Has Capcom said how much it cost to develope MH3 for the Wii by the way? If i am not mistaken, all that i know is that Mosnter Hunter 3 was announced for the Wii sometime early in October in 2007. And Capcom did have a in-game (i think?) trailer for MH3 at this time (it didnt show too much though, and this trailer might have been put together relatively fast, but at least they had a trailer to show ). Going by this, i would guess that MH3 for the Wii was in develope for at least about 2 years. This doesnt necessarily tells us how much it would have cost to develope MH3 for the Wii though.

Or do we have some other examples about how much a big-titled Wii game has cost to develope compared to a big-titled HD-console game has cost to develope? I am just curious about these things

EDIT: I added some text.

 

[test_account]

EDIT: *Double post, i am sorry :\ This post can be deleted*

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

And notable releases...
Namco = Tales of Graces?
S-E = Crystal Bearers?
Koei = Samurai Warrior 3?

Yeah, I think it's safe to say those are pretty much the biggest Wii efforts yet from those companies. Well, with the possible exception of Taiko no Tatsujin Wii for Namco, but I didn't have the idea it was such a big deal until after release, when it just didn't stop selling.

Actually, Naruto 3 on the Cube topped 400k.

You are correct, sir.

So did Biohazard 0 (and barely at that).

And you, too. :lol OK: Monster Hunter 3, Taiko no Tatsujin, and Dragon Quest Swords are the only N64/GCN/Wii third party games to pass 410K.

That is a bit of a difference from the MH3 Famitsu numbers indeed, so MH3 didnt get over 600k :\ I guess that the Dengeki numbers can still be over 600k? Do we still get the Dengeki numbers by the way?

It's a bit different than it used to be, but they still give a Top 20.

 

[charlequin]

I do agree that a PS3 version of Monster Hunter 3 probably would have cost more to develope compared to the Wii version of Monster Hunter 3, but do we know how much more?

While greater-powered hardware pushes games into requiring bigger teams, more complex engine programming, etc., by far the #1 cause of increased budgets is asset creation. By far the lion's share of the budget for most HD games goes into the creation of 2D and 3D art assets (which didn't used to be true) and the costs entailed in this are very difficult to reduce without just not having as much visual content in the game.

 

[test_account]

It's a bit different than it used to be, but they still give a Top 20.

Ah ok, cool, thanks for the info! If i remember correctly, Dengeki updates their numbers on Fridays right? I dont see Monster Hunter 3 in Dengeki's latest sales chart at least.

While greater-powered hardware pushes games into requiring bigger teams, more complex engine programming, etc., by far the #1 cause of increased budgets is asset creation. By far the lion's share of the budget for most HD games goes into the creation of 2D and 3D art assets (which didn't used to be true) and the costs entailed in this are very difficult to reduce without just not having as much visual content in the game.

Ok, i see, that makes sense, thanks for the info! But without known any certain development costs, generally speaking, wouldnt it be hard to know how much more it cost to develope one game compared to how much it costs to develope another game, and in this case about Monster Hunter 3 for either the Wii or for the PS3?

I am under the impression that several of HD (PS3 and Xbox 360) games are still being announced in Japan. Some of these games might not necessarily sell more on the PS3 and/or Xbox 360 compared to the Wii, at least in my opinion, so is there any reason why people dont make more Wii games instead? In some cases it might be moneyhatting that is the reason though, but i dont know how often that happends compared to how many games that are being announced and released. Or now that Monster Hunter 3 has been released, maybe that we will see more big titled games being announced and developed for the Wii?

I am also under the impression that now that game developers still makes many PS3 and/or Xbox 360 games because they have invested much money into "HD technology" (like the game engine etc.) if you know what i mean? And now that this technology (game engine etc.) have been made/developed and now that the game developers are more familiar with this technology, that the development costs have come down quite a bit. I thought that this was one big reason for why developers still contunies to develope PS3 and Xbox 360 games because the development cost has come down, and maybe the development costs for HD games isnt as expencive as we first might think? Developing games for the Wii might still cost less compared to developing games for the PS3 and for the Xbox 360 though

EDIT: I added some text.

 

[charlequin]

wouldnt it be hard to know how much more it cost to develope one game compared to how much it costs to develope another game, and in this case about Monster Hunter 3 for either the Wii or for the PS3?

It's hard to know exactly how big the difference in price would be (especially once you start to take into account differences in the base game design due to a different platform, etc.) but trivial to know that there would be a difference and that said difference would be large.

Some of these games might not necessarily sell more on the PS3 and/or Xbox 360 compared to the Wii, at least in my opinion, so is there any reason why people dont make more Wii games instead?

That's like the entire question of debate in every sales-age thread for the last three years. :lol

And now that this technology (game engine etc.) have been made/developed and now that the game developers are more familiar with this technology, that the development costs have come down quite a bit.

Nope. Engine/pipeline/toolchain technology improvements have never reduced real costs in the industry; every generation, huge new technology improvements that drastically improve productivity are introduced, yet end-of-gen games have much higher budgets than beginning-of-gen games for the same platform. Essentially this technology works to reduce the speed of growth of costs, not to actually lower it, since production standards rise enough over time to push up costs anyway.

What is true is that you can make a sequel to a game much more cheaply if you use the same engine and reuse large portions of the assets, so in some cases a PS360 sequel to a PS360 game might be cheaper than starting over to develop a new engine and assets for said sequel on Wii.

 

[test_account]

I am sorry for bumping this older Media Create thread, but i didnt get around to reply to this before now, i am sorry! And i thought it might be easier to follow this discussion by replying in this thread instead of only copying some of these quotes into a newer Media Create thread. I hope that this is ok?

It's hard to know exactly how big the difference in price would be (especially once you start to take into account differences in the base game design due to a different platform, etc.) but trivial to know that there would be a difference and that said difference would be large.

Ye, i dont disagree that it most likely would cost more to make Monster Hunter 3 for the PS3 instead of the Wii, i mostly wanted to question if a PS3 version of MH3 would cost 3 times more to develope compared to how much it costed to develope MH3 for the Wii. But maybe that Shaheed79 didnt litterally mean that it would cost 3 times as much to make MH3 for the PS3 though, but that he said "3x more to make on a HD console" to make his point more cleary that it would cost more to make MH3 on a HD console.

That's like the entire question of debate in every sales-age thread for the last three years. :lol

Hehe indeed But since several of companies chooses to make HD games instead of Wii games, i wonder if developing for the HD consoles might be a bit cheaper than what we might think?

Nope. Engine/pipeline/toolchain technology improvements have never reduced real costs in the industry; every generation, huge new technology improvements that drastically improve productivity are introduced, yet end-of-gen games have much higher budgets than beginning-of-gen games for the same platform. Essentially this technology works to reduce the speed of growth of costs, not to actually lower it, since production standards rise enough over time to push up costs anyway.

Ye, i think that this is a good point that development costs has gone up from console generation to console generation as you say But what i ment with my quote was that when the game engines and development tools have pretty much been done, then the development costs might come down. I think that this is one reason why several of developers license for example the Unreal Engine 3 instead of making their own engine, since by licensing the Unreal Engine 3, then they will save money compared to if they had to program their own engine from scratch.

If Capcom could have used the MT Framework engine to develope MH3, then i guess that they could have saved some money on the developing instead of making a new game engine from scratch? But sure, it has probably cost alot of money to develope the MT Framework engine (and the Unreal Engine 3 as well as i mentioned above here), so maybe it will be more correct to factor in some of these expences in how much it would have cost to develope Monster Hunter 3 for the PS3 as well.

What is true is that you can make a sequel to a game much more cheaply if you use the same engine and reuse large portions of the assets, so in some cases a PS360 sequel to a PS360 game might be cheaper than starting over to develop a new engine and assets for said sequel on Wii.

Ye, this is what i wanted to say If the game engines are made, and if the game engine is going to be used for several of games, then the developers might save some money on the developing costs