Well it is very pricey for nintendo hardware (yamauchi had a sub 25000yen policy which was breached for the first time) and has very little exclusives at the moment. I will be worried if wiiu sells sub 20k when wiifit or dqx hits
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Media Create Sales: Week 2, 2013 (Jan 07 - Jan 13)
- Thread starter Chris1964
- Start date
Well it is very pricey for nintendo hardware (yamauchi had a sub 25000yen policy which was breached for the first time) and has very little exclusives at the moment. I will be worried if wiiu sells sub 20k when wiifit or dqx hits
test_account
XP-39C²
The Vita had one year head start on the WiiU, but that didnt help much.
electroplankton
Banned
Vita's direct competitor was 3DS, and then PSP. Wii U's direct competitor is now PS3, but in the future it will be PS4, and maybe Nextbox.
unlikely in japan
Hmm, I think I could have been clearer. What I meant was that a lot of the PSP legacy support that Sony took for granted has gone to 3DS instead (or stayed on PSP for the time being...)
Haha, you learn.
test_account
XP-39C²
Yeah, but i mean in regards of chosing the Vita or WiiU for developement. The one year head start that the Vita had didnt help much.
It is still up in the air if the WiiU's head start over the PS4/Xbox 720 will have an advantage though, but it can go both ways.
electroplankton
Banned
Because all were developing for 3DS and PSP.
I disagree. The 720 will be competition, but indirectly. If the PS4 and 720 are similar in terms of power and the Wii U lags behind, many devs will opt for PS4/720 (with games being on the 720 for the sole reason of appealing to the West) over, say, PS4/Wii U.
lunchwithyuzo
Banned
I did this list in another thread, it's more of less for the last 3 years + announced coming stuff, games only:
Nintendo
-Ambrella
-AQ Interactive (inc. Artoon)
-Arika
-Arzest
-Asobism
-Atlus
-Camelot Software Planning
-Chunsoft
-Cing
-Creatures
-Engines
-Game Freak
-Ganbarion
-Genius Sonority
-Good-Feel
-Grezzo
-G-rounding
-indies-zero
-Jamsworks
-Jupiter
-Keys Factory
-Konami
-Level-5
-M2
-Mindware
-Mistwalker
-Mitchell
-MuuMuu
-Namco Bandai
-Omiya Soft
-Paon
-ParityBit
-Platinum Games
-Prope
-Q-Games
-Red Entertainment
-Sandlot
-Sega
-Shift
-Skip
-Square Enix (inc. 1DD and Armor Project)
-syn Sophia
-Tecmo Koei (inc. Team Ninja)
-Treasure
-Tose Software
-Vanpool
-Vitei
Sony
-Acquire
-Alfasystem
-Chunsoft
-Clap Hanz
-Comcept
-Crispy's!
-Eighting
-Level-5
-Marvelous AQL (inc. Artoon)
-Matrix Software
-Pyramid
-Q-Games
-Racjin
Microsoft
-G-rounding
-Grasshopper Manufacture
-iNiS
-Land Ho
-NaNaOnSha
-Spike
-Treasure
Ruud_Luiten
Member
what about MS Mistwalker games, like Blue Dragon?
So in some ways, it begged the question of "If I'm not going to take advantage of this system, why am I making a game for it instead of PSP/3DS, and if I am, why not just make a console title?"
With it having no install base at launch by definition, that sounds quite plausible.
Right, in many ways the 3DS was the successor to the DS that could run what everyone was making on PSP as well, and had almost a year of headway and an aggressive price drop, so why support the system that isn't nearly as likely to take off in the same way and offers no tangible benefit if you don't need the hardware power?
---
Well, let's compare some of this to the current state of the Wii U. I'll throw in a bit myself as well.
On the one hand, the Wii U definitely did not launch late relative to the other platforms given that it's likely a year ahead of them. On the other hand, it's not really setting the charts on fire in any region, so it is unlikely to have a large install base advantage over competitors by the time they come out, thus not offering all the potential advantages of launching early either.
On the second hand, the Wii U is about equivalent to the PS3. While it doesn't really raise the standard, it also doesn't make porting over to it child's play. We have publicly heard many complaints about moving an Xbox 360/PlayStation 3 game to the system, but unless I have forgotten (and correct me if I'm wrong), we haven't heard anyone complain about the difficulties of getting their PSP series onto the 3DS. Also of note, the top end bar the Wii U sets, while not moved, is still very high. To make the highest end Wii U game possible, you must compete with Resident Evil 6, Ground Zeroes, The Last of Us, Halo 4, and Assassin's Creed 3. To make the highest end 3DS game possible, you have to compete with Resident Evil: Revelations and Kingdom Hearts 3D, which while not simple, is much more attainable. As a final impact of being basically equivalent, the Wii U does not offer an immediately obvious benefit to developers who are hoping to sell their games by making them look better/shinier, which is something the 3DS offered despite being a relatively modest boost from the PSP era.
On the third hand (we'll return that to the morgue later), we have the historical audience. I feel the DS (in Japan) was never really seen as a system that did not have core games, but more so as one that had many core games, but lacked some as they simply would not work on the system. We saw attempts to get series like Resident Evil and Phantasy Star on the system, but ultimately they were horrific, and thus series like Monster Hunter didn't follow. This didn't stop things like Atlus titles, niche adventure games, Kingdom Hearts, or a large amount of Final Fantasy entries from showing up however. So, when the 3DS came around, these titles started showing up on the system right from its announcement, thus removing the biggest advantage the PSP had over the DS and helping to gut the Vita. With the Wii, there were some games that were blocked by technical issues, but there were others that certainly could have happened. There was nothing stopping a Kingdom Hearts spin-off or a Resident Evil game like Revelations from showing up outside of publishers simply not finding it an interesting proposition. Publishers haven't notably implied that they see the Wii U as the successor to the PS3 + Wii audience in the way they did with the 3DS and the DS + PSP, which doesn't bode as well for its line-up. Two of the biggest third party series on the system, which currently aren't many, are Dragon Quest and Monster Hunter, both series that are serving as continuations of their audience from the Wii.
Finally, and I don't have proof of this, but I feel developers thought the 3DS could potentially do well worldwide given the success of the DS, while the PSP signified that PlayStation handhelds were in significant decline outside of Japan. The PS3 is still at least moderately healthy in every region, while the Wii was fairly dead going into the Wii U. Even in Japan, there are still a notable amount of big potential hits coming out on the PS3, indicating that there is still interest for console games from the PlayStation audience, while the Wii has been dead for a long time. If you had to bet your company's console future on the successor to one of these horses, in the same way that publishers may have had to choose between supporting the Vita or the 3DS, which would you choose?
Personally I feel the situation doesn't look as bleak as it did for the Vita, since clearly it doesn't have all the same ties to potential disaster, but there's also not much giving me overwhelming confidence in its ability to hook third parties.
Edit:
Certainly anyone can answer. I didn't mean to imply otherwise.
But yeah, you're looking at this from the perspective of a consumer and coming to this conclusion. Ultimately, companies have to make the same kind of choices, and have to do it very far out in order to get games out in the first year.
Anyone who looked at the 3DS's announced line-up as of E3 2010 could see a fair number of large titles that would help build an audience for their game in one to two years. Can the same be said about the showings from Nintendo at E3 2011 or E3 2012 for the Wii U?
It will be a direct competitor for both sales and development efforts
Regarding the first it will not be strong (that was what i was referring to, but yeah weak competitor is still competitor) regarding the second it will be very strong as any dev that wants to have sales n us or europe will probably make a 720 game by default
test_account
XP-39C²
Ah ok, i understand what you mean. I dont know what is the biggest factor for it, is Sony took it for granted, or if 3rd parties believed that the 3DS would follow the success of the DS. I think there is only so much Sony (and Nintendo with the WiiU) can do to get support without offering money in some way (pay for adverticement, publishing etc. etc.).
That is possible, but will this change though? Will there be any clear advantage to chose WiiU instead of Vita?
Vita has gotten more PS3 ports announced than WiiU in the last few months.
If I recall correctly, people were and still are expecting WiiU to be a companion for most PS3 games.
Bruno MB
Member
Wii U Basic model only costs 1.250 yen more than Wii launch price. After the poor sales of Brain Training 3DS I wouldn't bet anything on Wii Fit U although it will probably do better. And what can we expect from a port of a game that sold 600k units? even if it sells one or two hundred thousand units it won't move a sizable amount of systems. There will be a very short-term bump (2 weeks) and then back to the reality.
Eh did i miss some key announcements on wiiu?
test_account
XP-39C²
Yeah, that is an interesting point. Stuff like One Piece Musou 2 and Project J could have been ported to WiiU instead. I wonder what the decision making behind those games were.
lunchwithyuzo
Banned
Panic Mode SCE.
electroplankton
Banned
I said that a year of advantage might well help Nintendo in understanding what's not working, so to prepare the big guns for the next holidays seasons, when PS4 and Nextbox will be launched. Vita didn't have any time advantage over 3DS, and that might be one of the reasons why no one is developing for it.
No, you just missed his point.
No, but I just mean in terms of the hardware's potential.
If we view the system as at least as powerful as the PS3, that's where the high bar exists.
Will many hit it? Of course not, but part of Thunder Monkey's point was that the Vita had a hard to reach high water mark in terms of how powerful it was, which impacted support, and that statement is a reflection of where that mark exists for Wii U if we're looking at this on paper.
Never heard of that one before.
test_account
XP-39C²
You think that Sony payed for those ports? It is possible, but i've heard that Sony has offered tools for easy porting. I wonder which decision that were chosen. It is alson console/console VS console/handheld. Maybe that is one factor for the decision as well.
Ah ok, like that. That could be possible. I think it depends most on if Nintendo can offer the 3rd parties something that gives the WiiU a good advantage to develope for instead of the PS4/Xbox 720 (or at least try to get ports).
I dont see how brantraining 3ds not selling well indicates that wiifitu will not sell. Wiifitu has advantages over the wii version that can be convincing to those people that already have a balance board. The biggest one is that you will not need to turnon your tv at all to measure yourself or do exercizes.
Regarding DQX: isnt dqx a mmorpg with a subscriber base of 400k? Most of the times mmorpg players are willing to invest a lot into a single game as it is the only gamemthey play. DQX has certain advantages over the wii version (for example off tv play) that may push many people over the edge.i domt think it eill only do one or two hundred units it will do something areound 50k at least.
While both titles may not sell extremely well they will both do better than what is on the horizon for vita
lunchwithyuzo
Banned
I think SCE is probably incentivising exclusive PS3/Vita multiplatform development in any way they can right now (technical support, royalty reductions, etc). Same for PSP/Vita (ex: LBXW, God Eater 2), and I suspect a lot of these ports wouldn't being happening without some sort of push out of SCE.
If we dont have games on wiiu that match those games listed how can we say that is the bar? I simply cant buy halo 4 or resident evil 6 on wiiu so devs will not have to worry about competition with those titles on the wiiu software market
So the mark is where those few ps3/360 ports and zombiu sit
thehypocrite
Member
I was trying to list developers, not games.
These are 3rd party developers working on Nintendo published games?
lunchwithyuzo
Banned
I wonder which will do better, DQX Wii U or FFXIV PS3?
test_account
XP-39C²
Seems plausible i think. If it is the case, at least it shows that Sony hasnt abandoned the Vita yet.
While I suspect there's definitely monetary incentive, I feel I should also note on the technical support side, there is actually a large step Sony took by making the Vita relatively compatible with PS3 code. For example, the same shaders will run natively on both of them.
Nintendo actually did a similar thing, but instead of sharing compatible elements with PS3/Xbox 360, it's compatible with the Wii, which is not the technology base most of these companies are starting from.
I would honestly be shocked if they couldn't get this one given the support they gave that game on 3DS.
Even if Capcom totally bails on them outside of titles like Monster Hunter and Sengoku Basara, I would still expect this game.
lunchwithyuzo
Banned
Yep. There are also 3rd party publishers for which Nintendo developers have made games (ie: Level 5, Square Enix).
I think we can all agree that nintendo cant count on third oarties ever accept they buy em out.
Quite the opposite for me. I would be shocked if wiiu gets a revelations port
Okay, but if we set the bar at Arkham City and Assassin's Creed 3, it's not much lower.
a bit off topic but Sony's problems with Vita and Nintendo's with the WiiU stem from the fact that they let their predecessors die a long and painful death and the brand was hurt. So much, that their successors are out of the loop, both for consumers and developers.
here in Europe the PSP has been dead for years, shelf space was minimal or irrelevant since 2010. Wii U had a bit more games but the craze ended with Wii Music in 2009, as far as I am concerned.
here in Europe the PSP has been dead for years, shelf space was minimal or irrelevant since 2010. Wii U had a bit more games but the craze ended with Wii Music in 2009, as far as I am concerned.
Aquamarine
Member
That looks like a list of third-party developers that have very good relationships with Nintendo (except maybe Konami...I'm not sure where they fit in).
How popular is ffxiv right now userbase wise ? I heard ffix had 600k at its peak (mostly pc) and dqx with 400k seems pretty strong
Well arkham on wiiu is a very poor portjob. Id rather say ac3, zombiu , tekken and blops2.
So that would be mid tier ps3 graphics from my untrained eye
thehypocrite
Member
I see, I was wrong in my assumption. Thank you for the information lunchwithyuzo.
Bruno MB
Member
Now that I read my message, what I really meant to say was one or two hundred thousand units.
We are talking japan here in this thread and psp has been quite active before vita launched. Wii was dead after zelda skyward sword was released (what your personal taste is does not matter in context of sales talk. However i would suggest to at least try some of the games that were released after 2009).
I think you have a point though. Nintendo should release games on their old hardware to keep people interested (thats why they need to buy a lot more studios)
200k seems a tad high.. Wiifitu will reach that over time (and probably will end up selling quite a lot) but not within the first few month.
And if A 200k selling game on a 700k system will not move some units what will?
lunchwithyuzo
Banned
I think it's interesting that nearly all Capcom's major 3DS action games seem to be hitting HD consoles as well:
E.X.Troopers: PS3
Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate: Wii U
Resident Evil Revelations: 360, likely PS3, possibly Wii U
I expect MH4 will probably follow suit too.
E.X.Troopers: PS3
Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate: Wii U
Resident Evil Revelations: 360, likely PS3, possibly Wii U
I expect MH4 will probably follow suit too.
shinra-bansho
Member
From Software seems to have been omitted from those listwars with regard to Sony and Microsoft.
I'm not sure I understand your continued focus on the sell-through of all these minor titles. These titles all had initial shipments <50k, with most of them well under that. Retail might get burned, but not the publishers. Why do you think the publishers throw all these titles into the launch window, knowing full well that they'll be overlooked by the bigger Nintento/MH releases? They could easily release the games in Jan/Feb and get a lot more visibility for their titles, even though they still won't sell all that much more. But they can sucker retail into overstocking these titles for the holiday/launch period - so you ended up with mountains of small games and late ports all crammed into the holidays.
There's no price protection in Japan, so the publishers don't really care whether the games sell through or not - they got their money. They don't want to massively overship the bigger titles, because the clearance sales can help damage a powerful brand, and hurt future iterations. But for these smaller games that were never expected to sell anything anyway - the publishers are more than happy to sucker retail into whatever they can on these things.
I'm not really understanding your point here either. There's a gap because the WiiU actually had some good selling games at launch. You're penalizing the system for having popular games at launch? The Wii also had big-ass gaps because it had popular games at launch. The PS3/360/PSP/Vita didn't have big-ass gaps because there were no high-selling games to establish a possible gap in the first place. The top 3 for the DS were similar to the top 3 for the WiiU, but the DS sold 1.5M fricking units of hardware in its first holiday, so it makes sense that it would have more software sales once you drop past the Top 3.
I'm just not getting your point. Are you saying that it's better for a system for the #4/5/6 games to sell 30k instead of 15k, even though the Top 3 sell like shit? I don't get it.
Using your reasoning, the Vita's 4/5/6 games sold better than the PSP's counterparts - even though the Vita sold less hardware. So surely, the Vita should have been in a better software position than the PSP, since it had a much smaller gap. The fact that the PSP had 3 games top 90k, and the Vita didn't have a single game even reach 70k shouldn't matter?
The WiiU tie ratio through the end of the year was very solid. It sold as much software as would be expected for it's hardware sales (which were also historically decent). So it sold the amount of software that you would have expected - so what exactly is the problem? Were you honestly expecting NSMBU/NinLand/MH3G to sell a lot less and all the crap at the bottom to sell a lot more? I know you weren't.
Top 3 for each launch (through end of year): (I left the 3DS out because it didn't launch at the end of the year)
WiiU - 381k/214k/167k
DS - 367k/350k/177k
PSP - 131k/115k/91k
Wii - 553k/285k/197k (not counting Wii Play)
PS3 - 99k/97k/73k
360 - 39k/21k/13k
Vita - 69k/58k/45k
# 4/5/6 games
DS - 83k/59k/52k
PSP - 38k/31k/30k
Wii - 131k/44k/35k
PS3 - 49k/37k/26k
360 - 6k/5k/3k
Vita - 40k/30k/26k
Tie Ratios through end-of 1st December:
WiiU - 1.4 (Hw=638k)
DS - 0.8 (Hw=1,496k)
PSP - 1.1 (Hw=482k)
Wii - 1.6 (Hw=920k)
PS3 - 1.0 (Hw=458k)
360 - 1.3 (Hw=71k)
Vita - 1.0 (Hw=403k)
I think both sentences work better if you replace "third party" with "independent" in the context of the message. Unfortunately, the sentiment should also be noted that Nintendo funds a considerably less amount publishings from Western based developers than SONY or Microsoft.
yes, this is a thread about Japanese Sales and trends but Nirolak made a big post indirectly related to the feasibilty of ports coming to WiiU and Vita and I was trying to come up with an argument about why the ports aren't coming, japan or otherwise.
there is just too much mindshare that got lost in this last 3 years, both WiiU and Vita are suffering from it. Quite simply they arrived late to the party, both. WiiU should have been a mid-generation upgrade.
Nintendo of America is just a sales organization not an R&D organization. They have no relation to the american development communities. Western nintendo devs like Retro are just a subsidiary of EAD and dont have any negotiating power. EAD is full of japanese people that dont really give much interest to western devs...
So yeah... Unless nintendo establishes a western dev center that will continue
Ports will be feasible if nintendo can create a big enough userbase(for japan id say 5 million units). They cant count on outside support so they will have to do that by themselves but once they are up to that point and ps360 games are still being made, why the hell not?