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NPD Sales Results for April 2016 [Sony, MS, & Nintendo refuse to comment on hardware]

DC1

Member
If they are working on Knack 2 they are simply taking the piss, terrible game with no clear target audience or reason for existing.

Those resources are better served elsewhere.
You're very wrong here. Knack was/is a pivotal launch title for the PS4 demostrating the graphical prowless and a tasteful throwback to potential buyers. It was highly adopted on those precepts only.

With that said the purchasing body for Knack fall within two camps:

The first would be folks that picked up knack as part of the bundle or through genuine hype-ness but would have never picked of a platformer/family oriented game in any other circumstances. These folks expressed fevered disappointment.

The second camp are folks who genuinely loved games like Crash Bandicoot/Mario and legacy based platforming gaming. Knack was an absolutely refreshing title and beauty to behold. Additionally (for us Dads or Moms), Knack Incorporated some really fun couch co-op gameplay. My Kids have replayed Knack two years after the release and love it. It's their Super Mario Brothers.

In short, the buying community was split based on ideology. I as well as many other are looking forward to a Knack II. There is no need to squat on it.
 

Fdkn

Member
Regarding the 'tough' competition this month (LOL), if Remedy can't go against Dark Souls and Ratchet and sell, they are worthless. That poor excuse is making them no favours.
 
Uncharted 1 wasn't a masterpiece either. Second part always is the best.
The Empire strikes Knack

exactly

Knack sequel

kqz1pzs.gif
 

hawk2025

Member
I would be very ok with a Knack sequel.

But c'mon, the low hanging fruit is a quick Pupeteer port.


Regarding QB multiplayer: time powers never work in multi. It either makes things frustrating by slowing others down/stopping them or keeps only lame teleportation powers in place.
 

Loris146

Member
I would be very ok with a Knack sequel.

But c'mon, the low hanging fruit is a quick Pupeteer port.

Unfortunately Puppeteer bombed pretty hard. I don't think they will port it to the PS4. They tried with Tearaway and it didn't work well at all ( from a sales perspective of course) .
 

RexNovis

Banned
That's really low for The Division.

People got to the end game and started discovering a plethora of exploits followed shortly thereafter by the much ballyhooed incursion turneing out to be naught but a room with a horde mode. Suddenly the game isn't selling well and very few people are actually still playing the title on a regular basis. It's almost as if the game was a derivative monotonous grind that had no solid game design/gameplay loop to fall back on. Crazy that nobody noticed this sooner... Oh wait!
 

etta

my hard graphic balls
People got to the end game and started discovering a plethora of exploits followed shortly thereafter by the much ballyhooed incursion turneing out to be naught but a room with a horde mode. Suddenly the game isn't selling well and very few people are actually still playing the title on a regular basis. It's almost as if the game was a derivative monotonous grind that had no solid game design/gameplay loop to fall back on. Crazy that nobody noticed this sooner... Oh wait!
Damn you're still going about this huh.
Show me on the doll where The Division touched you!
Show me, Mitchell!

tumblr_lcyr2zULjR1qaoheno1_500.png
 
What are you talking about.

During the Spring Event, he hinted towards an iterative approach. FCC findings hint towards an XB1 redesign, and a possible Xbox 1.5 device.

Phil never said he was against an iterative approach. He said:



meaning that he's against the notion of an XB1.5, or anything that could be classified as a half-measure. An iterative approach does not have to be a small step forward, which is the only thing he pushed back on...

Thats a ridiculous statement though. They can't make a substantial incremental upgrade based on the architecture of the current X1 it hamstrings them too much. He is either talking about the next Xbox or just throwing PR speak out there based on the rumors of the NEO.

Damn you're still going about this huh.
Show me on the doll where The Division touched you!
Show me, Mitchell!

Ha nice etta
 
Unfortunately Puppeteer bombed pretty hard. I don't think they will port it to the PS4. They tried with Tearaway and it didn't work well at all ( from a sales perspective of course) .

They gave it away with PS+. It's hard to imagine a lot of people would pay for a port.
 
E3 2013 is still unthinkable. I STILL can't believe just how historically awful the Xbox One unveiling was.

Business classes will be studying it for years and decades to come. Even now, years later, after backpedaling on almost EVERYTHING the Xbox One stood for and giving players almost EVERYTHING they wanted (lower price, no Kinect, backwards compatibility, tons of free games, new IPs, etc.), it's never been enough to overcome that botched unveiling.

That one moment still resonates years and years later and MS is still dealing with the repercussions. I don't imagine we'll ever see anything quite like it again for a good long while.
the reveal wasn’t that bad, it was mostly boring and uninspired. And they did end with “we’ll take care of the gamers at E3”. I think Angry Joe’s rant https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ekOtn7L1N0 is why so many people remember this as “the horrible” reveal. It was the used game things that really struck a chord as MS was personally doing something completely unnecessary that was directly effective how you interact with your console. I think the no-used game thing just felt personal, not the same with an always online check in, no B/C from X360, TVTVTVTV, etc...I think that was really the turning point for people to say “I’m just not going to buy one”.
 
Regarding the 'tough' competition this month (LOL), if Remedy can't go against Dark Souls and Ratchet and sell, they are worthless. That poor excuse is making them no favours.

Did you see the sales numbers for The division, COD and Souls a couple pages back?

Seems like a legit reason why it only sold modestly.
 

RexNovis

Banned
Damn you're still going about this huh.
Show me on the doll where The Division touched you!
Show me, Mitchell!

tumblr_lcyr2zULjR1qaoheno1_500.png

The game didn't but it's hyper protective overzealous fans did. They barked up the wrong tree. A Rex, much like an Elephant, never forgets.

Are you saying you think the game is in a good place and or that the sales haven't sharply declined due to very poor WoM? The point is regardles of all the insults and ad hominems slung my way for being critical of the game it turns out SURPRISE there were very valid reasons to be wary.
 

GKFinns

Member
The game didn't but it's hyper protective overzealous fans did. They barked up the wrong tree. A Rex, much like an Elephant, never forgets.

Are you saying you think the game is in a good place and or that the sales haven't sharply declined due to very poor WoM? The point is regardles of all the insults and ad hominems slung my way for being critical of the game it turns out SURPRISE there were very valid reasons to be wary.

Didn't Ubisoft just confirm something crazy like a 90% retention of players from March to April? It might not be gaining many new players, but it seems a ton of people are still playing.
 

IvanJ

Banned
Didn't Ubisoft just confirm something crazy like a 90% retention of players from March to April? It might not be gaining many new players, but it seems a ton of people are still playing.

For all we know, those 90% are the ones eagerly awaiting Incursion after being disappointed in the endgame, logging in once in April just to be disappointed again.
I wonder if they will give the same data for April -> May.
 
I'm not helping the retail situation at all, I think. I bought The Division on digital last month.

For next month, I'm the guy who bought a physical copy of a PC game in Overwatch: Origins Edition. I wonder if that SKU will actually have a decent amount of sales, PC games rarely seem to get as big a retail release as Blizzard games do and Best Buy and Amazon both have 20% on the retail Origins SKU's, bringing it close in price to the cheaper digital version that doesn't include the extra stuff. Best Buy is also offering an extra 10 dollar rewards certificate for preordering through them. It won't be anywhere near the console versions at retail, but it could be an actual meaningful amount of copies sold.
 

harSon

Banned
Thats a ridiculous statement though. They can't make a substantial incremental upgrade based on the architecture of the current X1 it hamstrings them too much. He is either talking about the next Xbox or just throwing PR speak out there based on the rumors of the NEO.

Look at the date of the article. Phil Spencer made the statement about the Xbox having incremental upgrades before there were even mutterings of PS4K or Xbox 1.5

And you're being absolutely ridiculous. How is a substantial incremental upgrade an impossibility due to the architecture and specs of the Xbox One, when Microsoft is making a massive fucking push to blur the boundaries of Xbox and PC gaming? Ease of development across platforms is literally one of the pillars of their entire company moving forward. Everything they've been doing from an OS, SDK and API level has been about cross platform development.
 
Phil Spencer made the statement about the Xbox having incremental upgrades before there were even mutterings of PS4K or Xbox 1.5

And you're being absolutely ridiculous. How is a substantial incremental upgrade an impossibility due to the architecture and specs of the Xbox One, when Microsoft is making a massive fucking push to blur the boundaries of Xbox and PC gaming? Ease of development across platforms is literally one of the pillars of their entire company moving forward. Everything they've been doing from an OS, SDK and API level has been about cross platform development.

Not really, that also could have been interpreted as having a console that can be upgraded like a pc.
 

RexNovis

Banned
Didn't Ubisoft just confirm something crazy like a 90% retention of players from March to April? It might not be gaining many new players, but it seems a ton of people are still playing.

They were suspiciously unspecific about that sort of playtime or regularity they required to be counted as part of that 90% figure. It could very well just be how many people who purchased the game and logged in at some point during April.

I think anyone watching the player population of the game and how it has steadily declined since the release of the incursion would be highly skeptical of those figures if they were meant to imply that many players still log in and play regularly.
 

oSoLucky

Member
The Division 1.2 needs to be great after how disappointing 1.1 was. If the update hits hard then there's a chance to get back a lot of the fans. The economy designer supposedly used to work on mobile games, which is the crux of the majority of end game problems. Not sure who made that call.

Most people are hitting 30 at the 25-40 hour mark. After that, the initial gear boost via HMs and CMs, and getting a couple high level patterns(including hitting DZ50+) is another 15-20 hours. Are you saying that the game, which is giving most people a minimum of 30 hours of enjoyment isn't worth it or what?

The ones that are complaining the loudest are people with days of playtime in the game. You won't be reasonably doing the HM Incursion as a first timer with less than 40 hours or so total. I log on for reset on Friday evening and that's it at this point, and I have over 12 days of time in, so I'm far from someone who thinks the game is flawless.

Rex, I just don't understand you. I hated Wonderful 101, Mario Kart 8 and Fallout 4. You will never see me bring those games up or even discuss them more than "I think they're bad". Why even waste your energy on a game that you have despised from the start?

Edit: As per above, there absolutely isnt still 90% of the playerbase playing regularly. Those have to be logins only. I would be surprised if it's more than 30% tbh.
 
The Division 1.2 needs to be great after how disappointing 1.1 was. If the update hits hard then there's a chance to get back a lot of the fans. The economy designer supposedly used to work on mobile games, which is the crux of the majority of end game problems. Not sure who made that call.

Most people are hitting 30 at the 25-40 hour mark. After that, the initial gear boost via HMs and CMs, and getting a couple high level patterns(including hitting DZ50+) is another 15-20 hours. Are you saying that the game, which is giving most people a minimum of 30 hours of enjoyment isn't worth it or what?

The ones that are complaining the loudest are people with days of playtime in the game. You won't be reasonably doing the HM Incursion as a first timer with less than 40 hours or so total. I log on for reset on Friday evening and that's it at this point, and I have over 12 days of time in, so I'm far from someone who thinks the game is flawless.

Rex, I just don't understand you. I hated Wonderful 101, Mario Kart 8 and Fallout 4. You will never see me bring those games up or even discuss them more than "I think they're bad". Why even waste your energy on a game that you have despised from the start?

Edit: As per above, there absolutely isnt still 90% of the playerbase playing regularly. Those have to be logins only. I would be surprised if it's more than 30% tbh.

Replace The Division with Destiny and this post could be from 2014. Hopefully this fad dies out soon. Gearbox needs to hurry up and get Borderlands 3 out because the current crop of loot games are piss poor substitutes.
 
Look at the date of the article. Phil Spencer made the statement about the Xbox having incremental upgrades before there were even mutterings of PS4K or Xbox 1.5

And you're being absolutely ridiculous. How is a substantial incremental upgrade an impossibility due to the architecture and specs of the Xbox One, when Microsoft is making a massive fucking push to blur the boundaries of Xbox and PC gaming? Ease of development across platforms is literally one of the pillars of their entire company moving forward. Everything they've been doing from an OS, SDK and API level has been about cross platform development.

Except, what good would a 'substantial' increase in hardware power do for them? The whole point of a incremental console is that its software library is still a part of the currently existing eco-system, which means games are still going to be built & designed for the greatest common denominator aka PS4/X1. A really powerful console is just going to be super expensive, except unlike a new console generation, this one won't have a software library that plays games designed with its advantages in mind, meaning there is even less value proposition in that box for the consumer.

Sure, MS will get to tout "we have the most powerful console on the market", as it sits there & continues to get outsold WW by the PS4, cause consumers deep down don't really care about the hardware specs, they just care about being able to play the latest games at a solid performance level. We have several generations of consoles that were not the strongest on the market being the lead console, and that wouldn't change in this scenario either. MS needs to broaden its WW appeal, not obsess over its graphical prowess.
 

Welfare

Member
Replace The Division with Destiny and this post could be from 2014. Hopefully this fad dies out soon. Gearbox needs to hurry up and get Borderlands 3 out because the current crop of loot games are piss poor substitutes.

What game can Pitchford syphon money from to get BL3 done faster?
 

oSoLucky

Member
Replace The Division with Destiny and this post could be from 2014. Hopefully this fad dies out soon. Gearbox needs to hurry up and get Borderlands 3 out because the current crop of loot games are piss poor substitutes.

Sad part is, they sell so much that it probably won't. Both games are extremely fun with others at their core though.
 
Sad part is, they sell so much that it probably won't. Both games are extremely fun with others at their core though.

I like the social nature of the games, but they need to come up with better things to do while playing with your friends. The Division in particular has some of the most boring loot, skills and abilities you could possibly imagine and the incursion that had everyone hyped was quite frankly worse than the most poorly designed Destiny strike. Compare it to either of the 3 raids so far and well....
 
Quantum Break should've had a co-op/multiplayer mode. A single player only game is basically a relic of pre 8th gen, especially for the multiplayer centric player base of Xbox, and almost 3 years into the gen is pretty late for this type of release.
MP like in Mass Effect 3 would have been great!
 
Except, what good would a 'substantial' increase in hardware power do for them? The whole point of a incremental console is that its software library is still a part of the currently existing eco-system, which means games are still going to be built & designed for the greatest common denominator aka PS4/X1. ... MS needs to broaden its WW appeal, not obsess over its graphical prowess.

I'd say it needs to do both. Can you imagine MS launching their version of a neo and having it 40% behind neo in graphics power? How do you think that would go down? It would be DOA.

ms need graphical parity at a minimum *in addition* to the ww appeal stuff. Launch a weak console and it has 0 chance of getting ww appeal.
 

cilonen

Member
So how does QB stack up to other new ip from MS? Does the "biggest selling new Microsoft Studios ip launch of the generation" quote hold water?

On the other end, Sony's best selling new ip would be Bloodborne right? It was at just above 700k in NA at the end of 2015 iirc. Nintendo probably has Splatoon at over 1mil right?

Edit: Oops mixing time periods. I assume MS meant launch numbers. In that case Bloodborne was <450k and I have no clue what Splatoon's launch numbers were.

I may be wrong here but I think the best selling MS IP launch proclamation from Greenberg was for the first week.

I think that came in response to people seeing Week 1 UK sales looking bad - so it may have been technically true over a 1 week period in the USA but the man is a serial liar so we can't really be sure.
 

Rymuth

Member
Replace The Division with Destiny and this post could be from 2014.
Eeeeeh, I don't know about that. For me, personally, I gave up on The Division because the subject matter made me really uncomfortable.Couldn't get past level 14 before selling it. I might have been to power-through its tone-deaf nature it if the mechanics were fun but the shooting felt incredibly unsatisfying and the bullet sponge enemies were just a chore.

Destiny was a pure dopamine machine from Day 1, it's just that it's QOL features were bullocks (at launch) - I still and will continue hopping backing into it from time to time because the foundation is so good.
 

Hydrargyrus

Member
I think that MS is in a very bad situation with its IPs: all the new IPs doesn't seem to have any force to pull people and with their low sales numbers, seems like doesn't have too much appeal between the Xb1 owners.
Plus, the strongest IPs (Halo, Gears and Forza) are loosing appeal too, and very quickly.
 
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