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[Duckhuntdog]

They started bundling POP with Splinter Cell in a post-Christmas panic. That's not what I would call a sign of good sales. In Europe they were PS2 exclusive for the holiday season, so they missed out on a lot there too.

I think Ubi managed to sucker retailers into buying a shit-ton of copies of POP (hence their "high" shipped number), but the majority of them were sold as bundles or at bargain bin prices. I don't know if the game was a financial failure, but something certainly went wrong.

I imagine it is going to be difficult to get retailers to sink as much money into POP2 inventory....particularly when they could just use the money to buy more copies of guaranteed sellers like MGS3, Halo 2, GTA: SA, etc

I believe that UBI is thinking that the bundles they did with PoPand SC will translate into sales for PoP 2. I don't know about that. I don't think so but, we'll see.

 

[ge-man]

Whatever happened to "For the growth of the Industry. For Gamecube." ? =P

While Production Studio 4 may have believed that line of reasoning, I doubt that Capcom executives ever gave a shit. I'm betting most are unhappy that RE4 is GC exclusive.

 

[wazoo]

They started bundling POP with Splinter Cell in a post-Christmas panic. That's not what I would call a sign of good sales. In Europe they were PS2 exclusive for the holiday season, so they missed out on a lot there too.

In europe, POP was bundled before christmas with the ps2.

but the majority of them were sold as bundles or at bargain bin prices. I don't know if the game was a financial failure, but something certainly went wrong.

That was a good move unlike too many price rebates which come too late to boost sales. At least, for now, they have a known game to build a franchise on it. That was not easy considering the failure, which was the previous POP 3D.

 

[cvxfreak]

I don't think RE4 in January will hurt much. January still goes within the same fiscal report as December, and Capcom's bottom line is the game selling, not the systems. I DO think that in Japan biohazard 4 will be bundled with GC systems, but not in the U.S. Personally, if I were Capcom, I'd make a REmake/RE0 Double Pack with the Famitsu RE4 demo and sell it for $30 to build anticipation.

 

[Ranger X]

I suppose Capcom will make more money with RE4 in January.
I mean, this year is a turning point for the industry. The market is FREAKIN overcrowded for 2004 holidays and i guess some compagny starts to realise they will make more money by selling their games when people will have the money to buy them.
Only roughly 20 games will sell this year. You heard it here first. There will be ALOT more "Beyond Good and Evil games" this year.
It's written in the sky that people will buy Halo2, GTASA, GT4, MGS3, SplinterCell3, Metroid Prime 2 and a couple of other big fat games i'm forgetting at the moment.
All the other games should pray to be selling alongside those biggies.
Maybe Capcom is actually making a good move with selling their RE4 in January when people will have money again (and also more time to play). I guess they figured it's the safe way to sell RE4.

 

[JJConrad]

The early/mid-January release shouldn't hurt either product too much. For RE4, it allows the hype for the other games to die down a little, making it the next big thing. Also, previous games in the RE series have done well with a January release. January is no December, but its a still a decent month for sales.

The Gamecube can still benefit from the game's hype and anticipation. The game is only missing Christmas on by 16 days; if they're smart, they would heavily advertise the game on TV throughout December.

Then again, this is Capcom USA and they're a bunch of morons. They won't begin their commercials until after the game is released and then it'll be the cheapest, dullest commercial you can imagine. I wish the japanese headquarters would step in and not let CapUSA screw this up.... like CapUSA has with every game in the last 4 years.

I'm sure Nintendo will have their commercials running with it.

 

[Odysseus]

Resident Evil 4 will have such an insignificant impact on GameCube sales that it will not matter when the game releases. The only company that can be hurt by the release date is Capcom.