Support NeoGAF

[Vena]

Okay, yeah, I could see the Wii U being a good fit. The game runs on Vita and PS3 so it shouldn't be a technological issue, and they obviously have a Dragon Quest fanbase there due to DQX.

DQX is another good point, though comparatively small to the others I mentioned, I think.

But, again, its moot. The situation has been bought and paid for, lol.

 

[Fisico]

With the way the anime looks it wouldn't suprise me if it gets a pretty hefty bump. I Expect GE2:RB PSV to manage to outsell GE2 PSV when all is said and done. Resurrection will also help by bringing newcomers.

On retail, not taking into account the best version sitting at >25k, there's almost a 100k difference.
God Eater being a late night anime I have my doubts about the benefit of its airing being in that range.

 

[Oregano]

Yeah the "It's all for Sony!" argument I don't get.

Yokai Watch sold a gigantic number of copies. DQM:SL is one of the biggest mobile games in Japan. It's the perfect time to roll out DQM and try to push the series to be as large as humanly possible.

This is the type of game they should be pushing to move from a 1 million seller to a 3 million seller, and the target platform for that is self evident.

By comparison, the target platforms for Minecraft and Musou are also already drawn for Japan (though you would expect Builders to be ported to mobile and PC at some point), and they're simply following the trend there as well.

They launched a new mobile game a month ago as well (a new version of Monster Parade which is definitely a best fit as a social title).

I really wasn't sure the new Monsters game would be 3DS bound(especially after WOFF was announced) but it's good to see common sense prevailed. However there's not a chance in hell Square Enix is willing to put the effort in to compete with Youkai Watch and Pokémon. It wouldn't be a third Joker game if that was the plan.

Spoiler

Judging by SE's recent 3DS games the disasters that are Pokémon Gen VI might actually be more technically impressive.

 

[Eolz]

Finally took the time to see this week's sales, and despite really great numbers for YW, and surprising ones for Super Run for Money, don't think anything was really a surprise tbh.

Seen a bit of the last page too, and yeah, made sense that DQM3 would be on 3DS. No similar audience elsewhere right now, apart from mobile maybe. The 3DS can still easily be a platform for specific titles until it's replaced

Spoiler

next year

, and even if publishers really want PS to succeed, they aren't dumb enough to not release something on the biggest traditional platform in Japan just because "muh sony".
Just as DQ Heroes made more sense on PS platforms, JM made more sense on 3DS for audience/userbase reason, nothing more complicated than that.

 

[Sammy Samusu]

Yodobashi: http://www.yodobashi.com/ec/product/stock/100000001002685215/index.html (sold out at most stores)
Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B00VJSFF5W/ (in stock on August 15)

 

[hiska-kun]

First Day Sell-through {2015.07.16}

[WIU] Yoshi's Woolly World # <ACT> (Nintendo) (¥6.156) - 20% Low but movement by next week's holidays is expected

[PS4] Batman: Arkham Knight <ADV> (Warner Entertainment Japan) (¥8.208) - 50-60% initial sales will probably surpass total sales of past entries

[PS4] Godzilla Vs. <ACT> (Bandai Namco Games) (¥8.208) - 40% no optimism though

Rabbids Land

[3DS] Dasshutsu Adventure: Zetsubou Yousai <ADV> (Rocket Company) (¥5.184)

 

[Mory Dunz]

Yashii

 

[Nirolak]

I really wasn't sure the new Monsters game would be 3DS bound(especially after WOFF was announced) but it's good to see common sense prevailed. However there's not a chance in hell Square Enix is willing to put the effort in to compete with Youkai Watch and Pokémon. It wouldn't be a third Joker game if that was the plan.

Spoiler

Judging by SE's recent 3DS games the disasters that are Pokémon Gen VI might actually be more technically impressive.

That may very well be true, but it would still be my assessment of what they *should* be doing.

 

[hiska-kun]

Media Create

00./00. [3DS] Yo-Kai Watch Busters: White Dog Squad <ACT> (Level 5) {2015.07.11} (¥4.968) - 423.000 / NEW
00./00. [3DS] Yo-Kai Watch Busters: Red Cat Team <ACT> (Level 5) {2015.07.11} (¥4.968) - 271.000 / NEW

 

[michaelius]

I really wasn't sure the new Monsters game would be 3DS bound(especially after WOFF was announced) but it's good to see common sense prevailed. However there's not a chance in hell Square Enix is willing to put the effort in to compete with Youkai Watch and Pokémon. It wouldn't be a third Joker game if that was the plan.

They have engine and code base and assets from previous games and they built audience for it - it would make no sense to put new Monsters on anything else.

 

[hiska-kun]

Famitsu hasn't published the first half Top 100 2015 (should've been posted this week), maybe Chris was right and they stopped doing it.

 

[Fisico]

Famitsu hasn't published the first half Top 2015 (should've been posted this week), maybe Chris was right and they stopped doing it.

Famitsu please :<

 

[mao2]

Tekken Revolution's total worldwide downloads surpassed 4 million.
http://www.4gamer.net/games/219/G021985/20150717087/

 

[Darius]

I really wasn't sure the new Monsters game would be 3DS bound(especially after WOFF was announced) but it's good to see common sense prevailed. However there's not a chance in hell Square Enix is willing to put the effort in to compete with Youkai Watch and Pokémon. It wouldn't be a third Joker game if that was the plan.

Spoiler

Judging by SE's recent 3DS games the disasters that are Pokémon Gen VI might actually be more technically impressive.

Reaching the heights of Pokemon or Youkai Watch isn´t something that can be simply reached by "effort" these have pretty much become videogames phenomenas in Japan, just take a look at Final Fantasy, a series that´s doing noticeably worse compared to these two, or compared to Dragon Quest their own in-house competition, and you can´t blame them for weak effort in mainline FFs case be it in respect to production values and marketing.

The important thing for DQMJ3 is that it´s part of a newish series with two very successful million-selling prequels. A threshhold that isn´t anything to scuff at in Japan, considering that this doesn´t happen that often. Besides some of Nintendos games and the most successful mainline entries of the biggest 3rd party series it´s pretty uncommon actually. It´s even less frequent on Playstation systems in for almost a complete decade in Japan.

At the very least the DQM series (or even DQMJ series itself) has been far more competetive with Pokemon, Youkai Watch (MH), than any Monster Hunter clone compared to Monster Hunter.

There is a risk of oversaturating the market with Dragon Quest spinoffs though and the added lack of focus on SQEX part isn´t beneficial either to be honest, I still expect it to perform similarily well to the DQM remakes on 3DS, and to handily be more successful than any non Nintendo system DQ spinoff sku in Japan at worst.

 

[Chris1964]

21./25. [PS4] Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair <ACT> (D3 Publisher) {2015.04.02} (¥7.538)
22./28. [PSV] God Eater 2: Rage Burst <ACT> (Bandai Namco Games) {2015.02.19} (¥6.145)
23./21. [3DS] Ansatsu Kyoushitsu: Korosensei Daihouimou!! <ACT> (Bandai Namco Games) {2015.03.12} (¥6.145)
24./26. [3DS] Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate # <ACT> (Capcom) {2014.10.11} (¥6.264)
25./23. [3DS] Mario Kart 7 <RCE> (Nintendo) {2011.12.01} (¥4.800)
26./20. [PSV] The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky Evolution # <RPG> (Kadokawa Games) {2015.06.11} (¥6.264)
27./19. [PS4] Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward # <RPG> (Square Enix) {2015.06.23} (¥4.104)
28./17. [PSV] Chaos;Child # <ADV> (5pb.) {2015.06.25} (¥7.344)
29./22. [PS4] Final Fantasy XIV: The Complete Experience {Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn \ Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward} <RPG> (Square Enix) {2015.06.23} (¥6.264)
30./29. [WIU] Mario Party 10 # <ETC> (Nintendo) {2015.03.12} (¥5.616)
31./33. [3DS] Dragon Ball Heroes: Ultimate Mission 2 <TBL> (Bandai Namco Games) {2014.08.07} (¥6.145)
32./31. [3DS] Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai Deluxe <ACT> (Sega) {2015.05.28} (¥5.378)
33./24. [PSV] Shiren the Wanderer 5 Plus: Fortune Tower and the Dice of Fate <RPG> (Spike Chunsoft) {2015.06.04} (¥5.184)
34./34. [3DS] Yo-kai Watch 2: Shin Uchi <RPG> (Level 5) {2014.12.13} (¥4.968)
35./47. [3DS] Sumikko Gurashi: Koko ga Ochitsukundesu <ETC> (Nippon Columbia) {2014.11.20} (¥5.184)
36./41. [3DS] Kirby Triple Deluxe <ACT> (Nintendo) {2014.01.11} (¥4.800)
37./39. [PSV] Pro Baseball Spirits 2015 <SPT> (Konami) {2015.03.26} (¥7.538)
38./32. [PSV] Persona 4: Golden [1/1][PlayStation Vita the Best] <RPG> (Atlus) {2015.02.05} (¥4.298)
39./15. [PSV] Zettai Geigeki Wars <SLG> (Acquire) {2015.07.02} (¥6.458)
40./50. [PS4] Grand Theft Auto V # <ACT> (Take-Two Interactive Japan) {2014.12.11} (¥7.992)
41./35. [WIU] Dragon Quest X: Inishie no Ryuu no Denshou Online <RPG> (Square Enix) {2015.04.30} (¥4.104)
42./49. [3DS] Tomodachi Life # <ETC> (Nintendo) {2013.04.18} (¥4.800)
43./27. [PSV] Hakuoki: Reimeiroku - Omouhase Kara # <ADV> (Idea Factory) {2015.07.02} (¥6.264)
44./00. [PS3] World Soccer Winning Eleven 2015 [1/1][Konami the Best] <SPT> (Konami) {2015.06.11} (¥4.298)
45./30. [3DS] Kaitou Joker: Toki o Koeru Kaitou to Ushinawareta Houseki <ADV> (Bandai Namco Games) {2015.06.25} (¥5.627)
46./44. [PS3] Pro Baseball Spirits 2015 <SPT> (Konami) {2015.03.26} (¥8.208)
47./00. [3DS] Dragon Quest VII: Warriors of Eden [1/1][Ultimate Hits] <RPG> (Square Enix) {2015.04.16} (¥3.024)
48./48. [3DS] The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 3D # <ADV> (Nintendo) {2015.02.14} (¥5.076)
49./00. [3DS] Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy <Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney \ Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Justice For All \ Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Trials and Tribulations> [1/1][Best Price!] <ADV> (Capcom) {2015.04.02} (¥3.229)
50./38. [PS4] Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster <Final Fantasy X \ Final Fantasy X-2> <RPG> (Square Enix) {2015.05.14} (¥7.344)
00./00. [3DS] Yo-Kai Watch Busters: White Dog Squad <ACT> (Level 5) {2015.07.11} (¥4.968) - 423.000 / NEW
00./00. [3DS] Yo-Kai Watch Busters: Red Cat Team <ACT> (Level 5) {2015.07.11} (¥4.968) - 271.000 / NEW

Top 50

3DS - 25
PSV - 11
PS4 - 7
WIU - 5
PS3 - 2

SOFTWARE

+-------+------------+------------+------------+------------+------------+
|System | This Week  | Last Week  | Last Year  |     YTD    |  Last YTD  |
+-------+------------+------------+------------+------------+------------+
|  ALL  |  1.159.000 |    359.000 |  1.616.000 | 17.318.000 | 20.795.000 |
+-------+------------+------------+------------+------------+------------+

 

[Eolz]

First Day Sell-through {2015.07.16}
[PS4] Godzilla Vs. <ACT> (Bandai Namco Games) (¥8.208) - 40% no optimism though

Isn't that pretty expensive? Makes more or less sense in the west, but they already got mostly the same game in japan on ps3...

 

[Dash Kappei]

Splatoon is starting to hit the low-userbase ceiling imposed by the WiiU's poor LTD. Hopefully Yoshi, summer kids and Christmas will all keep giving it bumps to get those legs going but I've never expected it to reach 1M like many here seemed to be predicting in the past couple weeks: 650k is more of my guess, 700k would be spectacular already. Even then, Nintendo might have found its next franchise cow, I wonder if we'll see them take it the handheld route next gen... I can honestly see two games hitting both home and portable's NX in the future, kinda like Mario Kart and Smash.

I don't see GGS's numbers as good either, hopefully word of mouth will carry it but it seems AA peaked with the DS and its non-games/casual gamers' "blue-ocean". I wish we'd know how much AA5 in particular sold on mobile, it might give a reasonable sneak-peek on the series numbers and how good a mobile release will do for GGS' ltd.
If casuals are not part of the picture anymore, I guess what's left of the series' audience would be comprised of dedicated fans who probably won't wait for a mobile enhanced port coming later, especially with a physical release; *IF* the game will actually get localized in the West, I for once even as a huge fan will wait nonetheless for the eventual iPad port (having getting burnt in the past), unless of course Capcom releases -ah!- the boxed game at retail.

edit:

Yodobashi: http://www.yodobashi.com/ec/product/stock/100000001002685215/index.html (sold out at most stores)
Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B00VJSFF5W/ (in stock on August 15)

That's pretty awesome, is word of mouth good then? What are Amazon reviews like?
Fingers crossed for a very good 2nd week and quick restocking, god I love this series

While it's not doing as good as it is doing in other countries, the PS4 is selling pretty well at least.

12k with no new games? Sounds good enough!

I can't believe how good PS4 is selling w'o anything major release, dat SE (DQXI, DQB, DQH, FFXV, FFVIIr, Nier, SO, etc) power damn.

Is this some kind of meme I'm not aware of or these posts are actually serious?

 

[vinnygambini]

In the next few months we might potentially have three million sellers on the 3DS:

- Yo-Kai Watch Busters
- Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer
- Dragon Quest VIII

It all hinges on the positive reception of Animal Crossing, and hopefully an audience seeking to play another Dragon Quest remake as the last one if I'm not mistaken did not reach the million threshold.

 

[Xbro]

Splatoon is starting to hit the low-userbase ceiling imposed by the WiiU's poor LTD.

And we know this already at 6 weeks in?

In the next few months we might potentially have three million sellers on the 3DS:

- Yo-Kai Watch Busters
- Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer
- Dragon Quest VIII

It all hinges on the positive reception of Animal Crossing, and hopefully an audience seeking to play another Dragon Quest remake as the last one if I'm not mistaken did not reach the million threshold.

Dragon Quest VII hit a million on the 3DS.

 

[KillerMan91]

Is this some kind of meme I'm not aware of or these posts are actually serious?

Well it's not like 16k is great number (It seems famitsu is alone with their 13k figure) but it's not like PS3 sold that much more during normal dead weeks either last gen. Outside of early Wii years this just have been sadly the state of home console market for years already. Sure those posts are maybe little too optimistic in their tone lol.

 

[Vena]

Is this some kind of meme I'm not aware of or these posts are actually serious?

They're serious.

 

[vinnygambini]

Dragon Quest VII hit a million on the 3DS.

Thanks, was thinking of Dragon Quest Monsters 2 which reached in the low 800k if I'm not mistaken.

Hopefully VIII reaches 1 million like its predecessor VII.

Killer line-up for Japan.

 

[Vena]

Thanks, was thinking of Dragon Quest Monsters 2 which reached in the low 800k if I'm not mistaken.

Hopefully VIII reaches 1 million like its predecessor VII.

Killer line-up for Japan.

This is something I've wondered, are console software sales higher returns/yields than handheld sales [development factored return per sale]? (Or is it to do with losses/fees on ROM cartridges? In which case its higher returns per sale on disc press variants as less is lost per sale.) Does this carry over when you factor in budget comparisons of releases (as well as frequency)?

Handheld development budgets themselves probably aren't small (anymore) but I'd imagine they are still considerably smaller than that of a console release, regardless of quality or HDness.

If the loss per sale is lower for consoles, then it might explain why we see movements as we currently do (outside of bags of money). Even if you can't reach "hit" status, what you sell + not losing more on cartridge prices, is enough for satisfactory RoI even with increased budgets of development (though you spread risk by throwing it on every suitable piece of hardware as well). Of course my numberless math here may be off the deep if I am overestimating how much a ROM cart costs to produce.

Does Nintendo offer to waive cartridge fees for big profile games? Or at all? (And do we have comparison between disc pressing (which I am sure is on the order of tens of cents for Bluray) vs. ROM carts?)

 

[vinnygambini]

This is something I've wondered, are console software sales higher returns/yields than handheld sales [development factored return per sale]? (Or is it to do with losses/fees on ROM cartridges? In which case its higher returns per sale on disc press variants as less is lost per sale.) Does this carry over when you factor in budget comparisons of releases (as well as frequency)?

Handheld development budgets themselves probably aren't small (anymore) but I'd imagine they are still considerably smaller than that of a console release, regardless of quality or HDness.

If the loss per sale is lower for consoles, then it might explain why we see movements as we currently do (outside of bags of money). Even if you can't reach "hit" status, what you sell + not losing more on cartridge prices, is enough for satisfactory RoI even with increased budgets of development (though you spread risk by throwing it on every suitable piece of hardware as well). Of course my numberless math here may be off the deep if I am overestimating how much a ROM cart costs to produce.

Does Nintendo offer to waive cartridge fees for big profile games? Or at all? (And do we have comparison between disc pressing (which I am sure is on the order of tens of cents for Bluray) vs. ROM carts?)

Prior to the Gamecube era, Nintendo carried a higher license fee (royalty rate) than its competitors (Sony, Microsoft) but except that, the details you're outlining are not known per se.

In regards to development budgets, Marvelous stated that they doubled or tripled depending on the title comparatively to the DS era.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

They're serious.

It's all relative - look at PS4s sales last year and look back at this year. It may be very poor in absolute terms, but it could be doing so much worse, especially in a quiet period as it is now.

 

[Thunder Monkey]

It's all relative - look at PS4s sales last year and look back at this year. It may be very poor in absolute terms, but it could be doing so much worse, especially in a quiet period as it is now.

It's just funny.

I mean, even with bumps, if this is the floor, PS4 won't get higher than 4 million units.

I've been fairly bullish with my PS4 expectations, given the pace it maintains. I'm beginning to think my projection of 6.5-7 million units is way way higher than it will actually hit.

 

[Vena]

Prior to the Gamecube era, Nintendo carried a higher license fee (royalty rate) than its competitors (Sony, Microsoft) but except that, the details you're outlining are not known per se.

In regards to development budgets, Marvelous stated that they doubled or tripled depending on the title comparatively to the DS era.

On the handheld? Or in general?

The DS to 3DS would be a big jump, ya, since the system is still considerably more powerful than its predecessor even if it is relatively weak compared to the competition. Having to learn/develop engines to build on the 3D and take advantage of the tech would initially require a considerable investment... though I'd suspect costs after the fact would start to drop greatly as tools become more efficient.

And as has been said in these threads regularly, now, the lack of the more modern, regularly and widely available tools for development on the 3DS are part of what is holding it back from many of the handheld titles ending up elsewhere. Its just too old. (And hence why I expect a mid-2016 NX release. Nintendo has obviously struck a deal with Unity for its consoles going forward, and all that's left to pocket is UE4/UE4mobile and their set in terms of tool chains.)

It's all relative - look at PS4s sales last year and look back at this year. It may be very poor in absolute terms, but it could be doing so much worse, especially in a quiet period as it is now.

There's nothing "big" sure but there are still regular releases, and when you're selling on comparable levels to a console predominantly populated by squid (and supported by a single developer, week to week not YTD, obviously)... then saying that we should be looking at this relatively is trying to have one's cake and eat it too. We have the entire western market producing games at a gradual clip, a number of large and small Japanese studios (and all but, like, one of the largest non-Nintendo IP already on board) have thrown their weight behind it, and it still sputters along like an old Trabant out of gas.

I say this simply because we can twist this whole "relative" discussion and say "Well look at the WiiU compared to last year!" After all, its flat YoY, hasn't hit its strongest season (as opposed to the PS platforms enjoying there usual kick in at the start of the year), doesn't have huge tentpoles like Mario Kart coming or out recently to prop the baseline, etc.

Spoiler

Splatoon is an absolute anomaly and not something one ever expected, yet here we are.

Spoiler

Also software sales are terrible.

 

[KillerMan91]

It's just funny.

I mean, even with bumps, if this is the floor, PS4 won't get higher than 4 million units.

I've been fairly bullish with my PS4 expectations, given the pace it maintains. I'm beginning to think my projection of 6.5-7 million units is way way higher than it will actually hit.

Well PS3 had pretty much same kind of floor and it went to sell over 10 million units. It really depends on how long PS4 lives. Of course I don't think it will reach PS3s numbers. Something like 7-8 million is my prediction too.

 

[noshten]

Splatoon is starting to hit the low-userbase ceiling imposed by the WiiU's poor LTD. Hopefully Yoshi, summer kids and Christmas will all keep giving it bumps to get those legs going but I've never expected it to reach 1M like many here seemed to be predicting in the past couple weeks: 650k is more of my guess, 700k would be spectacular already. Even then, Nintendo might have found its next franchise cow, I wonder if we'll see them take it the handheld route next gen... I can honestly see two games hitting both home and portable's NX in the future, kinda like Mario Kart and Smash.

This is the reality of the market in Japan for consoles at the moment. Few games will pass 1M lifetime in Japan this gen. Splatoon has that chance - it has really long tentacles and it's not just Japan. It will sell around half a million in Japan in about two months. Than if the trend from last year is repeated, I expect it get around the totals you are predicting by the end of this year and to possibly catch up to SSB.

Personally I'm thinking it's going to be around 750k by the end of 2015. Than who knows how long it will continue to sell, MK8 has insane attach rate, Splatoon at this point is clearly going to end up the second most popular Wii U game in Japan.

 

[Nirolak]

This is something I've wondered, are console software sales higher returns/yields than handheld sales [development factored return per sale]? (Or is it to do with losses/fees on ROM cartridges? In which case its higher returns per sale on disc press variants as less is lost per sale.) Does this carry over when you factor in budget comparisons of releases (as well as frequency)?

Handheld development budgets themselves probably aren't small (anymore) but I'd imagine they are still considerably smaller than that of a console release, regardless of quality or HDness.

If the loss per sale is lower for consoles, then it might explain why we see movements as we currently do (outside of bags of money). Even if you can't reach "hit" status, what you sell + not losing more on cartridge prices, is enough for satisfactory RoI even with increased budgets of development (though you spread risk by throwing it on every suitable piece of hardware as well). Of course my numberless math here may be off the deep if I am overestimating how much a ROM cart costs to produce.

Does Nintendo offer to waive cartridge fees for big profile games? Or at all? (And do we have comparison between disc pressing (which I am sure is on the order of tens of cents for Bluray) vs. ROM carts?)

I'm going to use numbers for the US market since I'm not entirely clear how it's priced in Japan, but I imagine it's similar.

In order to press a disc for PS4/XB1, you're charged $10-12, but covers the cost of materials (very small) and about a $10 license fee to Sony or Microsoft for the ability to release a game on their console. This is a big part of how they make money with break-even or loss leading strategies and why they release consoles in the first place. You get charged this fee regardless of whether you're charging $20 for your game or $100, and regardless of whether or not the game sells.

Now, this part I'm not as sure about because executives and analysts haven't talked about it as much, but essentially the setup for handhelds is similar, but you're effectively paying a lower price for the license fee and more for the physical media. Since it's just an up front cost-of-goods charge to print a game either way, it doesn't make a difference from the publisher's perspective - unless they're ordering an unusually large cartridge - at which point the cost goes up and they will often charge more for the game to compensate.

As such, I'd be surprised if companies were making notable decisions based on production costs. One benefit of consoles is that you can often charge more money for your game, but the trade-off is you're hitting a smaller total audience, and usually you have to spend a bit more to make the art assets/technology reach an acceptable level for release.

One thing that could be happening incentive wise is, let's just peg the cost-of-goods setup for a PS4 game as $12. Sony could sit there and say "Hey, if you release your game on PS4 and only other PlayStation platforms in Japan, we'll only charge you $6 per disc and we'll include you in our general platform marketing. We'll also work with you to help make the PS4 port of your game as easy as possible. The license fee break only applies to your first game per series on the platform." The former would involve Sony still making quite a bit of money (discs are really cheap to produce), but give the developer and extra $6 per copy sold, and the marketing would include things like being part of an ad campaign they're running on TV, a Sony PlayStation paid ad run in Famitsu, or having your game appear in their paid retailer floor space marketing.

If you're a game with expected sales of 100,000, this could be pretty appealing. If you feel you'd sell about the same on 3DS and Vita/PS4, you'd get $600,000 extra in game profit, and they might have sufficiently covered say $50-$100K of your marketing cost or something. Even if you had to spend that same $50-$100K getting the game on PS4, this would still be worthwhile. I included the part about the license fee incentive expiring since they're obviously not going to cut the price forever, as its their main source of income. They might lower it to something like "And we'll still give you a $2-$3 discount." later on to make sure the incentive stays, but the basic incentive for the parties involved is the first game incentvizes fans of the series to pick up a PS4, while the developer gets a financial buffer and a larger risk amortization when they first have to uplift their technology and art assets to "PS4 quality".

However, as you may have noticed, these are small numbers. This is the kind of incentivization that's primarily attractive to studios like Nippon Ichi, Nihon Falcom, lower end licensed games, and similar such products. In these cases you're basically incentivizing developers to choose PlayStation as their base and/or port what would normally be a Vita-only game to PS4. If you have a bigger mid-tier series or a blockbuster franchise, what matters to you way more is finding the biggest and most appropriate audience for your product.

You can see this to be relatively self evident just looking at the line-up from big Japanese publishers. Most of them actually have very reserved line-ups on PS4, and only (or at least overwhelmingly) only put out products that are safe bets and conceptually best fits for a PlayStation console regardless of any incentives in place. If we wander over to Namco Bandai's line-up, games like Tekken, Tales, Naruto, and Dragon Ball were always going to have console entries.

The company most of the thread seems to obsess over when they see this is Square Enix. I'd first just like to take a moment to point out that, while they're around 50-75% of what NeoGAF focuses on when talking about Japan, they're not actually 50-75% of the market. They're a much, much lower percentage than that. Also, the fact that we talk about and focus on them so much around here actually reveals the real reason they're doing what they're doing. When we look at Square Enix's announced PS4 line-up, it overwhelmingly consists of games that you would expect to be on PS4. With the exception of things like World of Final Fantasy, if we look at each individual product, choosing PS4 as a platform is not an unusual or surprising choice. What is unusual is that they're choosing to greenlight so many games for a platform that is failing in Japan. Getting back to what I was saying earlier, if we look back at what made Square (Enix) a titan in the PS1 and PS2 era, it wasn't just that their games sold very well in Japan - this was true for many companies - it was that they sold very well in Japan and sold even better world wide. Now, while the market has changed radically since then, given the venue that Square Enix is announcing games like Final Fantasy XV, Kingdom Hearts 3, Final Fantasy VII Remake, Nier 2, Project Setsuna, and World of Final Fantasy at, it doesn't take very long to figure out who they're hoping the game will sell well to. We even had the announcement of Star Ocean 5 for the West well before we normally get this type of product confirmed for international release. Square Enix is essentially hoping to go back to the days where their products do very well abroad, because they know that even with the changes in the market, their titles are at least still frequently talked about outside Japan. The dedicated market is also shrinking in Japan, with consoles being nigh moribund, so if they want to keep investing in the high production value arm of their business, they don't have any other choice. By comparison, it's completely unclear when any of their Japanese mobile titles will come over, as those are targeted distinctly at Japan. In addition, they still make 3DS games - the leading dedicated platform in Japan - when a game is both expected to overwhelmingly sell in Japan and the platform is the traditional fit for the audience. See games like Dragon Quest Monsters and Dragon Quest VIII as examples of this, while titles like Musou are seen more as games for PlayStation console. Now yes, it's possible we're about to see Dragon Quest XI show up on PS4 whereas it would make more sense on 3DS, but it makes far more sense to gaze across the whole strategy and look for patterns and then try to explain the anomalies than to look for the anomalies to generate the pattern.

Anyway, overall I don't think the profitability of console games versus handheld games is a driving factor of any perceived changes in output strategy. Otherwise we'd be seeing way more publishers and independent studios shifting this way. Instead, we see very limited examples of this, so the best way to uncover that is to separate developers/publishers into categories and try to find the patterns within them to uncover what the root cause for each is likely to be.

 

[Vena]

^ Thanks, Niro. I'll read this and reply later.

This is the reality of the market in Japan for consoles at the moment. Few games will pass 1M lifetime in Japan this gen. Splatoon has that chance - it has really long tentacles and it's not just Japan. It will sell around half a million in Japan in about two months. Than if the trend from last year is repeated, I expect it get around the totals you are predicting by the end of this year and to possibly catch up to SSB.

Personally I'm thinking it's going to be around 750k by the end of 2015. Than who knows how long it will continue to sell, MK8 has insane attach rate, Splatoon at this point is clearly going to end up the second most popular Wii U game in Japan.

Without any bundles, Splatoon will ink its way to ~700k. Its already at ~500k with digital.

Bundle it, give the bundle a good value this year (probably see the price drop a bit), and you'll be looking at the upper bounds of a million rather than ~700k.

 

[noshten]

Without any bundles, Splatoon will ink its way to ~700k. Its already at ~500k with digital.

Bundle it, give the bundle a good value this year (probably see the price drop a bit), and you'll be looking at the upper bounds of a million rather than ~700k.

They should definitely bundle it, they simply didn't predict it will do as well as it has done.

 

[saichi]

Splatoon is starting to hit the low-userbase ceiling imposed by the WiiU's poor LTD. Hopefully Yoshi, summer kids and Christmas will all keep giving it bumps to get those legs going but I've never expected it to reach 1M like many here seemed to be predicting in the past couple weeks: 650k is more of my guess, 700k would be spectacular already. Even then, Nintendo might have found its next franchise cow, I wonder if we'll see them take it the handheld route next gen... I can honestly see two games hitting both home and portable's NX in the future, kinda like Mario Kart and Smash.

Here is what someone posted earlier in the thread.

MK8 VS Splatoon (excluding FW) Longer legs

------------------------------------------------------------- 
|    |   Mario Kart 8    |      Splatoon     |  Difference  | 
|    | [WIU] (2014/05/29)| [WIU] (2015/05/28)|              | 
|----|---------|---------|---------|---------|--------------| 
|Week|  Weekly |   LTD   |  Weekly |   LTD   | MK8 – SPLTN  | 
|----|---------|---------|---------|---------|--------------| 
|  2 |   73.051|   73.051|   68.913|   68.913|         4.138| 
|  3 |   42.261|  115.312|   53.198|  122.111|        -6.799|  
|  4 |   28.112|  143.424|   43.653|  165.764|       -22.340| 
|  5 |   23.520|  166.944|   37.458|  203.222|       -36.278|  
|  6 |   19.386|  186.330|   34.135|  237.357|       -51.027|  
|  7 |   15.143|  201.473|   26.136|  263.493|       -62.020|  
|  8 |   14.992|  216.465|         |         |              |  
|  9 |   18.129|  234.594|         |         |              | 
| 10 |   18.067|  252.661|         |         |              | 
| 11 |   20.860|  273.521|         |         |              | 
| 12 |   28.221|  301.742|         |         |              | 
| 13 |   12.075|  313.817|         |         |              | 
| 14 |   11.148|  324.965|         |         |              |
|----|---------|---------|---------|---------|--------------|

Week 9 is the start of summer holidays, week 12 is Obon.
Splatoon should perform similar.

Splatoon keeps on going, if there is a bump with the school holidays - the trend will mirror MK8. That leads to speculation of another bump in December. Last year MK8 was selling 20k-40k in December. By than Splatoon could be catching up to SSB's total sales in Japan.

Considering Splatoon is holding better than MK8 last year and MK8 sold around 122K from week 8-14, Splatoon should sell around 150K in the same period. MK8 sold around 116K last Dec. Assuming Splattoon would sell the same. It would mean another 266K at retail and that would make Splatton to be over 650K without digital. I don't think anyone expect Splatoon to sell 0 copies in September, October and November or after 2015.

Splatoon will definitely sell over 700K this year in Japan unless Nintendo bundles it. Splatoon does not need bundling to help it reach 700K.

 

[ZhugeEX]

http://blog.esuteru.com/archives/8260300.html

 

[RyoonZ]

http://blog.esuteru.com/archives/8260300.html

Also this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARJDT8bHWT4

 

[ßig]

Also this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARJDT8bHWT4

The Taiko game that recently came out makes so much more sense now.

EDIT: Thinking about it some more it's probably the other way around.

 

[Mpl90]

Ok, Idolmasters,but what, specifically.

 

[ZhugeEX]

The company most of the thread seems to obsess over when they see this is Square Enix. I'd first just like to take a moment to point out that, while they're around 50-75% of what NeoGAF focuses on when talking about Japan, they're not actually 50-75% of the market. They're a much, much lower percentage than that. Also, the fact that we talk about and focus on them so much around here actually reveals the real reason they're doing what they're doing. When we look at Square Enix's announced PS4 line-up, it overwhelmingly consists of games that you would expect to be on PS4. With the exception of things like World of Final Fantasy, if we look at each individual product, choosing PS4 as a platform is not an unusual or surprising choice. What is unusual is that they're choosing to greenlight so many games for a platform that is failing in Japan. Getting back to what I was saying earlier, if we look back at what made Square (Enix) a titan in the PS1 and PS2 era, it wasn't just that their games sold very well in Japan - this was true for many companies - it was that they sold very well in Japan and sold even better world wide. Now, while the market has changed radically since then, given the venue that Square Enix is announcing games like Final Fantasy XV, Kingdom Hearts 3, Final Fantasy VII Remake, Nier 2, Project Setsuna, and World of Final Fantasy at, it doesn't take very long to figure out who they're hoping the game will sell well to. We even had the announcement of Star Ocean 5 for the West well before we normally get this type of product confirmed for international release. Square Enix is essentially hoping to go back to the days where their products do very well abroad, because they know that even with the changes in the market, their titles are at least still frequently talked about outside Japan. The dedicated market is also shrinking in Japan, with consoles being nigh moribund, so if they want to keep investing in the high production value arm of their business, they don't have any other choice. By comparison, it's completely unclear when any of their Japanese mobile titles will come over, as those are targeted distinctly at Japan. In addition, they still make 3DS games - the leading dedicated platform in Japan - when a game is both expected to overwhelmingly sell in Japan and the platform is the traditional fit for the audience. See games like Dragon Quest Monsters and Dragon Quest VIII as examples of this, while titles like Musou are seen more as games for PlayStation console. Now yes, it's possible we're about to see Dragon Quest XI show up on PS4 whereas it would make more sense on 3DS, but it makes far more sense to gaze across the whole strategy and look for patterns and then try to explain the anomalies than to look for the anomalies to generate the pattern.

The only way your posts could get better is if they're narrated by Morgan Freeman.

I mean dude, your posts are so on point it's unreal!

 

[Rymuth]

*snip*

Ever since Kagari's mention of printing costs, I've been waiting for someone to go into more detail about discs. Much gratitude, I'll copy/paste and save this for future reference.

The only way your posts could get better is if they're narrated by Morgan Freeman.

I've been meaning to use that line but I was waiting for the right opportunity!

ffs, Zhuge, what the hell?!

 

[Vena]

The only way your posts could get better is if they're narrated by Morgan Freeman.

I mean dude, your posts are so on point it's unreal!

You do realize he is Morgan Freeman, right?

Anyway, overall I don't think the profitability of console games versus handheld games is a driving factor of any perceived changes in output strategy. Otherwise we'd be seeing way more publishers and independent studios shifting this way. Instead, we see very limited examples of this, so the best way to uncover that is to separate developers/publishers into categories and try to find the patterns within them to uncover what the root cause for each is likely to be.

Thanks for the breakdown, so my thinking was a bit off the mark it would seem! But that's fine, this is how we learn.

 

[Mpl90]

You do realize he is Morgan Freeman, right?

Ok, he may be Morgan Freeman but...is he a kid Morgan Freeman or a squid Morgan Freeman? My life depends on the answer of this auestion.

 

[ZhugeEX]

wow.... sorry Rymuth. Didn't realise you wanted to use the Morgan Freeman line! There's always next time...? right? ..... Right?

Anyway,

Can someone make this a thread if it's not already. I'm too tired to pull out all the quotes and stuff. - http://www.novacrystallis.com/2015/...w-with-the-developers-of-dragon-quest-heroes/

 

[Shizuka]

I'm going to use numbers for the US market since I'm not entirely clear how it's priced in Japan, but I imagine it's similar.

In order to press a disc for PS4/XB1, you're charged $10-12, but covers the cost of materials (very small) and about a $10 license fee to Sony or Microsoft for the ability to release a game on their console. This is a big part of how they make money with break-even or loss leading strategies and why they release consoles in the first place. You get charged this fee regardless of whether you're charging $20 for your game or $100, and regardless of whether or not the game sells.

Now, this part I'm not as sure about because executives and analysts haven't talked about it as much, but essentially the setup for handhelds is similar, but you're effectively paying a lower price for the license fee and more for the physical media. Since it's just an up front cost-of-goods charge to print a game either way, it doesn't make a difference from the publisher's perspective - unless they're ordering an unusually large cartridge - at which point the cost goes up and they will often charge more for the game to compensate.

As such, I'd be surprised if companies were making notable decisions based on production costs. One benefit of consoles is that you can often charge more money for your game, but the trade-off is you're hitting a smaller total audience, and usually you have to spend a bit more to make the art assets/technology reach an acceptable level for release.

One thing that could be happening incentive wise is, let's just peg the cost-of-goods setup for a PS4 game as $12. Sony could sit there and say "Hey, if you release your game on PS4 and only other PlayStation platforms in Japan, we'll only charge you $6 per disc and we'll include you in our general platform marketing. We'll also work with you to help make the PS4 port of your game as easy as possible. The license fee break only applies to your first game per series on the platform." The former would involve Sony still making quite a bit of money (discs are really cheap to produce), but give the developer and extra $6 per copy sold, and the marketing would include things like being part of an ad campaign they're running on TV, a Sony PlayStation paid ad run in Famitsu, or having your game appear in their paid retailer floor space marketing.

If you're a game with expected sales of 100,000, this could be pretty appealing. If you feel you'd sell about the same on 3DS and Vita/PS4, you'd get $600,000 extra in game profit, and they might have sufficiently covered say $50-$100K of your marketing cost or something. Even if you had to spend that same $50-$100K getting the game on PS4, this would still be worthwhile. I included the part about the license fee incentive expiring since they're obviously not going to cut the price forever, as its their main source of income. They might lower it to something like "And we'll still give you a $2-$3 discount." later on to make sure the incentive stays, but the basic incentive for the parties involved is the first game incentvizes fans of the series to pick up a PS4, while the developer gets a financial buffer and a larger risk amortization when they first have to uplift their technology and art assets to "PS4 quality".

However, as you may have noticed, these are small numbers. This is the kind of incentivization that's primarily attractive to studios like Nippon Ichi, Nihon Falcom, lower end licensed games, and similar such products. In these cases you're basically incentivizing developers to choose PlayStation as their base and/or port what would normally be a Vita-only game to PS4. If you have a bigger mid-tier series or a blockbuster franchise, what matters to you way more is finding the biggest and most appropriate audience for your product.

You can see this to be relatively self evident just looking at the line-up from big Japanese publishers. Most of them actually have very reserved line-ups on PS4, and only (or at least overwhelmingly) only put out products that are safe bets and conceptually best fits for a PlayStation console regardless of any incentives in place. If we wander over to Namco Bandai's line-up, games like Tekken, Tales, Naruto, and Dragon Ball were always going to have console entries.

The company most of the thread seems to obsess over when they see this is Square Enix. I'd first just like to take a moment to point out that, while they're around 50-75% of what NeoGAF focuses on when talking about Japan, they're not actually 50-75% of the market. They're a much, much lower percentage than that. Also, the fact that we talk about and focus on them so much around here actually reveals the real reason they're doing what they're doing. When we look at Square Enix's announced PS4 line-up, it overwhelmingly consists of games that you would expect to be on PS4. With the exception of things like World of Final Fantasy, if we look at each individual product, choosing PS4 as a platform is not an unusual or surprising choice. What is unusual is that they're choosing to greenlight so many games for a platform that is failing in Japan. Getting back to what I was saying earlier, if we look back at what made Square (Enix) a titan in the PS1 and PS2 era, it wasn't just that their games sold very well in Japan - this was true for many companies - it was that they sold very well in Japan and sold even better world wide. Now, while the market has changed radically since then, given the venue that Square Enix is announcing games like Final Fantasy XV, Kingdom Hearts 3, Final Fantasy VII Remake, Nier 2, Project Setsuna, and World of Final Fantasy at, it doesn't take very long to figure out who they're hoping the game will sell well to. We even had the announcement of Star Ocean 5 for the West well before we normally get this type of product confirmed for international release. Square Enix is essentially hoping to go back to the days where their products do very well abroad, because they know that even with the changes in the market, their titles are at least still frequently talked about outside Japan. The dedicated market is also shrinking in Japan, with consoles being nigh moribund, so if they want to keep investing in the high production value arm of their business, they don't have any other choice. By comparison, it's completely unclear when any of their Japanese mobile titles will come over, as those are targeted distinctly at Japan. In addition, they still make 3DS games - the leading dedicated platform in Japan - when a game is both expected to overwhelmingly sell in Japan and the platform is the traditional fit for the audience. See games like Dragon Quest Monsters and Dragon Quest VIII as examples of this, while titles like Musou are seen more as games for PlayStation console. Now yes, it's possible we're about to see Dragon Quest XI show up on PS4 whereas it would make more sense on 3DS, but it makes far more sense to gaze across the whole strategy and look for patterns and then try to explain the anomalies than to look for the anomalies to generate the pattern.

Anyway, overall I don't think the profitability of console games versus handheld games is a driving factor of any perceived changes in output strategy. Otherwise we'd be seeing way more publishers and independent studios shifting this way. Instead, we see very limited examples of this, so the best way to uncover that is to separate developers/publishers into categories and try to find the patterns within them to uncover what the root cause for each is likely to be.

I'm a lurker of MC threads, but this was truly an interesting read. Thanks for the insight!

 

[RyoonZ]

Snip

Great post, I just want to add that Sony also offer to localize Japanese games into Traditional Chinese for Asian market, which help a game like Yakuza Zero that sold ~300k (I only counted total from their weeks on Top 20) to 500k which I think is also a very attractive incentive and very good for me personally since I'm Chinese.

 

[crinale]

IIRC Sony indeed provide licence fee reduction when they go Playstation multiplat (second platform and so on receives reduction or something). I've forgotten where I've read that info though..

 

[Sammy Samusu]

That's pretty awesome, is word of mouth good then? What are Amazon reviews like? Fingers crossed for a very good 2nd week and quick restocking, god I love this series.

Reviews on Amazon are pretty bad, 2.5/5 stars. Don't ask me why!

I'm also hoping for a good second week (-70%), but I'm not very confident.

 

[Man God]

I've always wondered how the fees work out for crossbuy games. It seems to be a real lucrative incentive for very small releases but as you get to larger and more established third parties almost none of them have joined on, even with their smaller releases.

 

[King Beyond the wall]

There's nothing "big" sure but there are still regular releases, and when you're selling on comparable levels to a console predominantly populated by squid (and supported by a single developer, week to week not YTD, obviously)... then saying that we should be looking at this relatively is trying to have one's cake and eat it too. We have the entire western market producing games at a gradual clip, a number of large and small Japanese studios (and all but, like, one of the largest non-Nintendo IP already on board) have thrown their weight behind it, and it still sputters along like an old Trabant out of gas.

I say this simply because we can twist this whole "relative" discussion and say "Well look at the WiiU compared to last year!" After all, its flat YoY, hasn't hit its strongest season (as opposed to the PS platforms enjoying there usual kick in at the start of the year), doesn't have huge tentpoles like Mario Kart coming or out recently to prop the baseline, etc.

Spoiler

Splatoon is an absolute anomaly and not something one ever expected, yet here we are.

Spoiler

Also software sales are terrible.

I think you're being a little

Spoiler

very

harsh here. The 'large and small' japanese studios have yet to release their main projects onto the PS4 yet, with the biggest being a psp final fantasy port, a 2 hour prologue to the next MGS and a budget Resident evil. The rest of the small to mid tier releases seen so far have been niche and never likely to move the needle far.

Do you not think that games like MGS5 or Persona or the many western games which have grown increasingly relevant in the Japanese market over the past few years will have much of an effect on the PS4s performance for the rest of the year? Additionally, I may be wrong, but I am confident in saying that playstation sales increase in the holiday/ Christmas shopping season.

I am not sure whether you took this from my post but I was comparing the recent performance of the PS4 to its performance in the same period last year. I was making the point that the situation could be much worse (as it was last year) but the baseline of the PS4 has seemingly doubled in periods without releases. Surely you must agree that this is an improvement of the health of the console in the market?

I wasn't comparing it to the WiiU , but some of your comments are a little confusing. Firstly, is it fair to compare the PS4 year to date sales to the WiiUs compared with last years numbers? The PS4 launched last year (around 320k if I remember correctly) so the PS4 has had to catch this up whilst the WiiU has not. Also you state that PS4 and WiiU have sold comparably this year, but the PS4 is sitting at 615k and the Wiiu at 300k? Finally, are you saying that Splatoon has not given the WiiU a hardware boost?

 

[1st Course]

stuff

Great post as always. Thanks for the insight.

The $12 license fees the platform holder get regardless got me wondering though, does this mean that anything sold at $20 and under is effectively being sold at loss? Between the $12 license fee, the distribution fees, the retailer cut...etc I don't imagine there's much room for profit under such a price.

I wish there was reliable sources explaining how this retail game business works but all I've seen is random articles with no sources and dubious information.

 

[Vena]

Do you not think that games like MGS5 or Persona or the many western games which have grown increasingly relevant in the Japanese market over the past few years will have much of an effect on the PS4s performance for the rest of the year? Additionally, I may be wrong, but I am confident in saying that playstation sales increase in the holiday/ Christmas shopping season.

There have been western releases coming at a regular pace all year as well as others like Bloodborne, DQH, and so on, you seem to be cherry picking examples of "nothing have released except mid-tier niche". Which isn't the case. Its has had a much stronger year in terms of good software... the market just doesn't care or isn't compelled to buy a big black brick.

Of course it will get a boost in the holidays, the point was that the PS family also enjoys a small boost at the start of the year after the holidays and in the new CY. (That boost, obviously, isn't 300k as per the gap with the WiiU. That gap is attributed to the software releases that you don't seem to be counting which have been giving the system regular but passing bumps while the WiiU was, pre-Splatoon, selling at 6-8k.)

I am not sure whether you took this from my post but I was comparing the recent performance of the PS4 to its performance in the same period last year. I was making the point that the situation could be much worse (as it was last year) but the baseline of the PS4 has seemingly doubled in periods without releases. Surely you must agree that this is an improvement of the health of the console in the market?

Its an improvement, its not good. And talking about things "relatively" leads me too...

I wasn't comparing it to the WiiU , but some of your comments are a little confusing. Firstly, is it fair to compare the PS4 year to date sales to the WiiUs compared with last years numbers? The PS4 launched last year (around 320k if I remember correctly) so the PS4 has had to catch this up whilst the WiiU has not. Also you state that PS4 and WiiU have sold comparably this year, but the PS4 is sitting at 615k and the Wiiu at 300k? Finally, are you saying that Splatoon has not given the WiiU a hardware boost?

The point here was that I could say: "Well, relatively look at how WiiU is doing! Its flat YoY without entering its strongest season and without Mario Kart!" and with how bad the bundling was last year, the WiiU could well end up up YoY. Its still a dead console.

Yes, the PS4 has overcome, for the most part, its launch bolstered numbers with a slightly higher baseline this year, thanks in part to a much stronger software line-up... just as the WiiU has overcome its strongest software.

Spoiler

Software sales are still terrible for the system.

But neither is doing well. The WiiU is doing worse, obviously, but week to week the two systems are trading mean looks from inside same hole in the ground.