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[mayham2199]

Expensive DLC isn't a thing for a reason. The industry tried it. It doesn't work.

When you say doesn't work what do you mean by that exactly? It has 8+ rating on metacritic and steam (user reviews) and it also sold 8+ million copies. What would it need to have done to "work" exactly because it performed better than most standalone SP games.

 

[nial]

Then why the hell did they do it? Just testing the waters with launching a AAA game early into PS Plus? I don’t have a business degree and even I could have told them it was an idiotic move that would cost them.

It wasn't exactly testing the waters as it was experimenting to see *how much* a heavy hitter can be affected by being introduced to a subscription service a year later.
It's not like Sony didn't know that would happen, and remember that they're like, one of the few companies out there that can actually afford to do stuff like this just for the sake of business data.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

When you say doesn't work what do you mean by that exactly? It has 8+ rating on metacritic and steam (user reviews) and it also sold 8+ million copies. What would it need to have done to "work" exactly because it performed better than most standalone SP games.

It's really hard to sell "more of the same" (aka story DLC) to an audience that only had a 35% completion rate.

Most people think "Maybe I'll buy Forbidden West once I complete Zero Dawn". You NEVER want your audience thinking that way. They nibble at the hook around launch week / month and then most never buy after that.

 

[Iced Arcade]

I loved the game BUT it takes a good bit to get good. I feel like it dragged until I got a sunwing.

 

[Fbh]

What's frustrating about Horizon is that you can see the potential for something better.
The presentation is great (I still think it's by far the best looking game this gen in terms of scale + visuals + performance), the core mechanics are competent and the whole concept of the world with the animal mechs is awesome.

But then you play it and it's just a generic Ubisoft style open world, with a dogshit story with one of the most unlikeable character in any ongoing AAA franchise right now, and combat that IMO is fun but not good enough to carry the entire experience.

 

[mayham2199]

It's really hard to sell "more of the same" (aka story DLC) to an audience that only had a 35% completion rate.

Most people think "Maybe I'll buy Forbidden West once I complete Zero Dawn". You NEVER want your audience thinking that way. They nibble at the hook around launch week / month and then most never buy after that.

Ok I can agree with all that but 8+ million in sales and 8+ rating. I think we can agree that can't be ignored either right? Most companies would love for their games to sell 8+ million on PS only. This doesn't even get into the PC sales which wont be astronomical or anything but will also bring in even more sales. Especially since it was also rated very well on Steam almost reaching 90% (89%).

 

[ArtHands]

Can’t say I am shock. Data suggest that spending on current gen console is less than PC, after all

 

[Zacfoldor]

Can’t say I am shock. Data suggest that spending on current gen console is less than PC, after all

Does that take into account the cost of the 2000 dollar graphics card itself, or is that just software?

 

[simpatico]

Sony gamers don't want Alloy crammed down their throats as the new Nathan Drake. It's a ridiculous concept that would have been fine as a first party side dish one-off, but face of the brand? Good luck Herm.

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

Horizon has sold very well, but IMO the potential is limited as long as it's focused on Aloy, the same as Star Wars with Rey. If they created great stories with tribe wars, factions, and expand the lore, the IP could last long, but Aloy is not Lara Croft so her arc should be wrapped up with one more game.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Ok I can agree with all that but 8+ million in sales and 8+ rating. I think we can agree that can't be ignored either right? Most companies would love for their games to sell 8+ million on PS only. This doesn't even get into the PC sales which wont be astronomical or anything but will also bring in even more sales. Especially since it was also rated very well on Steam almost reaching 90% (89%).

Yeah, Forbidden West wasn't a flop. It was a successful title, it just didn't do as well as Yoshida expected / hoped. In football, there is something called a 5 yard run...it's pretty good.

I just think companies have to do After Action Reports on all their titles and attempt to understand what prevented their games from seeing bigger success.

 

[Sharius]

If sony keep their woke character design, i won't buy any of their 1st party game, only play it when it come in ps plus, if it's not then i am fine to skip it, include god of war ragnarok, spiderman 2 and upcoming ghost

 

[Tiago Rodrigues]

GAF gets excited way too easily.

Adding First-Party Games to PS Plus Negatively Impacts Sales, Sony Data Confirms - PlayStation LifeStyle

The recent Insomniac Games hack has revealed that sales of Sony's first-party exclusives are negatively impacted by PS Plus.

www.playstationlifestyle.net

Basically, Sony "sacrificed" HFW's sales in order to get data on how PS Plus can affect the sales of first-party titles.
The most hilarious thing here is people acting as if the game only sold 3M units or something.

Japan Studio (without the 's', enough of that mistake) was reorganized in favor of the creation of a new, different Japanese studio, Team Asobi.

Exactly...this is what i remember as well...

But people want this IP to flop so badly now

 

[Kurimao]

Fix Alloy she`s fat and a motormouth. Make here attractive as Eve.

 

[Saber]

Which examples are we talking about? If they didn't have a teathrical release, they don't count, btw.

Didn't Turning Red had a theathrical release? Also some Marvel movies like The Marvels I remember going to streaming not that long, or maybe I misremembered.

 

[nial]

Didn't Turning Red had a theathrical release? Also some Marvel movies like The Marvels I remember going to streaming not that long, or maybe I misremembered.

Turning Red was back when they released ALL their theatrical films day one on Disney Plus due to the pandemic, and The Marvels got there 3 months later like every other Disney movie does.

 

[JackedTortoise09]

Of course, the inclusion into PS+ hurt sales, but it doesn't change the fact that even without it Horizon Forbidden West was disappointing sales-wise. It was only doing marginally better than Horizon Zero Dawn, which is not what you want with sequels, they're supposed to grow. To quote Shuhei, "I was hoping the second game would do even better in terms of sales". Even better than the first game.

Horizon Zero Dawn: 47 million budget, only on PS4 (about 55-60 million units at the time)
Horizon Forbidden West: 212 million dollar budget, on PS4 and PS5 (about 135 million units at the time)

And HFW was essentially selling the same as HZD by year one. You can clearly see the return of investment would have been disappointing.

 

[Hawk The Slayer]

Series was always overrated with a very boring and uninteresting character.

 

[reezoo]

Horizon is an amazing technical showcase to see but a dreadfully dull game to play.

With a depth in combat and engaging side quests it can become really good,

 

[Heimdall_Xtreme]

"As of April 16, 2023, the Horizon franchise has sold through more than 32.7 million units worldwide, of which Horizon Forbidden West has sold through over 8.4 million units." https://blog.playstation.com/2023/0...-story-of-a-playstation-studio/?sf266576029=1

Call me a Hermen d*** sucking Fanboy, but it's still an impressive number.
Sure, let's say that Horizon Call of the Mountain sold 1 million at the time, are the rest of the 32,7 million units Zero Dawn.
But still impressive numbers for Forbidden West.
Especially because it was in the PS Plus library since february 2023 till september 2024.

Horizon Call of the Mountain is a piece of shit.

I have it on PS vr2 and I didn't even finish it.

 

[JimmyRustler]

The game drained me like not other. Stopped playing for around two months after getting the plat.

Loved the first one but part 2 was just way too bloated and the writing was horrible.

 

[Insanemaelstrom]

Makes sense. Forbidden west sales and momentum was killed by Sony releasing it on ps plus extra as soon as they did. Sony even mentioned that in their financials or something if I remember correctly( also the reason why Sony isn't keen on releasing first party games sooner than 2-3 years on ps plus)

 

[Nickolaidas]

 

[SkylineRKR]

It was quite obvious. Forbidden West didn't light the charts up and I think Sony didn't disclose any numbers at first. I never bought it for some reason. I liked the original, and I was hyped for FW but I guess I lost interest once it launched. It was also sort of released in the same time frame as GT7, which I bought.

The 5 hour trial was fun, but around this point I stopped caring about these open world AAA games.

 

[FeralEcho]

Herman hears ya, Herman doesn't care.

He's busy playing with his Aloy toys.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

He's busy playing with his Aloy toys.

Is this the same problem Square Enix had with Lightning

Lightning was someone's waifu at SE so they made 3 games with her and each time they sold worse and worse

 

[Three]

"The game was bigger and great, but I don't think the second one did as many units as the first one"

When has this ever happened Shu?
Why was he expecting 2 to sell more than 1? No matter how big and great the game is, sequels very rarely do better than the 1st.

 

[FeralEcho]

Is this the same problem Square Enix had with Lightning

Lightning was someone's waifu at SE so they made 3 games with her and each time they sold worse and worse

Yeah Toriyama At this point he's probably his idol.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Didn't they stop releasing games on PS Plus 1 year after release because this was a test subject that clearly failed?
They even had some graphics that showed the game was selling well (better than the first i think) and then PS Plus release cut its legs completely.

Might be wrong though.

You are100% correct. I remember that too.

 

[Inanilmaz]

Thank God!

 

[DenchDeckard]

"The game was bigger and great, but I don't think the second one did as many units as the first one"

When has this ever happened Shu?
Why was he expecting 2 to sell more than 1? No matter how big and great the game is, sequels very rarely do better than the 1st.

Back when I feel console gaming was really great. Games like halo 2. Gears of war 2.

You know, big tent pole industry hyped games. The sequels destroyed the original in sales.

You should be growing fanbases with really exciting good products.

Horizon is the perfect example of a franchise that is forced down our throats. All the reviews and media tell us it's a great game. But, in reality it has very little in the way of original game design and can't actually fool the larger audience. It's not an incredible game. It's not a industry defining game. Sony want it to be, and does everything to convince us of their magic trick, but ultimately they can't fool the crowd because it lacks soul.

Horizon is an ok to good game but far from the masterpiece that people used to say about it. That word got worn out when talking about games and I personally feel we are left with decent games that get too much hype for their own game.

I platinumed the first game...I enjoyed it. It was fine but I was completely done with the entire franchise by the second.

Sony has so many better games.

 

[lh032]

Im one of the PS fanboys that doesnt believe this franchise.
I knew the sequel is going to sell less.

The dinobot popularity theme has passed long ago.

 

[Three]

Back when I feel console gaming was really great. Games like halo 2. Gears of war 2.

You know, big tent pole industry hyped games. The sequels destroyed the original in sales.

You should be growing fanbases with really exciting good products.

Horizon is the perfect example of a franchise that is forced down our throats. All the reviews and media tell us it's a great game. But, in reality it has very little in the way of original game design and can't actually fool the larger audience. It's not an incredible game. It's not a industry defining game. Sony want it to be, and does everything to convince us of their magic trick, but ultimately they can't fool the crowd because it lacks soul.

Horizon is an ok to good game but far from the masterpiece that people used to say about it. That word got worn out when talking about games and I personally feel we are left with decent games that get too much hype for their own game.

I platinumed the first game...I enjoyed it. It was fine but I was completely done with the entire franchise by the second.

Sony has so many better games.

Gears of war 1 vs 2 was on the same gen 2 years apart. With a much better install base by the third year and a growing gears audience. You could do this for older PS3/360 games back then like Uncharted 2 but this does not happen anymore. As Shu says HFW was a great game but this rarely if ever happens anymore and Shu should have known. Especially with declining game sales in general and the growth of f2p/GaaS and longer dev cycles.

 

[clarky]

"The game was bigger and great, but I don't think the second one did as many units as the first one"

When has this ever happened Shu?
Why was he expecting 2 to sell more than 1? No matter how big and great the game is, sequels very rarely do better than the 1st.

Without looking it up, surely there's loads of sequels that do more than the first game in a franchise?

Fake edit. Yeah, half of the best selling games of all time are sequels.

 

[Three]

Without looking it up, surely there's loads of sequels that do more than the first game in a franchise?

Fake edit. Yeah half of the best selling games of all time are sequels.

Not in this day and age of games. I disagree.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Gears of war 1 vs 2 was on the same gen 2 years apart. With a much better install base by the third year and a growing gears audience. You could do this for older PS3/360 games back then like Uncharted 2 but this does not happen anymore. As Shu says HFW was a great game but this rarely if ever happens anymore and Shu should have known. Especially with declining game sales in general and the growth of f2p/GaaS and longer dev cycles.

HFW released on ps4 and ps5 so I don't understand your point. It had all the increased ps4 fan base and ps5. The ps4 being far more popular than Xbox and 360.

I'm just trying to say that Sony fails to grow their franchises with the second installment. Every single one of them gets hype from media and Sony fans but the reality is their ips are in decline not growth.

Do you think ghost of yotei will be as big as tsushima. I don't think so if we look at past data.

Spider man 2. Less than spider man.
Horizon fw. Less than zero dawn.
Gow ragnorak Less than gow 2018.
Last of us 2 Less than lou

Somethings is not adding up

 

[TheKratos]

Great game. Best graphics on console, good gameplay, great beast design, story fun enough but nothing amazing. I give it a solid 8/10.

Maybe making Aloy even uglier hurt the sales if it sold worse than the original.

 

[Certinty]

Can’t say i’m surprised.

First game was so incredibly boring. Just forced myself at one point to run through the story.

Thought the second would be better. An hour or two in it was the same thing, pretty but dull. Instantly gave up on it.

Never seen a game and franchise which is clearly not huge constantly pushed to fans as if it is.

 

[Three]

HFW released on ps4 and ps5 so I don't understand your point. It had all the increased ps4 fan base and ps5. The ps4 being far more popular than Xbox and 360.

With a 5 year gap between them and PS4 users switching to PS5. The reason is because people move on with the longer dev times and hype dies down and the market isn't the same anymore either in half a decade the landscape has very much changed to one of declining game sales and a rise in f2p/gaas, microtransactions and subs.

I'm just trying to say that Sony fails to grow their franchises with the second installment. Every single one of them gets hype from media and Sony fans but the reality is their ips are in decline not growth.

Do you think ghost of yotei will be as big as tsushima. I don't think so if we look at past data.

Spider man 2. Less than spider man.
Horizon fw. Less than zero dawn.
Gow ragnorak Less than gow 2018.
Last of us 2 Less than lou

Somethings is not adding up

Except if you go back to the PS3 gen you're referring to you have Uncharted 2, you have Killzone 2, you have LBP2, Resistance 2.
The point is that the game industry isn't the same anymore so what happened during that 360/PS3 gen no longer applies. Name a sequel from MS or anyone really that did better than its first in sales this gen. You probably can't. Did Alan wake 2 for example on far more platforms? Nope. Did Halo? Did Gears? You would struggle to find any really. Even TotK did worse than BoTW (even outselling it recently) yet you don't hear anything about it.

 

[Warablo]

The best part of the 1st game was uncovering the mystery of the world that you're in, I don't see that being part of the 2nd.

 

[MMaRsu]

It came out a week before Elden Ring.

What the fuck did they expect????????????????????????????????????????

Sony Management be like

 

[Goalus]

Remaster it now!

 

[Sintoid]

Avad was the bigger candidate, in the first game you literally have a dialogue choice to tell him that you want to pass more time with him after fixing the planet, varl wasn't even close to get a line like that.

Pretty sure aloy is bi more than full lesbian.

There's the same choice in the beginning of the second one, before leaving for the Forbidden West

 

[xenosys]

I've never really got the hype around the Horizon franchise and felt a lot of the promo by Sony following the first game was very forced. They've been absolutely desperate to shove her into as many IPs and ads as possible to make Aloy happen as a console mascot and it doesn't feel very organic at all.

Don't get me wrong, Zero Dawn was a pretty good game and a great looking game, but Sony trying to continually trying to push Aloy as a generational PS mascot like Cloud, Lara Croft and Crash were back in the PS1 days, and Kratos nowadays is just very transparent and forced.

 

[Xtib81]

The story of the first game was much more compelling. Also, for some reason I don't like exploring in the horizon games while it's something I love to do in other games.
Plus, the first game had that new concept to carry it. Fighting robo dinos is quite cool but it became too tedious in FW.

 

[xrnzaaas]

The first Horizon was a cool and refreshing experience, but I don't think there was room for having a sequel that plays VERY much the same. Maybe they should've waited longer to come up with better ideas or changed things up like offer a new protagonist or co-protagonists.

 

[Sintoid]

I don't understand complains about Zero Dawn and Forbidden West's Story. Premise is an original take about man vs machine conflict, there is a deep lore and a lot of elements of the future events that will be told in Forbidden West are already told in Zero Dawn.

Surely is a lot deeper than the previous work Killzone (wich was actually good) that everybody now is praising like gold...

 

[TheGodfather07]

Should have never trusted hermen, the moment he had his PS5 set up upside down! The guys a clown.

 

[Grizzled Ghost]

Name a sequel from MS or anyone really that did better than its first in sales this gen. You probably can't.

Helldivers 2, Baldur's Gate 3, Doom Eternal, Elden Ring, many others I'm sure. Especially if you only look at first few month's sales.

 

[Three]

Helldivers 2, Baldur's Gate 3, Doom Eternal, Elden Ring, many others I'm sure. Especially if you only look at first few month's sales.

Elden Ring isn't a sequel. Helldivers 2 is a GaaS/live service game and so doesn't really go against what I'm saying. Doom Eternal I don't know if it sold more than other Dooms. Baldur's Gate 3 is a good example.