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Forums - Sales Discussion - Ubisoft to "refocus" on PS3/360 in 2010

It's good if people have forgotten Red Steel 1, as it left a foul taste in many people's mouths. The best thing about Red Steel 2 is that it looks nothing like Red Steel.



A game I'm developing with some friends:

www.xnagg.com/zombieasteroids/publish.htm

It is largely a technical exercise but feedback is appreciated.

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A NSMB Wii 2 wouldn't cut the other one sales. Actually the opposite happened to NSMB DS. And SMB1, 2, 3 and 4 keep selling on the virtual console.



Above: still the best game of the year.

DnE said:

And the list of Ubisoft 2009 Wii titles:

04th Dec 09 - (0.00m) : Sleepover Party
01st Dec 09 - (0.19m) : James Cameron's Avatar: The Game
24th Nov 09 - (0.01m) : Cook Wars
24th Nov 09 - (0.28m) : Your Shape featuring Jenny McCarthy
17th Nov 09 - (0.64m) : Just Dance
10th Nov 09 - (0.03m) : Team Elimination Games
08th Nov 09 - (0.08m) : Shaun White Snowboarding: World Stage
06th Nov 09 - (0.00m) : Knockout Party
03rd Nov 09 - (0.02m) : Academy of Champions: Soccer
03rd Nov 09 - (0.58m) : Rabbids Go Home
27th Oct 09 - (0.10m) : CSI: Deadly Intent
27th Oct 09 - (0.05m) : Monster 4x4: Stunt Racer
27th Oct 09 - (0.18m) : Press Your Luck 2010 Edition
29th Sep 09 - (0.27m) : Family Feud 2010
22nd Sep 09 - (0.18m) : Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Smash-Up
22nd Sep 09 - (0.08m) : The Price Is Right 2010 Edition
22nd Sep 09 - (0.10m) : Where's Waldo? The Fantastic Journey
15th Sep 09 - (0.05m) : Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs
17th Jul 09 - (0.21m) : Gold's Gym: Cardio Workout (Others sales)
03rd Jul 09 - (0.14m) : Summer Sports 2: Island Sports Party
23rd Jun 09 - (0.06m) : Dawn of Discovery
27th Mar 09 - (0.00m) : World Sports Party
25th Mar 09 - (0.55m) : Gold's Gym: Cardio Workout
24th Mar 09 - (0.15m) : Broken Sword: Shadows of the Templars - The Director's Cut
19th Mar 09 - (0.00m) : No More Heroes / Red Steel
10th Mar 09 - (0.05m) : Vacation Sports
04th Mar 09 - (0.04m) : Grey's Anatomy: The Video Game
03rd Mar 09 - (0.15m) : Six Flags Fun Park
05th Feb 09 - (0.12m) : Tenchu: Shadow Assassins

03rd Feb 09 - (0.12m) : Imagine: Fashion Party

 

 

"Imagine: Fashion Party"? Thats creative genius lmao. Looks like Ubi and capcom have different approaches to the wii.



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It has probably been said elsewhere: Ubi - if you flood the market with trite crap, what did you expect? People tend to get savvy when they are burnt by poor product. Also how many pet / baby / fashion games can you shovel down peoples necks?
A lot of publishers say that the DS and Wii market has collapsed and are pulling back... This is nonsense.
You can develop Ninty quality on Wii games if you publishers do the following:
a.) Invest in more original / innovative IP that actually plays to the Wii/DS strengths.
b.) Pay a dev co a decent amount to develop a game. (Dev budgets are usually pitiful, esp. on DS)
c.) Give them enough time develop it and make it quality.
d.) Actually market it with a decent budget and stick it on TV. Don’t rely on conventional games sites and mags to get through to Wii/Ds owners. Don’t leave it to die and then bemoan the fact it didn’t sell.
e.) Don’t have crap box art. What is it with shite Wii box art?
If you don’t understand the market and can’t make a profit from an install base of 124m and 65m respectively, then sack your marketing people.
For their part, Nintendo could certainly be a hell of a lot more helpful with the submission process.

Retail can do their part by not filling the shelves with utter crap, and be more selective.
PS: People, please get it right when talking about devs. It’s usually the publisher that pushes this shite on poor dev co’s. Not the other way around. Dev’s generally have a pretty good idea about what’s going on. (Unless they have crap management that have their own bonkers ideas.) Trying to convince a publisher otherwise is difficult, and they need the work, so have to bend over and take what they can get.



Ubi Soft and other third parties really have no one to blame but themselves.

They also should cut back on Wii titles -- but make better Wii projects. Instead of 10-12 garbage games with maybe 1 half-decent game in the bunch, make 3-4 Wii games, but make them really good and put some actual marketing behind a couple of them.

Red Steel 2 looks good ... but this is coming what? 3+ years after the first one. Talk about missing the bus.



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Good for Ubisoft. Hopefully they garner better sales



 who cares ubisoft is responsible for at least 60% of wii shovelware this is a good thing.



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theRepublic said:
killeryoshis said:
NJ5 said:
Let's see how well this works out for them in the next gen, if Nintendo dominates again...

Think about all the Wii-only owners and how they'll be getting no exposure at all to Ubisoft's franchises.


If nintendo dominates again. All of the publishers are scwered. Also do we need exposure to their franchhises anyway?

It's not that we need exposure to their franchises, it's that they need exposure for their franchises.

It is actually one of my pet theories as to why third parties have struggled so much on Nintendo consoles.  Starting with the N64, third parties have left many of their biggest, most important franchises off of Nintendo consoles.  Therefore, people who play mostly on Nintendo consoles will have zero loyalty to those franchises, and zero loyalty to those companies.  Then, when something doesn't perform on the same level as on other consoles, they complain.  The difference is that on those other consoles they have spent years and years and years building a fanbase, and just expect one to pop out of thin air on Nintendo consoles.

(Contrast that with Nintendo, who has built a fanbase that will buy games almost without question.  They trust Nintendo to deliver great games over and over again.)

So now, with the Nintendo the winner, third parties are in trouble because the audience is not familiar with them.  They have to win their trust from scratch (and so far, have been doing a terrible job at that).  On the other hand, if third parties had given themselves more exposure on Nintendo consoles over the past two generations, I think they would be having a much easier time finding an audience right now.

Granted, this theory is only meant to be one piece of the puzzle, and not the entire reason as to why third parties struggle with Nintendo consoles.

This actually makes a lot of sense.



trestres said:
theRepublic said:
killeryoshis said:
NJ5 said:
Let's see how well this works out for them in the next gen, if Nintendo dominates again...

Think about all the Wii-only owners and how they'll be getting no exposure at all to Ubisoft's franchises.


If nintendo dominates again. All of the publishers are scwered. Also do we need exposure to their franchhises anyway?

It's not that we need exposure to their franchises, it's that they need exposure for their franchises.

It is actually one of my pet theories as to why third parties have struggled so much on Nintendo consoles.  Starting with the N64, third parties have left many of their biggest, most important franchises off of Nintendo consoles.  Therefore, people who play mostly on Nintendo consoles will have zero loyalty to those franchises, and zero loyalty to those companies.  Then, when something doesn't perform on the same level as on other consoles, they complain.  The difference is that on those other consoles they have spent years and years and years building a fanbase, and just expect one to pop out of thin air on Nintendo consoles.

(Contrast that with Nintendo, who has built a fanbase that will buy games almost without question.  They trust Nintendo to deliver great games over and over again.)

So now, with the Nintendo the winner, third parties are in trouble because the audience is not familiar with them.  They have to win their trust from scratch (and so far, have been doing a terrible job at that).  On the other hand, if third parties had given themselves more exposure on Nintendo consoles over the past two generations, I think they would be having a much easier time finding an audience right now.

Granted, this theory is only meant to be one piece of the puzzle, and not the entire reason as to why third parties struggle with Nintendo consoles.

Great post and it makes a lot of sense. Really, when we compare the amount of big IP's the biggest 3rd parties put into each console, it's ridiculous to say Wii games don't sell, since there aren't any notable ones. Most of the old and new IP's are appearing on the HD consoles ONLY.

Taken from my post on the other thread about this subject, look, compare the amount of games the biggest 3rd party publishers are putting into each console:

Capcom is releasing Tatsunoko vs. Capcom in about 2 weeks, after that it is only bringing Sengoku Basara 3 in the future for the Wii, but they are giving the PS3 the superior version of the game with online play and HD graphics. Nothing else from them.
For the HD's they have Dark Void, Lost Planet 2, Dead Rising 2, Resident Evil 5 Gold Edition and Super Street Fighter 4.

Konami has put Silent Hill: SM for the Wii recently, but what else do they have coming up? More dance dance revolution? Late entries of their Pro Evolution series? Arcade ports? Walk it out?
Meanwhile they are giving the HD consoles Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, Metal Gear Solid Rising, Pro Evoution (on time).

Namco Bandai, well, they have nothing coming up for the Wii.
For the HD's they have Dead to Rights: Retribution, Enslaved, Splatterhouse, Clash of the Titans.

Square Enix, well they have DQX coming up for the Wii but besides that they have NOTHING and have announced nothing since 2008, yes it is their biggest game, but they have absolutely nothing else for the Wii, which is strange considering they are giving it their biggest game.
For the HD's they have FFvsXIII, FFXIV, Nier Replicant, Nier Gestalt, Star Ocean 4 International, Front Mission Evolved, Supreme Commander 2, Just Cause 2, Kane & Lynch 2, Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, Deus Ex 3, Highlander, Arkaham Asylum 2.

EA has NBA Jam coming out for the Wii as an exclusive, but what else? The yearly iterations of their sports games, which are all inferior save for TigerWoods PGA Tour (which they might ditch thanks to his problems).
Meanwhile they will give the HD consoles American McGee Alice II, Dead Space 2, Dante's Inferno, Dragon Age Origins: Awakening, Mass Effect 2, LMNO, Medal of Honour Modern Combat (or whatever), Rage, Skate 3, Battlefield Bad Company 2, Crysis 2, EA Sports MMA, and many Sports games exclusive to the HD's.

Sega has Super Monkey Ball: Step & Roll coming up for the Wii, and what else? Sonic All star Racing (on the HD's too). Nothing else.
For the HD's they are brining Alien vs. Predator, Alien: Colonial Marines, Alpha Protocol, Resonance of Fate and Armored Core 5.

Activision, besides their multiplatform music and peripheral games like DJ Hero or Tony Hawk's Ride, the only notable game they have coming up for the Wii is CoD 7, which will be inferior to their HD counterparts, like all of the previous CoD have been.
For the HD's on the other hand they have Blur, Gun 2, Singularity, True Crime.

Ubisoft has Red Steel 2 and NMH2 coming up, but after these, what else have they got? Their recent statements make it clear that not much, if anything notable will come out from their studios for the Wii. More Raving Rabbids milking? Just Dance 2? A movie tie in Prince of Persia game?
The HD's will have Splinter Cell, Beyond Good & Evil 2, I Am Alive, R.U.S.E., Ghost Recon Predator.


With support like this, it's obvious that 3rd parties will never succeed on the Wii.

Holy crap that is really, really depressing when looking at all those publisher releases side by side.



Yes, and people actually believe Wii is getting good support this year. The amount of games coming out for the HD's is really overwhelming, no wonder why Wii fans cry when there's a 1st party game drought. Third parties are pathetic.

For the Wii it's a case of "Buy the only decent game we will release this year or forget about good support FOREVER!", meanwhile, these lousy and disgusting companies keep on releasing all their big guns on the HD consoles and flooding the Wii with garbage. I think their own garbage is killing the sales of their decent games, people just won't buy games from shovelware devs anymore. Plus the games they release on the Wii are nowhere as close to the ones they release on the HD consoles in terms of quality and budget. If the only game they release flops they blame the audience and just use that as an excuse for their incompetence.

HD owners have a lot to choose from, and they know 3rd parties have to make a great job for them to buy the game, meanwhile these companies keeping releasing turds and then in between a half decent game expecting it to shatter all records even when people know it will probably be terrible shovelware like most of the games the games they had released before. They shot themselves on their feet and are now blaming Nintendo and Wii owners for their lack of vision and terrible decisions. Good job.



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