Let's talk about Microsoft's shooters.

[blue-lady]

Onyxmeth said:

blue-lady said:

Onyxmeth said:

blue-lady said:

I have alluded to this in thread's before, but it strikes me that for the first time Microsoft will not have a large, decisive shooter out for the Christmas period based on the information available to us.

So far the console's life has looked like this:

-2005: Perfect Dark Zero

-2006: Gears of War

-2007: Halo 3

-2008: Gears of War 2

But in 2009, the only shooter who's existence we are aware of is the Halo 3 expansion ODST.  As great as I'm sure this new single-player campaign will be, it is extremely unlikely to develop the sort of system-selling and promoting hype the other shooters have.

So what, if anything, do you believe Microsoft has planned?

Do you perhaps believe they feel the shooter market is saturated and that they can make do with ODST and multiplatform shooters?

Or do you feel that they have a large shooter planned?  Perhaps a true Perfect Dark sequel?

So you don't think Halo 3 ODST is going to outsell the 1.47 million Perfect Dark Zero sold? You seem to be ok with calling PDZ a "large, decisive shooter" so you must feel ODST will perform worse, correct?

I can't get on that boat buddy. Halo 3 ODST will be 3 million bare minimum, which is double the sales of PDZ. I will guarantee you it performs better critically also, which leaves you with no further leg to stand on argumentively if you agree with my two assumptions.

Also isn't Halo 3 ODST a standalone expansion?

You're missing the point.  Of course Halo ODST will outsell PDZ, I also agree it is likely to do better critically.  But it is an expansion title at a budget price.  It simply on its own doesnt offer the console definition that we have seen the previous four holidays.

I am not for a moment suggesting that the Xbox 360 will flounder if another large exclusive shooter isn't announced.  Once you look past the Killzone 2 hype currently dominating the boards, the Xbox 360 easily matches the PS3 in terms of this year's line-up.

I'm merely wondering if Microsoft mightn't like another shooter in their repertoir this holiday season to match previous efforts.

 

I didn't miss your point at all. I merely called you out on how incorrect it was. Perfect Dark Zero was never a big shooter, it was merely the biggest they had at the time. That doesn't make it in the same league as the Gears and Halo games, and my point was that if you considered PDZ in that league then surely ODST will match and then suprass it. If you had simply acknowledged they had no decisive shooter that first year, then I never would have answered the question the way I did. Don't blame me. Blame yourself for having such a weak link in your argument.

If you're wondering whether Microsoft mightn't like another shooter in their repertoir this holiday season to match previous efforts, you should probably just ask Microsoft, since nobody here I know of can answer that question. If I had to venture a guess though, I'm sure Microsoft would like another shooter this holiday season, and probably a big game in every other major genre too, since it would all mean more money probably.

 

I think it's quite clearly relative.  PDZ was a launch title, in much the same way Resistance was.  Without bundling and launch status neither would have sold or been acclaimed as they did and were.

Launched today, they would be the epitomy of mediocre, but at the time PDZ was a follow up to one of the greatest shooters of all time and the only shooter out on the Xbox 360 save for Cod2.

So whilst it may simply have been the biggest shooter they had at the time, it was nonetheless a distinctive, flagship shooter.

Gears 2 was different enough and a new enough game to be distinguished in the publics eye from the first Gears.  Do you honestly see any substantive number of people looking to buy a shooter this holiday being swayed by ODST though if they weren't by Halo 3?

As for the last paragraph?  If I had a mechanism by which to ask Microsoft about this years lineup and expect an honest answer clearly I would utilise it.  In the meantime, the purpose of these boards is discussion.  This is a perfectly reasonable topic to discuss.  Microsoft may well have decided that a blend of Bioshock 2, ODST and Mass Effect 2 is preferable this year to having a single distinctive and defining shooter.  If you beleive that, simply say so.  But dont attempt to invalidate a thread simply because you dont think PDZ measures up too Gears or Halo.  At the time, it was a hyped game.