| sieanr said: sianr, you can't use ratio of userbase to figure out the sales, GT5 i think will sell at least 6 million lifetime, max 10 million, probably 7-8 million. I know this, and that wasn't my point anyway. Plenty of people go on and on about how GT5/FF/MGS will put the PS3 in the lead since every PS2 owner will just have to have a PS3 then. Yet these titles sold to a relativly small part of the PS2 userbase, meaning that those titles werent important to most PS2 owners - thus the PS2 was sucessful not because of GT/FF/MGS, but because of lesser titles. I really think most people are biased in their view that (insert "hardcore" game here) is what "gamers" play. They seem to forget that those titles are sold to a comparitivly small part of the market, and those "kiddie" games and "casual" games combined with some major titles are what reallt sell consoles. What I'm getting at is some big names plus a very diverse library is what propells a system to success, not a couple big franchises. Hence the "PS3 will need more than GT" comment. |
I think this is a good point and I think there are a couple other important details ...
Just because someone bought Metal Gear Solid 2, Final Fantasy X or Gran Turismo 3 on the PS2 doesn't mean that they're a die-hard fan of the series and willing to pay any price to play the next installment of the series. Many (possibly most) of the people who bought these games because they were really good games in a genre they liked on a platform they owned (or were already interested in).
Even if you look at the small group of people who were willing to buy a PS2 for Metal Gear Solid 2, Final Fantasy X or Gran Turismo 3 there is nothing that says that these people will buy a PS3 for the sequel to these games; buying a $150 to $300 console to play 1 game is quite a bit different than buying a $400/$500 console to play 1 game. When these games were released they were in a class of their own, splinter cell didn't exist so there was really no competition to Metal Gear, Final Fantasy's competition were mostly low budget clones, and there wasn't many high quality racing games to compete against Gran Turismo; certainly, these games are still at the head of their class but they're no where nearly as distinct as they once were.
