Japan First Day Sales 12/10 (Tales of Graces and other games)

[mrstickball]

Majin-Tenshinhan said:

mrstickball said:

Majin-Tenshinhan said:

mrstickball said:

patjuan32 said:

mrstickball said:
Great for Modern Warfare 2, personally disappointing for Tales of Graces. Its a mainline Tales game, yet will not be anywhere close to Vesperia (X360+PS3)

Actually the game sold very well considering the competition that it has to face, New Super Mario Bros. and Final Fantasy XIII. Just the fact that it is on the same console as New Super Mario Bros. and still managed to sell in line with the other main Tales games is a plus. This means its probably going to sell very well.

So games can't sell well when there are any other major games coming out? I don't think that is good logic at all.

Which mainline Tales did it sell near? Vesperia on the worst selling console this gen?

Why do you think every single game except NSMBWii and Assassin's Creed II got delayed to Q1 2010? Because of Modern Warfare 2. We all know it. Don't try and deny it. Sure, a few probably got delayed for extra dev time or whatever, but most were afraid of getting eaten alive. Which they most likely would have.

Also, it's way too early to tell if it sold near mainline Tales-games or not because these are first day sales.

What about Left 4 Dead, Dragon Age, and about a dozen other games that launched this quarter? I'd argue that games moved to Q1 and Q2 of 2010 not because of Modern Warfare but rather because of how bad some titles did in 2008 despite no behemoth in competition. Furthermore, we're talking about Japan here, and not North America or Europe.

Do you realize how well first day sales for RPGs go to predict the long tail of the title? This isn't a new IP we're talking about, but a mainline game in a very established series. Because of that, we can easily project sales for Tales of Graces using DOTNW and multiple other Tales games.

The simple fact is this: Tales of Graces did not reach Vesperia on PS3, nor Dawn of the New World on first day, nor any older Tales game. Tales games are usually frontloaded and cater to a specific user base. Because of these known facts it is very reasonable to make the assumption that this Tales game will struggle to reach 300,000 in Japan (low for a Tales game), and may be closer to 250,000 when everything is said and done.

 

But there are way too many things you are just flat-out ignoring. It's the holiday season, which means lower openings and longer legs. It's still positioned right between NSMBWii and FF13 - And don't try telling me that that doesn't affect sales performance, because that's just ludicrous. It's still first day sales. Even if it's first week sales it's way too easy to be calling bomb, but hell, if you'd wait that long at least I wouldn't complain as much. And, of course, the biggest one of them all - We still have no idea if the hardware bundles are counted in this number or not. No idea. Whatsoever.

Lets go over this:

But there are way too many things you are just flat-out ignoring. It's the holiday season, which means lower openings and longer legs.

Not for every game. Some of the most front loaded games came out during the holiday season in Japan such as Dragon Quest VII, Kingdom Hearts 2 (which was notoriously frontloaded, despite debuting in December), Metal Gear Solid 3, Tales of Destiny 2 (nearly same release date, did 65% of business on first week). Some games during the holiday do have good legs, but they are not RPGs.

It's still positioned right between NSMBWii and FF13 - And don't try telling me that that doesn't affect sales performance, because that's just ludicrous.

So a game on another system, and a game from another genre are to adversely effect sales performance? I could make the exact opposite argument and say that since NSMB:Wii moved 100,000 hardware units that ToG should be selling better with a nice influx of new users.

It's still first day sales. Even if it's first week sales it's way too easy to be calling bomb, but hell, if you'd wait that long at least I wouldn't complain as much

I never called it a bomb. I called it a dissapointment. Furthermore, as I stated, this is an RPG in a very known series. Almost every Tales game for DS, PSP, Wii, X360, PS3, PS2 and your grandmothers rocking chair perform the same. Of the DOZEN Tales games that have released in NOVEMBER OR DECEMBER, NONE. And I repeat NONE have had better than 60% of their LTD value sell outside of opening week. The best were the DS Tales games which debuted at 100,000 units first week (which one could argue better sales since the LTD value was still under 250,000). That should be compelling evidence against Tales of Graces. Argue whatever you want, but we have 10 years of sales data to look at to compare notes on for Tales games. That is hell or highwater for other major games that should have stolen Tales unit sales on first week, but we still find that no Tales console game has sold better than 40% of its LTD outside of the first week - lending to the idea that Tales games, especially on consoles are very frontloaded. Ironically, DOTNW had only 30% of its sales outside of the first week. I could argue that would be the most apt comparison, but I would be nicer.

I see Tales of Graces selling 140-160k on week one, and 250k LTD (which would be an extra 40% on top of opening week which is average for a Tales game).

. And, of course, the biggest one of them all - We still have no idea if the hardware bundles are counted in this number or not. No idea. Whatsoever.

How many bundles were made for this promotion? I don't think it could be so high as to skew the numbers by an incredible amount.

Again, to reiterate:

I don't think Tales of Graces is a bomb. If it was, then that would make Vesperia on 360 an even worse failure. I think it is below what Namco expected, and not very good for the Wii as a serious RPG machine, given the fact that Vesperia did manage over 525k between two systems with smaller install bases. Given the series history, I would have expected Graces to hit 400k LTD with 200-250k being first week, but it seems that was about 30% too high, which again is not good given the size of the Tales franchise.