Compile Heart's second Galapagos JRPG "Omega Quintet" delayed to October 2nd

[VanceIX]

Akiran said:

VanceIX said:

Digital downloads are so common now for many areas that making a game digital-only is very feasible. The games that do bad on Steam are generally Indies that are lost among the countless other garbage indies, I doubt some of those great JRPGs would go completely unnoticed on the PS Store. Even if you don't sell as much from having your game digital-only in the west, you will still make a decent profit from the digital sales.

And the reason retailers are a problem is because their shelf space is limited. They won't sell niche Japanese titles when they could be displaying the more mainstream titles instead. Publishers that go digital don't have to worry about negotiating for shelf space.

That's not entirely true, and there are plenty of JRPGs that go unnoticed by everyone except their fanbase which is tiny considering JRPGs are so niche. Will they be able to make a decent profit from digital sales? there aren't stats on this.

Steam or PS Store front page can be considered as shelf space, things on the front page sell alot more than when they're not.

edit: Like i've been saying if they wanted to go digital they would've went digital. I think the status quo of physical & digital we have now is perfectly fine

edit 2: normally people only buy digital games when they're less than $20 (estimation), and Steam proves this because there are plenty of people who will wait for a sale to buy a game

Nope. There has been a HUGE rise in console digital sales (14% up this year compared to last), and those games are almost always at full price because consoles don't have Steam-esque sales for the most part. Maybe in the past digital wouldn't have been worth it for publishers because there simply wasn't a market for it, but now there is one and it is growing at a staggering rate. Let's be honst here, by next gen over 50%, if not more, of game sales will transition to digital. 
Now is the perfect time for publishers to make games universally available through digital distribution, and I think we'll be seeing that more and more this gen.

Also, the few good JRPGs on Steam practically have a cult following, and easily are profitable for devs. If a publisher makes a profit selling in Japan, there is nothing wrong with padding it a little with some digital sales from the west. Western sales won't ever be their bread and butter, but they are extra profit that can now be accessed.