cookingyourmama said:
Haha wow, ok you do know that the numbers that viper1 posted for the week aren't the real third party sales overall? I've already had this discussion with him in the worldwide weekly sales thread. His numbers that he posted are only for the top 50 games overall and not the top 50 games for each console added up. When you are comparing the overall sales of 3rd party software you COMPARE IT ALL not just cherry pick some data to make the wii look like it sold the most third party software when it didn't. The real third party sales this week are: 935,406 wii Despite the wii having sold 6 million more consoles than the 360 it still can't out sell it in 3rd party software sales. So the wii with an overall hardware market share of 44.8% only had 36.3% of 3rd party software sales this week, compared to the xbox360's 33.5% hardware market share and 39.5% 3rd party sales and the ps3's 21.7% hardware market share and 24.2%. The fact is the wii is underperforming when it comes to 3rd party sales and it's doing it at a time when 3rd parties aren't releasing major games for the 360 and ps3 because they don't want to go head to head with grand theft auto 4. |
Then I concede that you’ve made an excellent counterpoint, and apologize for using incomplete data. I’ll try to be more careful in the future, and if you see an error on my part, please point it out to me. After all, you can’t get better if you’re making the same mistakes.
That said, I must still take issue with your overall thesis. Your main claim, if I understand it correctly, is that because the 360 continues to sell more third party software than the Wii, albeit by what even you must admit is quite a narrow margin, the Wii is therefore not an attractive platform for third party developers. This of course ignores the fact that third party games are outselling the PS3's third party games, and that it is not being heavily criticized for this, but for the sake of discussion we shall ignore this ever so minor detail. After all, there are still several other objections I have to this train of thought.
*WARNING. VERY LONG READ AHEAD. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED*
First, as that narrow gap shows, the difference between third party sales on the Wii and those for the 360 are nowhere near as large as they were even six months ago. Feel free to check the numbers for yourself: I’m fairly confident I’m right this time. (And if not, well, I don’t mind the taste of crow as much as some folks.) Third party sales have continued to rise for the system at a steady rate, and I see nothing in the data that makes me believe that this is not a long term trend. Retailers agree.
http://www.nintendorevolution.ca/11242007/03/retailer_nintendo_wii_third_parties_are_catching_up
Here, an HMV executive responded to a question of whether there’s still a difference between wii first and third party sales by saying "yes and no. Nintendo games are genuinely good, but I think third-parties are starting to catch up… Companies like Sega…EA…Ubisoft… they aren't selling as well as Brain Training but it all adds up to a healthy market. The volumes on the hardware are such that it's now worthwhile for publishers to make the extra effort of working with the Wii.
In other words, as your own data suggests, Wii third party sales are catching up to those of the 360, and appear poised to surpass them if the trend continues. Developers themselves are starting to see this trend. Factor 5 has gone from working on the Playstation 3 to making a new game for the Wii. EA has devoted an entire section to Wii games, and some of its big games are coming out for the system, including two games involving Steven Spielberg and the sole console version of their mega-game, Spore. More and more third party games are being announced for the system on an almost daily basis. Some companies, such as the developers of Mushroom Men and Hudson, have enough faith in the Wii's viability for third parties that they're literally staking their futures on the thing.
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6188860.html?sid=6188860∂=rss&subj=6188860
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=18247
There are numerous other examples, such as Capcom pulling Monster Hunter 3 from the PS3 in favor of the Wii, and the rumors that the next Sonic the Hedgehog game has the Wii as its lead platform. I'm sure you can come up with other examples if you wanted to. Now, some people here may feel that the Wii is a failure for third party developers, but those same developers obviously don't agree.
You will no doubt claim at this point that despite all of this, and despite the Wii's higher install base, third party sell proportionately higher on the 360. This is the "attach rate" argument that rose up a few months ago, when detractors needed something to prove that the Wii was a failure. You yourself allude to this when you write "(d)espite the wii having sold 6 million more consoles than the 360 it still can't out sell it in 3rd party software sales." I needn't get into too much detail to address this concern, because its a surprisingly weak point.
Ask yourself this: if you were a third party developer, would you care more about the absolute sales that your game received upon release, or about the proportion it sold in relation to the install base? If you pick the former, give yourself a cookie, because you've picked the same answer that anyone with common sense would. After all, choosing the latter argument means that the PS2 is the worst system of all time, since almost no game touched even 1/10th of the install base. In other words, third party developers don't care what percentage of people buy their stuff, they just care that enough people do so that they can turn a good profit. And if the current trends continue, that will inevitably be the case for third party games on the Wii.
But perhaps you'd like to interject at this point, and reemphasize that the Wii's current higher install base has not yet translated into the highest third party sales. The data has proven you correct at this point. But I'd like for you to answer a question for me: of all the third party games released for the Wii so far, how many of them do you honestly believe deserve to sell as well as the big-budget PS3 and 360 games have? If we're to judge Wii games by comparing them to the amount of talent and resources that they receive relative to the High Definition consoles, they should only be getting one third to one half of the PS3 and 360 sales. After all, that's how much they're spending on their Wii titles in relation to those on the PS3 and 360.
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=18389
"(A)n Ubisoft executive gave a breakdown of the company's average development costs per game...(with) PS3/Xbox 360/PC titles averaging 12 million to 18 million euros ($18.8m-$28.2m) to create for all 3 SKUs, and a Wii game expected to cost 5 million to 6 million euros ($7.8-$9m) to develop."
And it's not just that they're spending less on the Wii than on the other consoles: because the risk is bigger for the high definition consoles, they're also often devoting their most talented teams to those systems, and leaving the weaker teams on the Wii. This was the case with Sega, who outsourced Sonic and the Secret Rings, giving that company a shoestring budget to work with, while they devoted all of their money and their best talent to Sonic the Hedgehog. Guess which game sold better, though? See also Capcom, who gave Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles to some small developer no one's heard of, while they continue to devote their own manpower to Resident Evil 5. Heck, Shigeru Miyamoto himself pointed this out months ago.
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3158427
"If there's only one piece of advice that I could give to the managers of third party companies" said Miyamoto, "it would be that a lot of times it seems that when they're putting games out on Nintendo hardware, those games are being developed by their third-string team or their fourth-string team. Maybe that's because they see those products as being unique projects or somewhat smaller-scale projects. But when Nintendo puts out a title that is designed to really support and sell its hardware, that title is always developed by one of our number one teams. And so I think that when it comes to the question of trying to compete with our software, I would really like to see the parties try to do that with their number one teams rather than with the third- or fourth-string teams."
So I would argue that third parties generally have nothing to complain about when it comes to Wii sales, as they're getting more out of their investment in the system than they are from the PS3 or 360. Don't believe me? Look at the link I gave to Hudson once more, where they specifially credit the Wii with their reversal of fortune in the market. Not convinced? Look at Zak and Wiki, which has not sold well in overall numbers, but which Capcom has publically said has satisfied their expectations for the title. In fact, it's widely rumored they're working on a sequel, something which is not generally done for games that fail. You may also look at the other "poster child" for "third parties can't sell on the Wii" stereotypes, No More Heroes. Some folks say the game sold poorly. Of course, the guys who made it actually went and threw a party to celebrate the fact that it's Suda 51's best-selling game ever. And he's been in the business for twenty years.
But I sense that you're the type who's willing to try and make the Wii look bad no matter what. I think you're going to read all that I've written, and say "Ha! So you admit that third parties don't put their best teams on the Wii! The Wii will never see the best games third parties have to offer!" To which I can only say that you're wrong once again, because they're already starting to.
Let me repeat some of the points I've made above. Will Wright and the team that are developing Spore will be releasing their game for the Wii. The team that is working for Steven Spielberg will be releasing two games for the Wii, one of which reviewers are already saying is a total blast to play. (Boom Blox, coming next week!) The Sonic Team is supposed to be using the Wii as their primary platform, with the rest being either an upscaled or downscaled version of the Wii's game. What's more, Ubisoft is rumored to have scrapped the first build of Red Steel 2 and started it from scratch, a la Resident Evil 2, because they felt the game needed to be better than it was. Camelot, a damn fine developer if ever there was one, is about to release their own Wii game, We Love Golf. And if you put even the slightest amount of effort into searching for more examples of third parties starting to step up and deliver their A games on the Wii, you'll be certain to find it with little difficulty.
You say that until Wii third party sales outstrip those of the 360, the Wii "will continue to get criticized." I would submit to you that the only people who have that opinion are either fanboys who have chosen to despise the Wii for whatever reason, or they are merely misinformed about the reality of the situation. As you have shown yourself able to back up some of your beliefs, I happily place you in the latter category, and hope that my efforts at education are not in vain. However, if there's only one thing you take away from all that I said, let it be this: third party developers are the only people whose opinions on the sales of third party Wii games matters, and as I've just shown, they've already voted with their feet to hop on the Wii train. I've no doubt that some people, excluding yourself, will try to find another way to make the Wii look bad. But the developers feel that the Wii will profit them, and at the end of the day it is their lack of criticism that truly matters.
