Arkaign said:
I don't think there are any winners. MS loses as they paid for temporary exclusivity that didn't pay off (in no small way due to mismanagement of the release against ludicrous competition in the release window) SE loses, as it's extremely unlikely that MS paid more than their original estimates for lost sales. Nobody could have foreseen the title selling THIS badly. CD loses, as the title they worked hard on got basically buried before it even had a chance. In many cases there are bonuses to the dev house when a title sells well, and there is no chance of that now. etc. |
And how exactly do you know what MS expected from the exclusivity? Do you have any insight on their projections or goals? No?
How about they did not expect the game to sell 5 million copies in 2 weeks but rather they just tried to improve their christmas lineup with a good title (for ppl who don't care about Halo) to stand a chance against the PS4-sales force? I actually think it is stupid to honestly believe that MS thought that TR would suddenly become what Halo or Gears were for the Xbox/360. It was more likely just one part in their marketing plan.
I'm pretty sure they have more insight on the TR 2013 sales (which it will definately reach in time, especially since digital sales will be much higher nowadays than they were 2013. Over here the TR-XOne Bundle has been by far the best selling XOne console version since its release ) and it is quite unlikely that they expected it to exceed these by a lot.
And I doubt that you have any insight on the number of people who might have purchased an xbox one (which is MS main goal, they couldn't care less about the games sales) this christmas, because TR was the title that pushed them over the edge. I can tell you that I bought an xbox one (granted, for 120 € off bc of an insane gamerscore offer from MS & Amazon prior to christmas) on top of my main console, the PS4 ... and I would not have bought it at that point if not for Tomb Raider - which I bought as a used steelbook edition, so it won't even show up in the sales (my PS4 version in 2016 will however). I think Microsoft won't cry over that.
As for SE, how do you want to know if they game flops on the PC/PS4 (or if it flopped on the XO? It's not like the 2013 game sold 10 million copies on the 360) ? How do you know they game would even exist if MS did not drop a couple millions on the project?
The game is amazing and it will still be amazing in 2016, nothing will change that. And the majority of people buying games are not butthurt hardcore internet users who will boycott the game bc of some stupid reason ... they are your average people who will go to the store and look for some good games - which TR will be for PS4, probably even better. There is absolutely no reason to believe that the game won't sell well on the PS4. We won't suddenly see a huge technical explosion which makes the presentation subpar and the gameplay is top notch and won't just suddenly become crap bc of Uncharted. Uncharted 4 might even help the TR sales, because it might give people more appetite for similar games (which TR is obviously) ... and most ppl will be able to afford both over 6 months.
MS knows the PS4 will continue to sell on its own and they know that they will have to put out 2-3 (somewhat) exclusive games for each holiday to at least have a chance to survive in sales. I doubt they expect most of their "exclusives" right now to be system sellers on their own. They lost with their pre-generation mistakes they have to make these investements to stay at least alive.
And yeah the thread is old but the topic itself isnt.
