What is a bigger Franchise? God of War or Animal Crossing?

[Bodhesatva]

makingmusic476 said:

I'd say GoW is the bigger "core" franchise but AC is the bigger franchise overall. And we all know which one matters in the end.

To the guys comparing handhelds and consoles, you can't really do that. Just look at Monster Hunter. It sells millions on the PSP and barely breaks 500k on the ps2.

Would Nintendogs sell 15+ million on the Wii? Hell no.

Some games are just better on handhelds. They're fun games that cater to a wide variety of people and are easy to play on the go. This doesn't always translate into great console sales. They "fit" on handhelds when they wouldn't do so well on consoles.

That being said, AC should still sell quite a few millions on the Wii.

 

I'm not so sure about the Monster Hunter example, MakingMusic. Not that this is a big deal -- as I essentially agree with your point -- but I think it's unclear if MH is big because it's been on handhelds or because the franchise has steadily grown in popularity regardless of its location (along the lines of GTA III -> GTA: VC -> GTA: SA). I suspect that both factors played a significant role. Look at the sales of this franchise:

Monster Hunter 1 PS2: .28 Million
Monster Hunter 2 PS2: .62 Million. Sales more than double.
Monster Hunter Freedom PSP: 1.41 Million. Sales more than double again.
Monster Hunter Freedom 2nd: 2.2 Million. Sales increase significantly.
Monster Hunter Freedom 2nd G: 2.31 Million. Still increasing significantly, likely to end up at 2.5 Million+.

While there definitely is significant growth as a consequence of being on the PSP -- I wouldn't argue that for a second -- you can see the franchise was already growing on the PS2. Which, again, begs the question: did the franchise grow because it moved to the PSP, or simply because the franchise was becomingly increasingly popular? I think it's a combination of the two.

Sorry to nitpick, Makingmusic, as I know you didn't mean anything by it. I've just gotten involved in too many "Wii MH3 will do poorly because MH is portable!" conversations.