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Forums - Sales - Why does Sony fail at making another mega franchise?

Slimebeast on 04 September 2010
Scoobes said:
Slimebeast said:

Cool. I tried out Age of Empires at release but never owned it (until much later).

I started Age 2 in Jan 2000, so only a couple months after release.

Longbowmen are a sweet unit. I think my favorite civ all time is the Chinese. I also love the Teuts because they're versatile when you play DM (lol) and similar modes.

When I first started AoE II the Teutons and their Knights were my favourite. Used to quickly build a group of Knights and send them with a few trebuchets and the amount of damage that'd cause was suprising at times. Then I found out I could get to the final age faster with the Byzantines and they had a whole host of cheaper units to deal with the pesky longbowman!

I also really liked the Koreans in the Conq's too. Expensive and slow to build up, but a strategy mixing Onagers with War wagons used to decimate everyone.

Teutons were banned before the first patch though (only known super noobs were allowed to choose the Toots  ) . I think their TC arrow range was bigger than the range of Castles.

Koreans, the triumph card in Death Match.

Byz plain sucked lol.



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TheBlackNaruto on 04 September 2010

I have got to ask, but why do some of you feel that SONY is relying to much on 3rd party support? if anything they are the ONLY ones relying on 1st party support other than Nintendo. And Nintendo is relying on what it always has Mario, Zelda and Metroid. That's what works for them. Microsoft is/was relying on Halo/Gears(both 3rd party mnd you) and that's what works for them, more so because from what I have seem the ONLY true HUGE sellers on 360 are shooters which tends to be what Xbox/360 fans prefer(just my opinion of course). Gears and Halo are the ONLY games on 360 that sell HUGE no other games do that. And in my eyes that just shows how thier fanbase is built and it is built on shooters, the controller is MADE for shooters(the feel of it anyway).

What bothers me is why does a game have to sell 10mil units to be considered "succesful" 4-5mil is VERY succesful if you ask me. Sony is creating LOTS of new IPS, even if it is not anything "new" they are building on what's out there and making it better and  do not see anything wrong with that at all. As others have said sales do not always equal quality cause I personally feel that Halo 3 was a HUGE let down compared to Halo 1 and 2(m opinion yet again) yet it sold CRAZY well. Just my point of view...



The absence of evidence is NOT the evidence of absence...

PSN: StlUzumaki23

IMU1808 on 04 September 2010

1) They don't aim for mass appeal as much as Nintendo.

2) They don't focus all of their efforts into a few projects like Microsoft.

3) Killzone2 did fuckin' incredible for being the sequal to what everyone considered a "flop" (Which i don't)

SONY's never aimed for having a couple of IP selling gangbusters. As far as I've seen it, the goal has always been a number of good well performing IP's. Not to say that if they didn't have a ton of mega-sellers like Nintendo they wouldn't brag about it but as it stands now, that's clearly not the goal.

With that said, I love the way SONY handles software. They're the only 1st party willing to invest heavily in obscure quality titles that clearly don't have mass appeal. End of the day, most of those titles end up doing just fine.



Crazymann on 04 September 2010

I do agree with you about the color palette on SC and SC2, but I understand why they did it (screen readibility).  Joking or not, it is a valid critisism.

I enjoyed Age of Kings tremendously, and I agree that Ensemble (RIP) never got the recognition they deserved.

I am certainly not arguing that SC2 WoL is perfect, but I did very much enjoy the single player missions and story.  I believe it to be worth the money I spent - even though I have moved back to D2 for one last run (I want to complete Uber Tristram, and lay the game to rest before D3).

As for your MMO suggestions, I just really never got into any of them, and I don't know that I will as they all seem to have one critical flaw or another (to me).  Who knows

In any case, I appreciate your discussion.



Crazymann on 04 September 2010
Scoobes said:
Slimebeast said:
Scoobes said:
Crazymann said:

Well,

I am glad that you have your opinion, and no issues with sharing it, but many of us DO like how Blizzard does things.  Blizzard has a committment to polish, and furthermore, it seems rather hypocritical to laude the virtues of Sony and then trash Blizzard in the same post.  Both companies are very good at taking pre-existing ideas to new levels of refinement.  Blizzard's style is fine, Sony's style is fine.

I don't like WoW either, but I don't like MMO's in general.  Still, the fact is that (while long in the tooth) WoW is still the most recognizible MMO and it was the best of its kind at release (unless you seriously believe that EQ and its ilk were good).  All pre-WoW MMO's sucked, and neither WoW or any MMO since has changed the formula enough for me to give it a second thought.  Note, I don't lump Guild Wars into that mess because of its use of instancing.

Finally, I own Age 1, Age 2 Conquerers and Age 3

Age 3 sucks, Age 2 was the pinnacle of the series.  Starcraft, while lagging behind Age 2 in some respects was the MOST fun I had in a single player campain EVER.  So, how exactly does Age "slay" starcraft???

Reviews:  NOPE

Popularity:  NOPE

Sales:  NOPE

Cultural Impact:  NOPE

Single Player:  NOPE

Graphics:  NOPE

Production Values:  NOPE

AI/Pathing:  YEP

Multiplayer:  PERHAPS*

*  And that is only if you are still burned about LAN and other features removed from BNet2 (which I don't like, but still.)

 

Taking your list:

Reviews:  About equal. Some Age games are rated higher than Starcraft 1.

Popularity:  NOPE

Sales:  Techinically, the Age of series has sold over 20 million copies. Starcraft has 'only' sold 13 million. Having 4 games in that time-frame will do that ;)

Cultural Impact: I dunno, AoE taught me more history than school ever did :P

Single Player:  NOPE

Graphics:  Which games are you comparing? All the Age games (orginal included) are graphically superior to Starcraft 1 and Starcraft 2 has released 5 years after Age 3 which isn't really fair.

Production Values:  Arguable with the originals of each series.

AI/Pathing:  YEP (actually if you compare Age 1 with Starcraft 1 they were both pretty bad)

Multiplayer:  PERHAPS- Oddly I disagree with you in favor of Starcraft with this one. There's a reason the original is still played so heavily 10 yrs after release.

When did you start playing Age of Empires II?

(same question to you Crazzyman)

Pretty much since it was released. It's actually my favourite RTS franchise and I've been playing it since the original was first released. And I actually quite liked 3.

Used to play the second with my mates. I wasn't that good to be honest so I always chose Byzantines as most of my mates picked the British. The cheap skirmishers would always save me from those bloody longbowman. I still play Age of Mythology with my girlfriend from time to time as she likes the anchient mythology setting.

I played it on release.  Conquerers expansion as well.  I really enjoyed it, though I didn't get into 3 very well. 

I still have all 3 on my shelf, but not installed sadly.



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NYANKS on 04 September 2010

Think about Nintendo. Their mega franchises were made mostly by one guy, a long time ago.  Now he made a few more many years later.  It's not like Nintendo can will it at any time, either. 



mhsillen on 04 September 2010
Slimebeast said:

But I'm only happy that Sony doesn't have any mega franchises.

I don't like mega franchises because they always tend to dominate everything else and overshadow other great games (at least in the eyes of casuals they do).

I always hated GTA for being so huge. In this generation that game is Call of Duty. All other shooters are compared to Call of Duty and they even have to adjust release dates in fear of CoD.

I love Assassin's Creed but I'm starting to feel it's getting too big (I mean AC II is on track to sell 10 million. 10 million!)

I hate Mario because everyone buys Mario instead of other platformers which I think are far more interesting.

I love Xbox but I don't like the extreme hype for Halo as if it's the only game on earth. Same with Gears of War.

And most of all I hate World of Warcraft and Starcraft because I don't like the style of Blizzard and it pisses me off that everyone is playing WoW and ignoring better MMOs. I will get Diablo but I think it's extremely overrated and it pisses me off.

And Age of Empires slays Starcraft.

what platform game is better?

lbp?  uh no sorry



NYANKS on 04 September 2010

Think about Nintendo. Their mega franchises were made mostly by one guy, a long time ago.  Now he made a few more many years later.  It's not like Nintendo can will it at any time, either.



Doobie_wop on 04 September 2010
RolStoppable said:
evolution_1ne said:
RolStoppable said:

Sony doesn't do amazing things first, that's why. Their games usually consist of ideas borrowed from somewhere else and mixed together. It's not surprising that Uncharted was compared to Tomb Raider and Gears of War a lot. Why did Gears of War do so much better? Because it redefined its genre and ever since then other TPS try to mimic its gameplay. God of War followed Devil May Cry. Killzone followed Halo.

nothing about gears of war was original, it was successful for the same reason Halo was successful, at the time of their release they were the only worth while quality games for the platform, which is why Halo success was never repeated. Also gears didn't redefine anything, that "revolutionary" cover system was a carbon copy of the cover system in killswitch, and game released last gen. but you wouldn't know nothing of that considering the level of ignorance in you comment (not surprising coming from you). God of war is nothing like devil may cry, a game I know you never played, you couldn't have. bayonetta is like devil may cry. and Killzone followed Halo.... seriously, how about you play them first and come back to me.

Why didn't LittleBigPlanet or Heavy Rain become mega blockbusters? Because they are not amazing to most gamers. The thing that's new in LBP is the extensive level editor, but most gamers rather play than create, so they don't care. Heavy Rain is more of an interactive movie and that's only amazing to a small subset of gamers.

and nothing is wrong with appealing to smaller markets.

Of course, this explanation works in reverse as well and that's why Gran Turismo is so big while it's imitators never come close in sales. Forza would be the most popular one and hardly anyone remembers Konami's Enthusia Professional Racing anymore.

If you want to hit it big then you either have to do something first or something that hasn't been done in a long time by anyone else.

but then you mention lbp and heavy rain, both games have done something first and hasn't been done by anyone else...... fail logic is so very very very very very very FAIL!!!


So much fail it isn't even funny..........

Sony doesn't do anything amazing first *sigh* demon souls, shadow of the colossus, 256 player in a single match......

now to answer op, because no one else but Nintendo does, Nintendo is by far the best at finding the biggest markets making great games for those markets and sticking to them, they play it safe and only take risk when the have nothing to lose, which is what Sony doesn't do, they are always trying to reinvent themselves  and refresh their ip's and franchises no matter how successful they are, which is why Sony unlike Microsoft and Nintendo aren't a defined brand and playstation doesn't have a mascot, it appeals to everyone and every franchise isn't around long enough to become extremely popular, GT is the only one that is and it's been 4 years since the first one have hit the console. But op you have to realize this is why fans of Sony love the brand so much. 

Doing something first or doing so in an amazing way are two different things. It doesn't matter that kill.switch used a cover mechanic before Gears of War. Or Operation Winback which predates kill.switch. And it was GeoW that redefined the genre, because it was only after that game that TPS developers started to regularly implement similar cover mechanics.

God of War is as much like Devil May Cry as Super Mario Bros. is like Sonic the Hedgehog. Do they have differences? Of course. But more importantly, are their similarities in the core gameplay? Absolutely. Killzone was a selfproclaimed Halo-killer. If the developers of Killzone say that they are going after Halo, then this is a clear case.

Regarding LBP and Heavy Rain, I already explained why the things they did first were not amazing in the bigger picture... and you have read that paragraph. What is amazing is not defined by me nor you. In any entertainment medium the market at large decides what it amazing and that is what gives birth to a mega franchise. Likewise, the market also decides when a mega franchise has to die. For example, Guitar Hero is not what it used to be.

You may think that Demon's Souls and whatever else is amazing and you are entitled to it, just like I am free to believe that Fire Emblem is super awesome. But your and my personal opinion doesn't overrule the market as a whole.

@leo-j

inFamous is more or less just another sandbox game with a couple of new ideas. Did the game do anything that would have an impact on the genre as a whole? I guess no. So the market sees another GTA wannabe game, even if that perception isn't fair.

Marketing is far more a factor in how a game sell's than the actual quality of the game. The market is ignorant and misinformed, most of the general public don't know they want something until they are told what to want. Nintendo would never have been the success that it was if they didn't start grabbing celebrities for ad's, putting the Wii on talk shows and advertising the system non-stop for the first three years of it's release. The same applies to their games. 

You've seen the marketing push that's followed games like Halo 3, MW2, Gears of War, Wii Something Something, Mario and Gran Turismo. If little Timmy had never heard about Halo from his TV box or never read the back of a Mountain Dew can, he most likely would never have heard of Halo. People could say that word of mouth is the cause of their success, but that only works after the ad's kick in because they have to develop a large enough userbase to spread the word to a significant amount of people.

Your opinion on what games are innovative and important is skewed because I'm willing to bet that you don't play most of the PS3 games you've mentioned or you already have some sort of weird affiliation with another console that hinders your enjoyment of PS3 games. 



Bet with Conegamer and AussieGecko that the PS3 will have more exclusives in 2011 than the Wii or 360... or something.

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=3879752

kain_kusanagi on 04 September 2010

I don't know about the PSone or PS2, but I think the reason that best selling PS3 games don't do as well as the best selling Xbox 360 games, generaly speaking, is that a large portion of PS3 onwers bought the system as a Blu-ray player and they don't play games. Of the 37.3m PS3s in homes a lot of them aren't owned by gamers and as such no games are being bought for those machines. With Xbox 360 there are 42.7m in homes and all of them are owned by gamers becuase nobody would buy it just to watch DVDs or steam Netflix. So when a game comes out on Xbox 360 there are 42.7 potential buyers for it while of the 37.3m PS3 onwers it's hard to say how many of them will buy any games at all. In the console war a sale only matters if it's a gamer buying games. There are actualy less PS3s that matter in this console war than 37.3. I'm not going to venture a guess as to how many that is, but it does explain why the attachment rate is generaly mucyh lower on PS3 than Xbox 360 and why franchises, this generation, are strong on Xbox 360.