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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - ZombiU Was "Not Even Close" to Profitable, No Plans for a Sequel

coreyerb on 09 July 2013
BossPuma said:

I think companies are expecting too much from the Wii U fanbase. If ZombiU was released on the Ps3 and 360 with the same tie ratio as on the Wii U it would have sold 20 million units, and that is a ton from a mediocre zombie game.

Right. To be profitable, it sounds like it at minimum would have had to double its tie rate - to Mario territory - for a survival horror game. Unless they somehow expected 10 million Wii U's to be sold by now (is that even possible with their production rate?), they should have known ZombiU wasn't a million-seller in its first year.



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zorg1000 on 09 July 2013
coreyerb said:
zorg1000 said:
coreyerb said:
Ljink96 said:
coreyerb said:
Ljink96 said:
attaboy said:
Ljink96 said:
Well of course it wasn't! WHY DON'T PEOPLE GET IT! MATURE GAMES DON'T SELL ON NINTENDO! LEAVE THAT TO SONY AND MS! NINTENDO DON'T CARE ABOUT THOSE KINDS OF GAMES! Why don't they understand? Games like this sell well on Playstation or Xbox. Nintendo's kiddy outlook isn't an insult but this is!

So, Resident Evil on the Wii?


Totally different story. Should have exempted RE and MG. I'm talking about those really gritty FPS like CoD or GOW.

Repeating a cliché doesn't make it true. Look at actual facts. Zombi U sold 460K out of 3.19 million = 14.4 percent of Wii U owners bought it. What's a comparable PS3 title, Dead Space 3? 520K out of 78 million = 0.7 percent of PS3 owners bought it. Any other mature games you'd like to consider? Resident Evil 6 - 2.48M out of 78M = 3.2 percent. The difference is those games were released on multiple platforms and could combine sales to reach a profitable number.

Nope, the problem is it's early in the system's life and there aren't enough Wii U owners to support whatever sales target Ubisoft set for it. The problem empirically is not that mature games don't sell on Nintendo. They do.


Yes, I may be making a  cliché generalization but does it not hold at least some bit of truth? Generalizations aren't 100% opinionated.

Where is the truth? Where did that idea come from? What evidence is there that it's still happening? I can point out example after example of mature games selling on Nintendo consoles and yet this idea persists.

Give a few examples then. They may sell a decent amount but in comparison to other platforms, mature games dont sell well on Nintendo consoles.

Two random Nintendo mature-ish exclusives:

Perfect Dark (N64): 2.52 million / 32.93 million = 7.6 percent attach rate.
Mike Tyson's Punch-Out (NES): 3.02M / 61.91M = 4.9 percent

Now, how does that differ from random Xbox/PS exclusives?

God of War (PS3): average ~4.5M / 77.95M = 5.8 percent
Gears of War (X360): average ~6 M / 77.69M = 7.7 percent

Want a multi-platform?

Goldeneye (Wii): 1.76 M / 99.95M = 1.76 percent (better than Xbox360 - 410K / 77.69M = 0.53 percent, PS3 - 630K / 77.95M = 0.8 percent)

Just for fun, the hot new survival horror game against this flawed, unprofitable failure:

ZombiU: 460K / 3.19M = 14.4 percent
The Last of Us (PS3): 1.71 M / 77.95M = 2.2 percent; to reach ZombiU's equivalent attach rate, it'll have to sell an extra 9.5 million copies (more than that, since by the time it'd reach 14.4 percent, more PS3s will have sold). Precisely zero PS3 games not named Call of Duty have even made it to the 14.4 percent benchmark.

What am I missing? Are there piles and piles of failure mature games for Nintendo consoles that I'm forgetting?

I dont see what tie ratio has to do with this, a game is successful based on how many units it sells, not the percentage of console owners that get it. Also not sure why Punch Out is on this list, I also beleive GoldenEye was exclusive on Wii for a year so that one is irrelevent.

Like I said Nintendo has a few that sell well but in comparison to other consoles they dont. Compare the number of mature games that sold over 1 million on Nintendo consoles vs Sony/Microsoft consoles, I dont have a number but im sure the difference is astronomical.



When the herd loses its way, the shepard must kill the bull that leads them astray.

oniyide on 09 July 2013
AndrewWK said:
oniyide said:
AndrewWK said:


Of course thats a big fact that no one is buying Wii U so you can´t sell games on it. But if it would have been a Halo quality game then it would sold regardless the console or install base. But a generic Zombi game can´t get that much attention anymore. I hope you understand what I wanna say.

I kind of doubt it, would that game have moved consoles, if it was better? What kind of game would move WIi U? because the biggest franchise hasnt done it(2dMario and COD) so I dont know what would have done it.


Come on thats not fair. A 2D Mario was the laziest thing to do, plus just a few months before the released a crappy 2D Mario game so I guess people had enough of it. And come COD was never gonna move Nintendo consoles. What Nintendo needed was to win the coregamer over, and this wont be done with a 2D Mario game, and those who where interested in COD had already purchased it for other platforms.

Just take Halo as an example the original Xbox has sold like wet shit and Halo still managed to make a shitload of money, because it was the game to get. And Zombi U just isn´t that

Oh i do think its fair to a point, 2d Mario is the biggest gaming franchise, thats just money. It was never for the core gamer but to try to get everyone on board didnt work. I agree with everything else. 

What game was going to do it? Serious question, i know Zombi U wasnt really, but what could they have made?



oniyide on 09 July 2013
BossPuma said:

I think companies are expecting too much from the Wii U fanbase. If ZombiU was released on the Ps3 and 360 with the same tie ratio as on the Wii U it would have sold 20 million units, and that is a ton for a mediocre zombie game.

no companies were expecting the Wii U not to sell as bad as it has, hell maybe they WERE expecting it which is why they werent exactly throwing support at it, Ubi didnt get the memo apparently.



AndrewWK on 09 July 2013
oniyide said:
AndrewWK said:
oniyide said:
AndrewWK said:


Of course thats a big fact that no one is buying Wii U so you can´t sell games on it. But if it would have been a Halo quality game then it would sold regardless the console or install base. But a generic Zombi game can´t get that much attention anymore. I hope you understand what I wanna say.

I kind of doubt it, would that game have moved consoles, if it was better? What kind of game would move WIi U? because the biggest franchise hasnt done it(2dMario and COD) so I dont know what would have done it.


Come on thats not fair. A 2D Mario was the laziest thing to do, plus just a few months before the released a crappy 2D Mario game so I guess people had enough of it. And come COD was never gonna move Nintendo consoles. What Nintendo needed was to win the coregamer over, and this wont be done with a 2D Mario game, and those who where interested in COD had already purchased it for other platforms.

Just take Halo as an example the original Xbox has sold like wet shit and Halo still managed to make a shitload of money, because it was the game to get. And Zombi U just isn´t that

Oh i do think its fair to a point, 2d Mario is the biggest gaming franchise, thats just money. It was never for the core gamer but to try to get everyone on board didnt work. I agree with everything else. 

What game was going to do it? Serious question, i know Zombi U wasnt really, but what could they have made?

Now I am going to throw some crazy shit out there. But If Watch_Dogs would have been a Wii U exclusive this would have sold fantastic and pushed the Wii U imensly.



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oniyide on 09 July 2013
AndrewWK said:
oniyide said:
AndrewWK said:
oniyide said:
AndrewWK said:


Of course thats a big fact that no one is buying Wii U so you can´t sell games on it. But if it would have been a Halo quality game then it would sold regardless the console or install base. But a generic Zombi game can´t get that much attention anymore. I hope you understand what I wanna say.

I kind of doubt it, would that game have moved consoles, if it was better? What kind of game would move WIi U? because the biggest franchise hasnt done it(2dMario and COD) so I dont know what would have done it.


Come on thats not fair. A 2D Mario was the laziest thing to do, plus just a few months before the released a crappy 2D Mario game so I guess people had enough of it. And come COD was never gonna move Nintendo consoles. What Nintendo needed was to win the coregamer over, and this wont be done with a 2D Mario game, and those who where interested in COD had already purchased it for other platforms.

Just take Halo as an example the original Xbox has sold like wet shit and Halo still managed to make a shitload of money, because it was the game to get. And Zombi U just isn´t that

Oh i do think its fair to a point, 2d Mario is the biggest gaming franchise, thats just money. It was never for the core gamer but to try to get everyone on board didnt work. I agree with everything else. 

What game was going to do it? Serious question, i know Zombi U wasnt really, but what could they have made?

Now I am going to throw some crazy shit out there. But If Watch_Dogs would have been a Wii U exclusive this would have sold fantastic and pushed the Wii U imensly.

it would have faired better, but i dont think it would have pushed it immensly. Maybe its just me, but that game doesnt look all that.



Salnax on 09 July 2013

Really? Coz much as I like this game, it is not technically impressive. It's not that big, there's limited online functionality, and one melee weapon. What, did they make the game's engine from scratch or something? Did they include the costs of a Wii U license? Is Ubisoft just that bad with money?



Love and tolerate.

HikenNoAce on 09 July 2013

You can't make a new IP exclusive to a Nintendo system and expect it to sell well.



oniyide on 09 July 2013
HikenNoAce said:
You can't make a new IP exclusive to a Nintendo system and expect it to sell well.


Just Dance, Deca Sports, Carnival Games, all say hi



greenmedic88 on 09 July 2013

This was supposed to be the game that sold me on the Wii-U; the console selling game that makes one buy a new console. For those who don't just buy Nintendo hardware to play Nintendo games at any rate.

Instead, it came and went and I have yet to pick up a Wii-U. All I did was sample it at a Nintendo hosted Wii-U preview event, but it really didn't strike me as being anything I had to play. If anything, I was really reminded of Left 4 Dead/L4D2, but with a game pad and extra screen.

As for why it didn't sell to expectation, I'm going with the install base of the Wii-U has been well under expectation.