Legend11 said: Zucas said: Legend11 said: It's getting annoying to see consoles being bashed based on sales while the games themselves seem to be largely ignored. To me a console is a success if it has a great library of games and I really question "gamers" who appear not to think that way. The Xbox 360 has a great existing library and has more than enough great games coming in the next couple of years to be considered a success. Even the critics calling it a shooter box will find it increasingly harder to ignore all the rpgs, strategy, racing, sports, and adventure games as well as unique games such as Viva Pinata and Banjo Kazooie 3 either on or coming to the system. As for those bashing it because they "hate" Microsoft because of their practices, have you ever known any company with a monopoly to act any different? Nintendo during the NES days locked in some developers so they couldn't make games for any other system and also did other questionable things. Anyways it's likely that this post won't make much of a difference but even if one or a few people start making quality posts instead of bashing systems based on sales then it will have been worth it. NO cause factually success of a product on the market is determined by how much profits it makes. Personally games should be judged by quality, but you said success. Maybe you should rephrase. suc�cess �� (sk-ss) KEY � NOUN: The achievement of something desired, planned, or attempted: attributed their success in business to hard work. The gaining of fame or prosperity: an artist spoiled by success. The extent of such gain. One that is successful: The plan was a success. Obsolete A result or an outcome I'm talking about the first definition shown here. That the success of a console in my opinion should be measured by it's game library rather than how many sales it had compared to it's competition.

Yes and the first definition still agrees with what I said.  The achiement of something desired, planned, or attempted.  I'm sure all businesses desire out of a product is to make money.  That or gain something in a market.  Meaning once again it goes back to what I said.

Factually success is determined by profits and it always will be.  You can't get around that.  You can't have an opinion on if it was successful or not because you can determine if it was successful very easily.  I thought the Godfather Wii game was a great game but it was not a successful game.   

Personally I still agree that games should be judged by the general public on how good the game actually is, but that would be quality not success.   

Actually, the most important part of the console is the console.
Without a console ... games won't play.

Games sell consoles -- that's true. But if the console doesn't work, people stay away from it.

I agree that the X360 has the most well-rounded lineup of games (which as also said is a factor of being out a year earlier).

But RRoD has scared me into not buying one -- at least until its fixed.

Mike from Morgantown

PS -- Sales are important as are ratings when discussing games. They give Oscars for films once a year but they announce the box office take weekly.

Zucas said: Legend11 said: Zucas said: Legend11 said: It's getting annoying to see consoles being bashed based on sales while the games themselves seem to be largely ignored. To me a console is a success if it has a great library of games and I really question "gamers" who appear not to think that way. The Xbox 360 has a great existing library and has more than enough great games coming in the next couple of years to be considered a success. Even the critics calling it a shooter box will find it increasingly harder to ignore all the rpgs, strategy, racing, sports, and adventure games as well as unique games such as Viva Pinata and Banjo Kazooie 3 either on or coming to the system. As for those bashing it because they "hate" Microsoft because of their practices, have you ever known any company with a monopoly to act any different? Nintendo during the NES days locked in some developers so they couldn't make games for any other system and also did other questionable things. Anyways it's likely that this post won't make much of a difference but even if one or a few people start making quality posts instead of bashing systems based on sales then it will have been worth it. NO cause factually success of a product on the market is determined by how much profits it makes. Personally games should be judged by quality, but you said success. Maybe you should rephrase. suc�cess �� (sk-ss) KEY � NOUN: The achievement of something desired, planned, or attempted: attributed their success in business to hard work. The gaining of fame or prosperity: an artist spoiled by success. The extent of such gain. One that is successful: The plan was a success. Obsolete A result or an outcome I'm talking about the first definition shown here. That the success of a console in my opinion should be measured by it's game library rather than how many sales it had compared to it's competition. Yes and the first definition still agrees with what I said. The achiement of something desired, planned, or attempted. I'm sure all businesses desire out of a product is to make money. That or gain something in a market. Meaning once again it goes back to what I said. Factually success is determined by profits and it always will be. You can't get around that. You can't have an opinion on if it was successful or not because you can determine if it was successful very easily. I thought the Godfather Wii game was a great game but it was not a successful game. Personally I still agree that games should be judged by the general public on how good the game actually is, but that would be quality not success.

I'm not talking about success from a business standpoint but from a gamer's.  A gamer's view of a successful console should be based on it's game library not how many copies said library and console sold.  If a fantastic game sells 100,000 copies or 10,000,000 copies it doesn't change how good the game is.

Since I went off on a crazy tangent, Legend, I'll repeat what I said in my first post in this thread:

Sales do have some relevance even from a purely "gamer" perspective, and that relevance is to future trends in gaming. If a game sells extremely well, that bodes well for sequels, that bodes well for other games in its genre, and that bodes well for the platform its on. There are all sorts of ramifications to a game selling well.

As I said before, I think the most compelling and intriguing example of this is Bioshock. From multiple reports, it appears that even in this FPS crazy atmosphere where there seem to be 5 mega-budget FPS released every 6 months, Bioshock apparently was barely green lit.

I think it's reasonable to assume that Halo 1 started the FPS boom, and if it hadn't done well, it's reasonable to extrapolate that many games would never have been made as a consequence -- and Bioshock clearly looks like it would have been a casualty.

I think a gamer can and should care about how this industry is trending in the future, and for that purpose, sales considerations are a relevant interest. Mind you, I DO agree with you that this becomes much too team-sporty, and people start talking about their "side" and "victory" and "winning" and all this nonsense. So I'm not really arguing with that portion of your statement -- I'm just saying sales do have relevance towards what we are and will be playing. 

You're just de-valuing the word "success." What succeeded if you enjoy the games you purchase? YOU did. You made a good purchase. We already have phrases like "I am satisfied with my purchase" if you want to talk about "a gamer's view"; you don't need to render meaningless the phrase "the console is successful."

The age-old example is the word "gentleman." "Gentleman" originally meant "land-owning male." At some point, someone decided "Shouldn't gentlemanliness be measured by character?" There were already plenty of words to describe good character, so all that happened was gentleman became a useless word.

In light of this, one wonders why you want to challenge the meaning of "success" at this moment in time.

Of course, customer satisfaction is part of establishing a strong brand, and that leads to success for a game or a console. But its only one factor leading to success, and we measure the totality of all such factors with sales and profitability numbers.

somehow, I doubt the accuracy of that scenario. I'm far more inclined to believe that landowning males typical had access to education and culture that set themselves apart from other men, thus it became part of what "gentlemen" encompassed. Eventually you had other people who didn't own land, but found that acting in a similar manner could garner similar respect, and eventually gentlemen came to refer to the societal behavior rather than the land owning part. I could be wrong though.

the point still is correct that Legend really has used the wrong word. If I was the one who had put this thing forth, I would have to pick this point to say "Okay, success was the wrong term to use"as it's pretty much established that it doesn't apply to the scenario Legend is proposing. Best thing to do is scrap the issue and start from a new angle if there's still any interest in continuing the issue.

1. The achievement of something desired, planned, or attempted: attributed their success in business to hard work.

Legend11 said: Zucas said: Legend11 said: Zucas said: Legend11 said: It's getting annoying to see consoles being bashed based on sales while the games themselves seem to be largely ignored. To me a console is a success if it has a great library of games and I really question "gamers" who appear not to think that way. The Xbox 360 has a great existing library and has more than enough great games coming in the next couple of years to be considered a success. Even the critics calling it a shooter box will find it increasingly harder to ignore all the rpgs, strategy, racing, sports, and adventure games as well as unique games such as Viva Pinata and Banjo Kazooie 3 either on or coming to the system. As for those bashing it because they "hate" Microsoft because of their practices, have you ever known any company with a monopoly to act any different? Nintendo during the NES days locked in some developers so they couldn't make games for any other system and also did other questionable things. Anyways it's likely that this post won't make much of a difference but even if one or a few people start making quality posts instead of bashing systems based on sales then it will have been worth it. NO cause factually success of a product on the market is determined by how much profits it makes. Personally games should be judged by quality, but you said success. Maybe you should rephrase. suc�cess �� (sk-ss) KEY � NOUN: The achievement of something desired, planned, or attempted: attributed their success in business to hard work. The gaining of fame or prosperity: an artist spoiled by success. The extent of such gain. One that is successful: The plan was a success. Obsolete A result or an outcome I'm talking about the first definition shown here. That the success of a console in my opinion should be measured by it's game library rather than how many sales it had compared to it's competition. Yes and the first definition still agrees with what I said. The achiement of something desired, planned, or attempted. I'm sure all businesses desire out of a product is to make money. That or gain something in a market. Meaning once again it goes back to what I said. Factually success is determined by profits and it always will be. You can't get around that. You can't have an opinion on if it was successful or not because you can determine if it was successful very easily. I thought the Godfather Wii game was a great game but it was not a successful game. Personally I still agree that games should be judged by the general public on how good the game actually is, but that would be quality not success. I'm not talking about success from a business standpoint but from a gamer's. A gamer's view of a successful console should be based on it's game library not how many copies said library and console sold. If a fantastic game sells 100,000 copies or 10,000,000 copies it doesn't change how good the game is.

 Great I know that, but success is based on the business point of view.  You are thinking of quality.  Games should be based on how good they are not how much they sell.  Unluckilly there is not view of success as that would be stating its an opinion.  Success can be determined factually.  You are thinking of quality/opinion.  That is what I'm correction you on.  That is why this topic is misleading with your use of success.  

The problem here is that Legend looks over the 360 library which he personally likes a great deal and sees a slew of titles he can sink his teeth into, but when he looks at the Wii he doesn't see much he likes so he thinks "Who cares if it has sold more if the games on the 360 are better?" And while that point IS universally valid the perspective is definitely not. The ONLY way to fairly gauge widespread opinion is through widespread polling and thats what sales numbers represent, like it or not. With that said his individual purchase should absolutely be made through his perspective and is the only perspective he should consider for his purchases.

@Bod,

Your argument is really counterproductive. Sure you can take the obstinate position that even the choices of what kind of MOE is sufficient is an opinion but back here in reality the show must go on as they say. So acceptable margins of error are set in advance before people know what the results are so that their opinions aren't influenced by what they want the outcome to be. And anything within MOE is too close to call everything else is clear cut...this is how this type of uncertainty is handled and dwelling on it until obsession is truly an exercise in futility.

All of the acceptable MOEs for sales analysis have been established for a long time, long before this discussion was ever started and that kind of provably impartial decision is the sort of thing that should happily be accepted as good enough. Again we can raise objections about "good enough" being just an opinion but it is simply an exercise in futility since I can equally turn around and say that its only your opinion because BLAH BLAH, circular circular, worthless worthless, pointless pointless, and now back where we started!

Hopefully you see my point, and sorry if I'm being a bit blunt =P

As for the subject of whether we should use software or hardware in the measurement the reason we use hardware is simply because we have far far more reliable data on hardware than software. Not only do we have more points to check it against but one of those points is an absolute reference point and software rarely has that kind of info updated & available on a quarterly basis throughout its life.

So really if we are asking the question of where to draw the line on what is too fuzzy a "picture" I don't see how we can go wrong with choosing the option that is the least fuzzy of our choices.

Don't we agree on all this though, Sqrl? What you're saying was my whole point in the first place.

If we break down all the boundries of opinion and fact -- which, on a technical level, is fair -- we end up unable to resolve anything ever, because there is nothing but opinions. It is important that we accept at least some things as "fact" because otherwise all discussion and analysis grinds to a halt.

Therefore, we should accept some things as "facts" even though we know, technically, that they aren't absolute facts. An example: the Wii has outsold the Xbox360. Another example: Halo is a better game than Chicken Shoot.

I really don't understand your post, Sqrl, because it reads like you agree with me, but you seem to be phrasing it as if we were at odds.