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Forums - Gaming - Why are Shin Megami Tensei sales so low in Europe?

IkePoR on 25 June 2014
Darwinianevolution said:

Thanks for the recomendations! I'm thinking of picking up Conception II (do I need to know the history of the first one?) and SMT devil survivor or Soul hackers. I can't find them anywhere but what am i going to do. I already have Bravely Default, but I'm stuck betweeen two bosses i can't defeat. Need to grind a lot.

Sure thing.  I'm not sure about Conception, but I assume you get some kind of recap in the 3DS game.  

About BD: which bosses? One thing about this game is you don't always need to grind but change your strategy.  



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mjk45 on 25 June 2014
UltimateUnknown said:
The SMT games have always been delayed by 1 to 2 years in Europe after the NA release.

So the European market gets the games with a stealth release after the hype for the games have died down considerably. The fans have been screwed over consistently by Atlus with their highly delayed or no releases. And for these types of niche games, goodwill and hype of the hardcore fans are two major factors going for them, which Atlus has squandered every step of the way

The above is correct  , You have  games that aren't big sellers anyway , then you factor in them arriving years later and even then we have to thank Ghostlight a small publisher of niche titles mainly rpg 's. Who through little interest from stockist's and their  budget  can only make a limited volume , you have a real catch 22  that  makes it hard to grow the future titles , all this is combined,with no real marketing and hardcore fans having already imported those games  .

So unless Atlus themselves decide to grow the series in Europe  and that means spending money this will continue , looking at the way they seem to have split smt and persona by platform and SMT IV only available on the Eshop for Europe  I wouldn't hold my breath.



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Darwinianevolution on 26 June 2014
IkePoR said:
Darwinianevolution said:

Thanks for the recomendations! I'm thinking of picking up Conception II (do I need to know the history of the first one?) and SMT devil survivor or Soul hackers. I can't find them anywhere but what am i going to do. I already have Bravely Default, but I'm stuck betweeen two bosses i can't defeat. Need to grind a lot.

Sure thing.  I'm not sure about Conception, but I assume you get some kind of recap in the 3DS game.  

About BD: which bosses? One thing about this game is you don't always need to grind but change your strategy.  


One boss is a giant fish protecting one of the sacred stones that vomits its young and always instant k.o. me with a wave, and the other one is a guy that hypnotices Edea, keeps breaking my defaults and regenerates every three or four turns.



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hentai_11 on 26 June 2014

It also didn't help that the european version of Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked for 3DS had 2 Bugs which made the game nearly unplayable. That's the reason why I didn't buy the game. There is a patch out now, which repairs said bugs. But now I have enogh other games which I want play first ...



Stefan.De.Machtige on 26 June 2014
HintHRO said:
Europe does not like good games. I can tell that because I live in Europe. The tastes in games here are not diverse at all. I only see COD, other shooters, FIFA and hyped up third party crap like Watch Dogs.

As an european, i must agree with this. I see evidence of this all the time.



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Numberfox on 26 June 2014

Probably does worse now since EU isn't the biggest fan of Nintendo...



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Saeko on 26 June 2014

not translated ? lot of ppl i know only play in their language



Ucell on 26 June 2014

Europe in general like games which are western and are mature. SMT games are neither so they don't sell there.

US is more open to Japanese games than Europe.



Devil_Survivor on 26 June 2014
Darwinianevolution said:

So I was looking for some JRPGs for my 3ds and because Shin Megami Tensei 4 is arriving to the Eshop (and ONLY Eshop) I decided to see if I could learn a bit about the series. I have played Atlus games before (Ettrian Odissey in particular) so I was curious about the series, and I wanted to find one cheap game to try it. I discovered that not only most of the games were not released on Europe (and a lot of the ones who are don't have a physical release), but also the sales numbers are terrible.

I know that the series doesn't sell that much to begin with, but look at the difference:

Best selling SMT games

Pos Game Platform Year Genre Publisher North America Europe Japan Rest of World Global
1 Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 PS2 2008 Role-Playing Atlus 0.34 0.04 0.36 0.08 0.82
2 Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 FES PS2 2007 Role-Playing Tecmo Koei 0.22 0.20 0.16 0.05 0.63
3 Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Portable PSP 2009 Role-Playing Ghostlight 0.16 0.05 0.34 0.03 0.58
4 Shin Megami Tensei IV 3DS 2013 Role-Playing Atlus 0.19 0.00 0.27 0.01 0.48
5 Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 PS2 2006 Role-Playing Tecmo Koei 0.22 0.03 0.00 0.20 0.45
6 Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne PS2 2003 Role-Playing Ghostlight 0.07 0.05 0.25 0.02 0.38
7 Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner SAT 1995 Role-Playing Atlus 0.00 0.00 0.38 0.00 0.38
8 Shin Megami Tensei II SNES 1994 Role-Playing Atlus 0.00 0.00 0.37 0.00 0.37
9 Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2 DS 2011 Role-Playing Ghostlight 0.15 0.01 0.12 0.01 0.30
10 Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 2: Innocent Sin PSP 2011 Role-Playing Atlus 0.11 0.03 0.11 0.02 0.26

Total difference (all games, not just the ones already mentioned)

                          
 



North AmericaEuropeJapanRest of WorldGlobal
Total 2.20 0.56 3.54 0.51 6.82

 

NA sales are almost 4 times the European ones, not to mention Japan. Why is that? I don't know if this trend happens to all JRPGs in Europe or just this series. What do you think?

 

P.D. Also, if you can recommend me a good (and cheap) JRPG for my 3DS I would appreciate it.

P.D.2 Why Persona 3 on the PS2 sold that much compared to the others?

Have you played all SMT games before? I would recommend them and you can find the 3DS port of Soul Hackers for cheap now.



 

Devil_Survivor on 26 June 2014

BTW if anyone ever wondered about the origin of my user name well there it is at number 8 on the OP list.