They didn't learn that a dozen years ago or so, why do you expect them doing it now? Jim Sterling made a video on that back then, just swap out the game names and fiddle a bit with the genre and you could remake the exact same video and argument all over again:

Perfect Pasta Sauce (The Jimquisition REMASTERED) (youtube.com)

I was combining the two consoles there and I never said "main selling point". I said it wouldn't have sold as well as it did if didn't have high quality visuals and a portion of the sales being on Switch doesn't contradict that at all. It is a clear fact that graphics are a significant selling point for some games so I'm not sure why you're arguing with me over that.

Rethinking will need to happen yeah though the tricky part would be making up for the loss of appeal if spectacle is reduced since they'd need to make up for it somehow to avoid a reduction in sales. It's a difficult balance and I'm not sure what exactly companies like Square should do.

It might not have sold as much without countless contributing factors; a game is composed of a multitude of elements each of which adds to the whole in some way. Graphics were just one factor of many, and clearly not essential as the version without them still did well.

A game like Final Fantasy is not going to tank in sales if it looked merely good instead of amazing, most gamers aren't that hung up on cutting edge tech.

That's obviously the case for the first part and yes as long as it didn't look outright bad it still would've sold well due to it being HP but the spectacle was an important contributing factor to just how successful it was, a minority of people playing it on Switch doesn't dispute that. If it wasn't a good looking game not as many people would have bought it, that is a clear fact so again I really don't get the point of this argument.

Where did I say it would "tank" in sales? I ask that you should stop replying to things I never said.

The PS4 version sold really well too despite being substantially cut back from PS5 and arriving months late. Between them, the Switch and last gen versions make up a sizeable share of the game's sales, so clearly high end spectacle wasn't as big a deal as you're claiming.

What I've claimed is that a important factor in HL's success was its spectacle just like how it using a big IP was an important factor yet you've been acting like I said it was the only factor or was a much bigger factor than all the others ones when I never said anything remotely like that. In my last reply I literally said it still would've sold well as long as it looked alright so what do you mean it wasn't as big a deal as I'm claiming?

We agree it's a factor, we just feel differently about the extent.

Graphics can absolutely be a selling point for some gamers, I just question the wisdom of pouring so much money into graphics that you can't turn a profit, especially when so many games find great success without cutting edge visuals.

How do we feel differently about that? You didn't explain how it's not as big a deal as I'm claiming so I have no idea.

In cases where you can't turn a profit it's dumb of course.

Not sure if you're purposefully missing my point but I'll give the benefit of the doubt.

There are countless examples of games achieving success without cutting edge graphics, from Nintendo's games, to indies, to AA titles, to downgraded ports, to Minecraft, Fortnite, GTA5 and Roblox being the biggest games on the market, etc. Meanwhile, AAA budgets have ballooned out of control and the associated costs are causing devs across the industry to founder.

Ergo, unless you're one of the a handful of big brands that are pretty much guaranteed to sell tens of millions, selling your games on cutting edge spectacle is a foolish strategy.

I could say the same cause that does not answer my question at all. Explain how you feel differently than I do.