Dunno whats wrong with Japanese market. Even the very biggest games seem to struggle to get decent sales. Even smg hasn't hit the million mark yet. So many so-called big games are only getting to 100k ish. That's on ALL Consoles. Where have all the ps2 game buying public gone? Perhaps they are still hanging on to their ps2s and sitting on the fence this gen-wise. Perhaps they are still only buying ps2 games still, as the ps2 software sales are still good considering.

Have anybody seen the sales for Silent Hill: Homecoming?? Anyway I think it's more a generational thing. Probably the gamers that were the great supporters of the PS1 and PS2 don't have enough time to still playing. The new generations in Japan are more on handhelds; anyway I really hope that Tenchu and Sky Crawlers have a better chance on NA and EU markets.

That makes sense.  The PS2 Super Robot Taisen games have been consistantly selling hundreds of thousands of copies

Oh more and more ignorance. Why don't Wii 3rd party games in Japan not sell or seemingly worse right now. Probably because one the Japanese market isn't necessarily in the best shape. Haven't really seen any titles recently do amazing aside from a few DS titles. Secondly, Nintendo has quite a "monopoly" within Japan right now which really hurts 3rd party sales... more so than anywhere else in the world. You've seen this trend ever since DS became really popular in Japan. Now for DS it hasn't trashed 3rd party sales but it has meant that Nintendo game sales have been a lot better because of that heightened brand. This is very easy to see.

So given those factors you put in a title with a decent brand in Japan, Tenchu, give it a proper sequel but not much hyping and an average review and I think its very easy why this was never going to do as much as the 3rd one. Might have done a little better if it had released on the Ps3 considering games can be attached to certain brands which is why GTA and DMC have done better percentage wise on the PS3 compared to the 360 which would have helped Tenchu IV in Japan if released on PS3. Otherwise your left with this mixture. It's hard to sell a 3rd party game on the Wii right now given Ninty's dominance in the region, state of the Japanese market, and lack of real effort of 3rd party's to sell their games at huge titles. Hard for 3rd party games on 360 or PS3 in Japan to do the same given the state of the market, limitations of userbase, and higher development costs. Just not a pretty situation.

Ya see that wasn't too hard. All that bickering simply because ya couldn't come up with a legit answer.

Sky Crawlers is a licensed game so it may not even leave Japan. Tenchu IV would have to bomb everywhere for it not to do better than the JP sales. Well...Ubi's publishing and they're good at sabotage so, who knows?

I don't think it's just a generational thing, though. It's about who can keep a rabid fanbase and who can't. Tenchu had a small fanbase to begin with and hasn't had decent sales in years. But I bet Samurai Warriors 3 will completely trash Tenchu IV in the sales department - and it won't be because it's a better game (if it is).

Hyping a game shouldn't be that hard.  Just make some trailers, release some screenshots, release news on a consistant basis and there you go.  Is it really that hard to do?

But it is so much more haha.  I mean of course it sounds that easy but it's a lot more difficult.  I mean look what Capcom did for Monster Hunter 3 at TGS 08.  That is hyping a game.  Yes all the extravagence and overdoing everything seems unnecessary, but the lines for the game don't lie.  And that isn't all simply because of it being Monster Hunter. 

Advertising and marketing is about making a certain brand a center of attention.  It really doesn't even have to show that its better than everything.  All it has to show is that the game is fun and that you will want to continue to look into it.  As long as they got you looking at the game then you are obviously more apt to buy it.  Now releasing screenshots and trailers is apart of that but what's to separate it from the rest they see. 

Marketing a game is about continously showing and knocking your brand into the brains of the customers and hope that the media doesn't cause it to backfire on you.  It's why MS had Halo energy drinks.  It has nothing to do with the game but its spreads the brand out anymore. 

Now of course there is nothing to warrant this kinda marketing towards Tenchu IV on Wii in Japan.  I mean from a business perspective why would you spend more money marketing than you did to create the game?  And that's the exact thought.

The so called "being quiet for a long time to release info" method is actually why FFXIII has so much hype.  The long waits between info reveals causes gamers to want to know more about the game.

@Riachu: That's not true at all. Games that appear out of nowhere or that seem to be dead, like D:DoC or FFCC:CB (which is most probably cancelled) have no hype at all. Disaster could have been big, but Nintendo's decision to hide it away from the World and make a press release like 1 week before it launched killed it. And the game was revealed in 2006.

There's a way to hype games, for me the best one is the way they hyped SSBB.

OUCH at Tenchu 4...

I was expecting at last 50K first week...

ouch ouch