I know I've posted this one before, but with the X360 RPG onlslaught just 2 weeks away, I wanted to have a huge blowout discussion on the upcoming RPGs (W and J) for the X360.

 If you've been living under a rock the past year, the Xbox 360 is the home of RPGs this cycle, for the next 2-3 years atleast. This is in total opposition to the Xbox, as it had the RPG depth of a child's swimming pool. Although the Xbox's library was hardly lacking in real good RPGs (Morrowind, KOTOR 1/2, Jade Empire, Fable), it still lacked any Japanese-borne RPGs (sans Sukedi).

However, the reason I bought my X360 was for RPGs, as I felt that if MS wanted a fighting chance this cycle, it had to invest in more RPGs. And I was right 2 years ago, even with only Oblivion and Enchanted Arms on the table.

But now the onslaught is here. In just a 4 month span, the X360 will almost equal the Xbox's entire RPG catalogue, with 5 RPGs (3 JRPGs, 2 W-RPGs), and others slated for soon after (such as Sega's Culdicept Saga TCG/RPG).

Thus far, for sales, we've had:

With tepid sales of EM and PSU, where will JRPGs Lost Odyssey, Blue Dragon, and Eternal Sonata wind up? The one positive side of the tepid sales with both currently-released JRPGs, is that both sucked. The average score of EM/PSU hovered around 75%, whereas the weakest one, Eternal Sonata, should reach a projected score of 80% or above, as OXM has already reviewed it with a decent/solid 8.0.

Also, we have uber-heavyweight Mass Effect and unknown upcomer, Two Worlds to be the bookmarks of the start & end to the RPG-fest this year.

So where do you see sales being at?

I figure opening weeks and LTD totals at the end to be near:

My reasonings:

Mass Effect: Really, really high sales. When I see/think Mass Effect, I see "Gears of War" type numbers emblazed in my head. The game has been receiving GOW-type buzz for awhile now, and tons of positive hype from E3. Judging by the Xbox.com forums chatter, I'm not alone. ME is far out ahead of every other game's forum in post count, sans Halo3. Halo stands at 22,000 replies, and ME is at a whopping 14,000. Despite being so much later in the year. These numbers are far higher than any other game. Not only this, but having a November launch date gives it enough time to garner good December sales along with non-RPG X360 games GTA and H3. Also, with the game being shooter-heavy, I think it'll easily cater to both WRPG players that bought Oblivion, but also Halo/Gears fans as well.

Lost Odyssey: Supposedly the 'Guch's masterwork. Although JRPGs have done poorly, I think LO will be a great commercial succuess. With very few games planned for a December launch, LO seems to have a great date planned for it. Although I suspect it'll be very frontloaded, I consider 3/4m sales in the US to be a good ammount compared to Final Fantasy XII. More importantly, I think it should sell great outside of the US in PAL territories, and Japan, where the game is pretty high up the Famitsu Most Wanted list.

Blue Dragon: A kiddie RPG. This one is certainly a huge question. Viva Pinata, a great game with similar merits and pedigree bombed opening week, but managed huge numbers afterwards (atleast in comparison with it's abysmal 10k opening week). Opening week is a real mystery, but when I probed my local EB about pre-orders (when I got my pre-order), they told me PO had been real strong for Blue Dragon - over 30 copies (as of a week ago) were already done. This was about the same # for Forza Motorsports 2. Could a kiddo JRPG like this trump Dragon Quest VIII's sales (around 450k) on PS2? I think so.

Two Worlds: I've been getting ALOT more hyped about this one. Enough to go pre-order, and pay for a CE this week. There has been a decent bit of un-noticed hype for the game. Being called the "Oblivion killer" doesn't sound like it might hurt. But opening versus Madden 08 might hurt it alot too. I don't know how I'm to pick up this game the same day as Madden, and beat away the stupid idiots buying Madden for this gem. With multiplayer, this game could do gangbusters, and I even would say higher numbers are attainable in the US. When I got my CE, I asked if pre-orders were going well, and the sales guy (a good friend of mine that handled my Oblivion preorder last year), said that PO status was going very very well for the game, and had picked up dramatically as launch was apporaching.

 Eternal Sonata: The one I fear will bomb. ES, although graphically beautiful, and stunning, has been getting very, very, very little press/hype. Not only this, I think Namco has pretty much screwed themselves placing it only 2 weeks after higher-class Blue Dragon, and 2 weeks before Halo3. The game has been finished for awhile, and Namco decided to put it here, but why? Over at the XB forums, the ES forum has a whole 250 posts, compared to Blue Dragon's 5,000. Thats just abysmal. It reminds me of Enchanted Arms last year. No talk whatsoever. I think it'll wind up with EM-type numbers, sans the fact there are quite a few more X360 owners here. The only possible advantage is that most people aware of Blue Dragon are very intested in ES as well, which might translate into good sales. But nevertheless, I think it'll underpreform. Despite the fact this game, grapihcally, is far more abitious than any other RPG slated for the X360 thus far.

Am I vastly over/under thinking something? My ME prediction is certainly the highest, but when I see that ME has more chatter on XB forums than GTAIV has....I think something's just plain wrong there.

Eternal Sonata will bomb, no question about that one.

Blue Dragon too, it has the spirit of DQ and those games never do good in States.

Lost Odyssey, thats a very likely heavy hitter. It`s FF style, lots of action. I expect it to pull a decent 500k at least in USA. In Japan, less than BD.

Mass Effect, thats more of a genre merger, the fact that it has shooter elements will put it way over all the other games in your list. And the fact is is probably one of the top contender for GOTY will help.

Two Worlds...dunno, that game is a mystery for me.

Are your predictions WW or NA only?

If it is WW then I think ES, BD and TW will possibly be a bit higher. 300k for ES and 650k for TW. BD about 750k.

If it is NA only I think ME will be lower (around 2million).

I really have no idea as to how LO will do either WW or in NA.

Ah, diegomorco, what is considered a bomb on the X360 to you? At 130k for EM, I consider that a bomb (when most games easily hit 250k).

Saiyar - NA only.

For Worldwide, I would say something like:

Mass Effect - 3.5m (give or take. I think Europe should love this game)
Lost Odyssey - 2.0m (strong sales in Europe and Japan help get this game at, or near the double platinum mark)
Blue Dragon - 1.25m (again, strong European sales, but Japan has already decided where this game ends at)
Two Worlds - 900,000 (it's European. It should do rather good there)
Eternal Sonata - 800,000 (decent in Japan, and Europe hype has actually been decent)

The preorders i have gotten from my store for BD, TW, and ES have been very similar so i think imo they will be pretty close sales wise.

First off, I agree with you that for the rest of this year, the 360 has the best RPG lineup of any of the three consoles, I expect that to change at TGS when a lot of Japanese RPGs will be announced for Wii and PS3. Some have already been emerging lately (Tales, Disgaea).

Beyond that, I also bought the 360 for the RPGs. I had 3 games in mind beyond Gears when I got my 360: Blue Dragon, Mass Effect and Bioshock. 2 Of those are RPGs and both hit in the next few months.

I think you are overestimating by a lot here, specifically with the lifetime sales you are implying (Lost Odyssey 3 to 4 million lifetime????).

I think you overestimated everything except Eternal Sonata which you underestimated.

I expect these to be the round about numbers:

Mass Effect: 500,000+              1,800,000

Lost Odyssey: 180,000+             380,000

Blue Dragon: 120,000+               250,000

Two Worlds: 100,000+                210,000

Eternal Sonata: 80,000+             220,000

Mass Effect will be the third biggest 360 games this year. It will have some cross over appeal to the shooter audience, but not a huge amount beyond the hype of a big exclusive game. I see great numbers, but not Gears of War numbers at all because this is not a shooter and it doesn't have online multiplayer. I think the November launch date is really good for this game and shows how much importance MS is giving it, but it is also kinda late in the year so it will lose some sales compard to Halo and GTA which will be out a lot longer and have their tales longer in 07.

Lost Odyssey will do good in Japan, but I dunno if it will surpass Blue Dragon there. Over here though this game will be bigger than BD. Previously I thought the opposite was true but after getting to play BD, I tend to think this will have more appeal to the average 360 owner than that game. It is coming out really late in the year too, if it comes out this year so it will have fewer days to sell. I expect it to be somewhere between 500k-750k lifetime in the US.

Blue Dragon is not gonna sell as well as I had previously believed. It is very much tailored for the Japanese audience. It will sell mainly to JRPG fans on the 360, and maybe some others but it doesn't appeal to the majority of 360 owners much.

Two Worlds is gonna do well considering that it isn't a heavy hitter like the rest of these games. I see it selling well because it is doing the Oblivion thing in 3rd person and that should already get interest, but being a big hit? I just don't see it happening. I think the game will get middle of the road reviews and it will largely be forgotten by the time we are later in the year and the bigger games hit.

Eternal Sonata is the only game that I thought you underestimated in numbers albeit only by a little. I think there is a big enough JRPG fan base on the 360 for this to sell to them strongly and break 200k this year. I don't expect it to do exceptionally well, but well enough. (This game is eye candy, BD has better graphics but this game's art trumps that game's art by a lot).

I consider all of these successes. Definitely shows the 360 has a more multi genre audience. Also, for Two Worlds this number is very good. I think Mass Effect will have a solid base for its next two sequels which I predict will do a lot better. 2nd best MS franchise introduced this gen in my opinion.

I do feel that the Japanese RPGs will sell less simply because of the 360 audience not being that big for them compared to those who would be willing to go with Mass Effect and Two Worlds. BD and Eternal Sonata will turn off a lot of people because of their 'softness' for lack of a better term and it is a shame.

This is why I predict LO to do better than those two, because I expect it to be a lot more rugged and have more freedom than these two.

And i suppose Oblivion was a failure?

How can you people say a game will bomb without knowing the future

ckmlb - so you think that the RPGs for the X360 that are coming out this year (the JRPGs) are going to be the most frontloaded games the X360 has?

I really doubt that....But that's just me. No X360 RPG has had under a 3x multiplier in the US.