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Forums - Sales - Marvelous Financial Reports - Interesting Comments about Wii and PSP Sales

patjuan32 on 19 November 2009

What Marvelous needs to do is team up with a publisher that will advertise their games in the West. Without advertising how are gamers going to know that a particular game is out. They need to stop blaming gamers and save some for themselves.



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outlawauron on 19 November 2009
jarrod said:
I don't think ARF or LKS were low budget, both were in development over a year, thoroughly voiced and both had pretty high profile musicians working on them. Then again, both also had like zero promotional budget, like all MMV games.

Muramasa's pretty clearly the lone "profitable" Wii game given it almost met expectations and Vanilla Ware being a pretty tiny, low budget dev. It's actually Vanilla Ware's 2nd best selling game.


OP left out the PSP figures too...

Valhalla Knights 2 Battle Stance (JP) 35k
Valhalla Knights 2 (EU) 3k
Hitman Reborn! Battle Arena 2 (JP) 41k
Half Minute Hero (JP) 70k

Muramasa didn't make them any money. Little King's Story did.



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famousringo on 19 November 2009

I'm glad that LKS made them at least a little money.

I guess Marvelous didn't see a cent from Muramasa's robust NA sales. That's unfortunate.



"The worst part about these reviews is they are [subjective]--and their scores often depend on how drunk you got the media at a Street Fighter event."  — Mona Hamilton, Capcom Senior VP of Marketing
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jarrod on 19 November 2009
outlawauron said:
jarrod said:
I don't think ARF or LKS were low budget, both were in development over a year, thoroughly voiced and both had pretty high profile musicians working on them. Then again, both also had like zero promotional budget, like all MMV games.

Muramasa's pretty clearly the lone "profitable" Wii game given it almost met expectations and Vanilla Ware being a pretty tiny, low budget dev. It's actually Vanilla Ware's 2nd best selling game.


OP left out the PSP figures too...

Valhalla Knights 2 Battle Stance (JP) 35k
Valhalla Knights 2 (EU) 3k
Hitman Reborn! Battle Arena 2 (JP) 41k
Half Minute Hero (JP) 70k

Muramasa didn't make them any money. Little King's Story did.

They didn't specify in the financials which specific games made/lost money, they just gave platform ratios.  Considering Muramasa almost hit it's targets (47k shipped, 56k expected), while LKS didn't even hit half it's targets (130k shipped, 320k expected), I'm going to guess Muramasa was their lone profitable Wii game.

Their unprofitable PSP release is definitely going to be VK2 EU though.



theRepublic on 19 November 2009

Not that surprising considering only 20% of games make a significant profit.

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2008/11/25/only-20-percent-of-games-make-a-profit/1



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outlawauron on 19 November 2009
famousringo said:
I'm glad that LKS made them at least a little money.

I guess Marvelous didn't see a cent from Muramasa's robust NA sales. That's unfortunate.

Nope. They won't get a cent from Arc Rise Fantasia's sales either.

@ Soriku

It doesn't matter if they hit NA or EU if Marvelous isn't publishing it.



"We'll toss the dice however they fall,
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Then follow young Mat whenever he calls,
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Stefan.De.Machtige on 19 November 2009

They really need more advertising. Perhaps they should have made only half of that list and used the extra money for more development time and marketing.

They also make rather niche titles. You can't make game you like to play and then be surprised it won't sell. Know your audience!



In the wilderness we go alone with our new knowledge and strength.

famousringo on 19 November 2009
Soriku said:



@outlaw

Are you sure? I'm pretty sure Rising Star and XSeed and Ignition have ties to Marvelous when they publish their games.

If that's REALLY true, MMV need a Western subsidary like NIS or Atlus.

This is what I find puzzling. They list LKS, which was published by XSEED in NA and Rising Star in EU. But they don't list Muramasa's sales in NA, which was published by Ignition.

So it appears that XSEED and Rising Star cut deals with Marvelous to get their localization deals, while Ignition deals straight with the developer? Or perhaps XSEED and Rising Star pay a per-unit royalty while Ignition pays a lump sum?

I'd love to know the answer here.



"The worst part about these reviews is they are [subjective]--and their scores often depend on how drunk you got the media at a Street Fighter event."  — Mona Hamilton, Capcom Senior VP of Marketing
*Image indefinitely borrowed from BrainBoxLtd without his consent.

jarrod on 19 November 2009
famousringo said:
Soriku said:
 



@outlaw

Are you sure? I'm pretty sure Rising Star and XSeed and Ignition have ties to Marvelous when they publish their games.

If that's REALLY true, MMV need a Western subsidary like NIS or Atlus.

This is what I find puzzling. They list LKS, which was published by XSEED in NA and Rising Star in EU. But they don't list Muramasa's sales in NA, which was published by Ignition.

So it appears that XSEED and Rising Star cut deals with Marvelous to get their localization deals, while Ignition deals straight with the developer? Or perhaps XSEED and Rising Star pay a per-unit royalty while Ignition pays a lump sum?

I'd love to know the answer here.

Marvelous owns Rising Star, it's their European subsidiary.  Basically Rising Star = Marvelous Europe.

With XSEED, they have an exclusive publishing arrangement in place.  Marvelous can still shop around games to other publishers (like Natsume, Atlus, Ignition and Ubisoft) but they only report sales that are made under the XSEED alliance.

 

 

outlawauron said:
famousringo said:
I'm glad that LKS made them at least a little money.

I guess Marvelous didn't see a cent from Muramasa's robust NA sales. That's unfortunate.

Nope. They won't get a cent from Arc Rise Fantasia's sales either.

@ Soriku

It doesn't matter if they hit NA or EU if Marvelous isn't publishing it.

lol.  Are you insane, it's THEIR game... Marvelous is the one who chose Ignition over XSEED chiefly because they gave them a far, far better deal on Muramasa and ARF.  They've undoubtedly made MORE on Muramasa with Ignition than they would've with XSEED.



outlawauron on 19 November 2009
Soriku said:
patjuan32 said:
What Marvelous needs to do is team up with a publisher that will advertise their games in the West. Without advertising how are gamers going to know that a particular game is out. They need to stop blaming gamers and save some for themselves.


They aren't blaming gamers though...they actually blamed themselves because of the lack of marketing.

@outlaw

Are you sure? I'm pretty sure Rising Star and XSeed and Ignition have ties to Marvelous when they publish their games.

If that's REALLY true, MMV need a Western subsidary like NIS or Atlus.

Well, Marvelous sells the license to Ignition or XSeed, etc. so that they can publish the game. Unless, they have a deal where Marvelous receieves extra compensation based on sales.

From my understanding, the Japanese company sells the license to an western publisher and then, the product becomes property of that publisher in that region. So, the American sales of Muramasa stand to benefit Ignition and not VanillaWare or Marvelous. It's what I was saying yesterday.



"We'll toss the dice however they fall,
And snuggle the girls be they short or tall,
Then follow young Mat whenever he calls,
To dance with Jak o' the Shadows."

Check out MyAnimeList and my Game Collection. Owner of the 5 millionth post.