As a niche gamer do I need to worry?

[Lester C.]

Recently you have had huge game releases bomb or in Madden's case sell half of what they sold last year. As a guy whose primary gamings are from the niche market like Japanese RPGS of all genres I'm worried. If Madden is severely under-preforming then what hope does Magna Carta 2 have a soon to be released Korean RPG? My fear is that they are going to stop localizing and or producing niche games if the current sales trend continues.

[Rev. Calibos]

Recently you have had huge game releases bomb or in Madden's case sell half of what they sold last year. As a guy whose primary gamings are from the niche market like Japanese RPGS of all genres I'm worried. If Madden is severely under-preforming then what hope does Magna Carta 2 have a soon to be released Korean RPG? My fear is that they are going to stop localizing and or producing niche games if the current sales trend continues.

They're different things though.

I'm not a huge gamer but I enjoy Madden, NCAA Football, NBA Live and March Madness along with SD vs. Raw.

These games are annual releases, annual 'events' when they come out. Now I'm not too familiar with non-sports games but I don't think that most of them come out yearly.

So with the 'annual' releases you're going to see some flucuations from year to year.

This year the economy is in a bit of a different spot than where it was, oh, say 5 or 6 years ago.



And in my case I never buy new anyway. I still enjoy Madden '03 as much as I did when I bought it two years ago for $2 from Gamestop.

When Madden '08 drops to around the $5 mark I'll pick that up.

[Donald M.]

Yeah, the fact that RPGs are a niche genre offers them some protection. Few enough RPGs are released every year that the audience for those games will always be there.

Sports is very much not a niche genre, so its not surprising to see the economy effecting sales of things like Madden.

[JCAll]

RPGs have held a fanbase forever. I wouldn't wory. But if the annual big name franchises start to faulter it may convince developers to create more original games.

[Xero Kaiser]

Madden is only "severly underperforming" when compared to it's past showings. 2 million units sold in 2 weeks is extremely good by any standard. Only the PS2/PSP/Wii versions of the game took a real drop this year anyway.

But yes, Magnacarta 2 is going to sell like crap. I doubt they'll stop selling JRPGs altogether anytime soon though.

[Jmacq1]

Niche markets have such a fierce fanbase that they'll likely continue to perform at a consistent level.

Madden is probably a combination of the economy and people finally starting to realize that they were paying for the same game only slightly tweaked year-after-year.

But what other big releases this year have bombed?

[Lester C.]

Niche markets have such a fierce fanbase that they'll likely continue to perform at a consistent level.

Madden is probably a combination of the economy and people finally starting to realize that they were paying for the same game only slightly tweaked year-after-year.

But what other big releases this year have bombed?

The most recent and big example would be Wolfenstein. It was released on Windows, PS3 and the Xbox 360 and was a very highly anticpated shooter. Total sales for the month have been around a hundred thousand copies, which is far, far below the estimates as a lot of people were thinking it just might overtake this year version of Madden.

[Jmacq1]

That sounds like it may be far more a failure in advertising/marketing than anything else, because I didn't even know/hear about a new Wolfenstein game coming out until it was already here. Now FPS games aren't really my thing, so I wouldn't have bought it anyway, but still, I tend to have a pretty good general awareness of the big releases for the gaming industry in any given month, and Wolfenstein flew completely under my radar. Probably not a good sign.

The fact that it looks like it got middling reviews probably didn't help, either. The FPS market is pretty oversaturated. The same market that Wolfenstein is aimed squarely at is probably saving their money for Modern Warfare 2.

Or maybe we're getting luckier than I'd imagine possible and the FPS market might finally be going into a bit of a decline. It'd sure be nice if every second or third game that came out wasn't a FPS. Between that, rhythm games, and sports games you'd think there weren't any other games out there.

[Astonishing X-Fan]

The most recent and big example would be Wolfenstein. It was released on Windows, PS3 and the Xbox 360 and was a very highly anticpated shooter. Total sales for the month have been around a hundred thousand copies, which is far, far below the estimates as a lot of people were thinking it just might overtake this year version of Madden.

Yeah, but you need to take into account the game apparently kinda sucks, too.

Everything I've heard about it seems to indicate a generic shooter at best.

[jesse_custer]

I don't think there's a relationship at all between Madden sales and niche game releases. Probably nothing to fear.

[Lester C.]

I don't think there's a relationship at all between Madden sales and niche game releases. Probably nothing to fear.

My fear is that if developers are losing money on sales, while the cost of producing games keeps going up, then they are going to play it safe. I think we saw this a bit with the PS3 as it was a long time before JRPGS came out for that system, which is ironic because there were many fine JRPGS for the PS1 and PS2.

[jesse_custer]

One thing you have to keep in mind is that despite the economic downturn, video games have been doing pretty well compared to other markets.

[Jmacq1]

My fear is that if developers are losing money on sales, while the cost of producing games keeps going up, then they are going to play it safe. I think we saw this a bit with the PS3 as it was a long time before JRPGS came out for that system, which is ironic because there were many fine JRPGS for the PS1 and PS2.

From my understanding the PS3 isn't all that easy to code for. Plus it's not the dominant worldwide force that PS1 and PS2 (especially) were. It may simply have taken the developers that long to get things ready.

That, and there may have been more JRPGs for PS3 that simply haven't been imported because PS3 isn't a mega-seller in the US (again, particularly compared to what PS2 was).

[The Curtain]

You have to remember that publisher's expectations are going to be radically different for a Madden game then they are for a niche title. Niche titles are expected to sell a small amount, and publishers budget for that accordingly. As long as they're still making the money on them they expect to make, you should be fine.

[Xero Kaiser]

The most recent and big example would be Wolfenstein. It was released on Windows, PS3 and the Xbox 360 and was a very highly anticpated shooter. Total sales for the month have been around a hundred thousand copies, which is far, far below the estimates as a lot of people were thinking it just might overtake this year version of Madden.

Who thought it was going to overtake Madden? You sure you're not getting Wolfenstein confused with Modern Warfare 2? Because that's the FPS game making all the noise this year. Nobody cared about Wolfenstein.