Four and a half underperforming games in a row, where does Bethesda go next?

[Deleted member 10795]

I ask out of ignorance, is not doing great in the UK an indication it will perform badly everywhere else? (or does it tend to be?)

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This generally gets covered in the UK specific threads every time one of these stories surfaces, and others will be able to go into it in more detail, but generally it's rare for a game to "bomba" in the UK and not also do everywhere else.

In other words, "It's a UK problem" is generally disingenuous.

 

[Cake Boss]

Skyrim for X1X and PSVR.

 

[Spider-Man]

No one has access to digital sales.

Sales being down 40-50% is in line with current digital purchases for new games being 40-50% digital now.

Let Bethesda speak for themselves in regards to their sales and expectations. Threads like this are simply unnecessary.

 

[Rebel-TT]

EA: "VINNNDIIIIICAAAATIIIOONNN!"

But seriously, this is tragic news. I haven't played any of the listed games, and honestly felt lukewarm about all except Wolfenstein 2, but these sorts of passion projects should have a market.

Perhaps with all the heavy hitters this year, it was a saturated market already? Hopefully Bethesda isn't too discouraged.

 

[Nirolak]

This generally gets covered in the UK specific threads every time one of these stories surfaces, and others will be able to go into it in more detail, but generally it's rare for a game to "bomba" in the UK and not also do everywhere else.

In other words, "It's a UK problem" is generally disingenuous.

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The only two genres I've really seen do differently from NPD (which is the only other Western region we get numbers for) are fighting games and games like God of War/Devil May Cry, which sell way less in the UK than the US. Racing does better in the UK too.

Beyond that, they tend to be pretty similar, and none of these games are in those genres. We saw Dishonored 2 go down 40% in NPD, and down 38% in the UK, just as an example of similarity.

 

[Deleted member 13101]

I love all these types of games. But it seems to me that these types of titles, quality as they are, need the best of these conditions to succeed:

- Marketing - combination of media with well-timed early release and review copies - when an Easy Allies playthrough weeks after release hypes you up more than anything from the company itself, you know something was missing

- Release window - Winter, early spring, and late summer may end up being better for these games - Horizon and Lost Legacy got more attention during their release windows, and an opportunity to patch in bug fixes while things were still relatively quiet. Far Cry may benefit from this as well.

And this I think is probably most important:

- Technology - in this era, these types of titles need to be technically impeccable, across all platforms, and coming close may no longer be enough. Look at this forum in the threads for these games, the tech gets less than stellar reviews. Meanwhile the AC Origins thread is gushing over that game, even on base hardware across platforms. And that game is yet another Assassins Creed game gameplay-wise with divisive opinions on combat, modern day, etc. The Lost Legacy thread was similarly treated - same Uncharted gameplay, mixed reviews on the open-world area, but boy did it look and run great.

I'm pulling for these titles though, I really am.

 

[DekuBleep]

Well PS4 and X1 are really selling a lot of digital games these days. All the news we got about D2 physical sales were bad at first, and then we found out it was because the majority of D2 sales were digital and D2 owned September NPD. There were topics about how D2 did horribly in the UK too and then... Not saying that will happen for W2 but W2 could potentially have a lot of digital sales that we don't know about (yet).

I personally don't have as much time to play games as I did and most of the games I buy I end up only playing for a few hours. So I bought Mario and I might buy W2 later if I am looking for a game to play and/or it has a price dump.

 

[Y2Kev]

I would imagine a paring of studios and a refocusing into open world games. Seems to be their competitive strength.

 

[Resolution]

I think the poor optimization and buggy PC games have a lot to do with it. I felt burned after Dishonored 2 on steam and bad user reviews would make others stay away.

 

[iceblade]

I'm with those saying that this is a shame. Bethesda may have their issues, but their output as a publisher has been quite good and has been punching above their weight - all the more so since as someone else said these are all single player games designed for SP. Not sure how they can change things around, but going back to a more standard review policy sounds like it would help some.

 

[Drexion]

I'd wager that Bethesda's "no early review copies" policy probably lost Prey(2017) a half million copies in sales. (or more) They can get away with it for franchises like Doom or Elder Scrolls - because most gamers already know those brand names - but for a title like this they needed reviewers to get their previews and reviews out before the release date, not only for brand awareness but so that there is a large enough initial playerbase so that the 'word of mouth' secondary sales impact is meaningful.

This game had great word of mouth feedback from early buyers (especially from PC gamers where the hybrid bioshock/deusex playstyle is popular) - but the initial size of the early playerbase was too small for it to have a substantial impact. Having the reviews trickling out one by one days or a week after release was the worst thing Bethesda could have done for this game.

 

[Deleted member 4518]

Is the Dishonored 2 drop (38%) compared from the original games debut, or a 38% drop after the first month of release?

 

[goldenageoftelevision]

How can you conclude that Wolfenstein 2 sales are bad just because it sold less in the UK (a small country) than the rest of the world?

 

[Hawkeye 131]

Gut instinct, more promotion. I hardly saw any promo material anywhere for Prey or Wolfenstein 2. Dropping their ridiculous review policy probably wouldn't hurt either then again it might not have much of an impact hard to say.

 

[Finale Fireworker]

The biggest thing I think they're squandering is the free press that journalists give games. It's important to send review copies and previews because that lets people know your game even exists. Bethesda has a huge community following and a lot of engaged fans, but that's already proven to not be enough.

I really don't think the problem is the games. The games are tremendous and will hopefully have long tails as people pick them up later in the generation because there is only material that speaks to their quality. I really think the issue is hype and player awareness. But obviously there are people at Bethesda who were confident enough to the contrary that they stopped sending review copies. I can't say I know better than them.

I just know that I didn't know when Dishonored 2 game out. Or Prey came out. And I wouldn't have known that Wolfenstein came out if the marketing hadn't picked up so much in the final month. Dishonored 2 is one of my favorite games of the generation, and I played it pretty close to release, and not even I knew when Death of the Outsider came out.

 

[Falchion]

It sounds like the new Doom really needs to be a breadwinner for them so I look for them to push it hard.

 

[unicornKnight]

Skyrim 2 will save them.

Spoiler

What's an Elder Scrolls?

 

[Deleted member 8593]

Just speaking from a personal perspective, all these releases appeal to me (bought the first Dishonored, Wolfenstein and The Evil Within at launch) and I wasn't aware of their releases or their quality. This is obviously anecdotal but it seems to be a failure of the marketing department and their new review policy seems to have backfired badly. Many games these days rely on word of mouth and non-traditional marketing to succeed, it seems that Bethesda hasn't realized that yet.

But I don't think this is the only problem with their games. There's this weird perception that they're not enough value for money because people see them as these 8-12h once-and-never-again experiences and I don't know how to "fix" that within these franchises. Slapping some multiplayer mode on won't help here.

 

[Nirolak]

Is the Dishonored 2 drop (38%) compared from the original games debut, or a 38% drop after the first month of release?

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NPD is the first month. UK is the first week.

On Steam LTD:

Dishonored 2: 940,341 ± 28,816
Dishonored 1: 3,512,690 ± 55,542

Mind, Dishonored 2 has only went down to $20 while Dishonored 1 has been at $5 on Steam, so I wouldn't read that as a 73% drop.

 

[31GhostsIV]

Seems like if you're not a big known game like AC, Mario, Crash, Fifa, or a big exclusive, you're forgotten in UK.

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Nah. Releasing it on the same day as Mario and Ass Creed wasn't a bright move though.

For the record (I'm in the UK) I bought Mario day one, and ordered Wolfenstein today.

 

[Griffith]

I think that those franchises that sold poorly will simply be put on ice and Bethesda will continue to focus on their other successful franchises and games.

Even though, for example, I consider it to be the weakest of the series, Fallout 4's sales beat even Skyrim's.

 

[LossAversion]

1.) Where do you see Bethesda heading next?

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My standard response would be that I fear the worst but hope for the best. I'm praying for Arkane and while I don't see Bethesda Game Studios going anywhere anytime soon, I do see Bethesda pushing their future projects even further in the wrong direction.

2.) Where would you take Bethesda next?

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Bethesda has made many mistakes. The way they handled Human Head. Their recent review copy policy. Paid mods and a repeat of that disaster with the creation club. Honestly, I think if they rectified these issues and had better marketing for their games... Prey and Dishonored may have sold more copies. Better marketing doesn't necessarily mean more expensive marketing though. In fact, for Arkane's sake, I think Bethesda needs to be smarter with their budgeting. In today's market, games like Prey are sadly niche. I don't know if they can produce these kinds of games on a big budget and realistically get good returns.

I don't want these kinds of games to disappear though so... I hope there is a good solution. I'm afraid Bethesda's solution will involve a lot of microtransactions and/or other modern travesties that have no place in these types of games. Perhaps they could experiment with different pricing models following the success of Hellblade. Though I suppose Death of the Outsider may have been that experiment in their eyes.

On a more positive note, I think BGS can turn things around. They've been streamlining their games with each successive release and sometimes it works while other times it backfires terribly. I truly believe they can find a perfect middle ground between the freedom we all love in their games and the more cinematic approach they've been striving for. They just need to focus on their strengths like their ability to create fantastic environments to explore. Then they can try to cover their weaknesses by hiring new writers and not going overboard with their "shiny new thing!". Oblivion gates... dragons... settlements... all cool concepts that they had working well enough. But they don't seem to understand that moderation is they key to giving these ideas more impact on the player. You can only go into so many oblivion gates and fight so many dragons before they lose all of their luster.

I'm trying to be hopeful. It's just really hard these days.

 

[inner-G]

Time to go to Valenwood for a new big single-player Elder Scrolls experience.

Skyrim still making them $ and about to release on Switch. I imagine that if all the development investment from those underperforming games were put into single-player RPGs they'd have seen better returns on their money.

 

[fantasyGG]

Gut instinct, more promotion. I hardly saw any promo material anywhere for Prey or Wolfenstein 2. Dropping their ridiculous review policy probably wouldn't hurt either then again it might not have much of an impact hard to say.

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Not sure about Prey, but they did promote Wolfenstein 2 really hard. But yes, dropping their review policy would gain more exposure for their new games.

 

[WellbornWarrior]

Sorry I don't buy that narrative, OP. If you can't provide other hard data than sales in UK only there isn't much to support your thesis that Bethesda is in trouble.

Even if we had more numbers, do we even know if they include digital sales? Is there even any sales data company that include these in some form?

 

[Skittzo]

In all honesty they (or Nintendo, there's a weird publisher relationship happening) should market the hell out of their upcoming Switch games to hopefully find an additional audience to engage with.

Marketing seems to be the problem in general, and review copies are a part of that. The games are all reviewing well but there is very little word of mouth happening around release and even less marketing. This seems to have changed with Wolf 2 but I wonder if that was a bit of a Mario casualty, and sales of that might pick up in the coming weeks.

 

[Avantgarde]

If I were in charge I would give Arkane a chance to work on a TES spinoff single player action-adventure game with rp elements (fixed protagonist, heavy on lore and faction politics, fleshed out combat like Dark Messiah, etc). TES adventures stopped at Redguard and we never got to play Eye of Argonia due to sales failure, but back then the series was nowhere near today's cult status, so why not try again and see how it goes. Keep Arkane doing what they do best and give fans something fresh to play since the gap will be huge between V and VI.

 

[ASaiyan]

Where do they go? Hopefully somewhere with a marketing department. Also unclog the mail chute so you can start sending out review copies again. Because, you know, games get exposure and people get excited by reviews?

It sure ain't that they're making bad games. At least not recently anyway.

 

[Jimrpg]

I think

• People aren't as interested in single player games or story driven games like they are used to anymore.
• People know to wait for a price cut especially for story driven games.
• People are going to wait for the bugs to be ironed out before buying particularly for single player games. With multiplayer games friends are playing so people will buy Day 1.
• People can watch streams of it.

But honestly was performance by Bethesda games really that bad? Most of the games mentioned had solid reviews.

Dishonored 2 - seemed to perform ok almost 1m copies on PC.

Fallout 4 was a big hit.

Prey and EW2 underperformed.

Wolf 2 will be fine in the long run I think.

 

[Deleted member 5864]

At this point I'm just wondering if the next TES game will have Skyrim in the title. Before you murder me, I understand this is counter to tradition, but Skyrim has become their biggest brand in itself so they have to reference it somewhere.

 

[Deleted member 4518]

NPD is the first month. UK is the first week.

On Steam LTD:

Dishonored 2: 940,341 ± 28,816
Dishonored 1: 3,512,690 ± 55,542

Mind, Dishonored 2 has only went down to $20 while Dishonored 1 has been at $5 on Steam, so I wouldn't read that as a 73% drop.

Click to shrink...

Ah okay. Makes sense now, thanks.

 

[TheWordyGuy]

Dishonored 2 and Prey are great games.

I can't understand how some gamers can be so dismissive of these titles.

 

[Plasmids]

I'm in the uk and both myself and my son buy all our games digitally now.

I also have friends who also do this, so it might not be as bad for them as it looks at first glance.

 

[Nilaul]

Might as well make Metroid Prime.

Yeah, Wolfenstein is coming out? What horrible timing and I'd rather wait and buy the switch version.

 

[BioDigital Jazzman]

No one has access to digital sales.

Sales being down 40-50% is in line with current digital purchases for new games being 40-50% digital now.

Let Bethesda speak for themselves in regards to their sales and expectations. Threads like this are simply unnecessary.

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I highly doubt these single player experiences with little replay value are hitting 40-50% digital splits. Destiny 2 is 1 thing, but I wouldn't expect a fairly short linear game like Wolfenstein to be highly orucashed digitally without a sale going on

 

[Mr_F_Snowman]

Certainly a shame, Dishonored was one of my favorites from last gen and can't wait to get around to playing the second. From what I've heard and played they all deserve better sales.

Would have to imagine that the lack of marketing is a conscious risk mitigating decision to keep the games within pretty modest budgets and lessen the potential fallout (excuse the pun) from any low sales. Guess they will still be breaking even with them as is sales wise - if one or two then become unexpectedly large hits even better for them.

While they have the Elder Scrolls / Fallout as near enough guaranteed cash cows they can be a bit more flexible in not needing every other game to be a mega selling blockbuster and stick to a more AA sized budget mainly by limiting marketing spend

 

[OrdinaryPrime]

I mean it looks like they're porting them everywhere :). It sucks, DOOM and Wolfenstein are really good games. I can't say anything about Dishonored, never played it.

 

[Hindle]

Reevaluation. The same as what every publisher is doing. No more single player games which take years to make and offer little to no returns. They will start to look at Rainbow Six Siege, Overwatch for influence.

 

[Fisty]

Shame too because Evil Within 2 is fucking great. I'm on chapter 9 or 10 and having a blast, can't wait to keep playing.

Hopefully Wolf 2 picks up some steam, but we shouldn't take year 1 of the new gen as barometer for sales. People were STARVED for games to play on their shiny new boxes and the competition was far less fierce.

 

[Remachinate]

As Bethesda isn't public, we don't really have insight into development budgets for their games, right? Is it possible that most of these games are hitting breakeven despite these sales, given they have a lower marketing spend to recoup? I just can't imagine a seasoned publisher would keep making the same mistake over multiple years unless they're satisfied with these lower sales targets.

 

[Duxxy3]

I think the poor optimization and buggy PC games have a lot to do with it. I felt burned after Dishonored 2 on steam and bad user reviews would make others stay away.

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The part that pissed me off was the Prey and DOTO both ran great. They just refused to properly fix Dishonored 2. That pissed me off a bit. I didn't get the game until it was on a deep sale, and it ran like shit. Stayed away from Prey because it was an Arkane game and I was wary of Arkane game performance at that point.

 

[Nirolak]

As Bethesda isn't public, we don't really have insight into development budgets for their games, right? Is it possible that most of these games are hitting breakeven despite these sales, given they have a lower marketing spend to recoup? I just can't imagine a seasoned publisher would keep making the same mistake over multiple years unless they're satisfied with these lower sales targets.

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Well, it depends what you mean by "making the same mistake".

Like all of these games started development in 2014 or earlier. They were mostly done by the time the first one ran into headwind.

The most telling thing would presumably be what each of the studios in question (Arkane Lyon, Arkane Austin, Tango, and machinegames) release next, though we likely won't find that out for 2-3+ years.

 

[PeskyToaster]

They are putting out some of the best singleplayer content consistently. Sad to see. I guess it's the loss of all the people sleeping on these games.

 

[Remachinate]

Well, it depends what you mean by "making the same mistake".

Like all of these games started development in 2014 or earlier. They were mostly done by the time the first one ran into headwind.

The most telling thing would presumably be what each of the studios in question (Arkane Lyon, Arkane Austin, Tango, and machinegames) release next, though we likely won't find that out for 2-3+ years.

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I certainly don't think the mistake has been investing money into producing the consistently high-quality games of Dishonored 2, Prey, and so on. As many others have said in this thread, Bethesda has really dropped the ball in terms of gaining wider mindshare. Where I'm coming from is whether they really feel those ad dollars/better review policy/etc. wouldn't be made up in sales volume.

It almost makes me wonder if they're treating all their purchased studios as a "hobby" in the same way that Apple has treated its Apple TV--it's worth it to stay in that market for reasons other than the bottom line, but they don't want or expect for it to do gangbusters.

 

[MonadL]

Where does Bethesda go next? My guess is they fully hop on the GaaS train more than they have. More shared online experiences ala Destiny, Microtransactions, etc. I love SP experiences but it's clear that the market at large doesn't want them, at least not in the numbers that would justify a AAA budget.

 

[RoboitoAM]

I think that we'll still see single player games but likely lower budgeted... After all, Bethesda is privately owned right? I guess so long as Fallout and TES keep them afloat we'll be okay.

I hope, anyway. Dishonored 2 is a masterpiece and I'm loving Wolfenstein so far (did not get TEW 2 because the engine is terrible again, and waited on Dishonored 2 for the same reason).

 

[Kosma]

Pretty sure it means doubling down on what works: the boring Oblivion/FO3 template

 

[Deleted member 419]

The most frustrating thing of all is just thinking of what could've been.

This stable of releases is legitimate dynasty-creating material. Instead none of them sold and now people are questioning whether these kinds of experiences are financially viable anymore.

Just want to point out something for the pessimistic. Looking Glass Studios also bombed with the Thief franchise (though the first did decent numbers, eerily similar to the situation we have now with Dishonored), System Shock, and Ultima Underworld. I'd say we've had a...number of high-quality western single-player games since then, no?

Relax. These kinds of games aren't dying off. They'll just be in a slump, most likely.

 

[Timeaisis]

I love Bethesda, but they need to ditch realism and make cheaper, but similarly deep singleplayer video games.

Just my two cents, anyway.

 

[AyaisMUsikWhore]

Ehhh, using UK as any barometer as a studio success is kind of weird considering I don't think they can speak volumes for the markets out there. However I am intrigued into how Bethesda makes money, like, at all? If these games aren't flying off the shelf, what kind of war chest are they holding on to that's pumping out quality but is enough to have low quantity?