-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
Media Create Sales: Week 6, 2020 (Feb 03 - Feb 09)
- Thread starter Chris1964
- Start date
Yeah but still no. Even the late port of DQXI was not treated as an afterthought.
The late port wasnt, but i think that was more on the devs side, rather than Square itself.
I still think Square is gonna be drunk on FF7R juice and MHW dreams and will thus fuck up DQ112 in some way.
Square has made it clear since day one of its intention on Switch : make it the home of the Dragon Quest franchise (which is clever since the horse had a lot of potential).
You had Dragon Quest Heroes I&II at launch, Dragon Quest Builders 1 & 2 in 2018 and DQXIS in 2019 (+DQX). It is an effort initiated at the corporate level, same as the work done on DQXIS which was done in-house.
Also there is, DQM Classic, the ports of DQ1-3, and DQ Rivals. So Switch is not missing any of this gen's DQ games, and it has a few extras compared to what PS4 got.
It is missing Fortune Street, which is perhaps the dumbest one to skip Switch.
Technically Fortune Street isn't a DQ game, but rather a game which usually has DQ characters - although you are right in its lack of presence, and it would be nice if it were on Switch.
Do we really believe that Sony doesn't care about Japan? I see that often but Japan is a huge market. A succesful console can net you 20% percent of your revenue. Sony is successful worldwide but I'm pretty sure that they would want to be successful in Japan too. The circumstances have changed drastically but Sony going after Monster Hunter for PS4 is a sign that they do care for Japan and desperately want to revive their marketshare there. They don't have that kind of power anymore though.
I think Dragon Quest XII will be on Switch, in like 2022 (or perhaps 2023, if FFVII-2 is in the 2022-23 FY). There might be a PS5 version made mostly with the West in mind, but I think Switch will be the lead platform.
They went after MH for the west, not for Japan.
And really, all MHW did in japan was preserve some of their marketshare for a bit, not revive it.
They care about Japan, but care isn't binary - it's a sliding scale, and relative to America and Europe, their care for us is fairly low, and lower than it was 20 years ago.
Capcom went to Sony for the West but Sony did go to Capcom for Japan (and Asia in general).
Which do you think was more profitable? Ps3 or ps4?
Speaking of I see it's now sold 15M WW. What an absolute monster.
I think the real danger for Sony if the PS5 doesn't sell well at all in Japan is losing Japanese exclusives that sell in Japan... DQ, KH, FF, MH (at least in an exclusive to Japan sense), Persona, and Yakuza, to name a few from the top of my head. I think the transition to the PS5, leaves the door wide open for developers to port games to the Switch as well, if there isn't a strong Sony presence in Japan, developers who make games for the Japanese market, might be forced to bring their games to the Switch.
We will see it coming for sure, Atlus will probably be the first company to bring something over, also MH coming to the Switch for stronger Japanese sales makes a lot of sense, but we will have to wait and see if either of those things happen, but if so, we could start to see a few more games from those series I listed above make their way to the Switch.
What if Nintendo Switch is an immortal platform?: Losing the Japanese market could be a very big deal for Sony, and what if the Switch '2' isn't replacing the Switch, but extending the platform for another 5+ years, what if Nintendo's plan with the platform is to eventually offer streaming on older hardware and to keep the platform alive for 15 to 20 years like they did with the Gameboy, Gamecube hardware, DS/3DS... What if their goal is simply to have a platform that doesn't expire and they just keep selling Switch units throughout Japan and the world, right now they have over 52 Million Switch units in the world, by the time next gen arrives, it could be 70 Million+...
We will see it coming for sure, Atlus will probably be the first company to bring something over, also MH coming to the Switch for stronger Japanese sales makes a lot of sense, but we will have to wait and see if either of those things happen, but if so, we could start to see a few more games from those series I listed above make their way to the Switch.
What if Nintendo Switch is an immortal platform?: Losing the Japanese market could be a very big deal for Sony, and what if the Switch '2' isn't replacing the Switch, but extending the platform for another 5+ years, what if Nintendo's plan with the platform is to eventually offer streaming on older hardware and to keep the platform alive for 15 to 20 years like they did with the Gameboy, Gamecube hardware, DS/3DS... What if their goal is simply to have a platform that doesn't expire and they just keep selling Switch units throughout Japan and the world, right now they have over 52 Million Switch units in the world, by the time next gen arrives, it could be 70 Million+...
I think the what if part is a reality at this point. Nintendo has made it clear that the Switch will be a platform that has a long life ahead of it and the 2 decade partnership with Nvidia is a sign of how long they think they can keep selling Switch models. Nintendo has made a very smart move with going into the tablet/hybrid market. They've learned very valuable lessons from the 3DS and WiiU era .
Japan is important to Sony, still. One of the reasons Sony 1st party sales pales greatly in comparison to Nintendo 1st party sales has to do with the Japan market.
And yes, this thread is discussing Japan sales first and foremost.
But heck, I'll even go out and say Ring Fit Adventure will globally outsell most of Sony 1st party games. No need to qualify territories.
The only ones it won't beat are Spider-Man, GoW, Horizon and Naughty Dog. But everything else? Sure.
Dengeki
Fiscal Year (April 1st - February 2nd)
dengekionline.com
Fiscal Year (April 1st - February 2nd)
- Hardware: 5.23 million units (-0.1%) / 144.6 billion Yen (-7.9%), lower because of Switch Lite
- Software: 20 730 000 units (12.3%) / 136.8 billion Yen (-11.3%)
- Total: 281.5 billion Yen (-9.5%)
- Nintendo Switch (Hardware): 4.21 million units (+21.7%)
- Nintendo Switch (Software): 14 410 000 units (+12.6%)
- PlayStation 4 (Hardware): 900 000 units (-29.2%)
- PlayStation 4 (Software): 5.67 million units (29.5%)
- Other platforms (Hardware): 130 000 units (-75.3%)
- Other platforms (Software): 650 000 units (-76.9%)
【週間ソフト販売ランキング TOP50】『グラブル ヴァーサス』が8.6万本（2月3日～9日）
2位以下に目立った動きはなくSwitch『リングフィット アドベンチャー』が2.2万本で2位、『ポケットモンスター ソード・シールド』が2.3万本で3、7位を獲得した。
dengekionline.com
If you look at Resident Evil 2 you have 400k-500k domestic sales out of 5.8m WW.
Same with Tekken's 5m WW and so on. So as long as PlayStation can do the job worldwide the big publishers that rely on those sales might not sweat decreasing Japanese sales as much.
The small guys will be the studios that survive off of 50k-100k sales so having a massive console base could be irrelevant if their audience isn't there.
Sony fills a niche and even if PS5 puts up Vita numbers in Japan as long as worldwide numbers make up for it they won't lose any support.
Nintendo being more mainstream in Japan won't change that no matter how many consoles they sell and for how long they sell it.
Once upon a time when graphics stalled in Japan with Kingdom Hearts, Monster Hunter and Dragon Quest clinging to simpler tech an argument could have been made about sticking with a platform for longer. But now the big guys want to be in tbe same conversation as Ubisoft and Activision, impressing audiences at the big shows on the latest tech.
Last edited:
Probably PS4 but that doesn't matter either. It failed to be a mainstream platform and only catered to a vastly homogenous fanbase. Which is perfectly fine---simply it wasn't a leading platform.
Dengeki
Fiscal Year (April 1st - February 2nd)
Platforms:
- Hardware: 5.23 million units (-0.1%) / 144.6 billion Yen (-7.9%), lower because of Switch Lite
- Software: 20 730 000 units (12.3%) / 136.8 billion Yen (-11.3%)
- Total: 281.5 billion Yen (-9.5%)
Sales were up YoY in July, September, and December, but significantly down in December and January.
- Nintendo Switch (Hardware): 4.21 million units (+21.7%)
- Nintendo Switch (Software): 14 410 000 units (+12.6%)
- PlayStation 4 (Hardware): 900 000 units (-29.2%)
- PlayStation 4 (Software): 5.67 million units (29.5%)
- Other platforms (Hardware): 130 000 units (-75.3%)
- Other platforms (Software): 650 000 units (-76.9%)
【週間ソフト販売ランキング TOP50】『グラブル ヴァーサス』が8.6万本（2月3日～9日）
2位以下に目立った動きはなくSwitch『リングフィット アドベンチャー』が2.2万本で2位、『ポケットモンスター ソード・シールド』が2.3万本で3、7位を獲得した。
Smash and PS4's winter sale did work in 2018.
Yeah I think PS5 could sell like the Vita in Japan, world wide it will surely do 70 Million+ in 5 years, PS4 took almost 6 years to sell 100 Million, but PS5 will be more expensive, have stronger competition and the new Sony management in charge is not the team that have been successful in the past, so I think there is a lot to worry about with sales there, not to mention that if they do sell like the Vita in Japan, they will have 4 to 5 Million less units sold than the PS4.
I think losing exclusives, especially from Japan is a big deal for Sony, if Switch starts getting those series, it will start to move to a focus for Switch hardware, because Switch actually is millions ahead of PS4 launch aligned right now and will sell better in both America (21 Million so far, and should happen by the end of 2021 calendar year) and Japan (12 Million so far), Europe they are actually close, it's other regions where Sony has an edge, but Switch could end up outselling the PS4 in China too and world wide, as PS4 is already greatly slowing down.
The point about tech doesn't really matter when we are talking about streaming, Nintendo's president said last year that by the end of this decade streaming will be a standard of the industry, they clearly have plans in mind, even Reggie a few months ago said something similar, the is a future coming soon where Switch hardware limitations could mean nothing at all for AAA next gen games, since it will just be receiving a direct feed via the cloud.
I also think it is worth noting that a Switch 2 will likely be very close to next gen consoles in terms of performance, with technology like DLSS and mobile hardware already caught up to current gen base consoles, Switch 2 is going to seem a bit unreal.
That is because different launch periods. After next quarter PS4 will be millions ahead as it hits holiday quarter of 2016. Probably easiest (while still not completely fair) way to compare the two is to take away PS4 launch quarter and pretend PS4 launched during same quarter as Switch (so Jan-Mar 2014 for PS4). With that they are at 52.48 million Switch and PS4 at 52.6 million so pretty much neck in neck. Also overall I really don't see your point of japanese publishers suddenly abandoning their AAA focus with their big games when almost every one of them had record run during PS4 gen. Globally obviously.
I have no doubt mobile tech will continue to improve at the rate it has been. Nintendo prioritizes cost and longevity. The hardware they will have in Switch 2 won't be running at full chat and it will likely be proven tech that is a couple of years old. Nintendo and their 3rd party devs will still perform witchcraft on it I'm sure.
As far as streaming goes. I think it will be a while before streaming is a priority on a Nintendo platform considering how their past online endeavors have gone. I could even see a service that would say let you pair your JoyCon to your phone and remote play from your docked Switch at home. But a Nintendo equivalent to PS Now or xCloud? Let's have this discussion again in 10 years...
As far as the big guys thoughts on worldwide sales? It's frustrating but EA probably speaks for a lot of other companies when they said Nintendo is good at selling Nintendo games and that they look at the sales and still need to be selective about what they release. The only thing that would make them care imo is if Nintendo made a PS5/XSX comparable box and released it at the same time.
They could have done nothing apart from hand out a free $10 to the first 100 million who asked and it would have been more profitable than the PS3 considering the mammoth losses that thing led to lol
The sales numbers are true enough for now, but this year should sell higher than any PS4 year, so by next Spring, the problem with launch timing might not matter if Switch can exceed LTD numbers of PS4 launched align by the end of March 31st.
My expectations on Switch 2 hardware is sometime between 2021 and 2023 they launch the new more powerful versions of both Switch and Switch Lite, they will have about 4x the raw power of the 2015 year old chip (I'm actually looking at the 2018 Snapdragon 855 here for size, heat, power consumption and performance... Though I'm sure they will use an Nvidia equivalent product that currently doesn't exist, because it will be custom made for these products). I then expect Nintendo to use DLSS technology, because it's cheap, Nvidia is putting it in all their future products, and because it offers a 4x resolution bump, so the picture can for about the same resources as a snapdragon 855, have about 16x the image quality of the current Switch, PS5 is going to have about ~18x to 20x the image quality of the Switch, so it's well within the ball park here.
Streaming is being actively looked at by Nintendo, heck there are already games that are streaming on the Switch, there is no barrier here and all Switch models are already capable of it. We will see Nintendo try their own crack at Streaming within the next 4 or 5 years.
EA just doesn't want to do business on Nintendo's platforms, there is no reason they don't have remasters or Sims 4 on the Switch, they seem to only allow some indie games on the Switch currently, new hardware won't change this, but other AAA publishers actually do want their games on the Switch and the barrier here is the game card price/storage space... Over this year and the following 2 years, the price will come down to be far more competitive with bluray discs.
I think people are way too quick to claim that this year will be the peak of Switch based on few weeks of data from Japanese market. Animal Crossing hype and Ring Fit are pushing Switch hw at the moment in japan and neither is as big system seller in the west (January NPD numbers will be interesting later today). Not to mention you can be up yoy for almost whole year but lose that edge during single holiday quarter because holidays are so big part of the yearly sales (even more so for Nintendo). Could this year be peak for Switch? Sure. Can we say it now? No absolutely not. I mean I agree that Switch should at least be close to its peak (just like PS4 was in 2016 and 2017).
Also still doesn't change the overall point that why would big Japanese publisher suddenly completely change their strategy with their AAA franchises?(Outside of DQ). Capcom just reported near 15 million for MH:W globally and you think they will suddenly make Switch lead platform for MH:W2? Especially with the insane power gap between Switch and upcoming next gen consoles. I agree that mid tier and lower tier japanese games will start to have more and more Switch versions (like we have seen) but at the moment there really isn't reason for big AAA games to do the same. They want to compete with western pubs and their big budget games. That means targeting PS5/Xbox Series and PC.
Thats true, i just mean hardware in total. Same thing with the Switch that has some of the same factors (less competition, more 3rd party franchises being releasesd there etc.), i dont think many, if any, expect the Switch to sell a lot more than the 3DS.
Switch last year had 1 system seller in the first half of the year, that being Mario Maker 2, which came out right at the end of the first half. Yeah Switch is up YoY so far, but it's Animal Crossing and the games coming for the rest of the year. When we look at the holidays, yeah Pokemon is huge, but because Pokemon Let's Go was on the Switch the year prior, it wasn't as big of a system seller as a fresh IP could be, who knows what is coming this holiday, but last holiday wasn't particularly special. I'm not saying that it's a fact that this year will be up, but I'd say it's expected, simply because animal crossing is that big and will make sure that the Switch is up YoY by the time the holiday season starts.
As for AAA developers, I think you are misunderstanding my point here, I think streaming is how those games come to the Switch, at least until a more powerful Switch hits the market. There is nothing particularly alien about next gen consoles, they are just doing the same things the PS3/PS4 generations did, but with targeted higher resolutions... Is there even a game that couldn't exist on the Switch that exists now? I mean I use to think the Witcher 3 was that game, but it's on the Switch and hackers have made that game look and play really good on the Switch too, the port team have even said their update for the game will be worth the wait, so it sounds like the game is going to be even better on the Switch.
The Switch isn't the Wii, it's a modern console with modern APIs, developers don't have to create a separate game for the system, so they will continue to come to the Switch as long as it's successful, if Switch is an immortal platform, and the market is in a very weird place. Heck even the platform holders are putting their games on other platforms now, the idea that they will stay exclusive to PS5 even if it sells around Vita numbers in Japan is bonkers to me. I fully expect more Playstation exclusives to go multiplatform to survive, and to just increase sales, we will see it with AAA games too whether via streaming or downgrading, they will find their way onto the Switch platform.
A few comeback in Dengeki top 50, Yoshi's Crafted world escaped the niche status at last
I don't think you can seriously suggest that the change in third party support between PS3/PS4 and 3DS/Switch are remotely comparable. If anything the Switch is on worse footing than the 3DS when it comes to system selling software.
Maybe you're right. The comparison was just that the Switch has seen more franchises on it than before.
Good points. We're in for exciting times with new solutions to old problems.
I know RE8 has a streaming version on Switch. IIRC DQX can even be streamed on 3DS. The big guys are exploring their options but don't think Nintendo will be on the forefront with their own service for a while. They are just now making inroads with digital. I think they will wait until they throw streaming into the mix. They would likely look at clever hardware and software solutions to bring their games up to par.
It's not just EA now is it? The situation is improving though. To bring Japanese sales back into the discussion, Minecraft has done quite well and I'm sure Fortnite is doing well too. The successes are there and with post game installs gamecard sizes probably aren't stopping the bigger guys. They can't flat out ignore it but I wouldn't say they are putting their best foot forward.
Something Nintendo could do is basically a reverse of what they do and pretty much what Sony already does. Act as publisher for big western games that release in Japan. They do the reverse with big Japanese games for worldwide releases and Sony does that for COD games domestically.
Last edited:
I totally agree. This is the main issue with JP 3rd parties this generation. Western titles were considered "new" to a lot of Japanese folks and thus they did better than they used to.
Pokemon isn't a big JRPG? It actually hit 500K retail in Dengeki last week, but yeh it'll probably also do that in Famitsu eventually.
Nintendo was lucky/smart to turn Luigi's Mansion, Fire Emblem and Splatoon into system sellers. Now Ring Fit. They keep adding to their pile of first petty software.
They are starting to figure out how to solve their third party woes: by not depending on them lol.
Sure but you can see the effect just at the very top. Minecraft is the only 3rd party million seller on Switch whereas 3DS had several at this point. PS3 had one million seller, PS4 already has 3 or 4(including KH3) with at least one more on the way.
Yup, you're not wrong.
OP
OP
If Harada and Co. pull their heads out of sand when it comes to Switch, it will become the Nintendo system with more varied third party support since Super Famicom. Most small and mid tier Japanese developers have jumped to it multiplatform or exclusively, from the remaining big that are still absent Bandai Namco is the one that could make the difference. Capcom, From Software and Spike Chunsoft are lost cases.
Capcom already releases stuff for the Switch, do you really think they won't bring another Monster Hunter game to the Switch for the guaranteed 3+ Million seller? Just seems really odd that they wouldn't make a MH for Switch.
Namco did originally have a Tales of game coming to the Switch, but there has been no updates for it since 2017 that I'm aware of.
All Nintendo said at the time was Tales franchise was going to be on Switch..and Vesperia released on Switch!
I'm not trying to at all minimize the 1 million sellers. Obviously those are the most impactful games, etc. But you also can't just use that example (which, when you get down to the 3DS comparison is basically L5 falling off a cliff and no Monster Hunter or DQ) to completely ignore the rest of the market- which has moved to Switch in numbers not seen in a Nintendo platform since SNES, as Chris has said.
Thats true, but many smaller titles collectively can make a difference too. Not necessarily bringing in huge sales, but it means that its less needed to get another platform when many of the titles are also available elsewhere (theres of course the technical differences (resolution, texture quality etc.) which also matters when picking one version over another, but still).
Atlus not really being on Switch also has a notable impact... We will see how well Persona 5 Scramble does on Switch though, could help future support, though I feel like Atlus is just really slow making games right now.
That's not a new thing for them. Atlus is the company that released multiple PS2 games in 2008.
One day Switch will get a big 3rd party exclusive announcement. 2 late ports, a Level 5-ed franchise and Bamco family games doing 300-500k are good results. 3 years in with this being the case just shows how unprepared everyone was. If projects were greenlit post launch this is going to be the year we hear about them.
I'm just thinking of all the EO games, SMT games, Persona Q games, even the Radiant Historia games... On Switch they just finally released SMTxFE#.
OP
OP
P5R is just a baffling project all-around. Selling the same game but with some extra content on the same platform, making players replay most of a 100-hour JRPG to reach the comparatively small amount of new content... it would make a lot more sense as a product for a new platform P5 is not on yet.
We know the first two are getting new entries and Radiant Historia doesn't seem to be a series.
On the subject of EO the last update we got was in 2018 and I completely forgot about it lol.
Of course not.