Capcom Thinks It can Sell 10 Million Copies of Dragon's Dogma

[Bvenged]

snip

I honestly thought you were going to stick a spittake in there. Somehow it would have been more appropriate.

I was going to put in projectile vomiting, but then I got put off my meal.

Since I'm not eating and I found one that didn't have chunks in it;
reprimanded to vomiting

 

[Caffeine_Bombed]

Well... i found the game interesting... Like Monster Hunting but with fresh new mechanics that appealled to me. So instead of complaining, i'm going to wait for more information about this title (before i start hating it senselessly), and if i get curious or like it enough i will get it...

AND NOT B!TCH HOW IT IS A HORRIBLE GAME, WITHOUTH EVEN PLAYING IT, OR EVEN SAYING CAPCOM SUCKS.

Cuz it seems that's what you folks are doign around these parts...

Itsuno-san, is that you? When did you sneak in here ya little scamp!

And i wouldv gotten away, if it weren't for you meddling kids...

Jinkies! It was the completely sinister-looking games producer that we've never ever seen before!
So he used this oil lamp and an origami napkin to make the millions of screaming fans, then he used this correction fluid and a pen to alter the Capcom sales report!

 

[Spacewolf]

So is this the game that looks like monster hunter but less colourful are more "Gritty"

 

[Beautiful End]

~Snipeth~

That was a very well phrased response and I got nothing to add to that. I'll admit I know very little about marketing and how those numbers work, though I hope some day I can make it into this industry.

So from a customer's point of view, I still think MML could sell well. Maybe not as well as those AAA games of them moment, but I think it would do well nonetheless. Where I think they went wrong is with the scheduled 3DS release. I always believed that if they would have released it for the PSN or XBLA or something like that, it would sell better than for the 3DS. I dunno, that's just me.

Now, my job requires me to...inform people about videogames and sell stuff to them. From that point of view, getting people excited about the next Megaman game would be so much easier than getting people excited about Dragon's Dogma. A couple of reasons: 1. We haven't seen an original Megaman game being released in ages. 2. Again, it's Megaman. Though it's true a IP alone doesn't guarantee success, I still believe MML is not a bad game at all. Kinda out there, yes, but it's a good game. So those two simple facts should guarantee the game will do well. Again, maybe it won't be able to compete against CoD or AC, but still.

But Dragon's Dogma? I can't get people excited about the game. Let's say I start talking about it and people are interested. They usually reply with "Well, it sounds good...but I'll wait until it comes out/there's a price drop/you have it used before I give it a shot". And you know what? They're absolutely right. At that point, I just shut my mouth and let them be on their way. I'd do the same! I did the same with Kingdoms of Amaulur because it was a new IP. And yet, I loved the game. Kinda makes me sad I didn't pre-ordered it because I didn't get that armor bonus.
Anyway, looking at KoA and Skyrim as an example, KoA is a good game, but it can't possibly hope to sell as much as Skyrim, simply because Skyrim is better known, it has some prequels, has learned from its mistakes, etc. It comes as no surprise that KoA can't even hope to get as many sales as an Elder scrolls game.

So I'm not saying Dragon's Dogma is gonna be a crappy game or that it's gonna be the next Skyrim. But just based on the fact that it's a new IP, it cannot hope to sell 10M copies. It just can't. Just by reading this thread's replies give me an idea of what they're in for. Yes, this thread doesn't represent the world's opinion, but you can see 9 out of 10 people have their doubts about all this.Maybe in about 5 years or more. But I don't think that's what those Capcom guys meant.
However, and again, this is from a fan's point of view, a well-developed Megaman game, not just a game they did for fan service, could have way more potential. I'm not suggesting they follow the Sega route where they spam us with Sonic games because that's a well-known, old school game that sells anyway, as little or as much as it gathers. But I suppose a simple research/survey would reveal a Megaman game, whether it's MML or not, would sell better than Dragon's Dogma. I just can't understand how Capcom could think that. Yes, Capcom has done some horrible mistakes as of lately, but they seem to be getting a liking for shooting themselves on the foot. I still have a bit of faith in Capcom as much as they've pissed me off lately, though.

The way they make it look, Dragon's Dogma must be the next Skyrim x10. Cannot say it's not, either. So we'll see.

 

[Starke]

~Snipeth~

That was a very well phrased response and I got nothing to add to that. I'll admit I know very little about marketing and how those numbers work, though I hope some day I can make it into this industry.

I wouldn't. I mean, there was a time I did, but in recent years, since I got out of college, I've taken a serious look at the industry, and the treatment of workers... If I wanted to work 70-100 hours a week for years on end, I'd go back to school and pick up my law degree, because at least then I'd be making serious money by the end of it.

The game industry, at least, as it exists at this moment, is a pretty damn exploitative system. We've got people going into crunch time, working sixteen or eighteen hour days seven days a week, on salary.

It's possible this model can change. Mostly it's a function of what's wrong with the current publisher/developer system we're using. But, developers need to come up with a less exploitative system for their employees before I'd even consider working for the industry as something other than an outside writer.

So from a customer's point of view, I still think MML could sell well. Maybe not as well as those AAA games of them moment, but I think it would do well nonetheless. Where I think they went wrong is with the scheduled 3DS release. I always believed that if they would have released it for the PSN or XBLA or something like that, it would sell better than for the 3DS. I dunno, that's just me.

Capcom has been a master of making really terrible marketing decisions for a while now. I mean we're talking about the company that shipped a PC port of a game without mouse support.

As to the 3DS, I don't know specifics, but I do know it wasn't selling as quickly as Nintendo hoped. Now it may have just gotten a slow start, but there it is. Releasing anything to that platform exclusively strikes me as a bad idea at the moment.

Honestly, I know why they haven't, but for something like MML to really sell, rather than looking at the traditional venues, they probably should have looked at selling it on the smartphones, for Android and iPhone.

Now, my job requires me to...inform people about videogames and sell stuff to them. From that point of view, getting people excited about the next Megaman game would be so much easier than getting people excited about Dragon's Dogma. A couple of reasons: 1. We haven't seen an original Megaman game being released in ages. 2. Again, it's Megaman. Though it's true a IP alone doesn't guarantee success, I still believe MML is not a bad game at all. Kinda out there, yes, but it's a good game. So those two simple facts should guarantee the game will do well. Again, maybe it won't be able to compete against CoD or AC, but still.

From what I recall of when dinosaurs roamed the earth I worked retail for about fifteen seconds, the specific phrase was "create a need, then provide a solution to that need."

Edit: "and then forget about the rest of the paragraph and move on, apparently..."

Anyway, that's a lot easier with an existing IP because it's a market element people already have a loyalty to, or bias against, but basically the lines are drawn, and with any new iteration of an IP there's a chance to win some of the detractors over, through whatever the current iteration uses to mix things up.

Needless to say, if you're pitching a clone of an existing genre, when there's already a very shiny flagship for that genre, you're going to be seriously hobbled in trying to pitch that. Especially an unlimited playtime RPG like Skyrim.

But Dragon's Dogma? I can't get people excited about the game. Let's say I start talking about it and people are interested. They usually reply with "Well, it sounds good...but I'll wait until it comes out/there's a price drop/you have it used before I give it a shot". And you know what? They're absolutely right. At that point, I just shut my mouth and let them be on their way. I'd do the same! I did the same with Kingdoms of Amaulur because it was a new IP. And yet, I loved the game. Kinda makes me sad I didn't pre-ordered it because I didn't get that armor bonus.
Anyway, looking at KoA and Skyrim as an example, KoA is a good game, but it can't possibly hope to sell as much as Skyrim, simply because Skyrim is better known, it has some prequels, has learned from its mistakes, etc. It comes as no surprise that KoA can't even hope to get as many sales as an Elder scrolls game.

Which gets right back into what I was talking a while ago about new IPs versus established ones. We'll probably see the preorder bonus for KoA come up as a DLC pack down the road, if that's any consolation. But otherwise, I'm with you on that. It's a really good game, it's going to get drowned by Skyrim for a lot of reasons.

So I'm not saying Dragon's Dogma is gonna be a crappy game or that it's gonna be the next Skyrim. But just based on the fact that it's a new IP, it cannot hope to sell 10M copies. It just can't. Just by reading this thread's replies give me an idea of what they're in for. Yes, this thread doesn't represent the world's opinion, but you can see 9 out of 10 people have their doubts about all this.Maybe in about 5 years or more. But I don't think that's what those Capcom guys meant.

Honestly, on the 10m number: nothing sells ten million copies. Nothing. At least not in video gaming. It took WoW years of constant top of the charts sales to get to that figure. The original Starcraft and Diablo 2 may have, but you can easily find both on shelves at the nearest department store. Games that have been out consistently for ten years, cost twenty bucks, and are really freakin' good might have cracked that after most of a decade.

The odds of an unknown IP from a company with a slipshod reputation and no word on a PC release (which is still the largest install base)? Yeah, that's not happening.

On a lark, I tried spot checking the 360 and PS3 instal bases, and while I wasn't able to get precise numbers, it looks like about 10% of system would need to buy these games in order to hit those numbers. So, like I said, not happening.

EDIT: D'oh. Okay, so there is one thing that does sell that consistently, and fast. The Call of Duty franchise, basically for all the unreplicable reasons I cited earlier. The reason it didn't occur to me is they always announce their sales figures by dollars, not by units sold. So they'll go on about one billion dollars sold, and wander off and hide, and I'm honestly not sure if that's net or gross.

However, and again, this is from a fan's point of view, a well-developed Megaman game, not just a game they did for fan service, could have way more potential. I'm not suggesting they follow the Sega route where they spam us with Sonic games because that's a well-known, old school game that sells anyway, as little or as much as it gathers. But I suppose a simple research/survey would reveal a Megaman game, whether it's MML or not, would sell better than Dragon's Dogma. I just can't understand how Capcom could think that. Yes, Capcom has done some horrible mistakes as of lately, but they seem to be getting a liking for shooting themselves on the foot. I still have a bit of faith in Capcom as much as they've pissed me off lately, though.

The way they make it look, Dragon's Dogma must be the next Skyrim x10. Cannot say it's not, either. So we'll see.

Yeah, in spot checking, I remember how Skyrim was such an unprecedented success, and it still hasn't even come close to hitting that number. In fact it took them a month to get the sales that matched Mass Effect 3's day one sales. Which makes it sound even less promising for Dragon's Dogma.