Mafia II Unlikely to Turn a Profit

[TsunamiWombat]

On the one hand I think Pachter is right. On the other hand, for completly different reasons then he's suggesting. Also he's a douche.

Mafia 2 will struggle to turn profit because it's a flawed gem, lacking the qualities expected or anticipated of it. It's still well made, but because it's 'different' this will result in a cult hit, like Dune or The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

 

[ImprovizoR]

Mafia 2 wont make profit because 2k cut out half of the game's content to sell it later as DLC. Players noticed that. I bought the game, but I wont buy their DLC. The way I see it I already payed for it. Think of this what you will.

 

[SelectivelyEvil13]

I have only played Mafia I which was rather fun, but I have not tried the sequel. From the look and sound of things, they stuck with a similar format (Not a true sandbox) and kept it in a storyline of missions. I personally thought the first one could have actually used more discovery and exploration of the city, so that put me off for Mafia II.

I can't judge on actual quality of this game, but I would imagine that the appeal is limited to people with an attention span above 5 seconds because that was how the first was at least. It is not your typical game and does not have the name recognition of something like Grand Theft Auto where a bunch of children are going to go begging their parents to virtually steal cars and shoot hookers (and take their indolent cousin bowling...).

 

[pepitko]

Mafia 2 wont make profit because 2k cut out half of the game's content to sell it later as DLC. Players noticed that. I bought the game, but I wont buy their DLC. The way I see it I already payed for it. Think of this what you will.

That's how I feel as well. To me it seems that they outsmarted themselves with cutting stuff out to sell as DLCs, because as the game stands right now it got rather underwhelming reviews, which will eventually result in lower sales and thus even less people will buy the DLCs. Should they have kept everything in the original release of the game, it could have received "editor's choice" kind of reviews, and potentially be more profitable with higher sales. Just thinking out loud here.

 

[Vek]

See, the thing is, Pachter's
1) a damned idiot like Bobby Kotick
2) not defining what "success" is, and how many copies need to be pushed in order to get there.

Mafia 2 has sold over 340,000 copies on 360 and PS3, and are currently in the 2nd and 3rd spots for sales in the week ending August 28th.
http://www.vgchartz.com/weekly.php
All data pulled from NPD.

PC has performed dismally, with only 35,576 copies sold, but I cannot say how many Steam/Impulse/D2D sales are factored into that number.

That still puts mafia two close to 400,000 units pushed in its first full week of sales. It's been a second week now, and we'll see how many more units have shifted.

 

[SimuLord]

You may notice that Valve does not suffer from this sort of criticism; when you delay games because your rabid fanbase expects the game to be a classic on Day One...and when you tend to deliver exactly that...you don't run into many problems on that front, do you?