208 réponses à ce sujet

[abaris]

Aburai wrote...
That's what the musical composer for DA II says anyway, and I tend to believe him.

Even if he hadn't said it, it's quite obvious, isn't it? And its not as if this by itself would be something despiceable. Its rather what they made of it.

[Lunar Savage]

UncleScrooge wrote...

Zem_ wrote...

UncleScrooge wrote...

You do know that just a few days ago EA went to NPD and asked them to stop releasing sales data to the public and media and NPD has complied, right?  99% sure it's because DA2 sales are extremely lackluster and they dont want to ****** off stockholders further than what they currently are.  In other words, they dont want a THQ/Homefront incident.

Oh don't be ridiculous.  This is ONE game and not even a big one for EA compared to the way some of their other franchises sell.  They are no way going to stop reporting ALL sales figures because of DA2.

You dont seem to understand the significance of this game failing and how it effects EA.  Let me break it down for you.

Dragon Age 2 doesnt sell as much as expected after massive ad campaign.  Bad.

Dragon Age 2 is so terribly terrible and the overwhelming consumer outcroud so loud and massive at the opening of 2011, the most important year in EAs history in terms of risk/reward, that consumers are now saying they will not purchase TOR and ME3.  Bad.

NFL lockout uncertainty means Madden 12 sales may be absolutely abysmal if it eats into the season according to EA.  Bad.

Stockholders see what NPD would be publishing about DA2s low sales and see all the rest of the above and start selling stock.  This eats money out of TOR and ME3s development and advertising (Madden doesnt need as much advertising or development) which only compounds the aforementioned problem of consumers losing faith and holding out on those games.

tl'dr You will be hearing MUCH MUCH more about who went to NPD and why in the coming weeks.  EA led the charge, because 2011 already was risky, and with the way 2011 has already started it may wind up being the year EA gets crippled.

PS- Also dont forget a couple lawsuits coming down the pike, including this one

http://www.neoseeker...ets-greenlight/

PPS- If you don't think EAs being cautious with every last penny already in anticipation of what could be impending financial disaster, wheres all the money for the NFS Shift 2's advertising?  Have you even heard of NFS Shift 2?  Think about that.  It's a small sign, but a telling one among many.

Considering that of the games I own, only a fraction of them are published by EA. So I'm okay with this. It would actually be nice to see EA get a nice financial beat down anyway.

Let's see, here's the count:

Dragon Age: Origins (and if the sequel is any indicator of where the franchise is going for good, then I could care less about continuing my involvement with it)
Left 4 Dead 1 and 2 (great games, but it's Valve...I think if EA goes under, they'll find a way to survive)
The Orange Box (again, Valve)
Rockband 2 (yeah, I own quite a bit of DLC, but the rhythm game genre has been simmering down, so meh)
The Simpsons Game (a one shot game that has no support but is fun to play...and odds of a sequel are practically non-existant to my knowledge, besides, Groening could easily find a different publisher/dev)
Mass Effect 1 (rented 2 and got 1000/1000 out of it, saved my data, and am waiting to rent ME 3 to finish the story, beyond that, I'm not buying it unless it's absolutely mind blowing, which I don't think it will be)

And I don't give a damn at all about sports games.

Bioware will get caught in the crossfire, yes. And it's sad to see, but hopefully they'll learn a lesson and pick a better publisher. That is assuming they aren't completely dismantled by EA before s*** hits the fan.

[Warheadz]

Wrong thread :lol:

Modifié par Warheadz, 30 mars 2011 - 06:47 .

[UncleScrooge]

Had to hop in the shower and it gave me a minute to think about some thngs I ommitted so let me repost this properly.

Zem_ wrote...

UncleScrooge wrote...

You do know that just a few days ago EA went to NPD and asked them to stop releasing sales data to the public and media and NPD has complied, right?  99% sure it's because DA2 sales are extremely lackluster and they dont want to ****** off stockholders further than what they currently are.  In other words, they dont want a THQ/Homefront incident.

Oh don't be ridiculous.  This is ONE game and not even a big one for EA compared to the way some of their other franchises sell.  They are no way going to stop reporting ALL sales figures because of DA2.

You dont seem to understand the significance of this game failing and how it effects EA.  Let me break it down for you.

Dragon Age 2 doesn't sell as much as expected after massive ad campaign.  Bad.

Dragon Age 2 is so terribly terrible and the overwhelming consumer outcroud so loud and massive at the opening of 2011, the most important year in EAs history in terms of risk/reward, that consumers are now saying they will not purchase TOR and ME3.  Bad.

Dragon Age 2 was a quick cash in.  But not a cash in just for the sake of getting cash.  It was a cash in to fund other projects.  That eats money out of TOR and ME3s development and advertising (Madden
doesnt need as much advertising or development) and less advertising and less money for development only compounds the
aforementioned problem of consumers losing faith and holding out on
those games or cancelling TOR subsciptions after the free month is up. Bad.

NFL lockout uncertainty means Madden 12 sales may be absolutely abysmal if it eats into the season according to EA.  Bad.

Stockholders would be seeing hard numbers from NPD about DA2s low sales and see all the rest of the above coming together and start selling stock.  This eats in to EVERYTHING EA does.  BAD

You will be hearing MUCH MUCH more about who went to NPD and why in the coming weeks.  EA led the charge, because 2011 already was risky, and with the way 2011 has started it may wind up being the year EA gets crippled.

PS- Also dont forget a couple lawsuits coming down the pike, including this one

http://www.neoseeker...ets-greenlight/

PPS- If you don't think EAs being cautious with every last penny in anticipation of what could be impending financial disaster, where's all the money for the NFS Shift 2's advertising?  Have you even heard of NFS Shift 2?  Think about that.  It's a small sign, but a telling one among many.

PPPS- (When it gets to triple P's you know the ish that follows is about to get real)  The spiderweb effect.  This is really the big one because it covers so much that is entirely out of EAs control.  It's not just bad DA2 getting the avalanche started for EA.  It's projects not even MADE by EA whose failure iis going to effect them.  Final Fantasy 14.  Massive failure.  DCUniverse Online.  Massive failure.    Countless MMOs before them, failures.  Now of the ones I mentioned by name only FFXIV took a major money loss because of the amount of development dollars sunk into it..  TOR has much more tiime and money sunk into it.  But the constant failures of all these other MMOs are bad for TOR.  The whole reason it's been delayed so long is because EA knows MMOs are made and broken in the first month.  Get a bad reception and people bail en masse after the trial is up, and those people tell other people and nobody wants to even start paying to play because they hear it sucks.  People are stupid.  Really, people are dumb.  You can fool anybody once.  But people arent THAT dumb that once they start seeing trends they cant recognize and lookout for those trends to continue.  They'll be skeptical of TOR right off the bat because of other MMOs failures that EA had nothing to do with, and add on top of that EAs recent troubled releases with DA2 and Crysis 2...

(let me take a small break here to say that Crysis 2 is friggin awesome.  But pirates play online free, theres multiple hackers in every match because of it, and on PC and consoles your stuff doesnt save so it's getting really bad press for it, but the game itself is the best FPS I've ever played.  Highly recommended.)

... and those trends all are working against EA.  There's really nothing positive working in EAs favor at all.

[Uncle Scrooge]

Bump for the type of epic truth that leads to bans

[Baelyn]

UncleScrooge wrote...

Had to hop in the shower and it gave me a minute to think about some thngs I ommitted so let me repost this properly.

Zem_ wrote...

UncleScrooge wrote...

You do know that just a few days ago EA went to NPD and asked them to stop releasing sales data to the public and media and NPD has complied, right?  99% sure it's because DA2 sales are extremely lackluster and they dont want to ****** off stockholders further than what they currently are.  In other words, they dont want a THQ/Homefront incident.

Oh don't be ridiculous.  This is ONE game and not even a big one for EA compared to the way some of their other franchises sell.  They are no way going to stop reporting ALL sales figures because of DA2.

You dont seem to understand the significance of this game failing and how it effects EA.  Let me break it down for you.

Dragon Age 2 doesn't sell as much as expected after massive ad campaign.  Bad.

Dragon Age 2 is so terribly terrible and the overwhelming consumer outcroud so loud and massive at the opening of 2011, the most important year in EAs history in terms of risk/reward, that consumers are now saying they will not purchase TOR and ME3.  Bad.

Dragon Age 2 was a quick cash in.  But not a cash in just for the sake of getting cash.  It was a cash in to fund other projects.  That eats money out of TOR and ME3s development and advertising (Madden
doesnt need as much advertising or development) and less advertising and less money for development only compounds the
aforementioned problem of consumers losing faith and holding out on
those games or cancelling TOR subsciptions after the free month is up. Bad.

NFL lockout uncertainty means Madden 12 sales may be absolutely abysmal if it eats into the season according to EA.  Bad.

Stockholders would be seeing hard numbers from NPD about DA2s low sales and see all the rest of the above coming together and start selling stock.  This eats in to EVERYTHING EA does.  BAD

You will be hearing MUCH MUCH more about who went to NPD and why in the coming weeks.  EA led the charge, because 2011 already was risky, and with the way 2011 has started it may wind up being the year EA gets crippled.

PS- Also dont forget a couple lawsuits coming down the pike, including this one

http://www.neoseeker...ets-greenlight/

PPS- If you don't think EAs being cautious with every last penny in anticipation of what could be impending financial disaster, where's all the money for the NFS Shift 2's advertising?  Have you even heard of NFS Shift 2?  Think about that.  It's a small sign, but a telling one among many.

PPPS- (When it gets to triple P's you know the ish that follows is about to get real)  The spiderweb effect.  This is really the big one because it covers so much that is entirely out of EAs control.  It's not just bad DA2 getting the avalanche started for EA.  It's projects not even MADE by EA whose failure iis going to effect them.  Final Fantasy 14.  Massive failure.  DCUniverse Online.  Massive failure.    Countless MMOs before them, failures.  Now of the ones I mentioned by name only FFXIV took a major money loss because of the amount of development dollars sunk into it..  TOR has much more tiime and money sunk into it.  But the constant failures of all these other MMOs are bad for TOR.  The whole reason it's been delayed so long is because EA knows MMOs are made and broken in the first month.  Get a bad reception and people bail en masse after the trial is up, and those people tell other people and nobody wants to even start paying to play because they hear it sucks.  People are stupid.  Really, people are dumb.  You can fool anybody once.  But people arent THAT dumb that once they start seeing trends they cant recognize and lookout for those trends to continue.  They'll be skeptical of TOR right off the bat because of other MMOs failures that EA had nothing to do with, and add on top of that EAs recent troubled releases with DA2 and Crysis 2...

(let me take a small break here to say that Crysis 2 is friggin awesome.  But pirates play online free, theres multiple hackers in every match because of it, and on PC and consoles your stuff doesnt save so it's getting really bad press for it, but the game itself is the best FPS I've ever played.  Highly recommended.)

... and those trends all are working against EA.  There's really nothing positive working in EAs favor at all.

Have you even been keeping up with ToR? Over a million users are registered on their board already...countless guilds already set up to go live right at launch. Now considering they only need half of those people to actually buy the game and subscribe to make it profitable and if all of those buy/subsribe then it will be very profitable, I think they are pretty safe in not losing any money on ToR.

You can hardly prove that DA2 was a financial failure. Thats absurd. Because VGCharts has it only selling a bit more than Origins? Thats hardly proof. You don't know how much they spent on advertising and there is no way you can know what amount of sales would lead to a profit unless you have access to their books.

The NFS games hardly have had much marketing since Underground. Thats not really proof of anything.

Modifié par Baelyn, 30 mars 2011 - 07:55 .

[aries1001]

If DA2 can sell the same amount (or thereabouts) with half the development time only (2½ year plans, 15-18 months in full prodcution) to DA: Origins (5 years), it'll mean that EA/Bioware will double its earnings and profits from DA2 compared to the earnings/profits they've made selling DA: Origins. If or when this happens EA/Bioware will probably give Bioware maybe the extra 6-9 months needed in full production. It'll depend on several things, for instance how many units (copies, SKUs) they expect to sell - in order to cover their production costs.

[Archereon]

You know, the big problem with the ideal DA sales is everything sends a bad message.

Higher sales than DA:O?  "Good, MOAR action."

Significantly lower sales than DA:O?  "Franchise is failing"- EA executives as they sign the order to discontinue the franchise.

Slightly lower sales than DA:O?  "Not mainstream enough, MOAR action."

[Archereon]

aries1001 wrote...

If DA2 can sell the same amount (or thereabouts) with half the development time only (2½ year plans, 15-18 months in full prodcution) to DA: Origins (5 years), it'll mean that EA/Bioware will double its earnings and profits from DA2 compared to the earnings/profits they've made selling DA: Origins. If or when this happens EA/Bioware will probably give Bioware maybe the extra 6-9 months needed in full production. It'll depend on several things, for instance how many units (copies, SKUs) they expect to sell - in order to cover their production costs.

That's where your wrong.  Despite what people say, EA is very much like activision.  If they see an opportunity to sell you the same thing over and over again every year *EA sports, cough* and rake in the dough, they'll jump for joy, then sell you some DLC that should have come with the original game.

This is to be the fate of Bioware.  If the game sells better than DA:O with a lower budget and production time, EA will take that as a sign that model works for the franchise.  If the game sells about the same as DA:O, they'll take it as a sign that DA:O's budget and production time was a massive waste of time, and keep it up.  If DA2 flops (unlikely now), the franchise is done.

[Badger8126]

All this "proves" is that the console market is over saturated and that E.A. should focus on the PC more.

[AkiKishi]

Archereon wrote...
This is to be the fate of Bioware.  If the game sells better than DA:O with a lower budget and production time, EA will take that as a sign that model works for the franchise.  If the game sells about the same as DA:O, they'll take it as a sign that DA:O's budget and production time was a massive waste of time, and keep it up.  If DA2 flops (unlikely now), the franchise is done.

That is what happened to C&C/Westwood.

They got one last substandard game out before the lights went out.

[lady constance]

Archereon wrote...

You know, the big problem with the ideal DA sales is everything sends a bad message.

Higher sales than DA:O?  "Good, MOAR action."

Significantly lower sales than DA:O?  "Franchise is failing"- EA executives as they sign the order to discontinue the franchise.

Slightly lower sales than DA:O?  "Not mainstream enough, MOAR action."

So... it's a lose, lose, lose? WE'RE DOOMED.

[Archereon]

lady constance wrote...

Archereon wrote...

You know, the big problem with the ideal DA sales is everything sends a bad message.

Higher sales than DA:O?  "Good, MOAR action."

Significantly lower sales than DA:O?  "Franchise is failing"- EA executives as they sign the order to discontinue the franchise.

Slightly lower sales than DA:O?  "Not mainstream enough, MOAR action."

So... it's a lose, lose, lose? WE'RE DOOMED.

No, but the franchise might be.

And IMHO, I think the franchise, and BioWare as a whole will be going more mainstream whether we want them to or not.  ME3 is being geared up to take on COD and GoW from what I've heard, and Laidlaw in a particularly boneheaded statement, implied that he thought DA2 wasn't mainstream enough.

Modifié par Archereon, 30 mars 2011 - 08:21 .

[Maleficent]

Okay so ea sports have yearly releases but look at the improvements they have made,plus a company needs a constant source of income.As for activision, COD no improvements since cod4,Wow so old now somebody needs to shoot it and guitar hero dying a death.of course Ea are about money money money like Activision and Microsoft but so are Sony,Zenimax,Nintendo and just about every other comany in the world.Just about the only two in the video games industry I can think of that are more about the experience and the love of making games are Platinum and Projekt cd maybe Rockstar and Grasshopper.They're maybe be others but thats the problem in the industry right now.With live arcade,the psn equivalent and small budget games being safe,AAA big franchises being safe also ,it's that middle ground where budgets are high enough but do not have the big franchise name,they are in the danger zone.What it leads to is the big publisher push to secure as much revenue as quickly as possible.They must be loving this whole preorder craziness thats reared its head up in the last couple of years.But alas what can we do,console games have become part of the pc patch culture ,what about the poor sods that don't have any net and there game is bugged.I think quality assurance is the thing that has suffered most this era and its a shame.

[Archereon]

On a side note, I heard a rumor DA3 will have multiplayer. You can panic now.

[aries1001]

Gatt9 wrote...

TcheQ wrote...

lol well if 700k sales is bad, what is good?

http://www.gamespot....id=m-1-58548218
 
http://en.wikipedia....ing_video_games

Today?

For a small company 1,000,000 units is a fairly decent figure.  For a company on the order of EA,  you're looking at 2-3 million for it to be acceptable and more to be good.

In general,  somewhere between 1-2 million is the break even point for a game today,  depending on some other factors like "Was an engine reused" and "How did the DLC sell"?

700k would be considered abyssmal for an EA product.  It's likely the game will break even,  but it won't be "Good sales".

A good point of reference would be your second link.  ME sold 2,000,000 and ME2 sold 1.6 million. 

Keep in mind though,  with that list,  things are different today.  In Diablo/Diablo 2/Baldur's Gate timeframe,  100,000 was break even (It was actually JE Sawyer who offered that information).  So BG was actually a blockbuster,  in contrast to the rest of Bioware's products that did just "good".

In 1998, the break even point was indeed about 100,000 to maybe 150,000 copies being sold. However, after the millenium started , in 2001, this all changed. Big corporations like EA, Activision, Disney etc. did suddenly see a market making games. And they poured a lot of money into making games thus pushing development costs, the next (gen) graphics and it'll also meant streamlining the interface to that people could actually play the game - instead of pressing four buttons at the same time, trying to figure out the store interface works. As for DA2, I like the new clean (streamlined, if you will) interface. It is much more understandable and logical than the one in DA: Origins.

Around 2003 or 2004, I think, a bunch of former Black Isle/Interplay founded a new studio, Troika. Troika only ever made 3-4 games, two of them are Arcanum and Temple of Elemental Evil, both released to critical acclaim. (buggy, though). However, they sold around 400,000 copies; in 2004, this was not nearly enough to cover the production costs and thus they closed. [As I understand, money management wasn't one of Troika's best strength). Planescape: Torment was also released to critical acclaim. It did also sell about 400,000-500,000 copies. However, PS: Torment was released around 2000-2001, just at the time when the big corporations decided to go into the gaming market. And so it did not sell well enough to cover production costs. [It did eventually, but over time].

I think this mainly is the reason why Bioware looks to expand its fanbase; Bioware wants to make sure that they also have fans in 10 years or even 20 years time. If a Call of Duty player wants to play DA2, he should try it out. And if he like it, maybe he (or she) will look into other Bioware games. In fact, I have seen some players in the BG forums asking about the BG games - because of DA: Origins. And also, probably, because of DA2.

Things change, markets change, people change, companies change - and games change. This is sadly not 1999 anymore. And as much as we all regret this (myself included), we need to look at the realities today. A game, even a Bioware game, needs to sell about 2 million copies to break even. Back in 1999, a game as quoted, only need to sell 100,000 copies to break even.

And so Bioware has to change in order to continue making games, reaching out to more people, expanding their fanbase.

[Baelyn]

Archereon wrote...

On a side note, I heard a rumor DA3 will have multiplayer. You can panic now.

He simply was asked if they would ever consider it and he said it might work with the game. Hardly a rumor that DA3 has multiplayer.

[Baelyn]

Archereon wrote...
 Laidlaw in a particularly boneheaded statement, implied that he thought DA2 wasn't mainstream enough.

Link please.

[Uncle Scrooge]

Baelyn wrote...

Archereon wrote...
 Laidlaw in a particularly boneheaded statement, implied that he thought DA2 wasn't mainstream enough.

Link please.

http://www.google.com/

[CaimDark]

Archereon wrote...

On a side note, I heard a rumor DA3 will have multiplayer. You can panic now.

Engaging panic mode in 5...4...3...

[Warheadz]

CaimDark wrote...

Archereon wrote...

On a side note, I heard a rumor DA3 will have multiplayer. You can panic now.

Engaging panic mode in 5...4...3...

I think the yshould make a Tactical Challenge mode a la Vanquish. Vanquish was an extremely easy 3rd person shooter, but the tactical challenges were extremely hard tests of skill. Why can't we get something like that in Dragon Age, if we have to add "Non-story" modes?

And DA wouldn't really work as a multiplayer. You'd think EA won't let them put a multiplayer in a singleplayer game after Dead Space 2. They are not that stupid.



...Or are they?

Modifié par Warheadz, 30 mars 2011 - 09:23 .

[KorPhaeron]

Baelyn wrote...

Archereon wrote...
 Laidlaw in a particularly boneheaded statement, implied that he thought DA2 wasn't mainstream enough.

Link please.

http://www.gamespot....305575/p-1.html

[Archereon]

Baelyn wrote...

Archereon wrote...
 Laidlaw in a particularly boneheaded statement, implied that he thought DA2 wasn't mainstream enough.

Link please.

It was on the forum.  He actually edited his response about 5 minutes after posting, then blanked the quotes of his post.

It was on a thread that got a few pages last week or so called "Dragon Age 3 More mainstream?" or something like that.  Can't quite remember.  It might have been locked.

Plus there was that gamespot article, though that would have just been icing on the cake if not for the order of events.

Modifié par Archereon, 30 mars 2011 - 09:26 .

[Baelyn]

Uncle Scrooge wrote...

Baelyn wrote...

Archereon wrote...
 Laidlaw in a particularly boneheaded statement, implied that he thought DA2 wasn't mainstream enough.

Link please.

http://www.google.com/

Nice try. But thank you for making yourself look like an idiot by not being able to come up with an actual proof.

I can't even count how many times I've asked directly on these forums for a link to prove Laidlaw saying that he "hates DA:O", "fans are idiots", and that "DA2 is perfect and they aren't changing anything" and never heard anything back. On the contrary I have provided several quotes of his to prove quite the opposite.

[Baelyn]

KorPhaeron wrote...

Baelyn wrote...

Archereon wrote...
 Laidlaw in a particularly boneheaded statement, implied that he thought DA2 wasn't mainstream enough.

Link please.

http://www.gamespot....305575/p-1.html

Read the article. Where in it does he say DA2 isn't mainstream enough?

EDIT* Was thinking about the previous argument I hear often enough about Laidlaw thinking DA2 is perfect instead of the person I quoted remarks.

Modifié par Baelyn, 30 mars 2011 - 09:33 .