According to various reports, Senran Kagura sold 52,000 units in its initial release. Sometime earlier, producer Kenichiko Takaki told the entire web that the side-scroller game featuring girls with big breasts is expected to move 80,000 units in sales.
And Takaki-san talked about making a sequel for the game - this game that has 52,000 units in sales.
Consider something made by Nintendo or Capcom, 52,000 units in sales for them is something so low. Nintendo of America initially refused to finally announced a release for Xenoblade Chronicles way back then because they think it will not sell well. Take note, Xenoblade Chronicles at that time had been making wonders in the European charts, and NOA still think the numbers at the European charts are still low.
Capcom, on the other hand, declined to release Ace Attorney Investigations 2: Miles Edgeworth outside Japan because their forecasted sales for the game will not meet their sales expectations.
I was very frustrated at that time. I followed the news about that game day by day to no avail - until the news coverage died down. There's still life in the Capcom Unity forums for the eventual localization of the game. But what's the fact here is that it didn't get release because of low sales expectations.
Capcom is a big company after all, so as Square Enix, as well as Nintendo, Sony, etc. These companies are big enough that making titles that will not sell is something that bother them. Square Enix in particular, said before that they are only interested in turning profitable games into franchises, while leaving the other games into obscurity.
Turning things around.
What if Capcom is not the owner of the Ace Attorney franchise? What if a company such as Marvelous owns it? Perhaps there will be a different story. Perhaps the game will get release because the sales expectations for that game, which is low by Capcom's standards, is already high for them.
We can say that as well with Senran Kagura - a game adored by the fans because of its fan-service, a game that will only cross 80,000 units in sales before the year closes while Mario Kart 7 has already reached the 1 million mark. Senran Kagura has met the sales expectations of Marvelous, and that is what's important to them.
It's a shame that companies are bound to do things based on their forecast and expectations. And that's what how the world works, unfortunately. They can always never afford to lose a lot of money over something that cannot be profitable.
But we can also always assume that a sales expectation between a small and a large company, have a big difference. Really big.
How about you? Do you think a company's sales perception is directly affected by its size? How about the console where the game is on? Let me know by hitting up the comment section below!
Senran Kagura is one of those Nintendo 3DS games that have gained attention because of its fanservice. Take a look at these other games too!
Sources:
Wikipedia
Youtube
Thanks Soundwave for the comment!
ReplyDeleteActually, it was really unfortunate that very good games can't get released because of budget considerations. But what's frustrating is a game that can't get a release because the big company thinks it will not sell even though the amount of fans and those willing to buy it further exceeds a small company's expectations. Senran Kagura lives on in Japan as mousepads, plushies and other stuff I currently don't know so I guess just from that a lot of money can pour in for Marvelous in the long run.
Plus, they're think of a sequel (If I can still remember that article in Siliconera) Thanks again for the comment!
The thing is underneath the fanservice is a good game and despite how Marvelous marketed the game what stood out the most was the gameplay if you experience the whole game. So the game had a 2 things going for it, it was good with good characters and had fanservice.
ReplyDeleteThe diffrence between Marvelous and someone like capcom is the bigger companies are thinking short term profit just numbers that look good on the books where as Marvelous is thinking long tern things like figures manga anime music everything. If they can get Senran Kagura on something that will sell they will do it. Thats why the numbers are good to them that just means they can go foward and release that art book or go to conventions and talk about the game and so on.