Boom Blox a bust at retail, sells only 60k units

by Christopher Grant on Jun 16th 2008 1:28PM

While the myth of third-party Wii software languishing on store shelves has been handily disproven by repeat NPD all-stars like Guitar Hero III (#8 this month), Mario and Sonic: Olympic Games, and even Carnival Games, the ugly truth is that those are the only third-party Wii games to break the 1 million unit milestone, according to NPD.

Why do we share such harsh statistics with you, dear reader? Because NPD just confirmed with our buddies at GameDaily that the well-received Boom Blox, an EA title with Steven Spielberg's name prominently places on the box, and the sixth highest-rated third-party Wii title on Metacritic, managed to sell only 60K units in its first month of sales. The title ranked 25 in the list of top sellers in May, and only managed to come in at number 9 in the list of top Wii sellers for the month. GameDaily did the math and determined that, using a North American install base of 10.2 million Wii units, Boom Blox's tie ratio was a barely noticeable 0.6%.

After the Zak and Wiki calamity of ought-seven, we're again afraid there's just no room for good third-party titles (even family friendly and marketable ones like Boom Blox) on Nintendo's console. In this case, where did EA go wrong (besides taking out head tracking)?

Boom Blox

Source

Tags: Boom-Blox, EA, Electronic-Arts, NPD, Wii

Reader Comments (260)

My bad Fiddy, like I said its nothing against you. Just trust in Dukes opinion a little more since we have both PS360 and usually share the same thoughts on most games. You marathoned it meaning youve beat it already?So how many hours did it take you? Yes, including cutscenes of course.

Yeah the beta had turned me off to MP too, the controls felt weird. Yet, now that I am used to it, I imagine it will be more fun. I have yet to try to shock with the mk yet, instead I just rolled it around.

First act took about four and a half hours with cutscenes. But that was more me playing with the game mechanics and getting a feel for it. The acts then got progressively shorter. All in all, I had 22 hours on my file when I completed and only got 7 out of 42 emblems so there is definately replay value there if I was obsessive about it.

Also, on the cutscenes, on half of them, you can't do anything but on a fair number of them, there is something to do. And to my knowledge, I don't recall any 90 minute cutscenes. Even the very end one, there was always SOMETHING to break things up.

The best thing I liked, though, is like MGS2, Kojima showed a very small fraction of the game so as long as you went spoiler free like myself, the entire experience is "oh shit" after "holy crap." All in all, I had a blast with it and debating whether or not I'll replay it so soon. After all, there is the core game then all the cool extra stuff you find.

I should also mention I was cautiously optimistic as well. After all, I was hyped for Haze. It came out, got bad reviews so I rented it. And I saw, single handedly, how a developer can take one of the coolest game design ideas in a long time and basically ruin it. I was expecting MGS4 to fuck up in some way as well. That's why I basically barely told anyone my opinions on the game until I beat it.

Whoa, what's an "Emblem"? Did I miss something? I'm on Act 3 and haven't found any of them. I found a few MP3 files though. The iPod is a pretty sweet bonus.

*****SORT OF SPOILERS*****

You get emblems at the end of the game depending on how and how well you have played. There are emblems for shooting the fuck out of everything, for not shooting the fuck out of everything etc. I wouldn't worry too much on your first time through.

There are also the standard MGS 'ranks' to achieve within the emblem system, I think I was some sort of crap like a hawk or something first time round.

Emblems show up in your final stats. I didn't know they existed until that final screen. I'd say don't look up how to get them until you've seen that screen. It might ruin things for you.

I bought this game, expecting it to be good because of the reviews, and I must have missed the point or something, because I absolutely hated it. I tried really hard to like it. I invited friends over and we played all of the multiplayer games, but it just felt so hum drum. To this day, it is the only game I have ever sold to gamestop.

Sucks since, Galaxy aside, this is probably the best game on the Wii.

I guess you've never played Metroid Prime 3. Shame.

I have. I was disappointed.

What a shame.

try smash brothers ! or MP3

I have to say I didn't really liked boom blox either tho. It kinda seemed pointless. I guess it's just not my type of game.

I have Smash Bros. too. It's not that great.

Well, it's not that much better than the one I put like 200 hours into on the GCN. More collectables, yeah, but not much else to write home about...except for Snake and Pokemon Trainer.

I agree on smash bros, after the huge jump between the N64 and gamecube one the Wii version just feels weak. I thought I would be playing it for months just like I did with the others. Instead I played it about a month on and off and haven't touched it since.

it's hard as a casual consumer (the wii demographic) to distinguish between boom blox, and say, ninjabread man. blame the glut of half-baked games that target the same demographic that boom blox does.

The only explaination is that the Wii is flooded with so much third-party crap that the average Wii owner is programmed to only buy something with any of the following words on the cover: Mario or Developed by Nintendo or a successful game from another system.

There is no place for third party titles on Nintendo systems because of the low quality of a lot of these titles. For every 1 Bloom Blox you have, you have 10 Kawasaki Snow Mobiles and nobody's to blame but Nintendo. They flooded their own market with garbage and the buyer doesn't know who to trust anymore.

If I was a casual gamer and didn't read reviews I'd definitely be hesistant to buy any game for that system.

"For every 1 Bloom Blox you have, you have 10 Kawasaki Snow Mobiles and nobody's to blame but Nintendo."

What??

"For every 1 Bloom Blox you have, you have 10 Kawasaki Snow Mobiles and nobody's to blame but Nintendo."

Yep that logic sure does make sense. Instead of holding lazy third party developers accountable for shitty games, lets just blame Nintendo. Even though Nintendo had a hand in some of the best games for the system, let's just blame them for other people's shitty mistakes. That makes so much sense.

You do realize that Nintendo has no QA, they don't work with developers and they have a lenient approval process for what games are allowed on their system. The reason with Sony and Microsoft have much much much less garbage games is because they work with developers and have a very thorough quality control system. If something is not up to their standard then they won't approve it. Nintendo doesn't have this which makes it easier for shitty games to flood their system with developers looking to make the quick buck.

Get your facts straight first.

I think the point he's getting at is that with the Wii and DS, Nintendo has not employed any sort of quality control towards what gets released on the system.

Which is true. The Wii's library would probably be half as big (or maybe even smaller than that) if Nintendo revoked licenses from some publishers [coughboldcough] and said, "No, this is crap. You can't put this on our system."

Because of this glut of throwaway shovelware, it makes it even harder for the gems to shine in the sea of crap.

One of the reasons why developers jumped ship to Sony back in the PS1 days (apart from the cartridge) was an overbearing Nintendo presence compared to the lax Sony one in developing games. Nintendo LOST market share over the very thing you're suggesting Nintendo do.

"One of the reasons why developers jumped ship to Sony back in the PS1 days (apart from the cartridge) was an overbearing Nintendo presence compared to the lax Sony one in developing games"

Uh, Im pretty sure it had more to do with the fact that developing for the PS1 was actually cheaper...

Anyway, no, Nintendo's QA back then was horrible, they were way to restrictive as to what kind of content was allowed on their system, they wouldn't allow certain themes...and that was something that Sony was more liberal about

So now Nintendo doesn't have any sort of QA, but now they have tons of shovelware...

mmm, look it up and you might find some other people that know more about it, they have even said that unlike Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft have people looking over the development of the titles.

Nintendo's #1 sales pitch to developers was low development costs. The mediocre hardware was just fine because of low development costs. The Gamecube toolkits were for low development costs. Gamecube re-releases with waggle ensure low development costs. Insane profits would come from low development costs.

What kind of developer are you going to attract to a platform if your major pitch is, "don't spend money?" Is is any wonder most people don't have any sense of pride and craftsmanship?

That is DEFINITELY Nintendo's fault, and they are loving every minute of it. It makes their own mediocrity (like Mario Kart Wii) look better and better every day.

Dang, now I feel bad, like I should go buy it...
...
still not going to tho. This just proves that the game probably would have done better at a $30 or $40 price point. I'd probably buy it for that.

I agree. I was actually really close to buying it, but at 50 bucks I decided against it. There just didn't seem to be enough there for that price.

Exactly. I'm not exactly a spendthrift, but $50 was too much for what's essentially a puzzle game. When the price drops, I'll be sure to pick it up.

Man, you guys are lucky. In the UK, it's the equivalent of $80. I'd pick this up for $50 at the drop of a hat.

Totally agree. I was just waiting for the price to inevitably decrease down to ~ $30.

But in UK you dont have to pay for your healthcare. j/k It is unexplicable to me why prices are some much higher in UK & Europe.

Did they do much marketing for the game? I don't recall hearing much about it except on video game sites (which the casual crowd doesn't read so much I presume).

Unlike Carnival Games or Guitar Hero, the title of this game is not enough to sell it. They should have advertised the game like crazy, and released press releases that made it sound like Steven Spielburg's involvement in the game marks a new milestone. They needed to create the kind of buzz that would get morning talk show types talking about it the way they talked about Wii Fit ("A video game that is *good* for your health?? It's true, so stay tuned to Fox & Friends to find out all about it later in this hour!").

As it was, the game just flew under the radar. They needed to get buzz for the game. Make people think that everyone is playing it, so that everyone will start playing it.

Exactly. Third party developers haven't learned how to reach the casual game audience yet and this isn't a hard core gamer game.

This game could still rocket off shelves if it had a proper marketing campaign that reached it's target audience.

Some dude above is claiming there were ads during old television shows, but personally, I saw a total of zero commercials or ads for this title, and I really try to pay attention to video game ads. I see ads for all the bigger Wii titles, and lots of DS ads (both in print and on television for the latter), but not a thing for this one.

agreed. It isn't enough to just put an ad of the game in a magazine, or have a 10 second commercial on tv. if Third Party developers really want their games to sell, they have to try harded in marketing these games to the casual audience. Unlike us, they don't do research on games so they really wouldn't know what is Bloombox or what type of game it is.

I tell you all, watch Cartoon Network (not Adult Swim, daytime). I've been made well aware of that game's presence through Cartoon Network, even if didn't know/didn't care/didn't own a Wii, i would still know

I've some ads for it while my daughter was watching Saturday Morning TV.

"I've seen some ads" (wish there was an edit button.)

Backing up Khan on this. There definitely were Boom Blox ads.

Cartoon Network? Yeah, that's the channel the Wii Sports audience is sure to be watching...

Sami, aside from Cartoon Network, there were alse ads on newspapers....I don't know about magazines, but I think I saw one but I don't remember on which, most likely a gaming magazine tho.

Impulse purchases need to be advertised in the store. The casual gaming crowd has no loyalty, so if they see an ad on TV that doesn't really grab them, they will forget about the game by the time they get to the store.

Like I said above, Carnival Games had huge amounts of in-store advertisement at Toys-R-Us (obviously at great expense). It worked marvelously. Nothing sells impulse purchases like a big banner. TV ads don't work for that audience.

If only it had been a collection of minigames with the Nintendo brand on it, they could have had a best seller.

It doesn't even need to be *good*, as long as you bundle a Wii wand with it!

Wow, man. Wow. What an original post. How long did it take you to come up with that gem of a comment? I can just imagine you sitting at your desk stroking your chin, deep in thought of how exactly to put your two cents into this game's failure. You thought long and hard until finally it came: "Eureka! Dur...Nintendo...dur...minigames!" As you hit ENTER, your heart swells at such an insightful post.

I think you guys are forgetting who buys the wii. Its not gamers. Its people in their 20s-30s who dont game other then playing solitare or some flash games on their computer. They buy a wii because of all the mainstream media hype about it and older gamers, and they also remember the nintendo brand which they used to play with mario as kids.

So they buy a wii, play wii sports, buy a mario title or 2 and the system sits their on their shelf collecting dust.

The wii is marketed at these people, and its priced right to make the sale. These people have no interest in 3rd party games, and probably dont even know a good game if it hit them in the face.

The wii is a hardware success, and has been profitable for nintendo from the start. Unfortunetly its a software failure, especially for the install base of hardware that it has.

Really? So I guess I'm not a gamer then. Guess I should just hand in my gamer badge huh?

You are dead on there. I got one at launch and since then many friends and even my parents have either bought one or considered it. I know most of them won't even buy ONE game. To them it's really just a Wii Sports machine.

Anyone who thinks the Wii doesn't sell to hardcore as well as casual gamers is deluding themselves.

"I got one at launch and since then many friends and even my parents have either bought one or considered it. I know most of them won't even buy ONE game. To them it's really just a Wii Sports machine."

The group of people you're talking about there are IN ADDITION TO the hordes of gamers and used to be gamers that are flocking to Wii as well. Hence TWICE as many sales as 360/PS3 since its debut.

"Its people in their 20s-30s who dont game other then playing solitare or some flash games on their computer."

Really? All the people I know who own Wii's are either 1) core gamers or 2) families with kids under 12ish. 20-to-30-year-old casual gamers are completely unrepresented (of course, I could just have an unusual sample).

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Boom Blox a bust at retail, sells only 60k units

Boom Blox

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