Sega: Overkill sales 'met expectations,' MadWorld's 'very encouraging'

it's easy to lower your expectations when you have lower development costs.

Well, I do think that they would be ok with HotD's numbers as I don't see the total cost for it to have been that high. But for MadWorld? I find it really unlike for them to be happy with said numbers, more so with all the advertising that they have put on it...shame really ;(

Still, when considering the Wii install base, those are pretty low expectations. I'm not riding on the game or anything, it's a really fun light shooter, haven't picked up Mad World, cause it's really not my style of game. But still I really don't see the game picking up more sales over the next few months, (isn't the trend almost always downwards for game sales, minus a few blockbusters?)

IGN had the developers of Moon on one of their podcasts talking about the game sales and it was apparently really really low, but the Moon guys insisted that the game was doing ok. I mean I don't really see Sega coming out and having their PR say our games didn't sell well, especially only a few months after a games release.

I mean isn't the whole point of PR to spin things in the positive no matter what? Even if a game sells bad, you don't preach it to the world, that's something that is discussed in board meetings to determine what to do next.

I'm sorry but only selling 45k for a Wii game, is not a lot of copies moved in respect to other Wii games out there. I mean personally I always figured light gun games were a niche market anyways, even though I love them to death, but honestly, when you compare these numbers to other Wii games out there, it just shows it's very tough to be a third party and sell a hardcore game on Wii.

You both make good points. I didn't really think about the advertising costs - that's got to be a disappointment for sure.

Hardcore games are a tough sell on the Wii market, but it's kind of an interesting crowd with the Wii - games don't really immediately fly off of the shelf unless they're first party games. They sell almost consistently over a long period of time. I think some of the games like No More Heroes started off really slowly, but eventually they hit the half million mark.

So maybe Sega's expectations are that games will slow in small numbers, but sell consistently over a period of time. I haven't picked it up yet, but I intend to get Madworld relatively soon - it looks entertaining enough and I've heard good things from the posters of this site.

Sadly, I expect a similar fate for the Conduit - can't wait for the haters to love the sales numbers on that - I don't expect the inital figures to be high, but I imagine it might sell decent for more than a few months.

We have no conclusive numbers for MadWorld quite yet. VGChartz may have undertracked.

It's a pretty good rule of thumb to just ignore everything VGChartz ever says.

When you make games for the wii, specially core ones, you have to have low expectations because as it has been proven time after time again...they don't sell on the wii.

http://cache.jalopnik.com/assets/resources/2008/06/Lowered-Expectations-Prius.jpg

Of course the expectations are low. Both of these games are niche, regardless of platform.

Didn't Sega also say something about Valkyria Chronicles meeting expectations?

It would be easy for them to make some cheap, rushed, terrible game with bright colours and cute box art that would, for all intents and purposes, be successful. I purchased both games and will continue to support anyone that puts out a quality game on the Wii that dares to be unlike the rest of the shovelware we're bombarded with.

Good on ya and keep'em coming!

That's encouraging. I've been meaning to pick it up. Money is tight right now (taxes) and my Wii hasn't even been plugged in for about 6 months anyways. Seems like every time I turn it on there's system updates to run, which take forever, and I can't really tell how long there is left with the Wii's "progress bar".

The evergreen games tend to be Nintendo ones (Mario Kart, New Super Mario Bros., etc.). Are there any third party games that continue to sell at a steady clip?

de Blob is over 700,000. Probably approaching 800k with it's recent price drop.
House o the Dead 2 & 3 was at nearly 900,000 if I'm not mistaken.
Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles is also over a million.
Sonic & the Secret Rings eventually clawed it's way up to a million.

No one ever expected OR MadWorld House of the Dead Overkill to be a huge selling games (although people who have an axe to grind against the Wii will insist otherwise). MadWorld WILL beat out No More Heroes in the long run. It could even breach a million, if things go well.
HotD:O will probably see a sales boost, too, once Sega cuts the price on it, especially since a lot of people online, at least, seem to be wary of paying $50 for a light gun game.

Ok but does this logic apply to M-Rated titles on Wii? Sure Wii Music makes sense, but outside of RE4, has there been an M Rated title that continues on a slow march forward?

There aren't many other M rated titles on the Wii to begin with. The only two that have shown legs are House of the Dead and Resident Evil UC.

and house of the dead 2 and 3 are just under a million seller and re:uc is 1.25 million

those games are ports. even resident evil is based on other resident evils, just turned into a shooter.

Overkill being a fresh game should give it better legs.

but even so, 1.25 million isn't horrible

Yeah I know de Blob ending up selling really really well, in fact haven't they already mentioned a sequel?

Do you really trust Amazons top-selling list? I just view it as an in-site ad...

I haven't played MadWorld yet but Overkill is a great game :)

I think the long tail will work for Sega. I know I want to get Overkill for my sister and her husband. Also, I will eventually pick up MadWorld.

I read that madworld got slashed in half in europe, but I'm hoping for the same here so I can get it for like $20 used at gamestop. I think I could get it at that price and not feel let down no matter what.

Or you could support the Wii Tmac and buy the game new?

Oh wait, you'd do anything to see the best console this gen fail.

Patience is key. EA didn't lose their heads when Boom Blox premiered to a measly 25,000 units, and now the title is past 500k with a sequel on the way

If MadWorld's sales collapse, then we have a problem on our hands. But even then, it's a Clover game. People should have been anticipating low sales from the start.

I agree with Johnnyboy. Sega are clearly trying to save face, probably for investors who read the WSJ/FT. Madworld, a favourite game of mine, has been discounted to below half price; HOTD has been selling at 60% its original RRP for what seems forever; The Conduit is destined to fail (deservedly so, considering the pathetic lack of ambition). The House of Sonic made a mistake hedging 2009 on the Wii with these titles. From my conclusions, only the Sonic rehash seems to be faring well in the charts. A sad situation indeed.

"(deservedly so, considering the pathetic lack of ambition)."

I think the game looks pretty bland as well, but to say they're not being ambitious with the title wouldn't be fair. The story seems pretty original (most FPSes don't go for the whole government conspiracy route, and this one's offering what appears to be a pretty solid twist), it has plenty of features that most Wii games don't, etc.

Of course, you like to hate anything FPS, saying that it's a genre that hasn't seen much advancement or innovation over the last few years. While it's an oversaturated genre, for sure, it's also a genre that's seen plenty of refinement over the last few years, so to act as though nothing's changed...

I don't think you voters are being fair to Johnny or Bowsey.

Honestly, with a userbase in the 40 millions, how are developers supposed to be excited over these sales figures? There's clearly not enough of us gamers buying these titles, and what that means is that developers who have more ambitious ideas or want to put out something large-profile on the system aren't really going to see a reason to. If a game with as much e-hype as Mad World sells this meh-ly, I mean, what makes you think devs are going to start making more games like it? Sega might be expecting these kinds of sales, but in a console 'war' with two systems that can give you quite the return on a several-million-dollar investment, well, where's the incentive to make anything worthwhile on the Wii?

PS2's best-selling game, GTA: SA, sold about 12M worldwide. Yet, the PS2 has sold way over 140M units worldwide. A huge difference in numbers, eh?

There's only two ways for a game to hit a high percentage of the userbase:
1) It's an incredibly "mainstream" game.
2) The install base is incredibly small.

Wii Play is over 20M (granted, most buy it for the Wii Remote), and Wii Fit is over 14M. Both are certainly mainstream. And when the system first came out, more than 3/4s of the Wii owners had Twilight Princess, due to how small the install base was.

HotD: OVERKILL and MadWorld are both niche games, and the Wii's install base is huge now. They don't have the same luxuries as other games do.

I just think that the sales aren't promising for other developers who want to feed the hardcore Wii niche. The majority of 3rd party Wii gams have trouble selling and these graphic-core titles are even worse. Say what you will about it being niche, clover game that traditionally don't sell well or that the games had low development costs but the fact still remains that the sales are abysmal and below expectations. Games like LBP & KZ2 sell closer to 500K or 1MIL units and are considered failures with a much smaller install base.

Maybe HotD could have had less gore, but MadWorld? are you serious? the attacks and setting are what make this game, and so its very unlikely to get away with a rating below M...

It's not that I have a POBLEM with gore and such. It's not CONTENT, after all. It's TONE. They made the game specifically to appeal to people based soley on the tone of "GRRRRRRRRRRRR BLOOD AND GORE IS MATURE", the kind of attitude you'll find in a 13 year-old boy that wants to be an adult by playing "M" games BECAUSE they're "M" games, and not for any reasons of actual content.

It's not the AMOUNT of gore and swearing and whatnot, it's the INTENT. Which is, basically, "appeal to the lowest common denominator". I can dig that, but I'm not paying the price I'd pay for a game with substance for it.

Looks like someone here hasn't seen a grindhouse film.

"I'll pick it up second-hand."

Therefore giving the developers and publishers no money, which in turn will discourage them from releasing follow-ups or related titles. I'd consider that a POBLEM.

"They made the game specifically to appeal to people based soley on the tone of "GRRRRRRRRRRRR BLOOD AND GORE IS MATURE""

More like "HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA INTENSE VIOLENCE IS HILARIOUS" because it is. Neither of those games try to be "mature." They're both weirdly light-hearted and silly.

"I like to wash down my happy pills with a litlle bit of scotch."

"I like to wash down my scotch with a little more scotch."

"I like to wash down that scotch that I washed down the other scotch with with a little more scotch."

"I like scotch."

"I like scotch."

I agree.

I hope the games do sell over time (and they may a bit - one reason why Wii games often 'have legs' is that there are always lots of new customers buying Wiis, some of whom might pick that new game), because they're 'gamer games'.

But it does seem a bit strange that companies which try to aim for the hardcore audience are largely releasing this type of game for Wii: in other words, either they're releasing minigames, or M-rated games - and often not just any M-rated games, but ones which try to push the boundary of taste as far as possible.

Games like Conduit are maybe exceptions to this rule - but I'd like to see more games that are T-rated, and also M-rated without being pure violence-fests. I don't have any objection at all to games like MadWorld and HotD:Overkill, but I'ld like to see more of the middle ground.

I think more games like Nintendo's Zelda:TP and Metroid Prime 3 would be nice, and might do better on the platform since they're able to sell to a slightly younger audience...

sam: "I think more games like Nintendo's Zelda:TP and Metroid Prime 3 would be nice, and might do better on the platform since they're able to sell to a slightly younger audience..."

Yes, please! I'm happy to see games like this doing well, because it shows that there are plenty of Wii gamers into things other than Minigame compilations and whatnot, and it attracts MORE of them... But personally, they're really not my cup of tea. I just hope that the more success they have, the more likely it is that we'll see other games in the "deep and challenging without being an all-out gorefest" genre.

Zelda and Metroid are excellent examples. I'm excited for Monster Hunter, for example :)

Me too! :)

Good luck on #2 there, buddy :P Just took the plunge myself last Oct.

I know I’ll definitely be picking up Overkill at some point, probably because I got a zapper for xmas, and bought a perfect shot on a yearly family resort vacation so some of us could try RE:UC. So all I have is Link’s Crossbow Training, which is kind of a waste of those two pieces of plastic. Mad World doesn’t really do much for me, dunno if I’ll pick that up at all. Got plenty to play on my 360, but looks like I’m due up for Rhythm Heaven (really fun demo), Henry Hatsworth, and Overkill next on my N hardwarez.

Finally found the will to start playing Phantom Hourglass again, so when i'm done with that it's onto more N goodness.

Really? I feel the opposite.

Maybe Canada wasn't targeted as much for these games. lol or Ottawa at least. :P