EEDAR: No More Heroes 2 sold less than 30k in January

More like: The fans of No More Heroes isn't big enough.

Though an amazing game, No More Heroes (1) didn't attract that many people. Even if it's "hardcore", it doesn't taste that great to everyone's "hardcore" palette.

"Hardcore" and "Wii base" together form an oxymoron. I'm convinced that the Wii occupies its own space in the market. The hardcore have 360/PS3 and use the Wii sparingly, while Grandma thinks that Travis Touchdown is "a really odd fellow."

Except the Wii is never the lead platform for popular third-party titles so it's an apples/oranges type of argument. The only hardcore games ever done on the Wii are these super-niche experiments and (sigh) on-rails crap.

I used to use my Wii a lot. Now I play PC/PS3 games mostly and for the Wii I just wait on Nintendo titles as I only have cash for great 3rd party PC/PS3 games and sparing the rest for my Nintendo faves.

"it's sad good games like this sell so poorly. guess the fanbase for hardcore wii games just ain't big enough."

And looking at the sales of games like Bayonetta and Dark void it would seem the HARDCORE fanbase just isnt big enough on the HD twins either.. Where are all the HARDCORE going?!?!? Is this the work of the CASUALS???

Those weren't exclusives that people were anticipating, TWEE.

I really hope they still bring the 360/PS3 port to the states, and hopefully it'll sell well enough for them to port over NMH2 as well.

I think we can agree a game like this would probably find a bit of a better audience on those two systems.

Tigre whats that have to do with the price of milk?

Everything when there was already a glutton of milk selections to choose from at those other two stores.

People weren't anticipating Bayonetta? Huh?

WREturns - you write:
"Except the Wii is never the lead platform for popular third-party titles so it's an apples/oranges type of argument."

Except that in this we're talking about a game (NMH) where the Wii is the lead or only platform (also included in this conversation: MadWorld, House of the Dead: Overkill), so I think I must be missing your point.

What I'm saying is that for gamers the Wii and 360/PS3 is EXACTLY an apples/oranges situation. The Wii is too underpowered (and chained to a non-standard control scheme) to produce a comparable 360/PS3 game, which is why you get "Extraction" instead of a genuine Wii version of "Dead Space". Hardcore gamers, when they play the Wii (and I've heard too many game journalists speak of selling/closeting their Wiis so don't try to tell me that all hardcore gamers play the Wii on a regular basis) they play a certain type of game they can't get anywhere else.

"The Wii is too underpowered (and chained to a non-standard control scheme) to produce a comparable 360/PS3 game, which is why you get "Extraction" instead of a genuine Wii version of "Dead Space"."

But that's not true, though.
How many games do you honestly - HONESTLY - think are on the PS3 and 360 that could not, at a passing glace, look just as good and be otherwise play nearly identical on the Wii?

There is approximately one game this generation that (somewhat debatably) falls into that category: Dead Rising.
...and even then, DR was originally planned for the PS2, so who knows?

Do you think Mass Effect couldn't be replicated on the Wii? What is going on in that game that's so advanced? There is nothing. That Sonic RPG on the DS has dialogue just as advanced as what's found in ME.
Bayonetta is a Devil May Cry game with a chick. Darksiders is a friggin' Zelda and God of War clone.


The point is, there's no reason the Wii keeps getting these little spin off type games. These games NEVER sold gangbusters on ANY console. That they're expected to magically sell like that on the Wii is one of the most confusing things to me this generation. There is no precedent for those games. Why is the Wii expected to be the exception?
Are Wii gamers REALLY expected to look at those games that wouldn't have done that well on the HD consoles and say, "well, it's not like I have any other games to play so I'll just settle for this!"?

Going back to your original sentence, there's no reason a "real" Dead Space couldn't have been made on the Wii.

I wouldn't call the Conduit "niche". You know, as an FPS and all.

The bottom line is when you're thinking up a different excuse for every single one of these games that come out, maybe the excuses aren't the issue here and the real issue is what's ridiculously apparent to anyone not blinded by their own fanboyism. The system's audience, in general, just doesn't want those hardcore style games. They want casual, and they want Mario. They want what they know.

Darksiders sold 170k on the 360, and probably another 100k on the PS3. Darksiders, a game that was so over-shadowed by so many other games, a new IP, with little hype or marketing had no problem selling well on the HD consoles. Yet, even among the best of their AAA new IPs the Wii can't produce a single one that comes close to those numbers their first month. Instead they just produce a bunch of excuses that they make up going backwards.

Speaking of niche games, it doesn't get ANY more niche than Heavy Rain. Does anyone think that game is going to move less than 30k its first month even with the PS3 having half the install base of the Wii in NA?

Here's the krux of my argument: the kind of people who want to buy a game like Mass Effect already have a PC, PS3, or 360. Therefore, even if you could make a comparable Wii version (for the most part; visuals would suffer even discounting the fact that there is no such thing as a HD Wii), who would buy it? Would you save $10 to play a version of the game that looked demonstrably worse than the same game you could be playing on your PC, or 360?

Answer: you wouldn't.

Brick,
With the exception of House of the Dead: Overkill which is a - say it together now - on-rails shooter, Madworld and NMH are new IPs. For a comparison on the HD consoles, see Dante's Inferno, which is selling like gangbusters, right? It isn't? Huh. Developers discounted the Wii from the beginning and instead of doing the right thing and putting the work in and getting their best teams on Wii development they took the cheap and easy route. Now it's biting them in the ass and I don't feel even a little bad for them about it.

The REAL problem with all of this is that the hardcore buys, because the hardcore know and the hardcore reads.

The only difference between, say Bayonetta and Dante's Inferno for most people is clever and effective marketing. Show some damn commercials, get the average guy who plays games to know about it, and it sells. I GUARANTEE if Bayonetta had a Super Bowl commercial it could be selling right now, too - but if you just let the hardcore know, you'll get few sales.

Honestly, all this proves to me is that low Wii sales have less to do with the console's demographic and more to do with the common decision to not advertise, because the same thing is happening on other consoles.

That anyone can release a product and not tell people is just silly. You make people want it, then you tell them they want it, then you provide it. Game publishers tend to be good at the providing and making, but not so much at the telling - and that can be all the difference.

If the Wii could give the same experience then something like COD MW wouldn't have been so awful by comparison. A game like Star Wars The Force Unleashed wouldn't have been the same version as the PS2 & PSP, it would've been the PS3 & 360 experience. The fact is that the Wii couldn't do MAG, Mass Effect 2, Darksiders, Little Big Planet, GTA IV, etc etc ... It'll have to be a completely scaled back experience. Thats just the way it is because the hardware is more on par with the last gen stuff than stuff this generation. Thats why EVERY multiplatform game that comes out for Wii gets its own little special "wii" edition ... the experience can't be replicated.

Modern Warfare 1 sure is a hardcore game though... and that's been selling like gangbusters on the Wii. Over a million copies already.

The problem isn't the size of the fanbase, it's the marketing.

WREturns - we could argue alternate reality ("they didn't do the right thing from the beginning") forever and it wouldn't settle anything, so let me just say "I disagree."

@chaos

They did advertise Bayonetta, though. There was an entire UFC event sponsored by Bayonetta! They had a crap load of TV commercials, you didn't see that "I'm going in for the kill, I'm doing it for the thrill ewwwwohhhhwee commercial a billion times over? Even Final Fantasy 13 is sponsoring games on ESPN now. I saw during the UNC vs Duke game, "college game day brought to you by Final Fantasy 13." I don't know what Bayonetta sold but I remember reading that it has already shipped over a million units globally. It wasn't because of an ad campaign that it didn't sell, I guess people just didn't want to buy it as they chose Darksiders over it by a margin of 3 to 1. I bought Bayonetta, Darksiders and Dantes Inferno ... so I didn't choose one over the other.

For the record, I've had a casual interest in checking out No More Heroes 2. I read Joystiq and *that other site* on a daily basis. I work in this industry. And yet somehow I missed this release. I had no idea that No More Heroes 2 had launched. There has been so little promotion and press hits compared to other releases.

@Tigre

Games on the Wii being inferior to the point of looking closer to the PS2 ports has nothing to do with the Wii NOT being able to replicate the experience of an HD console. It's just lack of effort from the developers. Of course sometimes it is a good course of action seeing how some games do poorly.

But in the end, it's a vicious circle. Games don't sell well so they're not pushed in quality, and they are not bought because they lack quality. Not saying this is the case always, but it's a recurring theme. Some are genuine flops, but they're not accountable for how and why things play out the way they do.

@Seishino
Yeah a lot of people were surprised to see it was out when it was posted here. I think it's pretty bad when the release of a "major" game goes unnoticed by the people who want to play it. Wii advertising is really non-existent, this is the only place where I here about most Wii games.

I think it's safe to say there's not really an argument anymore. There is just the obvious.

I agree, people who game as a hobby (hardcore) have Playstation's and Xbox's. Those who game casually (casual) have Wii's because "IT'S FUN!!!!!!!!!".

"I think it's safe to say there's not really an argument anymore. There is just the obvious."

I agree, Hardcore and Casual are just bullshit buzzwords with no defined meaning other then what you want them to be at the time you're playing console warrior.

And anybody who cant see that.. well I just feel sorry for them.

Plenty of hardcore Wii games but they always seem to fail at retail. I think Tats vs Caps actually did pretty decent, though. Game like No More Heroes 2 are supposed to appeal to that starved hardcore demographic. Maybe we can all agree now that those people are a very vocal minority on blogs who represent little more than a smidgen of the user base as a whole. That or we can say there is no distinction between core and causal and pretend those segments don't actually exist.

There are absolutely definitions of Hardcore and Casual and they are based on playtime, playstyle, and investment. There are games that fit into those molds which tend to make a game more casual friendly or not.

The only ones who fail to see there is a REAL DEFINABLE difference in the 2 audiences are the butt-hurt casual gamers who somehow feel demeaned for being referred in a separate group from the hardcore gamers.

Well define away Shagittarius. Please, enlighten us "CASUALS".

"There are absolutely definitions of Hardcore and Casual and they are based on playtime, playstyle, and investment. There are games that fit into those molds which tend to make a game more casual friendly or not."

This is true.


"The only ones who fail to see there is a REAL DEFINABLE difference in the 2 audiences are the butt-hurt casual gamers who somehow feel demeaned for being referred in a separate group from the hardcore gamers."

This is not. The problem is that by only offering two definitions, you're forcing a polarizing situation, when the reality is much more black and white.
Does someone who only plays Peggle and other Popcap games addictively qualify as a 'hardcore' gamer?
How about someone who only plays the latest Call of Duty and Madden games when friends are around? Are they a 'casual' gamer?

Some people would say yes to both questions, others would say no.

Hardcore and casual are stupid definitions on their own. There should be several definitions inbetween them, and they should never refer to the perceived simplicity of the game, IMO.

Just looking at the Wii...
Casual (Wii Sports)
Semi-casual (arguably sims would fit here)
"Cas-Core"/Bridge (Mario Kart Wii)
Core (Zelda)
Hardcore (No More Heroes)

So yeah... they are stupid definitions. They exist in a vacuum, basically. The two terms on their own aren't qualified to define all games and gamers. It's stupid to try and shoehorn all games into one column or the other like that. It isn't black and white, it's shades of gray.

The level of denial among Wii fans on this subject is ridiculous.

Sure, you can't pigeon-hole every single person into one category or another, but for many of them you can. And sure, there are hardcore videogame fanatics that favor the Wii as their console of choice, and there are casual soccer moms that have purchased a PS3. But that doesn't mean that we can't say that, in general, the percentage of super casual players on the Wii is much higher than the other consoles, and the percentage of hardcore players is much higher on the 360/PS3.

Generalizations exist for a reason, because they're usually true. Obviously not in every single case, but in general, hence the name. There are people that have owned a 360 and a Wii and had their Wii die on them while their 360 has functioned perfectly every single day, but that doesn't mean that we can't still say that in general, the 360 hardware is much shittier.

I mean, we're running out of excuses for these hardcore Wii titles selling like ass here. Despite much more consoles being out there, we still see AAA 3rd-party Wii games selling MUCH worse than merely above averagel 3rd party 360/ps3 new IPs that release every month.

The percentage of casual players on the Wii is much, much, much higher than the other consoles. We can say that without having to specifically and explicitly define what makes up the difference between casual and hardcore. Anyone doing that is just trying to use semantics to grasp at straws and make a point they themselves probably don't even believe to be true. I don't know why they blindly deny it so much, it's not a big deal, it's just the way things are. That's the audience that, in general, has latched onto the Wii.

"we still see AAA 3rd-party Wii games selling MUCH worse than merely above averagel 3rd party 360/ps3 new IPs that release every month."

There is only one game on the Wii that is AAA from a third party: Monster Hunter Tri.

AAA has a very specific definition that gamers are too often willing to attach to any old game.
MadWorld, No More Heroes, The Conduit and House of the Dead Overkill are *NOT* in the same league as Call of Duty, God of War, Final Fantasy, Mario, Zelda or MAss Effect.

Stop using the term "AAA". Instead think of them as "tentpole" or "Marquee" titles. THOSE are the games needed to build an install base. We ALSO call those "system sellers".
Now how many "system sellers" are on the Wii from third parties?

Again, ONE game.


And, as I proved to you LAST time you insisted upon doing this, the B-grade Wii games DO sell about in the same ballpark as the B-grade HD games. A little bit less, but again, that has to do with the lack of system selling titles on the Wii to build those audiences up.

Samfish, the type of games played doesn't define if your hardcore or casual just the amount of time spent and the number of games played. That is the defining difference between hardcore and casual.

You can say there are games designed to appeal to a hardcore or casual audience because you look at what fits with the playtime of each demographic and try to design a game that fits with the amount of dedication but you make a mistake when you try and define a specific game design as casual or hardcore. There is no such thing. It doesn't prevent companies from trying to design games that appeal to one demographic or another however, but labeling the software is irrelevant.

So by looking at your examples, IF someone plays 1,000 hours of Peggle that doesn't make them a hardcore gamer because they only play one game. We could debate how many different games you need to play to be considered hardcore, but someone who dabbles in other games but only invests a great deal of time in a single game is definitely not hardcore.

All we are talking about is this:

Hardcore Players : Make time to play games.

Casual Gamers: Play games when there's time.

I suppose there is a transistion period if someone evolves into a hardcore gamer but its not worth making a definition for the gestation stage as the metamorphosis will soon be complete.

I would say it's much worse than that, Sam. With the difference in install base these Wii games should be selling at least on par or better than HD comparables. Thats the part that you discount, the user base is twice as small yet the sales of 3rd party software pale in comparison. Again, when Monster Hunter Tri comes and goes, flops there will be another excuse as to why it didn't sell well. There is always an excuse because Wii owners subscribe to this sort of cult of personality delusion and always blame every failure of every game on something other than the user base. I firmly believe that the user base isn't interested in those games, period. They want what they want and it's more of a pick up and play experience than something deeper. They don't want depth, they prefer shallow, easy and what they define as fun. Yet, the vocal minority contingent of Wii owners online and on blogs are in such denial about this and can never just truly admit the truth. It shouldn't be big deal but because they see it as an attack on themselves and Nintendo they have to go on the defensive. I'm convinced that the hardcore, vocal minority Wii owner has that cult of personality syndrome.

@Shag- Said ...

All we are talking about is this:

Hardcore Players : Make time to play games.

Casual Gamers: Play games when there's time.

I suppose there is a transistion period if someone evolves into a hardcore gamer but its not worth making a definition for the gestation stage as the metamorphosis will soon be complete.
____

I'll go along with those definitions. The last paragraph was also really funny ... good stuff.

"Again, when Monster Hunter Tri comes and goes, flops there will be another excuse as to why it didn't sell well." Tigre Dude, its already out in japan. I could be wrong but hasn't it sold better then any home console Monster hunter?
So going by your argument, with the difference in install base these PS2 monster hunter games should have sold at least on par or better than the Wii version.. No? Or is there a good reason the ps2 version didn't sell as well? Maybe some sort of excuse.

See how pointless this is?

That's just semantics Sam, you know what I meant.

Either way a game like Darksiders, pretty much a B-grade HD console game with little hype, sold 171,000 this month on the 360. That's far more than any of the super hyped, marquee Wii games (many of which were actually much better games) sold in their first month despite a much larger install base.

I don't know how you can look at that and not see what's painfully frikkin' obvious here.

Btw, for the point I was trying to make earlier just refer to Johnny's post up above. He said exactly what I was trying to say, but much more eloquently.

Oh god Mcpoop/Tigre/Johnny5 do you really want to go down that road, with the psychological profiling? Somebody with your insanely pro Sony posting history?

Stop it!! BAD!!

"Samfish, the type of games played doesn't define if your hardcore or casual just the amount of time spent and the number of games played. That is the defining difference between hardcore and casual."

I disagree with that. I don't have nearly as much time to play games anymore as I used to. Yet here I am on Joystiq, every day while I'm at work, talking about games in depth. I'm well informed, I play games that most people have never heard of. The sad part is that when I go home at night, I have more important priorities these days. I only play games a few times a week, truth be told. It's the reason I have a huge backlog!
How am I not considered hardcore?


"With the difference in install base these Wii games should be selling at least on par or better than HD comparables."

You know as well as I do that the size of the install base doesn't mean much.
Resident Evil 4 is still the Go-To example.
PS2 version sold 2 million copies lifetime on a console with, at the time, approximately an 80 million install base.
Gamecube version sold 1.6 million copies lifetime on a console with, at the time, approximately a 15 million install base.
Wii version sold 1.5 million copies on a console with, at the time, about a 30 million install base.

Install base size historically means nothing.


"Again, when Monster Hunter Tri comes and goes, flops there will be another excuse as to why it didn't sell well."

I don't know why you're so willfully blind to this reality. The series has never sold well in the west. Why do you keep acting like you expect otherwise this time? What is so different to you?
Dragon Quest doesn't sell in the west, either. When DQ8 sold piss poorly on the PS2, what did you say?
I don't know if MH will catch on here. Part of it depends on how well it's marketed, but you can't just discount the fact that it historically hasn't been a popular series anywhere but Japan.


"That's far more than any of the super hyped, marquee Wii games (many of which were actually much better games) sold in their first month despite a much larger install base."

How can you say that? There ARE none! There are NO marquee titles for the Wii from third parties. Name me ONE third party game that is on par with a system selling HD console game. Just ONE.
The only one would be Monster Hunter and, again, that series has never been a big seller in the west.

If you take my two quotes:

Hardcore: Makes time to play games.

Casual: Plays games when theres time.


I would still consider you hardcore Samfish, we can't always manage to make the time to play games but with a hardcore gamer its a high priority. Real life always intercedes no matter what your desires are. You are hardcore because a) Playing games to you is something you purposely look forward to doing. and B) You play a large diverse number of games.

It is also possible for someone to change focuses and life permanantly and change from hardcore into casual over time.

If you want to try and discredit me for preferring the PS3, it only supports my argument. If you really want to boil it down to the meat and potatoes you could say that the Wii guys are like members of a cult they view almost like a religion and identify themselves personally with the company, 360 guys have the college jock / frat boy syndrome where everything else is shit even if it isn't and PS3 guys are like sheltered, insecure children who take any criticism comment as the end of the world even if it wasn't really THAT bad of a comment. Thats basically what I think about it if you want to know the truth.

Heres how I see it. Theres people who like the play video games.. and then theres people who try to turn it into politics.

@All we are talking about is this:

Hardcore Players : Make time to play games.

Casual Gamers: Play games when there's time.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Damn, i'm glad i'm a casual (by YOUR standards of course)

Oh, Nintendo needs to stop all the sh!tware from hitting the public.

It's desensitizing.

We can only hope for the Nintendo Seal of Quality to come back into full service by the next console generation.

I'm sure Khan and Samfish have said this several times already, but the Nintendo Seal of Quality never guaranteed the game was good, only that the game would run as it should without damaging your system.