Riku Rose wrote: Either have all the hype for a launch at a audience of over 100 million or have all the hype on a console with a few million I know which I would choose. Sure you have GTAV but many more games are coming out in Feb-March. You have the likes of Bioshock Infinite, Tomb Raider and Gears of War Judement all coming out within weeks of one another and then throw Rayman in there? Wii U owners may not have much to play on their systems but I doubt many people only have a Wii U and not a 360 and PS3 that they buy games for as well.
I believe the Wii U has sold around 2-3 millions systems. You are lucky if about 1 in 10 people who own the system you release on buy your game. 200-300k isn't a lot and I bet even against GTA it will still shift more units with the extra 100M install base.
Then you have a lot to learn about how things work.
First we'll talk install bases. So DMC was released at a time where over 100 million people had a console. Devil May Cry 4 was released in 2008, meanwhile the majority of ps3 and xbox consoles were sold after 2009. So in a world with only 40million consoles almost 3 million people bought the game. Now we can all say that DMC failed because of hate from people who like old DMC and have problems with black haired Dante, but the game can't clear 1.5 mill shipped with 100 million consoles out there. Les say the 3 mill of people that bought 4 didn't buy DMC that still means theres 97 million consoles that didn't play the game.
Ofcourse with only a few million 3ds handhelds out in the wild, Fantasy Life, as well as a bunch of other games have been able to clear 1 mill in japan alone.
A larger install base doesn't guarantee higher numbers.
Next lets look at the games releasing on the 26th, games that would have released same day as Rayman. Dynasty Warriors 7 Empires, Bit trip runner 2, Etrian odyssey 4 and Ninja gaiden sigma 2 plus. Aside from DWE7 Rayman was the only console game being released that day.
Bioshock infinite is a full month later at march 26th, Tomb Raider is on the 5th of march, god of war the 12th, gears of war the 19th. They're all not on WiiU. Now in September Rayman will be in direct competition with GTAV. A person that had a 360 and wanted other games, has a pay check or two before something else on another console they have comes out.
Since you didn't spend the last 6 months paying people 20-30k(and this team is made up of a few hundred people) you're costs are also much lower. You can make more money even if you sell less copies. This was also their only chance to sell 200-300k at 60$ considering Origins was sold at half that price and didn't fare much better per sku.
This whole thing was a bad idea.
