Eternity PoE II: Deadfire Sales Analysis Thread

[Strange Fellow]

What does it mean to "satisfy the nostalgia of customers"?

To make the grognards happy, essentially. A Sisyphean task. That's my point.
I do agree with this:

What they did do, however, was at least getting the basics to be good enough before smearing all over them and doing whatever they wanted.

Neither PoE nor NuXcom tried to iterate on the design of their (spiritual) predecessors. I took your original post to mean that you think Obsidian and InXile ruined any chance of video game marketing based on nostalgia for old-school RPGs being a success. Maybe I misunderstood. I still don't think the Pre-Raphaelite comparison works.

 

[Azarkon]

To prove that "nostalgia betrayal" is the primary reason for underperforming sales, first you have to show that a game that does satisfy its most nostalgic supporters can sell any better.

I'm open to arguments that PoE2 sold fewer copies than PoE1 because PoE1 wasn't fun enough.

I'm skeptical of arguments that PoE2 sold fewer copies than PoE1 because PoE1 wasn't fun enough specifically due to not being enough like Baldur's Gate.

That wasn't my argument to begin with.

Nostalgia betrayal = "These developers made Baldur's Gate 2, my favorite game ever! I want to see them capture that magic again!"

not

"I want Baldur's Gate 2 exactly. Make me Baldur's Gate 2 exactly or else."

The nostalgia - which is easily proven by the sales of a certain series of Enhanced Edition games, by the public support for the crowd funding campaigns, and by the way those campaigns were run - was over a memory of enjoyment, which was betrayed by bland mediocrity.

Pillars of Eternity 2 failed because people did not find the old magic they were looking for in Pillars of Eternity 1 - or any of the big renaissance games.

I know this, because I was one of those people - as were many or even most people on the Codex. In fact, Pillars of Eternity was marketed at people like us - that's the reason the original campaign emphasized its name drops so damn much. We supported the developers out of the belief that they could deliver a game worthy of their tradition. They failed to do so, and we did not come back.

You don't get a second chance, when it comes to nostalgia. That appeal works only once every so many years. You don't get to say - our second game will do what our first game didn't, because by the time people have finished the first game, they've already gotten over it.

 

[Azarkon]

What does it mean to "satisfy the nostalgia of customers"?

To make the grognards happy, essentially. A Sisyphean task. That's my point.
I do agree with this:

What they did do, however, was at least getting the basics to be good enough before smearing all over them and doing whatever they wanted.

Neither PoE nor NuXcom tried to iterate on the design of their (spiritual) predecessors. I took your original post to mean that you think Obsidian and InXile ruined any chance of video game marketing based on nostalgia for old-school RPGs being a success. Maybe I misunderstood. I still don't think the Pre-Raphaelite comparison works.

There's no separate metric for satisfying nostalgia. Nostalgia is driven by the memory of a feeling. To realize that feeling, the task is still to deliver an excellent game. What nostalgia does, is get your feet in the door - to bring attention to the product and over come the initial hesitation towards it.

The success of Pillars of Eternity 1 is because of nostalgia. Nostalgia drove the crowd funding campaigns. It made the initial sales. It spread the word. Had there been no nostalgia, these games wouldn't have sold much more than Age of Decadence, which by many measures is a superior game. The recent CRPG renaissance - among many other popular culture developments - is the living proof of nostalgia as a market force.

But nostalgia only works once. You can sell a game on nostalgia alone, but don't expect to sell its sequel on nostalgia, as well. For a sequel to succeed, the first game must have actually delivered the feeling so many people were looking for - in which case, you can build on that feeling to sell more of the same. That's the down side of nostalgia, in a way - it raises people's expectations and when those expectations are not met, it leads to a sense of betrayal which results in even more lost sales and criticism than might exist without the expectations. We saw this effect on the Codex, in fact, with Torment, which likely drove more people away from InXile than had they just not name dropped Torment in the first place.

I would not say that the failures of Obsidian and InXile necessarily block any chance of future CRPG marketing based on nostalgia. But the CRPG renaissance is over because those nostalgia fueled projects failed to deliver. People won't be so quick to jump on them again.

Nostalgia is still a powerful marketing force, however. Just not for this set of companies towards these sets of games.

 

[fantadomat]

To make the grognards happy, essentially.

At this all of them failed miserably. Only one that succeeded was Josh,that guy just disliked grognards and wanted to fuck them over.
You wanted a good D&D style RTwP similar to Baulder's gate games?
Oh never mind,here is my own system that i created specially for autist ,also the story and the lore are total bokus,enjoy!

 

[DemonKing]

For me Nostalgia driven games have to hit the key notes of the original but also bring something new to the table. I think M&M X and Grimrock have been the most successful to this end IMO although M&MX admittedly wasn't exactly a hit . PoE and its sequel were only partially successful in that they looked like IE games but with modern bells and whistles but the underlying systems and setting were unfamiliar, resulting in the lackluster fan response/sales.

 

[Roguey]

For me Nostalgia driven games have to hit the key notes of the original but also bring something new to the table. I think M&M X and Grimrock have been the most successful to this end IMO although M&MX admittedly wasn't exactly a hit .

M&M fans disliked X because its combat was too Wizardry, and Grimrock's sequel was one of the first to fall victim to decreased interest.

PoE and its sequel were only partially successful in that they looked like IE games but with modern bells and whistles but the underlying systems and setting were unfamiliar, resulting in the lackluster fan response/sales.

None of that is remotely true for Pillars of Eternity given its sales and ratings.

 

[DemonKing]

M&M fans disliked X because its combat was too Wizardry...

Probably why I liked M&MX so much!

None of that is remotely true for Pillars of Eternity given its sales and ratings.

The PoE kickstarter definitely benefited from it.

 

[Azarkon]

None of that is remotely true for Pillars of Eternity given its sales and ratings.

Neither of which accurately capture the long term reception of a game.

Sales are front loaded, heavily subject to success of marketing, and in this case, nostalgia driven.

The Codex already accepts that 99% of video game critics aren't worth listening to.

Now they just have to understand that 99% of user reviews also don't matter.

The only people who write those reviews, are people who care enough to comment.

But indifference is a much more important factor in determining long term sales. Apathy is death, and people who don't care, aren't going to write a review, one way or another.

Pillars of Eternity 2 held onto its devoted fans - we can see evidence of that in the average play time they've spent in the game. But it lost the rest, especially the nostalgia crowd who were attracted to the game for the promise of another experience like Baldur's Gate, but who never got it, and who lost interest half way or even a third of the way through, and never looked back.

Most people on the Codex are either devoted fans or critics and care enough to discuss the game day in, day out for over three years. But the rest of the gaming community has long stopped caring.

 

[fantadomat]

For me Nostalgia driven games have to hit the key notes of the original but also bring something new to the table. I think M&M X and Grimrock have been the most successful to this end IMO although M&MX admittedly wasn't exactly a hit .

M&M fans disliked X because its combat was too Wizardry, and Grimrock's sequel was one of the first to fall victim to decreased interest.

PoE and its sequel were only partially successful in that they looked like IE games but with modern bells and whistles but the underlying systems and setting were unfamiliar, resulting in the lackluster fan response/sales.

None of that is remotely true for Pillars of Eternity given its sales and ratings.

I am a big MM fan and hate that game,it is worst than MM9 in my eyes. It lacks everything that other MM games have,no freedom,no exploration,no hero progression,no interesting side content and all those potion drinking. I have finished all the MM games without using potions to be forced to drink theme in this pile of shit. The game felt like a shitty jrpg dungeon crawler.

 

[Roguey]

But it lost the rest, especially the nostalgia crowd who were attracted to the game for the promise of another experience like Baldur's Gate, but who never got it, and who lost interest half way or even a third of the way through, and never looked back.

Is that really the nostalgia crowd or just a bunch of curious casuals? Who can really say?

 

[Azarkon]

But it lost the rest, especially the nostalgia crowd who were attracted to the game for the promise of another experience like Baldur's Gate, but who never got it, and who lost interest half way or even a third of the way through, and never looked back.

Is that really the nostalgia crowd or just a bunch of curious casuals? Who can really say?

Judging by the sales of Enhanced Edition classic CRPGs, I don't think it's just a bunch of curious casuals who were involved in boosting the numbers. None of my casual friends had even heard about Pillars of Eternity when I told them I was playing it, and none of them bought it, either.

 

[Roguey]

Judging by the sales of Enhanced Edition classic CRPGs, I don't think it's just a bunch of curious casuals who were involved in boosting the numbers. None of my casual friends had even heard about Pillars of Eternity when I told them I was playing it, and none of them bought it, either.

Obsidian certainly seems to believe they exist, otherwise the system differences in Tyranny and Deadfire wouldn't be what they are. Additionally, Josh was convinced even back in the early 00s that grognards were a fraction of the audience.

 

[fantadomat]

But it lost the rest, especially the nostalgia crowd who were attracted to the game for the promise of another experience like Baldur's Gate, but who never got it, and who lost interest half way or even a third of the way through, and never looked back.

Is that really the nostalgia crowd or just a bunch of curious casuals? Who can really say?

Judging by the sales of Enhanced Edition classic CRPGs, I don't think it's just a bunch of curious casuals who were involved in boosting the numbers. None of my casual friends had even heard about Pillars of Eternity when I told them I was playing it, and none of them bought it, either.

PoE came during the kickstarter hype,a lot of people got overhyped and bought shit that have no interest in it. A lot of youtube retards were hyping all kinds of games and many sheep fallow them.

 

[fantadomat]

. Additionally, Josh was convinced even back in the early 00s that grognards were a fraction of the audience.

Yet many grognards didn't buy the second game and we see how it performed. I am interested to see how well the first DLC will perform,will we see a spike of online players on steamcharts.

 

[DalekFlay]

For me Nostalgia driven games have to hit the key notes of the original but also bring something new to the table. I think M&M X and Grimrock have been the most successful to this end IMO although M&MX admittedly wasn't exactly a hit . PoE and its sequel were only partially successful in that they looked like IE games but with modern bells and whistles but the underlying systems and setting were unfamiliar, resulting in the lackluster fan response/sales.

M&M:X is a great game to bring up here because despite being rather excellent and old-school it (supposedly) sold like shit. Though I suspect "sold like shit" is code for "Ubisoft had way too high of expectations," and it likely sold about what Grimrock did. I think expectations are highly important, and the fact Feargus paid for full voice-over to me shows his expectations were in the wrong place.

Everyone who played Baldur's Gate when it came out is now filtered through multiple strainers: people who stopped gaming altogether, people who game very rarely now due to obligations, people whose tastes changed with the market and don't want to play old style shit anymore. On top of THAT is the fact real singleplayer gameplay is seemingly on the wane in general, with most of today's top games being online survival/co-op/shooter games or interactive movies. So expectations should have been kept in check for all these games past the Kickstarter numbers, and I'm not sure they were.

Point is you can't just make a good "old game" and drown in the money, you have to either budget according to your much smaller market or innovate and bring in new players. I'm not sure a lot of these "incline" games are doing either, and that's assuming they're good to begin with.

 

[Strange Fellow]

There's no separate metric for satisfying nostalgia. Nostalgia is driven by the memory of a feeling. To realize that feeling, the task is still to deliver an excellent game.

It needs to do more than that. It needs to be a good game, that should go without saying, but it also needs to hit most of the same beats that the original did. Even if Wasteland 2 or the upcoming Bard's Tale 4 were excellent games, I don't think anyone will argue that they satisfy any nostalgia for the old games - for that, they’re too different. Of course, catering to nostalgia for 80s games isn't a good idea if you want to sell, so the changes make sense. PoE is a trickier one. On the one hand, Obs didn't use AD&D, and the tone of the writing and world-building is very different from BG. But the system in place is similar enough at first glance - you have your primary statistics and your resistances and per-rests - that it could fool more casual fans who had forgotten the specifics of the IE games' systems, or were maybe not very familiar with them in the first place. So maybe it did successfully cater to nostalgia, but even so, there are better examples out there, like Grimrock.

The success of Pillars of Eternity 1 is because of nostalgia. Nostalgia drove the crowd funding campaigns. It made the initial sales. It spread the word.

I think people underestimate the selling power of the Obsidian name. My friend bought it because it was a new Obs game, and if I had bought it too it would have been for the same reason.

Nostalgia is still a powerful marketing force, however. Just not for this set of companies towards these sets of games.

That's my conclusion as well.

 

[Azarkon]

It needs to do more than that. It needs to be a good game, that should go without saying, but it also needs to hit most of the same beats that the original did. Even if Wasteland 2 or the upcoming Bard's Tale 4 were excellent games, I don't think anyone will argue that they satisfy any nostalgia for the old games - for that, they’re too different. Of course, catering to nostalgia for 80s games isn't a good idea if you want to sell, so the changes make sense. PoE is a trickier one. On the one hand, Obs didn't use AD&D, and the tone of the writing and world-building is very different from BG. But the system in place is similar enough at first glance - you have your primary statistics and your resistances and per-rests - that it could fool more casual fans who had forgotten the specifics of the IE games' systems, or were maybe not very familiar with them in the first place. So maybe it did successfully cater to nostalgia, but even so, there are better examples out there, like Grimrock.

This is why I think there is no separate nostalgia metric for evaluating the game. People will come for the nostalgia; but they will only stay because the game itself is excellent. Nostalgia won't keep them around, because it's a transient emotional state - it lasts only as long as it takes you to go through the process of remembering. Whether that's playing Baldur's Gate 2 Enhanced Edition for 20 hours, or playing Pillars of Eternity for 20 hours, it's not going to endure. Sequels to nostalgia games do not work unless the games themselves have created new interest.

This brings us back to Divine Divinity: Original Sin. The sales of the original game may or may not have been significantly affected by nostalgia, but what is certain is that the sequel's over performance, relative to other CRPG renaissance games, had little to do with nostalgia, but much to do with the concrete accomplishments of the first game in generating new interest in Larian's products. So in that sense, they were rewarded for their efforts in the first game by spectacular sales for the second. However, the failures of Divine Divinity: Original Sin 2 as a game will probably come to bite them, as well, should they chance it with a third game.

However, I do agree that in order to market a game through the nostalgia factor, there must be enough similarities with the old games for people to actually believe that it could be a substitute. This is where developer name drops and game design parallels come in. But I don't think nostalgia is a hard constraint on the way the game must be made. Once they've bought the game already, the only measure that matters is that they enjoy it.

 

[Quillon]

selling power of the Obsidian name

has been faded. Sure Obsidian name is bigger than your random indie company but atm its far below the likes of Beth, CDPR, even Bioware. If they had made an AAA game in the recent years it would have helped with PoE2/Tyranny sales also. Guess they took far too much encouragement from PoE1's success and thought they'd be better off making games like PoE which was more profitable than making an AAA game for a publisher but sticking with low profile games backfired. We'll see if Cainarsky game gets the wider audience's attention back to Obs which in turn would help their lower budget games.

 

[Strange Fellow]

selling power of the Obsidian name

has been faded.

Largely as a result of PoE. Actually, I'm not sure it has at all, in the eyes of the mainstream. PoE was Obsdian's make-it-or-break-it slam dunk modern classic that brought back old-school RPGs, if I remember the reviews correctly.

 

[Lacrymas]

It's interesting how PoE failed to appease pretty much anyone. Neither normies nor grognards, which is saying something. I think the people who bought PoE2 are the ones who played 3.0 or White March and some stragglers here and there who actually liked PoE1. Azarkon is correct in saying nostalgia only has marketing power and only temporarily. For me, however, it was never about nostalgia, as I hadn't actually played the IE games (except PS:T) before the KS for PoE. I played BG1 after I had finished PoE1 (probably a unique case on the 'Dex) and found it muuuuuuuuuuch better, and I have a playthrough running pretty much constantly since then. The thing with PoE1 is that I found it disappointing even without having played the IE games, I simply didn't see a good game in it. I was constantly waiting for something interesting to happen, to see that Obsidian magic at work, but it never came. I felt like Mariana, waiting for love that will never come. I did enjoy White March, with a lot of compromises, but I only played it because people on here told me it's better and it's worth it (and only part 2 is a significant increase in quality). Normies don't have that advantage.

 

[DalekFlay]

selling power of the Obsidian name

has been faded. Sure Obsidian name is bigger than your random indie company but atm its far below the likes of Beth, CDPR, even Bioware. If they had made an AAA game in the recent years it would have helped with PoE2/Tyranny sales also. Guess they took far too much encouragement from PoE1's success and thought they'd be better off making games like PoE which was more profitable than making an AAA game for a publisher but sticking with low profile games backfired. We'll see if Cainarsky game gets the wider audience's attention back to Obs which in turn would help their lower budget games.

As said above, PoE seems to be the game that got this crowd down on Obsidian, not one before that. Dungeon Siege III was what it was I guess, but I don't remember people raging about it. Alpha Brotocol and New Vegas are pretty well regarded in general among RPG fans and South Park was a hit with people into what it offered while others could safely ignore it. In other words PoE is the only real disappointment, and as also said above it seems to have disappointed both classic fans and new fans. This is despite it receiving stellar reviews, which is why the stellar reviews for the sequel were obviously not trusted at all.

Obsidian should have never been the ones to try and take up the Baldur's Gate legacy anyway, it doesn't play to their strengths. As an Obsidian fan I went into PoE expecting their classic quest design, faction systems and unique dialogs... what I got was pretty much zippo on the first two and not enough of the last one. It's not a bad game it's just boring.

 

[Sizzle]

It's interesting how PoE failed to appease pretty much anyone. Neither normies nor grognards, which is saying something.

On the Codex - maybe, but you'd be amazed how many people (not just complete casuals) liked it, even its story.

 

[Lacrymas]

On the Codex - maybe, but you'd be amazed how many people (not just complete casuals) liked it, even its story.

And that's why PoE2 is successful and Obs are rolling in the dough and attention. The relative failure of PoE2 shows much more clearly how many people truly enjoyed PoE1 (or were hopeful that 2 is going to be better), sometimes you can't really trust people's spoken opinions, or they quickly change their opinion once the haze wears off. I've had some moments where I was negative towards something, but then realized I had actually enjoyed it, or the other way around. The negativity with PoE is a constant, though, lol.

 

[Quillon]

selling power of the Obsidian name

has been faded. Sure Obsidian name is bigger than your random indie company but atm its far below the likes of Beth, CDPR, even Bioware. If they had made an AAA game in the recent years it would have helped with PoE2/Tyranny sales also. Guess they took far too much encouragement from PoE1's success and thought they'd be better off making games like PoE which was more profitable than making an AAA game for a publisher but sticking with low profile games backfired. We'll see if Cainarsky game gets the wider audience's attention back to Obs which in turn would help their lower budget games.

As said above, PoE seems to be the game that got this crowd down on Obsidian, not one before that. Dungeon Siege III was what it was I guess, but I don't remember people raging about it. Alpha Brotocol and New Vegas are pretty well regarded in general among RPG fans and South Park was a hit with people into what it offered while others could safely ignore it. In other words PoE is the only real disappointment, and as also said above it seems to have disappointed both classic fans and new fans. This is despite it receiving stellar reviews, which is why the stellar reviews for the sequel were obviously not trusted at all.

Obsidian should have never been the ones to try and take up the Baldur's Gate legacy anyway, it doesn't play to their strengths. As an Obsidian fan I went into PoE expecting their classic quest design, faction systems and unique dialogs... what I got was pretty much zippo on the first two and not enough of the last one. It's not a bad game it's just boring.

People raging about PoE(Codex) doesn't matter :D Disappointed fans and boring game which somehow sold over 1M do. Most who played PoE clearly disappointed in some big way they didn't wanna come back for more, there is no other explanation for obviously better sequel selling so poorly compared to the original. Yeah PoE1 is the reason for Deadfire's failings.

 

[Sizzle]

On the Codex - maybe, but you'd be amazed how many people (not just complete casuals) liked it, even its story.

And that's why PoE2 is successful and Obs are rolling in the dough and attention. The relative failure of PoE2 shows much more clearly how many people truly enjoyed PoE1 (or were hopeful that 2 is going to be better), sometimes you can't really trust people's spoken opinions, or they quickly change their opinion once the haze wears off. I've had some moments where I was negative towards something, but then realized I had actually enjoyed it, or the other way around. The negativity with PoE is a constant, though, lol.

The same thing with Legend of Grimrock 1 & 2 - the first one was successful because it scratched that particular nostalgic itch at the time.

Most people don't really analyze games on any deep level - let alone the Codex's level - and can't discern the main differences between PoE and the IE games.

I would put more stock into PoE2 not selling as much as its predecessor down to mismanaged marketing and nostalgia satiation, than to people refusing to buy it because they bought the first one and disliked it (reviews would have reflected this if that was the case).