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The Sales of Incline.

Abu Antar

Turn-based Poster
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13,512
Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is. Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
If SteamSpy was ever to close, there will just be a new site and then another new one after that. This data can be retrieved without breaking any law, as far as I know.
 

Whisper

Arcane
Vatnik
Joined
Feb 29, 2012
Messages
4,357
In case anyone is interested Banner Saga 2 sold a third of Banner Saga 1
Sadly, this idea of selling more hardcore gameplay styles to casual is a one-shot deal.

People bought Legend of Grimrock because of the awesome graphics - then they found out what blobber means and never came back...
Now people bought Banner Saga for art style and BioWarian pedigree - then remembered why they never finished Final Fantasy Tactics and never came back...

Worst, those devs probably went "They loved our game! We established an IP! We can make the sequel many times bugger & more expensive and sell even more!"
It's an interesting topic for discussions but I'm not sure the answer is that simple. Yes, undoubtedly, the first KS games benefited from a massive press coverage as back then everything on KS was new and exciting. Now they get as much coverage as any other non-AAA games which does affect sales. However, I think the bigger issue here is the risk of doing more of the same (no offense meant, I thought that LoG2 was absolutely fantastic, way better than LoG). Would AoD 2, for instance, sell as much as AoD (our numbers can't be compared to LoG or BG but still...)? I doubt it.

Another factor is the bundles that artificially inflate the number of copies sold. On the surface the difference between 946,400 ± 23,934 and 250,995 ± 12,340, is staggering but at least 400,000 copies of LoG were sold in a single bundle. Its lowest price on Steam is $2.99, which also skewers things a bit. Also, LoG2 is a much more expensive game, so it's possible that even though LoG2 looks like an abysmal failure compared to LoG, it actually earned more.

Yet another factor to consider is that LoG was kinda shallow. The character system was horribly broken, the weakest aspect of the game. Combat was kinda meh. The highlights were the puzzles and the atmosphere, which isn't enough to make people crave more. As for Banner Saga, I couldn't finish it and I wouldn't describe it as a game with 'hardcore gameplay'.


LOG1 had much better atmosphere and setting than LOG2. I did replay LOG1 but i dont see myself replaying LOG2. Also idiotic puzzles, too many in small space, you basically cant make few moves without another puzzle. Some of which force you to wander around isle (Serpent staff, anyone?).
 

Archibald

Arcane
Joined
Aug 26, 2010
Messages
7,869
I think that unless you have a massive AAA franchise like Elder Scrolls, nu-Fallout, Witcher, Mass Effect that every casual dreams of, trying to establish your own tiny franchise is a big mistake. It works for single-developer studios like Spiderwebs, but not for 4-5 people and higher. Even if we consider the XCOM franchise, the numbers for the second game are way down: 780k vs 3.2 mil. Why? More of the same. You know what to expect, you know what the gameplay is like, you know that the new game will have new enemies and features, but the core will remain the same. So unless you're a die-hard fan who can't wait for that 'more of the same' content, you won't buy it. I'd say the diehards represent no more than a third of the first game's sales.

I'm not sure if that's true or not, but it's an insightful point worth discussing. I don't think I've seen anybody else bring it up.

I'd say big gaming franchises are slowly becoming part of our culture. Everyone knows about them so they are more inclined to buy them. I wouldn't be surprised if half of the people who bough first LoG don't even remember that they bought it or what it was about.

You know how shit Star Wars movie is likely to earn more money than 99% of other movies. Shit book by King is likely to outsell good stuff written by newcomer horror writer and shit Batman comic is likely to outsell everything because its god damn Batman. I don't see why gaming would be different in this regard?
 

Infinitron

I post news
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Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
I'm talking about his claim that small developers should never try to launch their own long-running IPs. That's a pretty profound statement.
 

Higher Animal

Arcane
Joined
Aug 11, 2012
Messages
1,854
Fallout and Divinity series are exceptions.

I don't think studio size or production costs or target audiences have much to do with whether sequels should be pursued. It's a question of delivering a vision, and if that means more iterations and second helpings then that is the best route. Vault Dweller's point makes sense if and only if a smaller-medium studio creates a product that is only mildly successful - enough to pay the production costs and keep the lights on for a new game- and those developers have lots of other ideas on the table to pursue. In other words, it works for Iron Tower Studios.

I don't know how much it hurts Larian studios to sell extra units of their older Divinity games due to the acclaim and popularity of Original Sin. My guess is that they can pull a soft revenue stream that will increase over time as more sequels are added to the series. Such soft revenue streams are actually a great incentive for long term work in video games.
 

Archibald

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Messages
7,869
I'm talking about his claim that small developers should never try to launch their own long-running IPs. That's a pretty profound statement.

I guess I didn't fully explain myself. In essence all franchises are "more of the same" and your average studio is bound to start hitting diminishing returns since they lack muscles of big studios. Big studios are able to milk franchises because they manage to push them into cultural territory where people are buying game not only because it looks interesting but because its part of the series (or made by a studio) that everyone is talking about. You know how Fallout 4 was bound to make lots of money before even single screenshot was shown.

Naturally there are exceptions like Minecraft that exploded for whatever reasons and now is also part of our culture and why MS bought it for billions, but that happens very rarely.
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
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Messages
28,024
Fallout and Divinity series are exceptions.

I don't think studio size or production costs or target audiences have much to do with whether sequels should be pursued. It's a question of delivering a vision, and if that means more iterations and second helpings then that is the best route.
Original vs sequel:

Legend of Grimrock: 936,949 vs 246,684
Blackguards: 471,616 vs 178,528
XCOM: 3,304,215 vs 823,999
Shadowrun: 723,457 vs 613,408 vs 188,034 (arguably Hong Kong was the best iteration but few people cared at this point)
The Banner Saga: 592,139 vs 43,826

Success of the first game often fools developers into thinking that they can do even better or at least as good with a second 'bigger and better' game, but it's rarely the case. The only exceptions to the rule are games that offer building, sandbox, and well-executed killing loop activities that people never seem to be tired of. Darkest Dungeon is a fucking monster but I bet if they go for a sequel it will sell less than a third of the original.

Vault Dweller's point makes sense if and only if a smaller-medium studio creates a product that is only mildly successful - enough to pay the production costs and keep the lights on for a new game- and those developers have lots of other ideas on the table to pursue. In other words, it works for Iron Tower Studios.
Most indie studios create products that either fail financially (either sells fuck all or sells well enough for an indie like 50-100k but still fails to cover the development costs or barely breaks even like Legends of Eisenwald) or sells just enough to continue.
 

Celerity

Takes 1337 hours to realise it's shit.
Village Idiot Possibly Retarded
Joined
Nov 20, 2015
Messages
1,096
Actually, it's more that Derpest Dungeon only sold more than about oh... 1,000, is because no one realized the devs were incompetent yet and believed in their future potential, and they had all the corrupt journos shilling them before said people became mainstream jokes. If they tried again, people would see it more accurately as a grindy and lazy Newgrounds game and disregard.

Alternately, we could assume the planet is populated by retards that will self destruct our civilization by 2030 and assume people won't learn, in which case I hope purging by fire or a meteor happens before some dumbass puts a fork in the world's electric outlet.

Anyways, I'm not surprised a retard like Vault Dweller is defending walking simulators. No idea why. Didn't he produce an actual game? Well, it's on my blacklist now. :troll:
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
Joined
Jan 7, 2003
Messages
28,024
Anyways, I'm not surprised a retard like Vault Dweller is defending walking simulators. No idea why. Didn't he produce an actual game? Well, it's on my blacklist now.
Defending? You must be easily be confused by words if you think that saying that DD sold a lot of copies is a passionate defense of said game. Our game, which did fairly well by indie standards, sold about 5% of what Darkest Dungeon did. It sold 30% more than Wasteland 2 even, which makes it a very successful indie undertaking.

I didn't really like it as it's not my cup of tea, design-wise, but denying its mass appeal is kinda silly.
 

Tigranes

Arcane
Joined
Jan 8, 2009
Messages
10,350
"You don't hate Darkest Dungeon? I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU AND YOUR MOM AND EVERYTHING YOU EVER ENJOYED IN LIFE! I-"

As a generic rule sequels have always been about milking the cow painfully birthed the first time round, knowing that you will get diminishing returns - unless the first one really became a household name (e.g. what Oblivion did for Skyrim) or the second one really knocks it out of the park and is new in many ways (BG2). As a business model the KS RPG producers should never be thinking of just the one franchise, but looking towards other titles on the side - it's just a pity that in many cases those 'second projects' have also been weird (e.g. Shadowrun then that Golem thing).
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
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Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Another advantage that Bethesda games have, I think, is that they take so long to come out. Maybe more of the same == diminishing returns when you release sequels in close proximity, but after 4+ years away from Tamriel, maybe people do want to go back to doing more of the same.

Conversely, I suspect that a lot of the annualized AAA franchises like Call of Duty may actually suffer from "hidden diminishing returns". That is, there are lots of players who will "drop out" for a year, then come back the next, etc, and it evens out so the numbers are high every year.
 

MRY

Wormwood Studios
Developer
Joined
Aug 15, 2012
Messages
5,703
Location
California
Fallout and Divinity series are exceptions.

I don't think studio size or production costs or target audiences have much to do with whether sequels should be pursued. It's a question of delivering a vision, and if that means more iterations and second helpings then that is the best route.
Original vs sequel:

Legend of Grimrock: 936,949 vs 246,684
Blackguards: 471,616 vs 178,528
XCOM: 3,304,215 vs 823,999
Shadowrun: 723,457 vs 613,408 vs 188,034 (arguably Hong Kong was the best iteration but few people cared at this point)
The Banner Saga: 592,139 vs 43,826

Success of the first game often fools developers into thinking that they can do even better or at least as good with a second 'bigger and better' game, but it's rarely the case. The only exceptions to the rule are games that offer building, sandbox, and well-executed killing loop activities that people never seem to be tired of. Darkest Dungeon is a fucking monster but I bet if they go for a sequel it will sell less than a third of the original.

Vault Dweller's point makes sense if and only if a smaller-medium studio creates a product that is only mildly successful - enough to pay the production costs and keep the lights on for a new game- and those developers have lots of other ideas on the table to pursue. In other words, it works for Iron Tower Studios.
Most indie studios create products that either fail financially (either sells fuck all or sells well enough for an indie like 50-100k but still fails to cover the development costs or barely breaks even like Legends of Eisenwald) or sells just enough to continue.
A couple random thoughts on this.

First, it may be premature to judge. A lot of these games saw their total sales spike after significant discounts / bundles / etc. So it may be worth checking back in a year or so to see if these numbers even mout more (cf. Shadowrun).

Second, I think a part of the problem is that runaway indie* successes often reflect a hunger for novelty coupled with groupthink and word of mouth.
(* Here perhaps "indie" should mean something that includes major but atypical products like XCOM.) I think Grimrock is a great example of that. A hard core of fans who actually like that horrible (IMHO) kind of gameplay had been starved of it for a while and loved the game. The visuals were pretty and new(ish) -- a genuine improvement on a classic model. Suddenly it's getting a whirlwind of good press and enthusiasm, it goes steeply on sale, and tons of people buy it for $10. Then they play it and discover that they don't like the stupid Dungeon Master two-step, they don't like RPGs with no plot or characterization, whatever. Thus when the sequel comes out, even if it's better than the original, everything is lost: the thrill of the long-deprived fans, the innocent (ignorant) enthusiasm of people unfamiliar with the genre, the excitement of great visuals from an indie team. There's nothing left.

I think the same is true to some degree of Banner Saga. It may not have been meeting a long-felt need, but it had these cool new visuals, clever new gameplay concepts, etc. But the heart of it was a lot of grinding and maybe some other structural weaknesses -- a lack of exploration, for example, fairly shallow character interactions and limited tactical variations on maps (at least in my experience). Again, you have people rushing to it en masse, playing it and realizing they don't really like it, etc. For example, Banner Saga's achievements indicate that fewer than half of the players make it to the Denglr godstone, which as I recall is someone in the first hour or two of the game. Only 15% completed the game on normal difficulty. I'm sure some will try the sequel to see if it's fixed the problems they had with the first, but maybe not.

I played the first Shadowrun for a bit, and I think it falls into the Grimrock scenario at least to some degree (pretty graphics, but the gameplay isn't quite as good as you think it'll be), but that kind of game has a broader base. I can't speak to the others, as I didn't play them, but I assume a big aspect of XCOM was the scratch-an-itch. I know I spent years and years longing for a new X-Com of decent quality, though by the time Xenonauts came out I had lost my interest. Alas.

I'd like to think that AoD is a different model, a sustainable one, just as WEG's point and clicks have been*: it's not really offering some crazy novelty or mass enticement. (* Excluding Shardlight, which seems to have been undercut by discounts on other WEG titles.) More or less the people who buy it know what they're getting and will probably like it, and they'll probably come back for sequels / successors because it's a formula they like.

[EDIT: It appears everyone made these points earlier in the thread. Ho hum]
 

Infinitron

I post news
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Messages
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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
And like Bethesda games, an Age of Decadence 2 would also take many years to develop...
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2013
Messages
1,258
I think that unless you have a massive AAA franchise like Elder Scrolls, nu-Fallout, Witcher, Mass Effect that every casual dreams of, trying to establish your own tiny franchise is a big mistake. It works for single-developer studios like Spiderwebs, but not for 4-5 people and higher. Even if we consider the XCOM franchise, the numbers for the second game are way down: 780k vs 3.2 mil. Why? More of the same. You know what to expect, you know what the gameplay is like, you know that the new game will have new enemies and features, but the core will remain the same. So unless you're a die-hard fan who can't wait for that 'more of the same' content, you won't buy it. I'd say the diehards represent no more than a third of the first game's sales.

First game also went up in bundles a bunch for dirt cheap. Same deal with LoG vs LoG2, no? Plus NuXCOM2 is a recent title compared to LoG2.
 

SausageInYourFace

Angelic Reinforcement
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Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Bubbles In Memoria A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. My team has the sexiest and deadliest waifus you can recruit. Pathfinder: Wrath
A hard core of fans who actually like that horrible (IMHO) kind of gameplay had been starved of it for a while and loved the game. The visuals were pretty and new(ish) -- a genuine improvement on a classic model. Suddenly it's getting a whirlwind of good press and enthusiasm, it goes steeply on sale, and tons of people buy it for $10. Then they play it and discover that they don't like the stupid Dungeon Master two-step, they don't like RPGs with no plot or characterization, whatever.

Hating on :obviously:-blobbers like that. :rpgcodex:

But to be honest, you are probably right, with regard to the other games too. The Renaissance got a lot of attention and attracted a bunch of newcomers, many of whom probably found out pretty soon that these kind of games are not really for them.
Meanwhile, I still hold on to the very basic (but probably true) explanation that the market may be a little over-saturated at the moment for the small hard-core of fans who actually do like these old school RPGs and could carry the sales.
 

SniperHF

Arcane
Joined
Aug 22, 2014
Messages
1,110
Just another random thought on this, but if you keep making sequels to mild successes or even break-even games you deprive yourself of that off-chance you hit on a crazy popular idea yourself.
 

Viata

Arcane
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Water Play Catarinense
If Indie devs didn't want to make their own franchise way too soon in their devs lifetime, this would hardly happens. If LoG3 is released in 3~4 years from now, they'll sell better than 2. People will want to play it thanks to the larger interval between the second and third game. Yearly release only works if you are releasing the next triple-AAA that everyone wants to play.
 
Self-Ejected

Excidium II

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Yearly release only works if you are releasing the next triple-AAA that everyone wants to play.
I think even that is being contested considering the fact Ubisoft took a break with AC and the next CoD is being very poorly received.
 

Celerity

Takes 1337 hours to realise it's shit.
Village Idiot Possibly Retarded
Joined
Nov 20, 2015
Messages
1,096
The usual wave of people going full retard aside, I wasn't just being a sarcastic asshole Vault Dweller

If I made an actual game and it sold 50k, then some SJW cucklords threw a bunch of money at some shill puppets over a Newgrounds game and it sold 20x that I'd be pretty pissed off and lose faith in both the industry and humanity. You're not doing any of that. You're just claiming that's success. Which naturally makes people question if we'll see you blowing Nathan Grayson in back alleys at some point in the near future.
 

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