Onimusha, Maximo, and Viewtiful Joe had to have done well enough to have green lit sequels. The first Maximo even got a greatest hits release, which back then meant it sold at least 400k copies.
I was about to say that the only one of those lists that might have been a money maker was DMC, and they milked that shit to dust.
Onimusha, Maximo, and Viewtiful Joe had to have done well enough to have green lit sequels. The first Maximo even got a greatest hits release, which back then meant it sold at least 400k copies.
Not necessarily.
I'm not saying that game in particular, because I honestly don't know. But there have been instances where Sony bypassed the usual rules and granted some games greatest hits status even though they didn't meet the standard.
And I recall Capcom pouring a ton of money into promotion for Maximo, and being disappointed at the resulting sales.
Last gen radically changed the market for publishers and developers. You can't really spend a modest amount and push out a new IP and make money from word of mouth anymore.
Which is weird, as word of mouth has never been as easy to spread.
I think that the market is getting more hostile to those sorts of games over time. Even if Twitter makes it theoretically easier to find groups of people who love RE and ancient Japanese mythology and sell them Onimusha, it's hard to cut through the Kim Kardashian Hollywood and Flappy Bird fog.
Also: I think Capcom's move towards western developers has been a complete disaster.
We're quickly getting to the point with this megabudget shit where the large studios are going to have one major flop and die off, and we'll be left with two or three "big companies" and everything else will be on a smaller hit-and-run indy game scale.
Which I'm fine with.
The predatory larger companies sucking the blood out of the indies need to be addressed (Zynga, King), but that's another thing.
I think it's a lot less about this:And a lot more about this:If marketing were the problem, indies wouldn't have blown up the way they have. I think it's more about products and markets not aligning. Capcom (probably) alienated their Japanese fan base with their western move while also missing the mark on what people want from western games.Also: I think Capcom's move towards western developers has been a complete disaster.
Also look at the new IP degradation. We went from Mega Man, Ghosts 'N Goblins, Commando, Bionic Commando, 194X, etc. to Street Fighter, Strider, Final Fight, etc. to Resident Evil, Dino Crisis, Darkstalkers, Vs., etc. to Onimusha, Devil May Cry, etc. to Dead Rising and...? The quantity, quality, and diversity of new IP has really been on the decline for longer than just the last generation.
edit: At least Capcom's decline has been a lot more protracted than Konami's.
edit2: I left out Ace Attorney, but I am not sure that materially changes the discussion, other than making GohanX happy.
Last edited by Yoshi; 27 Aug 2014 at 01:29 PM.
I absolutely agree with this.
I think we're almost already there with how many companies have merged, been bought, or closed in the last 5 - 10 years. Also I'm fine with it to an extent too, but I'd like to see B level games come back. To me the games like Maximo, Viewtiful Joe, PN03, were always smaller budget game scale games. Granted not indy hit and run small, which I hope isn't were we need to look for those games. I really wish companies like Capcom were able to make the games they once did, with smaller budgets and still do the big stuff. I think game devs/pubs need to learn that there can be B level games/budgets again and not everything has to be AAA or Indy.
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