Eternity PoE II: Deadfire Sales Analysis Thread

[Kyl Von Kull]

Early modern period fantasy RPG is definitely rare, the biggest and most common fantasy and fantasy inspirations are medieval. Only Warhammer Fantasy is early modern period and it doesn't have any RPGs. The whole world exploration and colonisation aspect of early modern period is mindblowingly untouched.

And later this year we’re going to get Greedfall, too, using the same kind of early modern colonization inspired setting. When it rains, it pours. It’s too bad Sawyer probably won’t get to make his turn-based renaissance/early modern RPG. I would love an espionage RPG set in the 16th century Mediterranean (maybe a Venetian desperately trying to play the Spanish crown and the Sublime Porte against each other). or an AoD style game in 18th century India—play as a merchant for the EIC or a spy or a diplomat an assassin or even a soldier.

I kind of wish Expeditions Conquistador had had more RPG elements, like Viking.

TorontRayne, Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones comes out next year. Very Lovecraftian. You should play the demo if you haven’t already.

 

[FreeKaner]

Early modern period fantasy RPG is definitely rare, the biggest and most common fantasy and fantasy inspirations are medieval. Only Warhammer Fantasy is early modern period and it doesn't have any RPGs. The whole world exploration and colonisation aspect of early modern period is mindblowingly untouched.

And later this year we’re going to get Greedfall, too, using the same kind of early modern colonization inspired setting. When it rains, it pours. It’s too bad Sawyer probably won’t get to make his turn-based renaissance/early modern RPG. I would love an espionage RPG set in the 16th century Mediterranean (maybe a Venetian desperately trying to play the Spanish crown and the Sublime Porte against each other). or an AoD style game in 18th century India—play as a merchant for the EIC or a spy or a diplomat an assassin or even a soldier.

Early modern period has so many historic or fantasy possibilities, it's really damning we have none of it. It has so much potential to be exploited in terms of statecraft, factions, uncharted frontiers, colonisation, espionage, diplomacy, dungeon-dwelling and all that. All we get is knight-errants, I blame the French. We needed more Spanish.

 

[FreeKaner]

Don't tell me you haven't played the best game story ever written? Go play The Secret World now!

I did play it, but it's a MMO, a bad one at that. No matter how well it's written and how many gems and puzzles it hides, it will stay a MMO designed and gutted to be a MMO. It's not enough.

 

[Lahey]

crpg devs could definitely take a page from strategy series like Age of Empires, Civilization, the Koei games or even otherwise-garbage mainstream action trash like Assassin's Creed in utilizing untapped historical settings. Thankfully we're seeing more variation in the near future from upcoming sci-fi offerings like New World and Copper Dreams which buck the post-apocalyptic trend, itself a kind of dark mirror to generic Tolkienesque fantasy in its oversaturation.

 

[AnnoyanceCrime]

The biggest reason was probably the fact that it is a direct sequel.
If someone is like: "Wow, this game looks amazing, but I havent played/finished the 1st one. Can I still buy it?" - for D:OS2 the answer would be "Yeah, sequel is set thousands of years later, there are completely different story and characters". And PoE: set 5 years later, you play as the same guy. Reactivity is nice for returning players, but overwhelming for newcomers.

 

[Riddler]

The biggest reason was probably the fact that it is a direct sequel.
If someone is like: "Wow, this game looks amazing, but I havent played/finished the 1st one. Can I still buy it?" - for D:OS2 the answer would be "Yeah, sequel is set thousands of years later, there are completely different story and characters". And PoE: set 5 years later, you play as the same guy. Reactivity is nice for returning players, but overwhelming for newcomers.

And even returning players don't really care about the reactivity based on the lukewarm response to the first game's story's reception.

Why they tried to build directly on that boggles the mind. Nobody cared about the watcher.

 

[J_C]

BTW, the gamer reception of PoE 2 on Steam is lower than that of PoE. That is a factor that shouldn't be ignored.

By 2 percent. I don't think that means anything when it comes to sales. Both are in the Very Positive category, I think that's what matters more.

 

[Frusciante]

I think the lower than expected sales would be due to two reasons;

- As pointed out above the fact that it's a direct sequel contributes for a good part (and was a bad decision imho).
- A lot of (mainstream) people played PoE because of the hype but found out that it's long, complicated, contains huge amounts of text, no VO, combat was a clusterfuck especially in 1.0 and graphics and animations were pretty basic. So they concluded that the next Skyrim/Mass Effect/Witcher etc is more for them.I though PoE was a great first, renewed effort in the top down isometric crpg genre. But it doesn't really sell the genre very well because of all the flaws it had.

Deadfire would have been a much better game to sell the genre to mainstream gamers...

 

[FreeKaner]

Below Frostpunk and behind Euro Truck Simulator 2 pack, off the global top 10 before its first patch. The game is a definite flop and maybe they will talk about it some months later. Direct sequel is definitely the biggest reason, all the talk about quality of game is senseless as that's something majority of people only realise after they already bought the game. There also would be people who bought into PoE1 due kickstarter cRPG rennaisaince hype but would not follow through, as well as people who got into genre with PoE1 and found that they do not like the genre altogether however even when you shave off those it's extremely underwhelming.

It's basically this:

I have said this when I first heard this dumpsterfire was going to be a direct sequel and I will say it when the dust settles too. Deadfire being a direct sequel was and is detrimental to its quality, its reception, its sales and its longevity. Moreover big RPGs should never be sequels especially if they are focusing on side content rather than the main journey like deadfire obviously is. A lot of resources went into flimsily connecting this game to first one, including the reactivity to first game that could instead be reactivity in the game itself.

It's such a doubledown, high-risk low-reward thing to do. Regardless of the game you are making it's a gamble that you should not take unless you are absolutely certain the main character is why it succeeded, which is never the case in a create your MC game. It occasionally works in some games where main character is compelling enough that they become instantly iconic, like Assassin's creed series' Ezio or MG's Solid Snake.

 

[Jokzore]

Whole lot less gamers back then though.

 

[Parabalus]

How many people will Feargus fire, or have slaving away for free, to cover the costs of this Dumpsterfire?

Is there some estimate of Dumpsterfire's budget? Those Critical Role guys seem extremely expensive.
What was the total budget for PoE1 anyway? 4 mil from Kickstarter, how much did Obs give out of their own pocket?

 

[J_C]

Those Critical Role guys seem extremely expensive.

On the contrary, I wouldn't be surprised if they worked for peanuts, seeing how enthusiastic they were about this game and the first one.

What was the total budget for PoE1 anyway? 4 mil from Kickstarter, how much did Obs give out of their own pocket?

Didn't they say that they had to put 1 million into the game from their own pockets?

 

[Mortmal]

Makes sense it sell less , people bought the first one just to try the new thing, some buy it because they were promised baldur's gate 3. So its not new anymore, people who bought it for that reason wont again, POE was not baldur's gate 3 ,disappointed people wont day one purchase it, if ever .It's better than the first one, superb environments and music, thats what they do best, it's a pleasure to explore those islands but writing is more close to the level of neverwinter mods done by enthusiasts (the good mods still) than any close to MCA writing level...Character development is still deep and complex, i am still not sure about one of my character monk build efficiency, but its all smoke and mirror as everything works,chokepoint tank and spank, combat at your level is even more trivial than in first pillar.

 

[Haba]

So...

a.) DLC get cancelled, season pack owners get refunded
b.) DLC are gutted into barebones cash grabs
c.) Obsidian makes a loss with the DLC

What is your bet?

 

[FreeKaner]

Obsidian was at a net loss with WM and Feargus noted it, so with Feargus in charge I would say b). Which is everyone loses scenario, as a game with potential is wasted and obsidian loses money.

 

[Elex]

consider also that many game are gift or come from gifted money.

when someone gift a game with the 2 in it?

when the marketing convice them to do that: in particular when the marketing show the 2 as a replacement of the 1 instead of as a “chapter 2 of the sane stuff”

the real fan will probally already buyed it/asked for the money.

you don’t gift “number 2” to someone you are unsure he like it


this explain also why some game are not played at all: gift and free stuff,
bundles

 

[Parabalus]

Those Critical Role guys seem extremely expensive.

On the contrary, I wouldn't be surprised if they worked for peanuts, seeing how enthusiastic they were about this game and the first one.

What was the total budget for PoE1 anyway? 4 mil from Kickstarter, how much did Obs give out of their own pocket?

Didn't they say that they had to put 1 million into the game from their own pockets?

They are actors, no? Enthusiasm is part of the contract I'd say.

So if PoE1 is $5 mil, Deadfire is at the very least also 5 mil, likely on the tune of 7-8 mil, they sold 100k copies for 50$, Steam + Uncle Sam take 40%, Feargus pockets 10% etc. - looks like several millions lost, they for sure haven't broken even yet. I doubt the excluded Fig shenanigans would be favourable.

Looks like a pretty Dumpsterfire to me.

 

[J_C]

I bet they don't think that full VO was a good idea anymore. It was one of the stupidest decisions, and I don't know how could Feargus think that it is the way to go. I can honestly say that I have barely encountered anyone on the net who said that he will buy the game now that it has full VO. Nobody else cared, nobody. Just imagine the amount of money and time went into this, instead of other parts of the game.

 

[imweasel]

a.) DLC get cancelled, season pack owners get refunded
b.) DLC are gutted into barebones cash grabs
c.) Obsidian makes a loss with the DLC

What is your bet?

Definitely b.)

...but that might have been what they were planning on doing anyway.

 

[The Great ThunThun*]

The biggest reason was probably the fact that it is a direct sequel.
If someone is like: "Wow, this game looks amazing, but I havent played/finished the 1st one. Can I still buy it?" - for D:OS2 the answer would be "Yeah, sequel is set thousands of years later, there are completely different story and characters". And PoE: set 5 years later, you play as the same guy. Reactivity is nice for returning players, but overwhelming for newcomers.

You can turn that around and say that actually, the loss was due to leakage in the number of returning players, not because the game failed to attract a new audience. PoE/2 are in not the niche genre that everyone keeps talking about, unless they are saying that RPGs are a niche genre (which they are not). They are the same stuff as Dragon ages and Baldur's gates. These games sell based not on the quality of their gameplay but on the quality of their writing/setting/characters. What PoE needs is an introspection on the quality of that latter.

 

[Mustawd]

I think people ITT are discounting how much nostalgia hangover plays into all this. DOS2, while doing a lot of new things DOS didn’t, has the advantage that there were never any built-in expectations from the first game.

Nostalgia-based games seem to have not sold as well when releasing sequels. The shadowrun games as well as XCOM2 come to mind.

I think a lot of it has to do with tons of hype surrounding a game’s initial release, and then once fans realize you can’t recreate those old games, they just lose interest or are dissapointed.

 

[Bohr]

PoE was never sold as the spiritual successor to the combat mechanics of BGs but a game in the same vein as exploration, quests, companions and banter as BGs.

Personally, I think these things were sh*t in BG too. But most people don't. And hence the problem.

Disagree, I think what it was "sold as" was broad enough for people to project whatever their personal tastes/nostalgia were, including similar combat, as was discussed to death around here after the KS cast its net as wide as possible in IE terms:

Spoiler

Project Eternity will take the central hero, memorable companions and the epic exploration of Baldur’s Gate, add in the fun, intense combat and dungeon diving of Icewind Dale, and tie it all together with the emotional writing and mature thematic exploration of Planescape: Torment.

Of course it was never going to live up to that or satisfy everyone and I agree with Mustawd's points about the hype and nostalgia factors and how they relate to a sequel. There are plenty of people who enjoyed PoE and want a sequel, but their numbers are only a portion of everyone who bought into the hype around the first one.

 

[Parabalus]

What was Wasteland's 2 budget?

 

[Infinitron]

What was Wasteland's 2 budget?

I think it was around $6 million for the original 2014 release.

 

[FreeKaner]

Do bear in mind though inXile is a ponzi scheme. Whatever failings Obsidian and Feargus might have, it's still a company.