Eternity PoE II: Deadfire Sales Analysis Thread

[Big Wrangle]

The game's subtitle turned out to be pretty accurate.

 

[Roguey]

Well, that is just poetic justice because Paradox was much better, but they fucked them in the ass, so now they have a second rate publisher. They made their own bed.

Paradox botched Tyranny's marketing though.

Roguey, post something.

What?

 

[fantadomat]

Hardly anybody is streaming the game on Twitch or watching the streams. Nobody is freaking interested in this game... So sad.

Versus Evil is quite bad at marketing, that much is known.

Well, that is just poetic justice because Paradox was much better, but they fucked them in the ass, so now they have a second rate publisher. They made their own bed.

It was certainly foolish to change publishers (or better said screw Paradox over), but I am still so surprised that so many gamers who played PoE are refusing to buy the sequel (for full price). I was expecting diminishing returns, but this is just appallingly bad. I despised PoE and even I am dismal, because this is a terrible omen for oldschool (RtwP) RPGs.

If only they had such good music in the game.

 

[fantadomat]

this is a terrible omen for oldschool (RtwP) RPGs.

I have a feeling Kingmaker and Black Geyser will sell better (relatively). I'm also imagining Beamdog's game will also be RTwP.

True,there is still hope. That is why i am happy that this game failed,popamole consolisation shouldn't be tolerated!

 

[Mustawd]

It's like saying that Broken Age or Torment: NumaNuma didn't sell because of "nostalgia" while some other games like Deponia or Divinity sold in the millions,

A. I'm talking about games specifically trying to ape older games. We're tlaking PoE, TTon, MIghty Number Nine, etc.

In addition:

B. Sequels of A where nostalgia is now not a factor in the sales because that nostalgia wave has already come and gone in the first game.

I don't know anything about Deponia, but DOS was not trying to ape anything specifically. It was its own game. My point is that PoE2's low sales are partly due to Nostalgia fatigue, as in "ok I saw poE and it didn't really do it for me like BG2, so meh".

Also, no where in my post have I said this is the only factor. I was merely talking about it as one factor in the context of poor sales of PoE2.

 

[baud]

They've already made 5 million with the game before it even shipped. If they manage to sell around 300k copies in the first few weeks they've made profit with the game and after that they've covered what ever money they put into the project. Everything after that is just "bonus".

1. Budgets change and projects can and will go over budget.
2. You're forgetting the marketing expenses

Aren't the marketing expenses usually paid by the publisher? In that case it would be Versus Evil, not Obsidian

 

[Mustawd]

Aren't the marketing expenses usually paid by the publisher? In that case it would be Versus Evil, not Obsidian

Good point.

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

Sequels of A where nostalgia is now not a factor in the sales because that nostalgia wave has already come and gone in the first game.

Do you seriously think that one million people bought PoE because of nostalgia? Maybe the backers, but that is about it.

 

[Dexter]

It's like saying that Broken Age or Torment: NumaNuma didn't sell because of "nostalgia" while some other games like Deponia or Divinity sold in the millions,

A. I'm talking about games specifically trying to ape older games. We're tlaking PoE, TTon, MIghty Number Nine, etc.

In addition:

B. Sequels of A where nostalgia is now not a factor in the sales because that nostalgia wave has already come and gone in the first game.

I don't know anything about Deponia, but DOS was not trying to ape anything specifically. It was its own game. My point is that PoE2's low sales are partly due to Nostalgia fatigue, as in "ok I saw poE and it didn't really do it for me like BG2, so meh".

Also, no where in my post have I said this is the only factor. I was merely talking about it as one factor in the context of poor sales of PoE2.

You are using a vague concept which you blame for poor Sales of specific products and invoking it over and over again as opposed to and instead of trying to do any actual analysis based on said specific product, ask for opinions or even try at an actual guess. For instance, get away from video games and into movies. There are a lot of Remakes or Reboots of old movies, but do you think it would be a good analysis to blame "nostalgia fatigue" for various of these either succeeding or failing? For instance the 2016 Ben Hur Remake or GhostBusters Reboot?

Do you really not believe that there could be any other more visible factors regarding the game and character design, storytelling, lore/world building, gameplay, memorability/distinctiveness or other that have any influence, or might be a lot more important in said failure? Do you really believe that some obscure and hard to pinpoint "feeling of nostalgia" determines these games Sales solely instead of things like content, quality or marketing and every time a product remaking or harking back to another one fails it's just something something nostalgia? Are you by chance writing articles about "nostalgia glasses" for some retarded Blog?

 

[Mustawd]

You are using a vague concept which you blame for poor Sales of specific products and invoking it over and over again as opposed to and instead of trying to do any actual analysis based on said specific product, ask for opinions or even try at an actual guess.

I am bringing up a concept that wasn't being discussed that is all. And I'm only repeating it cuz we're going back and forth.

Do you really not believe that there could be any other more visible factors regarding the game and character design, storytelling, lore/world building, gameplay, memorability/distinctiveness or other that have any influence, or might be a lot more important in said failure?

Also, no where in my post have I said this is the only factor. I was merely talking about it as one factor in the context of poor sales of PoE2.

See my previous quote above.

Do you really believe that some obscure and hard to pinpoint "feeling of nostalgia" determines these games Sales solely instead of things like content, quality or marketing and every time a product remaking or harking back to another one fails it's just something something nostalgia?

No. I never said that?

I find it weird reading your posts because it feels like you're talking about someone else's posts. I merely brought up the topic because I do think it is a factor and no one was talking about it. BUt the way you're tlakling about it makes me sound like I'm beraitng everyone here or something.

I mentioned it once, some people responded, and I clarified what I meant and that's basically it. Not sure where you're getting this:

invoking it over and over again

EDIT: I looked at my posts ITT and only two of them even mention nostalgia. And one of them was a clarification about XCOM/XCOM2. All the other mentions have been in response to your posts. What exactly are you referring to?

 

[Keith Brown]

You guys shoud look for data about refunds.

It dropped bellow 100,000 sales,this is your refund data .
https://steamspy.com/app/560130

That's not how steamspy works. Like at all.

For the moron saying "citation needed" the develepor of steamspy himself told me its a fluctuation in the estimate. Do you actually believe a game still in the top seller list is somehow selling negative copies?

Speaking of steamspy its fucking broken since the change to Steams privacy settings.

https://twitter.com/Steam_Spy/status/983879694658437120

This a big ol thread of confirmation bias.

 

[Morality Games]

Fuck you mustawd.,i was waiting for Deadfire to go under DOS 2 and post the chart .

It is amusing how many people have some kind of fate that PoE will come back from this and selling less than 100,000 copies is profitable for them. Guys do you even have any idea how much expenses there are in making and selling shit?! It is not just you make something and take 60 bucks per copy. There are taxes,steam cut,publisher cut,investors cut and a lot other shit. I would be surprised if they get even at 300,000 copies let alone 100,000.

I mean, all of the other games did (including Banner Saga 2 and Blackguards 2 for example). Even Tyranny sold 300k on Steam eventually.

With all of the added brand awareness PoE has plus positive reception, why would it be the sole exception of basically every game that didn't have big lifetime sales?

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

SteamSpy is about as reliable as my grandfather's penis.

 

[jf8350143]

Whoa.....DIVOS 2 came out in Sept 2017...[/QUOTE]

I'll say it again, the Chinese localization for DOS2 just came out this week, that's the reason why it gets a big bump on sales and numbers of people playing. Right now it's the second best selling steam game in China, just below PUBG.

There has been enough Chinese players on steam to make a big difference for this kind of games(relatively niche cRPG) already.

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

I mean, all of the other games did (including Banner Saga 2 and Blackguards 2 for example). Even Tyranny sold 300k on Steam eventually.

With all of the added brand awareness PoE has plus positive reception, why would it be the sole exception of basically every game that didn't have big lifetime sales?

That's not the point at all. People that have been following Obsidian thought that PoE2 was the big hit, their own BG2 if you will. The game that would sell even more than the first one. It didn't, with steamspy working or not. Sure, you can expect the game to sell more eventually, but that hardly justifies the investment, nor is enought to keep the studio afloat.

 

[Mustawd]

I'll say it again, the Chinese localization for DOS2 just came out this week, that's the reason why it gets a big bump on sales and numbers of people playing. Right now it's the second best selling steam game in China, just below PUBG.

There has been enough Chinese players on steam to make a big difference for this kind of games(relatively niche cRPG) already.

Well the chart has looked steady ever since march though...

 

[Morality Games]

I mean, all of the other games did (including Banner Saga 2 and Blackguards 2 for example). Even Tyranny sold 300k on Steam eventually.

With all of the added brand awareness PoE has plus positive reception, why would it be the sole exception of basically every game that didn't have big lifetime sales?

That's not the point at all. People that have been following Obsidian thought that PoE2 was the big hit, their own BG2 if you will. The game that would sell even more than the first one. It didn't, with steamspy working or not. Sure, you can expect the game to sell more eventually, but that hardly justifies the investment, nor is enought to keep the studio afloat.

It's not immediately obvious to me that this was a tent pole game, at least not to the extent they can't wait for DLC + console releases. The revenue stream isn't going to be fully online until that happens.

I'm sure the early sales are disappointing to some extent, but I find it hard to imagine they didn't expect that with the $50 price tag.

Given the DLC release structure they chose, it feels like that was a tradeoff they were will to making for the right to make the first couple hundred thousand people pay an extra 10-30$.

 

[Trashos]

A console release might make sense if they are trying to get comfortable with the console market for their future games.

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

It's not immediately obvious to me that this was a tent pole game, at least not to the extent they can't wait for DLC + console releases to boost the revenue stream.

The heavy investment and expectation of the fans would suggest otherwise.

A console release might make sense if they are trying to get comfortable with the console market for their future games.

Obsidian did this before. No need to waste precious resource and hours on this. This is pure Feargus.

 

[Morality Games]

It's not immediately obvious to me that this was a tent pole game, at least not to the extent they can't wait for DLC + console releases to boost the revenue stream.

The heavy investment and expectation of the fans would suggest otherwise.

Fans don't have any perspective when it comes to sales. Neither do haters.

I'm not sure what a heavy investment is either. Even if they equaled what they raised on Fig I doubt that's 20% of the money they made on Pillars of Eternity.

 

[Mustawd]

Speaking of investment, doesn't bad sales = bad news on the crowdfounding front? I mean I assume they'll be using fig again for another future game. I doubt investors will be as ready to open their wallets after PoE2's performance.

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

Fans don't have any perspective when it comes to sales. Neither do haters.

I'm not sure what a heavy investment is either. Even if they equaled what they raised on Fig I doubt that's 20% of the money they made on Pillars of Eternity.

No, you are wrong. Fans know a lot. They spend more time than developers playing their games and talking with other players. They have an intuitive understanding of what is happening and whatnot. It is foolish to ignore fans feedback like they did. Your core supporters are reliable, the potential sales od acidental buyers on steam, which can become refunds in twenty minutes, are not. The haters are important too because they are too diligent picking flaws, they provide feedback. Seriously, if it is already hard to make cRPGs with feedback, it is pratically impossible if you don't take feedback seriously. Regarding investment, the amount of money on fig, the VOs, the port, the size of the game, the smaller number of backers all prove that it was a massive investment.

 

[Urthor]

The thing is FIG gives them investors, and if the investors get their return on equity on FIG, then the investors will come back for the next game regardless of whether it's deadfire or elephantitis they are crowdfunding. It's actually a fairly good model even if it comes at the cost of losing the Kickstarter brand.

Actually, don't they have to tell the investors how many games they sold? They probably have to do a press release to everyone who pony'd up 1k when that happens.

 

[FreeKaner]

Speaking of investment, doesn't bad sales = bad news on the crowdfounding front? I mean I assume they'll be using fig again for another future game. I doubt investors will be as ready to open their wallets after PoE2's performance.

They won't make a third game at this rate. Their best bet is getting DLCs out for this one, polishing and refining the base game meanwhile, adding some freeLCs then wrapping up the whole PoE episode. Move on to different projects like the Cainarsky slamdunk.

 

[Morality Games]

Fans don't have any perspective when it comes to sales. Neither do haters.

I'm not sure what a heavy investment is either. Even if they equaled what they raised on Fig I doubt that's 20% of the money they made on Pillars of Eternity.

No, you are wrong. Fans know a lot. They spend more time than developers playing their games and talking with other players. They have an intuitive understanding of what is happening and whatnot. It is foolish to ignore fans feedback like they did. Your core supporters are reliable, the potential sales od acidental buyers on steam, which can become refunds in twenty minutes, are not. The haters are important too because they are too diligent picking flaws, they provide feedback. Seriously, it is really hard to make cRPGs after playing everything the game has too offer, and it is even harder if you don't take feedback seriously or think you can imitate other studios without the proper expertise. Regarding investment, the amount of money on fig, the VOs, the port, the size of the game, the smaller number of backers all prove that it was a massive investment.

I mean, it doesn't.

The only thing that proves a massive investment is how much you spent vs. how much money you have in your coffers.