Eternity PoE II: Deadfire Sales Analysis Thread

[fantadomat]

The last time i played Super Mario Bros 3 seriously (outside of just the first level at an emulator for nostalgia sake) was 23 years ago... Poorly constructed ad hominems won't save you...

People should stop judging others by what they use as their profile picture. "Soap opera drivel...."

Troika was trash, i concur. But nostalgia is a hell of a drug... And being a sperg too...

Oh God, there are still people in 2018 who actually believe Dragon Age Origins was good... How old were you in 2009, 12?

Skyrim was a freaking masterpiece.

 

[Whisper]

PoE has no mystery and bad writing.

PoE had plot!

"Bad guy is doing something, probably" for 99% of game.

 

[2house2fly]

I wonder who was the fucking genius who thought pulling a "the Force comes from midi-chlorians" on the origins of the gods as the main hook of PoE1 was a great idea. It torpedoes the necessary mystery about them (contrast with the Black City, at least in DA:O, don't know about the sequels), and doesn't functionally change anything about them.

"mystery" is not necessary

 

[Brancaleone]

I wonder who was the fucking genius who thought pulling a "the Force comes from midi-chlorians" on the origins of the gods as the main hook of PoE1 was a great idea. It torpedoes the necessary mystery about them (contrast with the Black City, at least in DA:O, don't know about the sequels), and doesn't functionally change anything about them.

"mystery" is not necessary

Necessary to prevent the main hook of the game from being revealed as a wet fart, I wasn't speaking in absolute terms.

 

[2house2fly]

why would the gods be the main hook of the game

 

[fantadomat]

why would the gods be the main hook of the game

It is a good hook if done right. Being in the mid of a gods war or being a holy avatar/chosen of X god is cool. Baldur's gate games did that but with class.

 

[Tenebris]

Gods being the main hook is excellent depending on how well the writing is. You can make pretty much anything interesting if the hook and writing is done right.

 

[Roguey]

The DA trio may have been disappointing to grognards and console kiddies alike, but they all sold millions which is more than Deadfire can say. Sawyer was snidely dismissive of Bioware, but the results speak for themselves.

 

[Quillon]

Sawyer was snidely dismissive of Bioware,

I always cringed a bit whenever they said "this type of game hasn't been done in 12(or so) years" ignoring DAO. Whether you like its story/combat or not, DAO is that type of game.

 

[Roguey]

I always cringed a bit whenever they said "this type of game hasn't been done in 12(or so) years" ignoring DAO. Whether you like its story/combat or not, DAO is that type of game.

It's just different enough to be technically correct, e.g. no prerendered backgrounds, not very D&D-like in its combat and character systems, cinematic dialogue.

 

[Quillon]

My thinking is it wasn't possible to make 3D backgrounds that looks good enough, nor cinematic dialogues back then so when it became possible they made it. Natural progression :D And they prolly didn't have the license for/didn't choose to use DnD.

 

[2house2fly]

I don't recall Sawyer being snidely dismissive of Bioware's mainstream appeal

 

[Trashos]

The good fights in DAO -even if rare among the millions of trash mobs- are better than any fight in vanilla PoE. The system was not as deep, of course, but some boss fights were very well designed.

DAO is a mixed bag to me. I have stopped replaying it due to the bad parts that started getting on my nerves after a while, but it gave me some fun for a few playthroughs. Also, Deep Roads could have been a masterpiece region if more care had been devoted to it, too bad for the missed opportunity.

 

[Roguey]

I don't recall Sawyer being snidely dismissive of Bioware's mainstream appeal

Not of their mainstream appeal, no, but of them yes, stating matter of factly that he has never played any Dragon Age game in addition to

This will probably sound really bad, but I don't think most RPG designers actually think about gameplay -- especially not core gameplay. I think this is due to a few problems: first, some gamers (and even some game devs) view gameplay as a chore. They are quite vocal about wanting to pursue the story and characters more as a choose-your-own adventure novel than as an integral part of a role-playing game. Because of this, designers often focus on the creative aspects of RPGs to a fault -- essentially letting the core gameplay elements fall by the wayside. The result is, unsurprisingly, worse gameplay that even more players are loathe to engage.

There are a lot of people who believe that writing an ultra-tight story with minimal amounts of mostly insigificant player choice = role-playing. I know that Oblivion seems to be going very far away from that concept and that annoys a lot of people, but it seems great to me.

Bethesda tries to do a lot of experimental stuff in their games. Sometimes it fails (spectacularly), but I like the fact that they are doing it.

To be honest, some of the decisions made in the transition from ME to ME2 (and DA to DA2) are a mystery to me. In some cases, it seems like someone detected a negative aspect of a system and, instead of modifying that aspect, just removed or rewrote the system entirely.

I think it comes down to–in a lot of cases–that instead of people listening to criticism they just know there is criticism and then they decide independent of it that they’re going to change some stuff. So like you said, you made a modest impact, you really struck home with some people that really liked the game, and maybe the execution needed some work. So why not just make the execution of what you were going for so that the next one is totally awesome and those things that people loved about it is now even better. Then if there’s stuff that’s janky about it, yeah change the janky stuff, but not if it’s something that those people that loved the game really liked. Just make it better. I think there’s where things go wrong. People look at something and go, “Ok, so we have this core of people that love the game and this other group that fundamentally hates it, so let’s make it a different game.” And it’s like, “Well… no. They hate the game. They didn’t like anything about it. You’re not going to win those people over. They don’t even like the idea of what you’re making.”

So much for that approach eh? Maybe there is something to this "make it a different game to appeal to people who hate it" business.

Semi-related: https://forums.obsidian.net/topic/39565-icewind-dale-2/page-4#entry534394

Like I wrote, most people don't like my stories or the way I write dialogue, which is why I try to stay out of that aspect of game design now.

I agree with Gromnir in that I'd like to see you take a chance, Sawyer. Maybe carry on a bit. Your friends will support you anyhow and your detractors already criticise your work. To fear such irrelevant labels as "cliche" or "hokie" is pointless. To fear failure is unworthy.

Have you ever seen Good Morning Vietnam? There's a guy in there who goes on to replace Robin Williams' character for a while. He's totally unfunny, but he insists on continuing his show even though everyone hates him. When he finally gets removed, he defiantly says to everyone around him, "In my heart, I know I am funny!"

Who wants to be that guy?

Congratulations, Sawyer, you are now well and truly That Guy.

 

[Ulfhednar]

DA:O is as repetitive as Sisyphus and his boulder, but the game had some good merits. It would have been a much better game if they had reduced the trash mob density by at least 60%, but the classes and kits all played sufficiently different to keep interest for another go when coupled with the different origin backgrounds. At least the trash would call for help so you ended up in much bigger fights than you anticipated.

 

[Atlantico]

DA:O is unintentionally above average. To put it another way, it's a hodgepodge of ideas, themes and gameplay stolen from everywhere and given the Bioware treatement. It does work, but by accident, not design.

That much is evident in both subsequent DA games, where Bioware demonstrates without a doubt, they haven't a clue why DA:O was a success. But it was, and it is definitely above average.

This is a game that was in development hell for half a decade. It had no right to come out as good as it was.

I'd love to give credit where credit is due, but I don't know that anyone in Bioware intended the game to become what it ultimately became.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Inquisition was intended to be "Skyrim killer + Bioware trademark interpersonal relationships". There is no way Origins was intended to be such, as it was produced and released in the pre-Skyrim era.

 

[whydoibother]

So whats the tl;dr here?
What were the expected sales, and what were the actual sales in comparison?
How well did competing projects of the same budget do in comparison?
What do the publishers and developers think the problem was, if it performed poorly?
Is it actually good enough for me to attempt liking it, after failing to like PoE 1?

 

[Funposter]

DA:O is a game that I know for a fact I completed three times, yet have no memory of playing. In this regard it is unique. I'm not sure what this says about it.

 

[Riddler]

I would not call SoZ od NWN2 bad games either. In fact, SOZ is fantastic for what it is. NWN2 is terrible because of the mechanics and encounter design. Otherwise, the story is quite a delightful adventure in FR.

I don't understand why NWN 2 is seen like a bad game. I love nwn2 and fror me, it was the BG3 that I have hoped.

If all rpg games was as bad than NWN2, I would be very happy. It would be the greatest incline.

The camera is a crime against humanity worse than the great leap forward.

 

[Trashos]

DA:O is unintentionally above average. To put it another way, it's a hodgepodge of ideas, themes and gameplay stolen from everywhere and given the Bioware treatement. It does work, but by accident, not design.

That much is evident in both subsequent DA games, where Bioware demonstrates without a doubt, they haven't a clue why DA:O was a success. But it was, and it is definitely above average.

This is a game that was in development hell for half a decade. It had no right to come out as good as it was.

I'd love to give credit where credit is due, but I don't know that anyone in Bioware intended the game to become what it ultimately became.

Interesting post, but I respectfully disagree. DAO had a troubled development, as you correctly pointed out, and I believe that this troubled development, possibly along with the whole Electronics Arts situation, is what kept it from being another quality product like BG2 (with some additional decline, sure). The basis is there, but they failed to make it work great as a total package for the more demanding players. The origins idea was good, companions were good enough to make everyone talk about them, Loghain was great tbh, the combat system was simpler but not poorly thought out, Orzammar was good, production values were good, some fights here and there were good.

Otoh, Deep Roads needed serious work, Denerim was no Athkatla, there were trash mobs everywhere, and there was more socializing with companions than I could stand. To the best of my understanding, the cool nerds who made sure that BG2 worked great as a whole, just failed (or were not allowed) to do the same for DAO.

In a way, DAO and PoE are in the same group of games in my mind, as they both needed more work to be great packages.

After DAO they just stopped resisting and just sold out more and more -even by their own standards. I think that's kinda obvious.

 

[Flou]

I always cringed a bit whenever they said "this type of game hasn't been done in 12(or so) years" ignoring DAO. Whether you like its story/combat or not, DAO is that type of game.

No one cares what Canadians do.

 

[AwesomeButton]

So whats the tl;dr here?
What were the expected sales, and what were the actual sales in comparison?
How well did competing projects of the same budget do in comparison?
What do the publishers and developers think the problem was, if it performed poorly?
Is it actually good enough for me to attempt liking it, after failing to like PoE 1?

Expected sales were about 550 000 units by now, for the investors to break even. The actual sales were reverse-engineered from the Fig investors' dividend to have been around 200 000, excluding backers' copies of the game.

The total revenue stands around $4.5 million (but this is before taking out the retailer's (GOG/Steam) cut of 30%), and the expected revenue was supposedly around $9-10 million. Correct me if I'm wrong about any of this.

However, there may have been many more copies sold that didn't get into Fig's report on the revenue, because of a legal loophole which allows a company ran by Obsidian's owners (Dark Rock Industries) to sell keys separately, for copies of the game for which Fig investors won't get dividend. Since the reverse engineering here is based on Fig's report on the revenue and dividend per share, all these calculations may be at least a little off.

 

[Jimmious]

Motherfuckers after 86 pages of analysis you better have some numbers for Sawyer and the guys
I bet they didn't spend even 3 Word pages to analyse these sales

 

[whydoibother]

Expected sales were about 550 000 units by now, for the investors to break even. The actual sales were reverse-engineered from the Fig investors' dividend to have been around 200 000, excluding backers' copies of the game.
The total revenue stands around $4.5 million (but this is before taking out the retailer's (GOG/Steam) cut of 30%), and the expected revenue was supposedly around $9-10 million. Correct me if I'm wrong about any of this.
However, there may have been many more copies sold that didn't get into Fig's report on the revenue, because of a legal loophole which allows a company ran by Obsidian's owners (Dark Rock Industries) to sell keys separately, for copies of the game for which Fig investors won't get dividend. Since the reverse engineering here is based on Fig's report on the revenue and dividend per share, all these calculations may be at least a little off.

Thanks, comrade. I was skimming through the thread, seems like even with the gray area income the game didn't do as well as the developers had hoped. Also seems like the fanbase got burned and perhaps a bit cynical, so the Microsoft acquisition might have been the only way for Obsidian to continue existing.
More surprised about inXile, who supposedly were doing better on income. But then again, maybe they saw Obsidian going down, their sales diminishing, their signatures figures leaving, and they didn't want to risk the same.

Edit: on an unrelated note, how do I add ratings to other posts?