Phil writes, "A genre so nice and enjoyable that it annually gets its own awards category here as the SuperPhillip Central Best of 2020 Awards continue! It's the platformer, my personal favorite genre of game, so if there were any other type of game that deserved its own category, I just don't see it! Fortunately, despite 2020 being a gnarly year in general, it was a fantastic year for platformers, as evident by this upcoming countdown. The genre sees more and more releases, and plenty of them are terrific. Here's hoping the platformer renaissance continues into 2021! For now, let's take a look back at the year that was with the Top Five Platformers of 2020!"
Sales of Activision and Toys for Bob's 2020 platformer, Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time, have surpassed 5 million copies.
Loved Crash 4, that's more than I thought, I had a feeling that releasing at full price, right before current systems was a bad move, so 5 million is pretty good. I shudder to think how poor Rumble sold though.
Spyro apparently at 10 million, would be interesting seeing the platform split for these.
Oh look at that, and people were trying to say it was a flop.
We need more 3D platformers
Sony should bring Jak and Daxter back, Ubisoft with Rayman 4 and maybe Microsoft can work something out with Playtonic to do Banjo-Kazooie since most of the ex Rare members are there.
Jak and Dexter along with sly. I would love even remakes man since Sony now a days don’t want to take chances of smaller single player games it seems
@fox: “Oh look at that, and people were trying to say it was a flop.”
Correct me if I’m wrong this was released in 2020 for all major platforms except for mobile as far as I can remember and PC a year later, and only sold 5 millions copies in 4 years?
Yes I would consider it a flop I seen games on PlayStation and Xbox sale 2 millions in a year and be called a flop.
It doesn't matter how many platforms it's on or how long it took to get there, 5 million sales is a great number period.
So where’s crash 5 ?
It’s been 4 years and nothing and it’ll be another 6+ if lucky.
I love the franchise and was one of the few ones that purchased 4 but I didn’t like it, it felt empty and no fun.
Remember activision/ Microsoft is all about the money if a franchise don’t perform it gets shelved no matter what we think or want.
@Asplundh,Victor isn't wrong, though.
5 million *is* a great number. But it took awhile to get there...And it was on PS4,XB1,PS5,XBX,PC and Switch. Movies and music will often gauge the commercial success of their respective products by "first week" sales and usually the first two weeks of a theatrical run. Shawshank Redemption, widely considered one of the best movies of all time earned only 16 million during it's theatrical run, against a 25 million dollar budget.
Most AAA games need to sell roughly 1.5 - 2 million copies to just break even these days. I tried to look up what this game's budget was, and couldn't find much.
I should state that I adore platformers. Love these games, love Jak and Daxter, Love the Sly games etc...But this wasn't exactly vindication for the sub-genre. I hope they were able to turn a profit and I wish more of these games were made.
Or go back a bit further...
An updated Commander Keen, Jill of the Jungle, Crystal Caves, Bio Menace, or Jazz Jackrabbit would be pretty cool.
Hocus Pocus, Halloween Harry, Monster Bash, Xargon OG Duke Nukems
Remember when Bethesda announced a new Commander Keen for mobile at E3 2019 with an animated trailer?
Jill of the Jungle being from Epic Games is funny to me.
Is flop the word of the month or something. Every time I come here lately all I seem to read is this games a flop that games a flop your a flop I have a floppy flipity flipity flop.
I don't keep up with final fantasy but apparently one of the new ones it's a flop for selling 2+ million in a few months on a single platform.
Now crash is a flop? Yes it releases on all platforms but in this day and age 4 million in 4 years seems fine by me.
Yeah, very low quality bait when Xbox probably accounted for 10% or less of those sales.
Platformers never died out, THQ just flooded the market with licensed crap and the industry shifted to copying COD cause gaming was "maturing".
Exactly gamers grew up mature games took off but many players who grew up on the nes, she's even Mario 64 are having kids and introducing them to platformers again so I can see a renewed interest in the genre.
The Ori and the Blind Forest studio CEO has asked the fans to purchase the game instead to completely support it.
I've been told that this is an outlier and 99% of devs feel the opposite of what moon studios is saying right here.
"It can be? If you're a smaller dev and get an upfront fee to put your game on gamepass and it blows up, that's great.
I merely pointed out that Moon would make no money at this point from people playing Ori on gamepass - so not the best way to support us!" - Thomas Mahler, Moon Studios
"This is the exact argument people have been saying about GP for years now"
It's not. Moon studios had no say in their game going on GamePass, because it's a 2nd party game and Microsoft own the Ip and games. Moon was paid for developing the games and presumably get a cut of sales, GamePass is hurting their sales but this is a different situation.
They make no money because they were already paid an upfront fee. So they MADE money, but make no additional money.
yeah of course because people renting games and not buying them is so much better for studios.
Microsoft has conditioned people not to pay for their hobby or at least not to pay to own anything
@GamerRN
"They make no money because they were already paid an upfront fee. So they MADE money, but make no additional money."
So it's a good thing that they make no additional money despite their game having continued success well after the initial payment?
@Lightning77
"Because it is. You can name on one hand the studios GP doesn't help."
Just in the past few months we have had statements from Larian, 2k and now Moon Studios (as well another indie studio that released it's game pass but I can't remember who it was) have made similar statements recently about the effect of subscriptions on sales and profitability.
Heck you recently saw in Insomniac's leaked slides that after games were put on subscriptions the sales of the games almost totally dried up, which is something they have publicly been saying for years. And on top of that even though xbox fans constantly deny it, Microsoft leaks as well as their own statements and actions (like putting thier games on rival platforms) clearly show that putting games on subscriptions lowers the potential profit of a game.
It's time to accept the reality that the long term effect of subscriptions has been lowered revenue and profit for game sales almost universally across the board.
Credible research and information keeps showing that people don't buy games that are on subscriptions and more and more people don't buy games they suspect are coming to subscriptions.
Look into Outriders situation, unless you are a very small indie dev, gamepass loses money for everyone involved, including Microsoft.
"oh really. The Microsoft /Game Pass Dream Bubble is bursting, eh?"
I don´t think Sony agrees, because they´ll continue and release yet another brand new MBL game on Gamepass day one for the fourth time in a row!
@Crows90
"Because they have a choice right?"
Yes they do. They could say no. Nobody is forcing Sony to make MLB games to Xbox at gun point, especially day one on Gamepass.
Christopher
"That's not by Sony's choice..."
Of course, it´s their choice. They could just said *no* to MLB and made their own baseball game just like EA did.
Besides, It´s a GaaS title after all and one of the most played on Xbox. So it´s not really hurting Sony in any way, and I´m 100% positive that they relly love those fat checks from MS.
"This is a poor argument."
You can say that, but, the Interesting and undeniable fact is that after four years making MBL games available on Gamepass day one, nobody from San Diego studio got fired in Sony´s recent wave of layoffs.
Just food for the brain.
That's not a business choice that was decided by Sony, that decision was decided by the MLB. Sony will reap the rewards only because Sony's first party developers (Sony San Diego Studios) develops The Show. If it wasn't for the MLB licensing contract of The Show the game would still be exclusive to PS.
"Of course, it´s their choice. They could just said *no* to MLB and made their own baseball game just like EA did."
Well this isn't EA, they lost the license to Fifa, not Fifpro, or the premiere league or champions league or the euros.
MLB I'm guessing (i don't play baseball) is the only licence to it. They have no choice, indeed. American gamers will want authentic teams im sure.
@christopher: “That's not by Sony's choice... This is a poor argument.”
Have you see him have a rich valid argument when it comes to Sony. 🤷🏿
@obscured: “Yes they do. They could say no. Nobody is forcing Sony to make MLB games to Xbox at gun point, especially day one on Gamepass.”
Sure buddy whatever keeps you happy same as no one is forcing Xbox to now and in the future release their games on PlayStation and Nintendo oh btw in the near future Xbox will go fully 3rd party like Sega 💵💰
do you understand the concept of licensed games? good lord the straw arguments or just lack of actual real information is astouding.
*** Of course, it´s their choice. They could just said *no* to MLB and made their own baseball game just like EA did. ***
That's an illusion of choice. It's not a choice. You're acting ignorant to try and serve up a bad argument.
you have to remember that these games are old now, they are given a fee upfront for their titles to be on gamepass, but for new people to play the games naturally you want to drive them to standalone sales as opposed to them playing on a service that they've already been paid for.
I don't understand what you are saying here. This is the exact argument people have been saying about GP for years now. In the short term the upfront cost is good, especially if your game is either trash or was never going to be popular in the first place, but long term and if your game exceeds expectations then it's not as good. Also if your game is AAA and is a sure fire going to sell millions day one, people want those titles day one on GP as well and think it's sustainable for some reason when logically that doesn't make sense.
@Outside - I don't know if MS has any incentives in place where devs get bonuses if games do well. You'd have to talk to someone in the know there.
Same here. its a nice little compilation. Plus I have the XB special editions on disc (still sealed)... and it was all thanks to playing them in Game pass. I dont get why its so hard for people to understand how this service can actually lead to sales, not just blindly accept the few who complain about how sales weren't as good as they expected.
Because not everyone is like you.
Most people wont go out and purchase a game on other consoles or buy special editions of games they already played if they can just try it on their cheap subscription service and move on once theyre done with it.
I bought Ori for Switch because it's on GP and wanted to be able to play it on the go. That being said, at 120fps and 4K on Series X, that is the way to play.
Fingers crossed for a release on PS5, I'd snap them up even though I have them on Switch already.
They didn't have a choice to partner with Microsoft for funding and create the game for them?
I’m with OneLove on this. Don’t go begging to fans when you already took Microsoft’s money.
For smaller companies to even have a CHANCE to make some money on Xbox, they often have to put their games on Game Pass. Don't be dense.
Anyone who wanted Ori has most likely already bought it. The game is not going to sell significantly anymore but GP will offer free exposure so that when Ori 3 comes out people may be willing to buy. If your game is good enough people will support in even if they can get it on a subscription. I still buy plenty of games that are available on GP and I also have played plenty of games that I would not have played thanks to GP. Bottom line is this, make a product people want and they will buy it.
I think what the CEO is implying is that the studio makes more money per copy sold vs a player on GP. But I think we know that as common sense. Even without being privy to Moon/Microsoft's contract, I think we can assume that because of the nature of GP, more money can be made per player at retail than via subscription. And honestly this would also probably apply to Microsoft as well. As in they would make more money too. Thats why the only way to maximize the utility of a subscription is to have a really large subscription base.
Discover some modern hits and timeless classics you and a friend can play across PlayStation Plus Essential, Extra, and Premium.
Astro’s Playground
Astro's Playroom, easily. What a great and innovative platformer. Really hope Sony continues this franchise and makes more Astro games.
Ori by a country mile. The art style music and super tight controls make it like a game above and beyond any platformer I’ve played before
Astro, crash 4, Ori and sackboy all pretty impressive for a supposedly dead genre.
I wouldn't really count the Mario collection as the games were re releases but it's incredible still
On a side note Spyro 4 possibly coming next year