Compared to the some of the big developers out there, Game Freak is relatively small. Companies like Ubisoft, Activision, and EA have massive amounts of staffers working on their projects. Meanwhile, the core team at Game Freak has only around 180-200 people working on Pokemon Sword/Shield, which may seem small in comparison.
Gematsu writes: "Cooperative third-person shooter Helldivers II has sold 12 million units as of May 5, publisher Sony Interactive Entertainment and developer Arrowhead Game Studios announced."
And well-deserved. I'm having a ball of a time so far. Just need to change out my heavy armour, it's a murder on my stamina and sprinting.
SIE managed to find success with gaas quicker than I suspected. Arrowhead did a great job getting past that initial launch difficulty, I've been playing again recently doing mostly solo missions. Can't even get off the damn planet after completing everything, lol.
12 million is crazy, but it also paints an opposite picture to what the forums would have you believe about gaas. And it being more successful then the single player games of late also kind of proves to an executive gaas IS. what the consumer wants.
Disagree, most GAAS games are free, cheaper than or around the same price as Helldivers.
Helldivers II sold very well because of the viral campaign and word of mouth, I can't think of another game that has done numbers like this that wasn't completely free or attached to a service like GamePass/Plus Extra~Premium.
Helldivers II is an exception to the rule, not the norm.
That’s a hard coup, considering the online campaign that happens with death to ALL gaas the forums campaign. To only turn around and try to explain the hypocrisy of it?
Either people hate GaaS, they don’t hate GAaS or they hate a practice in the GaaS but they DO love GaaS. But, the online campaigns as if you paying 40 bucks for a game then willingly paid an extra 20 for cosmetics THEN you buy more cosmetics in the 40-60 dollar game that is ONLINE only that alledgely people hate.
Or you don’t hate any of those things and you just act like you do when something isn’t being made how you want it to be on initial impressions. Regardless how many disagrees happen it doesn’t change the fact there is a clear hypocritical practice happening here when we discuss what is an “acceptable” game (swearing single player is the way with robust content) then buying the game that you swear is the death of gaming (gaas that have always online requirement, you don’t “own” the game, tied to online restrictions and isn’t truly a complete game as they continue to add content that could arguably be done day 1)
But go ahead try to make it seem like 12 million people didn’t just convince executives they want this over say the 3-4 million that support FF7R/FF16 or even the million or 2 that bought stellarblade or RoR.
You can’t convince people that live service games aren’t the future after they are supported more then the single player experience.
In a town hall that took place on Monday, Square Enix president Takashi Kiryu reportedly confirmed imminent layoffs in the U.S. and Europe.
@Outside_ofthe_Box,
So that Microsoft can close down the studio after doing nothing with them? Right...
Sad but true. It's the consequence of a shift in player habits, massive overhead, and out of control budgets across the industry.
What did NA and EU did anyways? Just translate or something? I would say it might help them get back to there roots but DK.
Actually, you are correct they play a hand in localization especially in Europe with the many languages. That and marketing.
The gaming world is still reeling from the announcement that Microsoft is shuttering Tango Gameworks, the studio behind last year’s big Xbox hit, Hi-Fi Rush.
They have a reason but they don't need to give a explanation. Gamers nowadays think they have a say so in telling people how to run their company. It's not the end of the world, fanboys. Microsoft is gonna due what benefits them the most. It's never been about you. Same with sony. Some of you need to get a grip. The crazy part is that some of the ones complaining don't even own an xbox.
I don’t own an Xbox and I have no real interest in HiFi Rush. I just hate to see a talented group of people lose their jobs when they did everything that was asked of them. You know… the decent, normal reaction to have when something like this happens.
There's no logical or good reason to give for closing Tango Gameworks. They make great games consistently and Hi-Fi Rush was the highest rated Xbox game in literal YEARS. Closing the studio was just plain stupid and nonsensical.
It’s quite strange to not see Phil Spencer in any talkshow or podcast… usually the dude would talk almost daily when there’s even a bit of news from xbox.
Muzzled and/or in on it from the very beginning. You have to be a very stupid person not to anticipate that your division is going to be under scrutiny from shareholders after 80 Billion Dollars worth of acquisitions
The beauty of being a CEO here in America is that when your company does well, you get extra money as a reward...
And when your company does badly, you get extra money to encourage you to stick around and lead it through the storm...And at some point, you get to bow out and float toward retirement on your golden parachute, which means and you guessed it, MORE MONEY!! What a deal for snake oil man Phil!!
Oh god no
You see when shit like this happens he throws Sarah Bond to the wolves
Seriously I only hear from her when it’s the yearly big Xbox showcase or when it’s super bad.
When the whole multiplatform release came out earlier this year he put her front and centre…kept his mouth shut for most of it
A game can be successful and still not reach a intended goal. No one likes to see studio closures and lost job but there's always the risk of this happening. At the end of the day the companies are going to do what they want.
The press is FINALLY calling out his lies and calling for his resignation.
Bakc then they would say amen to all his lies. But he can't lie anymore.
Perhaps they think they can sweep this one under the rug, gamers will forget about it,
We will not
They made a good game and you put the whole studio in the bin, this couldn’t be clearer, ms don’t care, everyone suspected it, but now we KNOW it
She's kinda got the verbal communication of 3-years-ago Biden trying to say something he knows nothing about.
What she meant to say is: "We wasted our budget for the next couple years buying Call of Duty, and we're moving all our chips to that one series"
It's starting to seem quite obvious that XBox is going to be shutting down most of their studios or selling them off, then focusing on some sort of PC/Console hybrid OS for the next XBox where they can collect royalties Valve style.
To be fair I don’t think there is a good answer, I’d rather her been honest but that probably would have pissed more people of then the word salad route.
@amp please leave your political red ruby sleepers at the door this is a gaming site or go back to truthfoxnewsmax to comment over there.
BACK ON TRACK
It’s obvious that Microsoft is moving on the money now direction guided by their investors watching all the failures from the 3rd quarter of the 360 gen to this generation I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a plan to replace Phil with Bobby as he proved for years he kept making money for activision.
Bobby jeez that would be an interesting turn of events and they'd certainly go 3rd party
You really comparing one developer to the biggest third party publishers of the industry? At 143 developers, Game Freak is a mid tier sized developer
They should have expanded over the years, the Pokemon games have always done well in sales thanks to the brand name alone so there’s no excuse to not expand your team so you can make each next project better than the last.
Recently it came out that 1000 people have worked on Sword and Shield, mostly from outsourcing it. Now for what the game looks like and the little jump it seems to have had for the next brand new generation of Pokemon with the first ever console game is ridiculous, they should have taken it more seriously.
I know it’s different for each studios and what specific game they make but CD Projekt Red has roughly 886 staff, NaughtyDog has about 336, The Collation is like 300ish, Platinum Games 224 etc. Point is look at what they accomplish and yet here’s GF who can’t even utilise 1000 properly
They have Nintendo’s backing so it’s not like they would be left in the shit.
Pokemon, pokemon = cash cow
If they want to start doing more than POKEMON then they're going to need to expand. Else they'll struggle juggling between it and their new IP if it takes off after release