Saling The World: GT5 Prologue, Kingdom Under Fire Top Charts in Japan

Gamasutra's weekly column, "Saling The World", covers the top five sellers for every available platform in the United States, Japan, and Europe, providing an important update of sales patterns worldwide.

[Omicron]

GT5 prologue bombed in Japan?

[SmokeyMcBear]

RTFA...."Gran Turismo 5 Prologue debuts to a resounding first-place sales finish in its first week on Japanese store shelves, with gamers eager to get a first glimpse at the newest edition of the popular driving simulation series."

[ruibing]

I know some people don't read the stories anywhere, but since when did they skip the title as well?

[hotshot127]

the 360 fanboys still WANNA BELIEVE the ps3 is doomed remember?

[DarkSniper]

No XBOX 360 owner has any rights to brag about console sales when doing so poor on a worldwide basis. Especially Japan.

Dark Sniper is here to inform N4G.com that Microsoft's system has run it's course. Poor marketing and constant PR shuffles have forced Microsoft into the pending inevitiable delegation to third place in the console wars for 2008.

$niper

[AAACE5]

DarkSniper, How can you believe the words you are saying(Typing).

If i'm correct the ps2 was the weakest console on the market, with the gamecube and xbox more powerful than the ps2! But that didn't stop sony from selling millions because sony got to market first and had more games(which is the same position the 360 is in).

The Wii caught everyone off guard with it's innovative control setup, which is why it is No. 1, but in the end the Wii will have reached it's peak once people realize there aren't many good games to play on it. Third party developers are already starting to see that this will be a repeat of last gen, when the only company to really make money off the Wii is Nintendo!

That leaves MS and Sony!

Lots of developers have stated that the two systems are similar in power. Alot of third-party developers prefer to make their core games on 360, then port it over to ps3. Cause the 360 has easier development tools, and the ps3 would require more development time to tap into the true power of the system, which would lead to higher cost for the final product, which would be a financial gamble on a system with a low user base.

Q. Would you put a million dollars on a gamble, where the odds were extremely against you? Especially on a system with fanboys who don't buy enough games?

A good selling title usually only reaches 25% of current owners if it's lucky. The average good game barely makes it to 5% of owners.

The 360 owners buy games. The attach rate is high. Developers see this and see they can make money on this system. Lost Planet and Dead Rising weren't really good games. But they came out at a time when the market was open, and the games just stood out, so everyone bought them!

Alot of other developers realized this as well, which is why GTA 4 and alot of other big named titles got held back from holiday '07. They liked the idea of their big name games having their own space to sell like crazy.

Ps3 has alot of great games coming out in '08. But if you want to try to label the 360 as the next dreamcast... You obviously never owned a 360 and don't know how much fun it is!

Another thing, alot of fanboys on here keep saying that the 360 doesn't have alot of games coming out in '08. MS made an announcement a few months ago about how they aren't going to hype their games the way everyone has done in the past. Usually they would announce a game 2 yrs. from launch. So you give fans 2 years of anticipation, and build the game up in their minds as the greatest thing on earth, only to realize when they get it home... It's just a new game! I think they said they were going to cut it down to like 6-12 months. That way when you hear about it, it's not so far away!

Back on topic... You said MS had poor marketing and PR shuffles!!! You must not read alot of industry news, cause the way I remember it... It started with sony having to rearrange everything! They had to remove Ken Kutaragi, because they viewed it as his fault for making the ps3 and leaving sony the burden of trying to sell the console.

You can't blame Ken for trying though... He really thought there were over 100 million individual ps2 owners in the world when he made the comment before he announced the price. You remember don't you, "I want people to want to put in overtime at work... I want kids to do extra chores just to get this console!" it went something like that.

I guess no one told Ken His "Disc Read Error" problem with the ps2 is what made the console sell so many units. So they launched the ps3 thinking it would be as popular as the Wii is right now, only to realize that something is really, really wrong!

I'm not taking sides really! I'm just pointing out that both companies made mistakes. I would get into MS's mistakes, but the ps3 fanboys do a pretty good job at that already!

[ThisIsWaiting]

Kingdom Under Fire would be popular ... I thought the original wasnt very good.

[osirisomeomi]

The new one isn't very good either, by western standards at least. Check reviews.

note that western standards aren't necessarily better or worse, but different in terms of taste and what is important to them.

[WIIIS1]

Kingdom Under Fire is complete garbage. Worse than Ninety-Nine Nights, which is quite a feat. Graphics are average, framerate issues, horrendous gameplay.

[wiizy]

i would like to see chocobo sell a bit more to bring the wii even more sales

[Nipplestiltskin]

Could you please keep to the story thread of GT5... I mean what's the point of even checking these comments anymore if no one is offering anything useful to the subject matter?

[KeiZka]

Wasn't there just a topic that said otherwise? As in Wiifit selling more than Prologue?

[ash_divine]

glad to see I was wrong