At this point, I’m convinced that most developers have forgotten how to make a multiplayer game that isn’t live service. Larian still remembers, but you’d think some people who make action games would remember too.
In order to be efficient, it assumes people will act at least mostly rationally. It’s one of those things where it’s both true and false at the same time, somehow.
I liked Hollow Knight just fine, and I’m sure I’ll enjoy Silksong, but it definitely doesn’t have me super excited. Invincible Vs, though…that one I’m looking forward to.
You can click on my profile and see how long I’ve been on Lemmy, and the fact my name is definitely derived from “Andrew” but his is “Mat” would be odd. There are lots of ways to follow the game industry, and I suppose many of them do not involve coming across his name, but many of them very much do. His work is US-focused, so maybe if you’re not from the US, it’s less likely. That is all stuff you could have researched before you asserted that he did not have access to enough data to come to his conclusions or that he doesn’t understand the economics of how game consoles make money. I promise you he does, to both.
The old model I was referring to was making a console, making exclusives to drive people to that console, and then making money on each game sold for that console, whether the console maker developed it or not. Sony would not have put any games on PC at all if that model had no holes in it. It isn’t copying Xbox to put your first party games on other platforms; it’s acknowledging the way the market has changed. Peak spending on console hardware was all the way back in 2009. This year might exceed that due to the supply of the Switch 2, or at the very least, this June was the most successful June since 09, but that’s a downward trend line. When most games must and easily can release on all platforms, your reason to get a machine for a handful of exclusives drops precipitously, especially since Piscatella argues that most of those customers are spending their time on a handful of multiplatform games anyway.
What I thought the discussions would revolve around was how wild it is that an Xbox game could release on PlayStation and immediately become one of its best sellers for the year, because those PlayStation players clearly wanted that game but would not buy an Xbox for it. What it turned into was people saying that of course Nintendo would never do this for reasons that Piscatella very much understands why they haven’t done it to date; what’s interesting about this interview is what has changed in the market that would make it potentially worth it for Nintendo to port their exclusives.
If you didn’t backpedal on the data that you thought this man didn’t have access to, or for not understanding how platforms taking a cut of sales works, then I’m sorry for thinking you could admit when you were wrong.
Those aren’t glaring holes in his argument; those are people rebutting the summary I put in the blurb that Lemmy lets me add without reading the article.
Xbox is doing badly, at least by the old console model, which is why they aren’t doing it anymore. Sony has reduced how much they’re sticking to the old model as well, by putting Helldivers on Xbox and most of their games on PC; does that not indicate the same thing to you?
Nintendo had the best launch in the history of game consoles because they had the most supply available in the history of game console launches, which is why Piscatella is noncommittal on how well the console is doing. Consoles basically always sell out, so it only shows that the people buying them are the people who would have bought it regardless, until we see how it does around the holiday.
He is not saying that Nintendo should copy what Xbox is doing. He is saying Nintendo might see a similar boon if they do what both Xbox and PlayStation are doing, because we are not seeing evidence that people are moving to a platform for exclusives, and we are seeing evidence that people are more than happy to wait on the platforms they’re on for the games to come to them. He also says Nintendo is unlikely to do it regardless, at least right now.
No worries. The Wii U sold 12M units in its lifetime, which is surely the floor for how many the Switch 2 can possibly sell, and it will almost certainly beat that, but at $500 with looming tariffs, not to mention how the market has changed in the past 8 years, I’d be shocked if it approached an install base as large as the Switch 1.
The Switch 2 has not sold 20M units yet. They just hit 5M, and they’re projecting they’ll sell 15M by the end of the fiscal year, which is by March.
Exactly, which shows that players do move to whatever platform is more enticing to them.
But not for exclusives, not like they used to, which is the author’s point.
The question is, does that risk them losing more money in the long run, as players buy their games elsewhere?
And Piscatella’s position is “maybe, but maybe not”. The Switch 2’s success in reaching those numbers is not a sure thing, and Nintendo’s games have enough appeal that they could be potentially reaching enough additional players that their method may not be the right call anymore. The point is a bit moot, because he also acknowledges that Nintendo is unlikely to change their ways anytime soon, but the possibility is there that they could make more money by going multiplatform. For Sony and Microsoft, that time has already come.
This isn’t the first time he’s spoken. He’s done this job for a long time, and people trust and respect his work. It would be a hell of a thing if he picked this time to start making things up. The trend he points out is something he acknowledges as a recent trend, in the last year or so, but he’s working with data that’s consistent with my own anecdotes, like how publisher after publisher have found that they’re making more money on PC than on consoles; that games that used to never come out on PC now dwarf the console versions in sales; that my friends mostly stopped playing on consoles last gen, and that I don’t see a need for new ones; that when I see kids playing games out and about, they’re on mobile far more often than they’re on Switch; and on and on.
I’ve been polite this whole time, but you decided this man didn’t know what he was talking about, backpedaled very hard when you found out what his actual credentials were, and then decided he was untrustworthy instead. He’s not the one with the credibility of a 3rd grader.
The article is a summary of an interview. If he was lying about any of this, competing firms or their business partners would call him out. I know how the world looks from our perspectives and how the console markets have always worked, but that’s why there are companies out there collecting data, and that’s why their perspectives can be worth listening to. No one can predict the future, but he’s sharing his insights into where the wind is blowing, and yes, it’s so that his company can sell a premium product to companies doing market research. The console business model has changed quite dramatically very recently and is looking like it will continue to change. He’s not the only one claiming that the console wars are over.
because nobody in their right mind would buy a $500 console for FH5 alone
But that’s exactly the same reason I stopped buying any console. I was more than happy to let the handful of Sony exclusives pass me by, and then they started coming to PC. Now I’m more than happy to let a handful of Nintendo exclusives pass me by.
Third parties have nothing to gain from exclusivity deals but the initial paycheck, while console manufacturers keep cashing in from people who bought into their ecosystem and are now locked into paying them a 30% from all their purchases.
But that’s not driving console sales like they used to. The last few Final Fantasy games seemed to do quite well on PC, indicating that people did not buy a PS5 to play them, and PS5 is having difficulty matching PS4 units sold even with the utter decimation of their closest competitor. That’s another point you made later in your post; wherever Xbox players went, it wasn’t to PlayStation. Data would seem to indicate that not even all of the PlayStation players stuck with PlayStation.
Port [Nintendo games] over [to PC], and a lot of people would just… Not buying the console at all.
Exactly, but potentially, they would stand to make way more money by selling more copies of those games than by selling more Switch 2s and getting those customers locked in.
There is no chance in hell that 30% from all purchases from a healthy fanbase on all games, DLCs and subscriptions (and that’s not factoring in hardware sales, like consoles, Amiibos and other overpriced plastic thingamajig Nintendo fans spend their money on) is even remotely comparable to a 70% cut on some titles, especially if taking that 70% cut risks lowering the interest and engagement on their main platform.
Yes, there is. If you got 30% of all sales from games on an install base the size of the Wii U, it’s not going to make up for a game like Mario Kart or Super Smash Bros. selling 100M additional copies on extra platforms. We don’t know yet how well Switch 2 will do (probably better than Wii U and not as well as the Switch 1), but at certain thresholds, that 30% leaves them worse off than that other 70 that reduces the value of their platform.