I'm going to make a prediction about the upcoming year in gaming -- it's going to be a great year in terms of Metacritic scores, but an unimpressive one in terms of sales. I can barely think of any major video games coming out in 2013 that don't look promising, and yet, video game sales have been dropping for the past couple years, and I don't think the downward trend stops this year. It's the end of generation -- people have amassed too many half-finished games by now and aren't interested in buying anything new unless it's a heavily hyped can't-miss title (think Grand Theft Auto V).
So, here are seven games likely to be good to downright great, which just aren't going to sell...
Bayonetta 2
The first Bayonetta was Platinum Games' best title to date, and Bayonetta 2 should be even better thanks to Nintendo's involvement. Unfortunately that Nintendo involvement may also doom this game to poor sales -- I just don't think Nintendo has the ability to market a game like this. Nintendo's standard "pretty people in a white room" approach just isn't going to work with a violent game about a sexy hair-clothes-wearing witch. Particularly in America I fear this game will just be dumped into stores with little-to-no promotion at all.
Gears of War: Judgment
Were you aware there's a new Gears of War game coming out in a bit over a month? I had totally forgotten, and combing through all the available video game news daily is my job. There's just zero buzz around Gears of War: Judgment, which is a shame because it looks like it may be slightly less dumb than past instalments in the series. I'm sure the game will still do fine considering it's the only major exclusive the Xbox has this year, but it's not going to do anywhere near the numbers past Gears games did.
Rayman Legends
Rayman Legends is a fantastic looking 2D platformer, but it's coming out barely a year after the also fantastic Rayman Origins. The general gaming public only has so much appetite for 2D platformers these days, no mater how pretty they are. Also the Wii U isn't exactly short on 2D platformers -- the system already has a 2D Mario, and a new 2D Yoshi game is coming this summer. I'm afraid Rayman Legends is going to end up the odd 2D platformer out.
Dead Space 3
EA's hoping to bring their cult-ish horror series to a greater audience, and well, I think they're probably going to fail. The changes they're making with Dead Space 3 have angered the series' hardcore fans, and worse, don't really seem to be creating much buzz amongst the greater gaming community. Some games just aren't going to be mainstream hits no matter how hard you try.
Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII
Lightning Returns looks like it may be the best Final Fantasy XIII game yet, but I don't think most gamers are going to put themselves in a position to be fooled a third time. The Final Fantasy XIII ship has sailed. Time to move on.
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
I don't mean to pick on Platinum Games, I really don't, but their games do disappoint at retail more often than not. Also, I think gamers are going to be confused as to what this game actually is -- "Metal Gear Rising? Is this part of the Metal Gear Solid series? Is Revengeance even a word? Wait, does it star that guy I hated from Metal Gear Solid 2? Eh, forget it."
The Last of Us
The Last of Us of looks fantastic. Amazing. Maybe a little too fantastic and amazing. I think the game may end up being too intense and bleak for the average gamer. Also, while I applaud Naughty Dog for sticking to their artistic principles and not removing their heroine Ellie from the game's cover or taking the game in a more shooter-ey mainstream direction, those decisions are almost certainly going to cost them sales. The Last of Us may end up having a more literal title than Naughty Dog intended -- I have a feeling the game won't sell well enough for a sequel.
What about you folks? Any games you think will disappoint sales-wise? Think I'm wrong about any of the games I've listed? Hit the comments and give me an earful.
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is ellen page ellie?
No, she does a voice in “Beyond: Two Souls”, the *other* Sony game that stars a girl that looks just like Ellen Page.
And that bastard is going to tank like the Titanic. If we’re talking bombs this year, that’s my vote.
I dunno, Heavy Rain did surprisingly well. I think Beyond might do okay.
I think Beyond definitely has more of a chance at being a huge bomb than The Last of Us does. Naughty Dog is the crown jewel in Sony’s arsenal. There is no chance that the game doesn’t get a gigantic marketing push. Plus with it having a zombie-like, end of the world, survivors traversing the country vibe I think it will do very well.
Nah man, if we’re talking Sony bombs for this year? Its 5 words – Sly 4: Thieves in Time.
She does look like Page, but there are differences (blue/green eyes, younger). And Joel looks like Dylan McDermott, which I never noticed until I saw this picture.
She used to look more like Page, but they redesigned the character slightly when Beyond Two Souls actually landed her as a voice actress.
Personally, I’ll be shilling for a bunch of games this year: Dead Space 3, Aliens Colonial Marines, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, Naruto Shippuuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 (love kicking the shit out of my friends ninja style), God of War Ascension, BioShock Infinite, Injustice: Gods Among Us, The Last of Us, and Resident Evil Revelations.
I’m gonna be broke as shit.
Oh yeah, as I’m reminded of above, Beyond Two Souls also looks amazing. I love the interactive story games like Heavy Rain.
I’m split on whether BioShock Infinite will do well. On the one hand, it’s a shooter and the first BioShock was a pretty big dead — on the other hand, it has colorful, somewhat stylized graphics, so it may be doomed.
I think Infinite will clean up. It’ll have that Fox News hype that’ll sell it.
I also love interactive games. Shadows of Destiny being one of my favorite games for the PS2 but Heavy Rain was very disappointing just like Indigo Prophesy. They started started off strong and then spiraled into nonsense. Gears of War is the only series where I’ve played every single game in the series with my brother, so I’ll definitely get Ascension if only for the bonding time.
Metal Gear has never really been a heavy hitter in terms of sales but I do agree that Rising will disappoint in terms of sales which means many people will probably miss out on what will be a balls crazy, DmC-style overdone game.
I’m surprised you didn’t include the Skyrim MMO.
I completely forgot that Ascension doesn’t allow for campaign co-op. That greatly reduces my reasons to get it.
Wow, okay. This is what I get for trying to comment simultaneously on two different forums. I have no idea why I keep writing Ascension.
@Brig I will play the Skyrim MMO, too. I have trouble remembering the stuff without a firm release date.
Nate, yopu have absolutely no respect for the average gamer, do you.
…..are you really Bobby Kotick?
Have you ever spent more than 10 minutes in a Gamestop Strych? The average gamer does not know much about games. Just like the average movie goer doesn’t know much about movies or the average TV viewer doesn’t know much good TV. There’s a reason Two and a Half Men, Adam Sandler and Madden games are all wildly popular. It is what it is.
It’s not a Skyrim MMO! It’s The Elder Scrolls! It’ll have Skyrim as well as Cyrodil (from oblivion) and some third place from Tamriel. Then if it’s successful I see them releasing Morrowind and the likes.
Either way, I’ll definitely have a look! Bethesda don’t do things by half!
Nate, I notice that two thirds of the things you listed to show that gamers are stupid aren’t games. The third actually is remarkably well crafted in what its actually doing – even if you don’t personally like Sports, you can understand the attraction of it, right?
I’ll buy anything with Gears of War in the title, it’s one of the few reasons I still fire up my xbox.
Were you aware a new one was coming out until I mentioned it in this article?
Yes, but only because I played GoW 3 a few weeks ago and saw something about it on their network. Otherwise I hadn’t heard a thing at all, you’re right they aren’t marketing it worth shit.
I really loved playing GoW but am I the only one who was disappointed as hell by GoW 3. A good game can be ruined by a weak ending. I hope Ascension redeems it but I’m not holding out hope.
I love Gears. What was stupid about it?
Im actually looking forward to the last of us and the new metal gear game
I loved Bayonetta and it was probably the most satisfying game of its type that I’ve ever played. But I am not going to buy a Wii U just to play its sequel–Smash Brothers it aint. But I have to disagree about the Last of Us just on principle. And, I dunno, I think MGS Rising will do fine.
I cannot wait till the last of us comes out. It will do well, and has a heavy rain kinda feel to me. And I LOVED heavy rain.
I dont think I bought a single game last year. I wanted to buy Assassins Creed 3 but didnt get around to it. I also didnt want to come off of the $60 either. That said, I will definitely buy the Last of Us, if nothing else, this year.
Also, Revengeance is hands down the dumbest title for anything at all. Just, dumb.
Then you havent seen the title Red Dead Redemptionier?
I can’t believe you’re trying to make the argument that both Dead Space 3 and The Last Of Us are going to flop. that’s a guaranteed ‘negative’ for both of those. those games are going to sell like goddamn hotcakes. Dead Space for sure because it already has an established audience and the Last Of Us is a new IP – but rest assured both of them are going to be fucking blockbusters. I realize you have to find things to write about and create some argument points and/or friction, but you’re nuts dude.
I think “The Last Of Us” is going to disappoint sales-wise. First of all, it’s relentlessly grim, by all accounts, and I don’t think it’s going to earn that tone.
Secondly, let’s face it, scrape off the music choices and the tone cribbed from “The Road” and it’s just another goddamn zombie game.
Besides the reasons I already listed in the article, I think they haven’t done a terribly good job communicating what The Last of Us is actually about. Who are you fighting? Zombies? Other humans infected with something? Monsters? It’s not terribly clear. What’s you’re goal? Now I don’t mind ambiguity. I watch a lot of artsy ambiguous movies — but I think people are a lot more willing to throw in and watch a 2-hour, 10 dollar movie where they aren’t sure what’s happening, than a 20-hour, 60 dollar video game.
Again, it looks like game of the year material, but it probably won’t sell more than a million copies, which isn’t good for a game this lavishly produced.
I totally thought they did explain all of that. It’s infected humans and your Joel and your partner Tess has gotten you guys a job to smuggle the girl, Ellie, out of the city and most likely to a specific point and the world is fraught with danger. The last few trailers where they introduced Tess and the VGA trailer give a much clearer picture.
I honestly think it’ll fit in with the “bran muffin” mentality, the concept that you should watch movies not because they’re fun but because they’re “good” or “bad” for you.
I think Naughty Dog has some noble ideas. The idea of the combat being realistic in the sense that it’s unpleasant and brutal and hard is interesting in the abstract. But I think it’s going to be frustrating and boring in the play.
And to be honest, I am immune to Naughty Dog’s charm. Their games are gorgeous, but they’re shallow.
Its not infected humans, its desperate humans.
Basically, its split between fear of zombies, and fear of the desperate uninfected who will gladly kill you to take your stuff.
Its very, very heavy “Who are the real monsters” stuff?
Except that’s a stock trope in every zombie movie dating back to “Night of the Living Dead.” It doesn’t help that Day Z uses this trope but twists it around so that the player can choose to be a dick or not.
I dunno guys. I hear what you’re saying, but Naughty Dog is known for quality. the Uncharted games (while definitely being on rails) are probably some of the greatest game experiences I’ve ever had. like playing through an excellent Indiana Jones movie. everything is smooth and fun as shit (except for some frustrating shooting sequences). Everything points to The Last Of Us being just as good of a game experience, if not better. The Uncharted games were brilliant successes, and people are VERY much into the whole “post-apocalyptic, zombie” stuff right now. Don’t ignore that. I really don’t see how The Last Of Us could be a flop at ALL.
Dead Space 3, not gonna happen either. Dead Space 1 and 2 were big commercial and critical successes. Even if this one does a belly-flop (which I doubt by playing the demo, but we’ll see) it’s still going to move a massive amount of units.
Again, never said I think The Last of Us will be bad. I think it’s going to be great. It just won’t sell as well as Sony hopes. Remember, the first Uncharted didn’t sell great initially — it took a couple sequels and a lengthy concerted effort from Sony to turn Uncharted into a major franchise. The Last of Us probably won’t get that chance.
Last of Us has a May release so there is still loads of time to market it as opposed to Dead Space which only has a week. In that time we will see more story trailers, a demo and probably something which has already started happening which is a lot of connections being made between Last of Us’ themes and the same themes used in The Walking Dead. A million copies is a terribly low benchmark for this game. Kingdoms of Alamar sold over a million and change while being a new ip from an unknown company and most likely a worse game(won’t know until I play Last of Us but all signs point to that being the case). Naughty Dog is no longer an unknown company like it was when the first Uncharted came out and has the reputation to stand behind a new IP and have predictable success. Sorry I am not buying it, that is to say your argument Nate. I will buy Last of Us.
Weird. I watched every trailer I could find when news was first coming out for ‘The Last of Us’ and thought it was just end of the world, post apocalyptic stuff. Desperate crazy humans. Not zombies. I must have missed that part. Kinda bums me out too. I’m really tired of zombies in everything. I think it’s more creepy with just desperate crazy people. Maybe I’m in the minority, but evil people are much scarier to me than flesh eating zombies.
I’m really looking forward to The Last of Us, and I hated the Uncharted games FWIW.
Naughty Dog is gonna pull it off. Just watch, tropes or no tropes, it’s gonna earn every bit of praise it gets.
per this article’s headline, the writer expects The Last Of Us to FLOP. FLOP! not “do okay” or “sold a good amount but wasn’t a blockbuster.” he expects it to John Carter. we can come back to this post a few months from now and have our laughs, but there’s just no way on this green Earth that The Last Of Us OR Dead Space 3 are going to “flop.” I’m sorry, but it ain’t happening. Both are way too strong and I’d bet serious coin on it. TheIncredibleBulk has some great points, too.
I’m looking forward to Tomb Raider. I think I can put up with a few QTEs if the rest of the game is good. The Last Of Us…we’ll see. Need a demo for that first. I might check out the new Bioshock. Other than that it’s Backlog City for me.
coming from a big gears fan, i am NOT looking forward to judgement out all. no dbno, no executions, and (probably) no horde mode. no thank you. wish they would’ve stuck with gow3 for the duration of the 360′s shelf life until the new gen console comes out.
Agreed, if it had just been a huge expansion for GoW3 for like 25 bucks, I would be much more interested.
The Last of Us will most certainly not flop. Not even close. People are crazy devoted to Naughty Dog, and Naughty Dog earned said devotion with Uncharted. It’s a gorgeous game, from one of the best developers, and it’s going to be marketed to all hell. I’d be surprised if we didn’t see a Super Bowl commercial.
Actually, if I had to peg one bomb this year, it’ll be “Walking Dead: Survival Instinct”. The game itself is probably OK, and Terminal Reality isn’t a bad developer, but the smell of “RUSH THIS OUT WHILE THE LICENSE IS HOT” is thick with this one.
@Dan I think you underestimate the stupidity of humanity. There’s a lot of people who are probably going to buy it just because Walking Dead’s in the name.
The only true zombie game anyone needs to worry about in 2013 is Undead Labs’s State of Decay, which will come out for XBLA layer this year, with another full game sequel releasing likely in 2014.
Not sure The Last of Us has really been confirmed as zombies, yet.
@Dan: What RockFlagNEagle said. You know there’ll be a lot of people who’ll see the box in the store, think “Oo! It’s that Walking Dead game that won all those awards!” and plonk down their $60 in a snap. Honestly, if not for the success of the Telltale game, Survival Instincts probably would tank, but I think the word of mouth from that one will end up helping it a lot. Which is a bummer.
The Last of us doesn’t have “Zombie” per say. The infected humans have a parasite that controls them. Naughty Dog got this concept from ants. There are certain ants that can contract a parasite, said parasite controls the ant, takes the ant back to the colony, explodes and infects every other ant in the colony. These other ants then go searching for other colonies to infect.
They said they took this concept and wondered what would happen if this parasite could infect humans.
Guys, keep in mind that this whole “The license sells the game” idea was pretty much THQ’s business strategy until 2009.
And then they abandoned it and went bankrupt within three years. So maybe it wasn’t such a bad strategy after all.
Having played the demos fir both MGR Revengance (ugh, I don’t even like typing that dumb ass title) and Dead Space 3, I think MGR is def gonna flop hard. The controls are terrible, the free blade mechanic is unbelievabley awkward, and this thing bears far more similarity to a half-assed Devil May Cry than anything from its venerable lineage.
Dead Space on the other hand is going to do well in spite of EA’s constant ham-fisted monetizing of everthing. The weapons system finally takes the leash off as far as customization goes, and this is best handling Issac yet from what I’ve played so far. The co-op is optional so the core single player experience is still there (once again, fuck you EA and your “everything must have social” policy) and most importantly, it still feels like a Dead Space game. Mad props to the hardworking guys and gals of Visceral for sneaking what looks like a decent single player game past EA’s corporate fuckery.
Also, while I ‘m not particularly excited for it, ams I don’t think Gears is going to do well, I wouldn’t totally count out their installed fan base yet.
Dude I agree the title is retarded for MGR but as for your critiques, you’re wrong on all counts. It’s made by Platinum and it’s supposed to be different than a standard MGS game but saying the controls are terrible? come on.
I’ll actually puit a bit more of a refined argument to the thing. THe controls may not be terrible, bu they are largely useless. You know the stick-controlled slash mechanic? Well you can get pretty much the same result just by mashing Square and Triangle.
Dont get me wrong, I dig Platinum. In fact Okami is one of my all time favorites and I would love to see them get their hands on a series like Darksiders. I will say that a lot of my disappointment stems from the fact that this isn’t a Metal Gear game, it’s Bayonetta but with Raiden (umm no thanks). As for the controls, a lot of my issue came from the fact that the camera becomes inverted in free-sword mode and it fucks everything up because there is no option to change it. Changing the analog stick assignments helped a little bit but it’s still really really awkward and that awkwardness becomes a deal breaker when you need to pull off a precision cut in the middle of a fight but instead you just stand there and look at the ceiling while you get killed.
So I’m gonna pass. If Konami puts out an HD graphical update of MGS: Snake Eater? I will be first in line.
This is second hand, but a friend of mine who’s played the Dead Space 3 demo reports that the crafting system is both stupid and annoying as fuck, and worst of all NOT SCARY.
I personally liked the hell out of the crafting system in the demo. I really appreciated the fact that I could figure out a weapons configuration that suited how I like to play (I ended up loving the “Aliens” style pulse rifle/flame thrower combo). As far as it being scary, I’m sure Visceral didn’t want to give anything good away in the demo but it def still had that DS vibe.
RAYMAN hasn’t been good since the first one. But damnit, it would make a great children’s cartoon.
why is metal gear a better devil may cry game than DMC is?
Spot on with everything except for last of us. that game is going to kick ass.
Yeah, you’re crazy if you think The Last of Us is going to under perform in any way.
I can’t see The Last of Us flopping. I haven’t heard one negative thing about it. And do people really care about games being grim? Fallout, Dead Space, and Bioshock aren’t exactly all happy and those sell well. At least to my knowledge…
I think it’s pretty bad when The Last Of Us is about 30,000 preorders over Gears of War. Plus you’ll have uncharted fans all over this and probably one of the last big ps3 games. MG Rising is pretty dissappointing because it’s actually sweet but will share the same fate as the new DMC. I figured the new Tomb Raider would have been on this list.
I’ll be buying MGR and Last of Us but I can’t say for the rest of the gaming world. I would see “hardcore” gamers (god I hate that saying) buying said games but I don’t know about the mass appeal. The Last of Us seems like it may actually have a huge PR push it seems so maybe it will work.
You know what games have ‘mass appeal’? Angry birds and its ilk. Fuck mass appeal. I’ll take 10 games aimed at a smaller audience than 1 mass appeal game any time. Shame that 1 game would outsell all the others anyway.
I feel like there’s too much hype behind The Last Of Us for it to really fail. It obviously won’t be an enormous success on the level of a Gears or a Halo, but I really think it’ll be one of the best-selling PS3 exclusives when all is said and done. I also thing MGR will do well enough… maybe better than MGS4, since it won’t be a PS3 exclusive. And I’m with Dan about Beyond; pretty confident that that one’s gonna tank. Though I’ll be buying it.
But I do agree with you about all the other things on this list. I’m bummed about DS3, but if it does sell poorly, then at least maybe EA might learn their lesson about trying to fix something that isn’t broken (I guess that’s pretty unlikely, actually, but we’ll see). I just hope it doesn’t sell badly enough to end the franchise right there, because it’s one of my favorites. And Rayman Legends I’m 100% bummed about. I guess it’s only because of Nintendo’s involvement that that game even got made in the first place, after Origins fared so poorly, but I doubt the gamble will pay off for them. But hell, maybe it’ll do well and Yoshi Yarn will be the one that tanks. Legends is my system-seller, so there’s at least that slight reason for optimism.
Fucking hell Nathan, its like I can actually taste the disdain you have for the average gamer in The Last Of Us’s entry.
I mean, for fucks sake, give gamers some fucking credit – we aren’t all just a bunch of chimps on methamphetamines, some of us do actually like introspective and emotional games.
The Last Of Us has been racking up pre-orders from Amazon since 2011. Gamestop has been taking preorders hand over fist. I’m pretty sure this game could actually beat the sales of Uncharted 3.
Also, if you’re reading this, I’d like to request I get my name on our list. Give me the guidelines, I can write up Agent and Last Guardian just perfect for you.
I know the market for zombie games is overflowing, but I have no doubt The Last of Us will sell. It looks too good to pass up.
The zombie market is oversaturated, but The Walking Dead proves that the intelligently made Zombie game market is still fertile ground.
I mean, it makes perfect sense. Whats the one thing a zombie needs to survive? Brains.
As awesome as The Last of Us looks, the real selling point for me will be the levels taking place in a post-apocalyptic version of my home town.
This list makes me sad, not necessarily for the the games’ actual sales- that’s not really any of my concern. Rather, I’m concerned about what the lack of sales will do to the mind set of a lot of these companies. Poor future.
the last of us sounds like it has the ability and story and overall tone to survive and be a mega hit. i think you’re worried that it won’t be good.
Depends on what your definition of a flop is. A system exclusive AAA title like the Last of Us with 100K pre-orders sixteen weeks out is almost guaranteed to sell a million units in its first few months. Is that a flop?
Fun article to read. Pretty accurate too. I will buy most any game that really looks good, and looking at this list (that has a few I didn’t even know about) I don’t know I will be getting any of these. I have weird taste though, so who knows. I hated the over the shoulder thing with Dead Space, and since the sequel had the same thing, I won’t bother with the 3rd go round. The only one on this list I was interested in was ‘The Last of Us’, but I plan on seeing what others think before buying it. Dan I’m waiting on your review.
The Last Of Us… ok that looks awesome. And if they had simplified it to a guy FPS trying to survive killing whatever I’d have passed.
That may be my next game purchase; only one on the list with a chance anyhow.