C
codeninja
Guest
Nintendog has been one of the biggest success stories of this holiday season's games; well over a million in US alone and over 4 millions in the world. Along with Animal Crossing, way more females purchased the games, who usually don't buy games. On the otherhand, many hardcore gamers were not impressed with the game at all, and some called it gimmicky. The game doesn't enjoy strong typical hardcore gamer following like Ico, which failed at the market place.
Street Fighter, Megaman and Castlevania series have their strong followings. None of them will make it to top 10 sale list, but small and very vocal "hardcore" followers will buy every version of the games as long as they make them.
GTA is a mixture of both groups. IMO hardcore audience alone is not big enough to push a game above 500k mark. GTA game itself is not a casual game, but it's got enough to appeal to casual gamers, although many of casual gamers probably stop playing the game shortly after killing some prostitutes and run over a few pedestrians.
I think, there are ways to succeed with or without the support of hardcore crowd. However, casual gamers, if we call them gamers, holds the real key to the financial success.
Street Fighter, Megaman and Castlevania series have their strong followings. None of them will make it to top 10 sale list, but small and very vocal "hardcore" followers will buy every version of the games as long as they make them.
GTA is a mixture of both groups. IMO hardcore audience alone is not big enough to push a game above 500k mark. GTA game itself is not a casual game, but it's got enough to appeal to casual gamers, although many of casual gamers probably stop playing the game shortly after killing some prostitutes and run over a few pedestrians.
I think, there are ways to succeed with or without the support of hardcore crowd. However, casual gamers, if we call them gamers, holds the real key to the financial success.