I don’t know how accurate this is, but it is a list of the top 100 games of 2006 and their relative sales. Good to see some quality games make the list, apparently only 20% of the games scored an average of 75% or lower in review totals.
Good to see Chromehounds make the list as well as Top Spin 2.
Some surprises such as Thrillville from Lucas Arts and Sonic Rider’s coming in at an impressive #32.
I’m glad Hitman: Blood Money did well, as well as Tomb Raider Legend, even though that wasn’t much of a surprise.
Re: Family Guy - Remember, it was released on multiple platforms and is a loved and recognizable property. While the game may not be for you, there are obviously people out there who like it enough to buy a game.
Nothing really surprising about that list, though. A mix of licensed games, established franchises, and the occasional AAA new IP/console exclusive game. Madden sitting pretty on top as well.
Parents buy gifts for their kids, and a Pixar movie is something that is instantly recognizable by both parent and child alike
Not sure why it’s so surprising. Are you just as surprised that Lego Star Wars is so high on the list? It’s a fun little game, but it’s actually rather poorly made and it’s got gasp! two licenses!
Not the best year for gaming really. I know Okami and FF12 have been out for god knows how long elsewhere but here in England all the great games are coming in 2007, with Okami and FF12 kicking it off in Feb, MGS 4, GTA 4, DMC 4, Assassins Creed and many more great looking next gen games coming somewhere in 2007. At least FF12, Okami and anything else for PS2 will keep me busy til I get a PS3.
In the future we won’t be seeing games like Cars at number one in any sales charts. The only reason we do is because parents just buy whatever is popular, but we are experienced and can give our children real games. If I have kids who get into gaming I’ll give them my Saturn and copy of PDS and see if they like it enough to cling onto it for 10-20 years and give to their children. If all goes to plan my copy of PDS will become a family heirloom. This will hopefully steer the children away from shite. I believe playing PDS has conditioned me not to play crap like Cars and made me play less known or commercially successful games like Ico. So make them play PDS or Final Fantasy games while they’re young to steer them clear of crap.
Parents buy gifts for their kids, and a Pixar movie is something that is instantly recognizable by both parent and child alike
Not sure why it’s so surprising. Are you just as surprised that Lego Star Wars is so high on the list? It’s a fun little game, but it’s actually rather poorly made and it’s got gasp! two licenses![/quote]
Well maybe because videogames are stil a LOT more popular among teenagers than kids around here.Not really suprised about Lego actually seeing as how it’s Star Wars and it’s suposed to be quite fun.And then it’s SW some more.
Well, Sonic Riders was released much earlier in the year than Okami. So it had a healthy head start over it saleswise.[/quote]
Yeah. Stupid people are the reason why Clover Studios shut down because their games didn’t sell so hot but were all acclaimed games. I’m amazed Okami is even on a chart. Maybe it’ll make it to the Greatest Hits list and become $20. But somehow I doubt it. Too bad because it’s one of the most awesome and emotional games I’ve ever played since Beyond Good and Evil. Stupid people are also the reason we’ll never see a sequel to that game either.
I wouldn’t count on it. Sure, teenagers and people in their early 20’s (18-24) are the largest user group across all territories, there are very few games where everyone’s tastes line up. Kids, on the other hand, are fairly predictable in what they will like. Just about every parent in the US and Europe will take their kids to see a Pixar movie (which is why they are amongst the best selling movies), and kids are guaranteed to love it. So, when the birthdays or X-mas rolls around, what do you think they’ll be asking for? A Final Fantasy game that they won’t understand anyway? Or the next Pixar game?
And really… is it that ludicrous that a child would enjoy a Pixar game? I guarantee most of the toys we played with as children were dumb. GI Joe? (I think it’s called Action Force or something in the UK.) Hell, my uncle created most of the GI Joe characters, and I played with them with passion, but they were dumb toys. Is that so wrong?
I wouldn’t count on it. Sure, teenagers and people in their early 20’s (18-24) are the largest user group across all territories, there are very few games where everyone’s tastes line up. Kids, on the other hand, are fairly predictable in what they will like. Just about every parent in the US and Europe will take their kids to see a Pixar movie (which is why they are amongst the best selling movies), and kids are guaranteed to love it. So, when the birthdays or X-mas rolls around, what do you think they’ll be asking for? A Final Fantasy game that they won’t understand anyway? Or the next Pixar game?
And really… is it that ludicrous that a child would enjoy a Pixar game? I guarantee most of the toys we played with as children were dumb. GI Joe? (I think it’s called Action Force or something in the UK.) Hell, my uncle created most of the GI Joe characters, and I played with them with passion, but they were dumb toys. Is that so wrong?[/quote]
Yes, it’s wrong. Just like putting a child through elementary school is wrong. At that age, a child is absorbing massive amounts of information and actually retaining it, which is why they should be taught Calculus and several foreign languages when they’re incredibly young.
In regard to games, introducing children to Pixar crap and the like only lowers the bar for when they mature into a teenager or an adult. The last thing we need is more braindead zombies in this world, and it’s crap like this which makes it happen. You may want to change your stance on this, soon.
Abadd: I agree with what you are saying (apart from the part where you said our childhood toys were dumb :p;ah I still wish I had been given one of those Mighty Max portable mini playground thingies with the little figures …) but still that doesn’t explain why there are still more people buying Cars than other games out there.Unless we are talking about astronomical numbers of young Cars fans here.Bigger than the mainstream teen audience…?
Lol. Hello Kadamose! Also, what future are you talking about? Weren’t you convinced mankind will be driven to extinction before long (among many other alternate future predictions that contradict the very nature of each other)?
And I believe Abadd’s point is kids actually enjoy such games, not that they are forced to play them because they aren’t given ‘grown up toys’ instead…
[quote=“Al3xand3r”]Lol. Hello Kadamose! Also, what future are you talking about? Weren’t you convinced mankind will be driven to extinction before long (among many other alternate future predictions that contradict the very nature of each other)?
And I believe Abadd’s point is kids actually enjoy such games, not that they are forced to play them because they aren’t given ‘grown up toys’ instead…[/quote]
I’ve made several predictions, all of which happen on the same date: December 21st, 2012. What wipes out the majority of manklnd, as well as most of the life on this planet, will be a pole shift. This has happened several times before and will happen again – the magnetic field around the earth is exponentially weakening, and once it fails completely and reaches ‘zero point’, the North and South poles will reverse. We have a little more than five years left before this happens, yet you’re already saying I’m wrong.
You should be a politician…you would do well promoting the ‘Global Warming’ scam.
No I was talking about your other prediction, about how we’ll be able to create our own sort of material-VR worlds, and you’d be able to make real life cat anime girls. Surely if mankind is driven to extinction within the next 5 years then it will stop us from achieving that level of technology… So which is going to happen then? Will we all die, or will we all live a real fantasy? And again, what future are you talking about in your last post? If we’re all going to be gone in 5 years then you can stop telling people what to correct, it won’t matter anyway… Thanks.
Exactly. I played PDS when I was eight and watched things like films or TV programmes that none of the other kids liked or understood. I believe this stopped me from ever getting into crap things. I’m always into bands my friends have never heard of like Joy Division (legends). I’m always looking for a cult film to watch while my friends or classmates are watching crap like Epic Movie. I could understand everything that was going on in Taxi Driver from a young age. All that stuff thats made me think more about whats going on around me. I know that makes me seem a litte emo but I actually hate emos. So if we force little kids to do the same we could see 8 year olds analysing the hidden meanings behind the tweenies.
Gehpnaet - Well, as I said in my previous post, it’s not necessarily that there are more kids, it’s just that their tastes tend to align more often than teenagers. Kids tend to flock to very specific things (Pokemon comes to mind) and when something is popular amongst kids, it gets saturated in that group.
However, once people get to their teenage years, tastes start to become more distinct, and people begin to break apart into more specific groups, making it more difficult to hit larger portions of that market.
Which is why even though the younger demographic isn’t quite as big as the teens (it’s the next largest, though), it’s a much more unified demographic.
That, coupled with the fact that while a game may have anywhere from $1 million to $7 million in marketing, a AAA movie will have $50 million to $100 million in marketing. A lot more people will know about a movie than a game.