Is it true that this game isn't selling so hot?

[eclipse]

Want to try again? If he had attacked my argument I wouldn't have an issue with him. He's a flaming troll though.

Cut it out.

Do not respond to this post. If you have a problem with the moderation staff, you are to contact Tangerine, and ONLY Tangerine. Doing anything else besides what I just stated will be met with a suspension.

EDIT: A word

Edited January 7, 2016 by eclipse

[Avk]

The sales figures for the second week are out (12/28 - 01/03). Famitsu and Media Create don't have the same figures, but in either case, it's not really good.

The game is no longer ranked in Media Create, and is in 16th position in Famitsu, at around 9k, so 32k total.

For the eShop ranking (also for 12/28 - 01/03), the game is in 7th position, after Minecraft, Splatoon, Super Mario Maker and the 3 Mother games, which is a decent performance I think.

Edited January 7, 2016 by Avk

[eclipse]

On pure numbers, the Famitsu list look awful.

But after looking at the Neogaf post, that's surprisingly not bad. It looks like almost all games are down on sales in terms of percentage, probably because everyone's done buying Christmas gifts. Little shocked by the lack of physical copies sold, though. Probably won't see it in next week's Famitsu, either.

[Avk]

For what it is worth, I've heard during the previous weeks that the bundle game + Wii U was sold out in multiple places (maybe they didn't ship many, or people got this bundle instead of the Splatoon one which was also sold out). Indeed, all softwares are seeing a significant drop, so it's not only #FE.

And I wonder if the loading times comparison are also affecting physical sales of the game, it probably isn't the main cause, but I think it could have affected a little.

[eclipse]

Do you think the sales "shortage" is because Atlus pulled one of its infamous "we are printing a few copies of this at a time" deal? For an American example, I got tired of waiting for Stella Glow to be released in physical form, so I got it from the eShop. It showed up in my local Gamestop a month and a half after it was released.

[Roy: Marquess of Pherae]

My friend in Japan says that most Fire Emblem players don't even know it's out.

[Avk]

Do you think the sales "shortage" is because Atlus pulled one of its infamous "we are printing a few copies of this at a time" deal? For an American example, I got tired of waiting for Stella Glow to be released in physical form, so I got it from the eShop. It showed up in my local Gamestop a month and a half after it was released.

To be perfectly honest, I've no clue. I'll try to look up some sources, but as far as I know, the game is managed and published by Nintendo, so I suppose it's mostly on their end. Plus I remember having heard that the quantity of games and stuff available (in retail) is mostly determined by the retailers ordering (not absolutely sure, and there are also some exceptions like the Splatoon bundle being sold out and Nintendo not manufacturing more, or so I've heard), they probably didn't expect it to sell much, so the quantity was limited (for the Wii U bundle, I don't know how the Fortissimo Edition performed, and there is still plenty of standard editions if we look at the Famitsu figures).

To the answer the post above (quoting not working well...), the game wasn't apparently heavily advertised.

There were things like coverage in magazines like Famitsu, Dengeki, one apparition in a FE Cipher livestream on Niconico, one livestream dedicated to the game on Niconico,

, and some ads (toi8 art looks amazing imo).

It's not a really huge advertising push, but I can understand why they didn't do it for a niche game like this one.

Edited January 7, 2016 by Avk

[SSbardock84]

No surprise, doubt it'll be much better when released to NA probably even worse. I'll still buy it of course though.

[Aiddon]

You could say this game is twice as bad as DmC because it's eschewing two existing fanbases rather than one.

Though is it a fair comparison? It doesn't appeal to me either, but it's for similar reasons that Persona and elements of modern FE don't appeal to me. I would think it's right up their alley.

The DmC comparison is a terrible one; the final product was legitimately mediocre, but what killed it in its cradle was the developer antagonizing the fanbase every chance they got, usually trying to display critics as strawmen and taking cheap shots at Dante. Instead of acting like professionals they acted like children and the game rightfully flopped. That failure was due to the developer legitimately, nakedly antagonizing people.

This is not the case here. There has not been ONE instance of Atlus or Nintendo doing such a thing as the game is just a goofy side project that is taking two disparate franchises and marrying them in order to give it a unique identity. Which is nothing new to Nintendo what with games like Pokemon Conquest, Hyrule Warriors, and Puzzle and Dragons Super Mario Edition finding interesting ways to the series they were crossing over and making them more than just "X Game in Y Skin." The devs are not inflicting any sort of insult to FE or SMT or to their fanbases. They are not blatantly slinging insults at SMT or FE, but instead just showed off the unique vibe the game presents and doing interesting exercises in the iconography of FE juxtaposed with the gameplay/setting style of SMT and its various spinoffs. Nintendo and Atlus both worked on it and have clear respect for both franchises. They were just doing something new as an experiment.

Which is where I point out the big, glowing elephant in the room everyone has been dutifully ignoring: pointing out its reception accomplishes nothing. It effects nothing. FE and SMT will just go on existing, making new entries, and trying new things on Nintendo systems and this game will still exist and have been released. Even if a worldwide flop occurs it will be, at best, a minor disappointment.

[Hardin]

Do you think the sales "shortage" is because Atlus pulled one of its infamous "we are printing a few copies of this at a time" deal? For an American example, I got tired of waiting for Stella Glow to be released in physical form, so I got it from the eShop. It showed up in my local Gamestop a month and a half after it was released.

Not at all, Atlus is only the game developer, distribution is handled by NCL.

[ckc22]

The DmC comparison is a terrible one; the final product was legitimately mediocre, but what killed it in its cradle was the developer antagonizing the fanbase every chance they got, usually trying to display critics as strawmen and taking cheap shots at Dante. Instead of acting like professionals they acted like children and the game rightfully flopped. That failure was due to the developer legitimately, nakedly antagonizing people.

This is not the case here. There has not been ONE instance of Atlus or Nintendo doing such a thing as the game is just a goofy side project that is taking two disparate franchises and marrying them in order to give it a unique identity. Which is nothing new to Nintendo what with games like Pokemon Conquest, Hyrule Warriors, and Puzzle and Dragons Super Mario Edition finding interesting ways to the series they were crossing over and making them more than just "X Game in Y Skin." The devs are not inflicting any sort of insult to FE or SMT or to their fanbases. They are not blatantly slinging insults at SMT or FE, but instead just showed off the unique vibe the game presents and doing interesting exercises in the iconography of FE juxtaposed with the gameplay/setting style of SMT and its various spinoffs. Nintendo and Atlus both worked on it and have clear respect for both franchises. They were just doing something new as an experiment.

Which is where I point out the big, glowing elephant in the room everyone has been dutifully ignoring: pointing out its reception accomplishes nothing. It effects nothing. FE and SMT will just go on existing, making new entries, and trying new things on Nintendo systems and this game will still exist and have been released. Even if a worldwide flop occurs it will be, at best, a minor disappointment.

I'm not sure if I'm allowed to post but I largely agree. I think the game is probably decent, if not exactly what I wanted (and judging "the internet's" reaction I personally believe that to be fairly widespread - inb4 crucifixion) . Even if it flops it's not really going to do anything to the individual franchises, or even necessarily Atlus' and Nintendo's relationship. To me it just feels like a missed opportunity. Perhaps if they had never released that first teaser people's reactions would have been different because they wouldn't have had time to imagine what the game would be like based off that teaser.

[Senario]

The DmC comparison is a terrible one; the final product was legitimately mediocre, but what killed it in its cradle was the developer antagonizing the fanbase every chance they got, usually trying to display critics as strawmen and taking cheap shots at Dante. Instead of acting like professionals they acted like children and the game rightfully flopped. That failure was due to the developer legitimately, nakedly antagonizing people.

I remember those comments, that developer didn't know when to keep his mouth shut lol. He even put in a joke about Dante's white hair+hairstyle in the game to spite those people, it was not pleasant. I'd wager that the developer's attitude in this case where he was responding to fans in a...problematic manner was one of the more problematic things concerning that game. Luckily, as you said, this game does not do anything of the sort. Not everybody likes it but at the very least they see their job as simply making the game with hopefully a decent amount of people supporting it. Which is what is going on in a way. About as much support as you can expect without any advertising nowadays.

Loads of Nintendo Games aren't advertised all that well lately, it definitely makes the games cheaper to produce and has a lower sales number needed to reach a profitable point...but at the same time it is difficult to get people to recognize that the game is even out as Roy and Avk mention. Some people in my family are huge Mario fans and that is the only games they really play. Basically just the platformer 2D and some 3D Mario games. But they didn't know that a new Mario game came out for the last two mario games, 3D world and Mario Maker.

But on the bright side, at least they don't need to sell millions of copies to be profitable. Lots of the budget money for these big name games are funneled into advertising, both good and average games alike.

Edited January 7, 2016 by Senario

[Roflolxp54]

As somebody mentioned before, the timing of the release is a very likely culprit for the game's low sales. It was right after Christmas -- what are people doing in Japan during Christmas? In Fire Emblem-terms, young adults trying to score S-supports (though there are plenty of people who do go through their X-mas loot). Japan's attitude towards Christmas/holiday season is a bit different from what's seen in America (less commercialism and consumerism).

Edited January 7, 2016 by Roflolxp54

[NinjaMonkey]

it probably would have done better if Atlus had showed it off more, instead of announcing it and then hiding it away for two years. Also, if it had been a proper crossover between the two series, instead of some cheesy J-idol rubbish with a sprinkling of FE stuff here and there.

[Avk]

Sales for the previous week (January 04- January10), the game is 24th in the Famitsu ranking with almost 4k, it's probably the last week we'll see the game in the ranking.

On the eShop ranking, the game is still in the Wii U top 10 at 9th place. I wonder how much does that represent (for this week and the previous).

As expected the game didn't perform well, now just hoping it'll do okay once it releases in NA/Europe (probably won't be great either).

[Thane]

I haven't been interested in this game at all due to me not being in the target demographic, to put it mildly. I've got my fair share of problems with games from both Intelligent Systems and Atlus so while I don't feel too bad about a game with such a seemingly trite story failing, I had wanted it to sell a bit better to warrant a continued collaboration between Atlus and Nintendo.

But hey, I know nothing about stuff like this, so hopefully one flop won't ruin any other potential future prospects.

[eclipse]

Huh. It's still on Famitsu, which is a lot more credit than I gave it.

For a game with a crappy release date (like, it was released AFTER everyone bought their Christmas gifts) and apparently a bad PR team, it's doing pretty well.

[Faye]

I've been wanting to try this game so I do hope we see a stateside release. It's a shame most people just see the all the anime and go "nope". I think it looks a bit more interesting than that.

[luyairis]

I've been wanting to try this game so I do hope we see a stateside release. It's a shame most people just see the all the anime and go "nope". I think it looks a bit more interesting than that.

It's definitely a lot better. Genei Ibunroku's battle system is one of the best I've ever played in a jrpg, the music is great, even if maybe the story and characters you might find meh overall.

...I could go on for hours about the battle system (if you don't mind spoilers, click here to watch a very good representation of the battle system).

I would recommend it overall. But that's just my subjective opinion :p

[Lann La Mirah]

Heres hoping the next FE crossover is neat I serious expect a crossover with Dynasty warriors at some point.

That's a crossover I would LOVE to see. I feel like it would be a perfect crossover~

[Avk]

Sorry for the bump, I didn't really know where to put that, and I don't think it warrants a new thread of its own since we've discussed sales here, but the game got quite a boost after the concert that happened 2 days ago (concert which was apparently a big success).
The game achieved to take rank 2 on the Wii U Nintendo eShop, rank that was previously owned by Splatoon, and behind Minecraft at 1st place. Also 2nd on amazon.co.jp on best selling Wii U games, behind Splatoon.

I didn't know what to expect from the concert, since the game didn't perform well, but it apparently did a lot of positive word of mouth on top of being a success, with the merchandise selling extremely quickly and the afternoon session being sold out (the evening session also did well, but I didn't see much report on that). I'm a little surprised since the situation is kind of "reversed", the game performing well should have brought people to the event instead of the event doing well (when the game didn't) getting more people to buy the game, since people that attended the event must already own the game (they were also selling the game at the event, and apparently one of the voice actor made the remark, saying "it's to gift your friends" or something of the sort, I'm not absolutely positive on that, but well, it's just some random statement).

There were other interesting things that transpired from the concert, but I think this is probably the most unexpected.

Edited May 17, 2016 by Avk

[Taka-kun]

Maybe the game is not so bad. Maybe it's just the bad publicity, seeing how choosy alot of both FE and Atlus fans are. I admit, the whole idol concept does put me off since it feels so unserious but like they say, one should not judge a book by its cover.

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

coming back to this topic for a post, after doing some research i find it amusing that other altus games, persona 4 and the dancing spin off, treat the idol industry in a negative light, so much so you could've guessed the company wasn't fond of the practices and behind the scenes events, not to mention the whole concept of "Idol purity" which can break a girl for life if that image gets ruined.

then we got this game which plays the idol life completely straight apparently and about how awesome it is to be one. (or so i heard.)

I'm just saying, i haven't seen such two facedness since Hillary Clinton.

Edited May 24, 2016 by HF Makalov Fanboy Kai

[RedRob]

coming back to this topic for a post, after doing some research i find it amusing that other altus games, persona 4 and the dancing spin off, treat the idol industry in a negative light, so much so you could've guessed the company wasn't fond of the practices and behind the scenes events, not to mention the whole concept of "Idol purity" which can break a girl for life if that image gets ruined.

then we got this game which plays the idol life completely straight apparently and about how awesome it is to be one. (or so i heard.)

I'm just saying, i haven't seen such two facedness since Hillary Clinton.

To be fair, Hilary is a single person, while Atlus is a company comprised of multiple people, who may or may not work with others individuals from different groups on certain projects. Expecting a single unified view on something from them might be expecting too much. Plus, it was like one game that had a negative light of the idol industry. Its not like Atlus has a history of hating the idol industry.

[Avk]

Maybe the game is not so bad. Maybe it's just the bad publicity, seeing how choosy alot of both FE and Atlus fans are. I admit, the whole idol concept does put me off since it feels so unserious but like they say, one should not judge a book by its cover.

The game is not bad. If you like turn based RPGs that is, if you don't, then the game probably wasn't for you to begin with, and that's fine. Whether one finds the entertainment theme appealing or not is usually the point of contention, and there is no absolute answer to that. Personally, I'm not incredibly fond of it (I prefer much more classic fantasy, like Fire Emblem), but I don't dislike it either. I probably would have ignored the game if the gameplay wasn't as good as it is.

coming back to this topic for a post, after doing some research i find it amusing that other altus games, persona 4 and the dancing spin off, treat the idol industry in a negative light, so much so you could've guessed the company wasn't fond of the practices and behind the scenes events, not to mention the whole concept of "Idol purity" which can break a girl for life if that image gets ruined.

then we got this game which plays the idol life completely straight apparently and about how awesome it is to be one. (or so i heard.)

I'm just saying, i haven't seen such two facedness since Hillary Clinton.

The post above answers this pretty well, the team behind #FE isn't the same as the team behind Persona, and I didn't play DAN, but I don't think they portrayed the "idol industry" too negatively in Persona 4 (it was balanced in my opinion).

For #FE, it's not especially that they show how awesome being an idol is, more like the overall tone of the game is more upbeat and positive. One of the negative points I've seen mentioned is that they didn't focus enough on the bad aspect of the entertainment industry, but if they aimed to have a more cheerful game, then it's understandable why they wouldn't put too much focus on that.