Feder – PS3 exclusivity will “help launch” Agent

Didn’t he say the same thing a few days ago? Or was that someone else?

He did.

http://www.vg247.com/2009/06/06/take-two-president-talks-agent-exclusivity-to-ps3/

He’s probably right – you get a bunch of money up front, and you get a guaranteed larger number of first day sales because whichever flavour of fanboy you’re targetting will be sure to pick it up immediately just because it’s an exclusive and therefore full of brag.

On the other hand, this is Rockstar. People pick up their games anyway, regardless of exclusivity. Unless the game’s somehow a bizarre diversion from their usual type of output, it’s hard to imagine how it could have ever been a failure.

Which just leaves the money.

Sorry. My bad.

The one major difference being that the PS2 completely dominated the console gaming market in its lifetime, to the point where the competition was largely null and void.

I love Agent already – it’s Rockstar, after all. Too bad I don’t have a PS3…

It helped propell LBP to the top 10. Same for Resistance and Killzone 2. I mean just look at these chartz

Highly arbitrary choices there, Tonka. How about the several multi-plat games which have sold more on PS3 than on 360 – despite there being 40% more of the latter in homes?

Yes, they’re not exclusives, but it shows games can do better on PS3.

Hmmm . . . relying on fanboyism to launch a new IP. Not a bad idea. Not a bad idea at all.

Some call it “fanboyism”, other call it “brand loyalty”.

Non the less, It’s a clever marketing strategy and good exclusives are a perfect way to establish a strong brand-image.

The last non-GTA game to come out of Rockstar North was the first Manhunt. Based on that, can we confidently say that Agent will
a) be automatically great, and
b) be automatically successful?

I’d wager that if MGS4 wasn’t exclusive you wouldn’t still be hearing about a year old product. As is a new rumour about a 360 port seems to appear every month, giving the game constant bumps of exposure from an enthusiast press that are forever obsessed with what’s coming next and rarely discuss things once they’re released.

Similarly a lot of 360 owners want MGS4 on their machine simply because they can’t play it. If they did there’s a fair chance they wouldn’t even like it as, whilst an excellent game, it relies heavily on nostalgia and fan service.

I think we can safely say ‘Agent’ won’t be rated AO, and that’s difference enough.

Then again, not many 360 owners bought a PS3 just to play MGS4. If it’d been dual-platform from the start, would it have actually sold more copies? I suspect it would have sold significantly more units, even if it had dropped out of the public mindset more quickly.

Whether the same applies to a new franchise, I don’t know. But in this day and age limiting yourself to a single machine doesn’t sound like a great idea, especially when the machine is currently sitting in third place, sales-wise.

/proud member of the ‘all games for everyone’ society

Looking at sales figures of the latest 1st party PS3 exclusives (KZ2 for example), it’s difficult to see exactly where the benefits of exclusivity lie for 3rd party devs.

Well it creates buzz socially. It still needs good marketing, and to be released at a more sensible time of the year than Killzone 2.

Sony enjoy sending their IPs out to die.

“Then again, not many 360 owners bought a PS3 just to play MGS4. ”

Correct. But that’s not the purpose of doing exclusives. It’s sole purpose is to establish a well defined brand-image. All exclusives combined (of one platform that is) constitute the image of said brand. And sometimes this is more important to the platform-holders than an additional few thousand of copies sold.

Not that many 360 owners, perhaps, but how many people bought a PS3 instead of an Xbox in order to play MGS4? It’s sold over 4 million copies, too, which isn’t exactly shabby for an exclusive on the machine with the smallest market share.

In any case, my point was that exclusivity drives hype and exposure; rarity increases desirability. By positioning Agent as a PS3 exclusive a certain amount of coverage is guaranteed, and when all’s said and done there’s (most likely) nothing to stop them coming out with a 360 version at a later date, giving the game a whole new wave of press.

once again for all the people who keep crying kz2 was a disappointment need to realize some things, first you don’t own a ps3, and second playstation was not built around a FPS like another console out there that would have never existed this generation if a title named HALO didn’t save its ass last gen.

Didn’t Tomb Raider sell better on PS3, ohhh i wonder why….because Tomb Raider was a title that help launch the playstation name in homes. Killzone never had that affect when it first launched on ps2.

The disconnect is what it is… It’s a great game. There’s an install base.

No marketing and putting it out when people are payign the bills after Christmas, in a recession is what is ridonkulous.

“first you don’t own a ps3″

So you have to own a PS3 to be able to properly read a sales chart or graph?

my statement was meant as, if the xbox only owners did own a ps3 they would have probably picked up killzone2. since they love fps so much, and don’t argue by say, well if they wanted killzone they would have just bought a ps3 for that game, No they wouldn’t have for a number of reasons.

oh and fruitcake feel free to quote the rest of my statement if you think i’m wrong.