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Final Fantasy 16 Extremely Underperformed On PC; Sold Only 289K Units Since Launch

ShirAhava

Plays with kids toys, in the adult gaming world
You dont have to like it but it's objectively an amazing game.
Are you a pc player who needs to be super stimulated with 10 things at the same time?
It's a immersive single player game lol. It's almost perfection

I almost exclusively play single player games.

FF16 is a bad jrpg. It should have been a spin off not a mainline FF game. it might be a good something else but who cares? its like if I bought Mario 64 and it was the best FMV game of all time but a shit platformer. I don't want an apple to be the best orange. I ordered an apple!
 

TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
No, I had to pull out sea of thieves because literally everything comes to console other than MS exclusives *
You don't understand what I tried to say. Sorry.

Didn't mean that there are no games being released on consoles, but that there are so, so many more games on PC not just being released but already released that makes those late ports at almost if not full price look like a very bad deal.

They should realize that the PC player has access to thousands of games, from the 90's to today, and that if they want to sell they really need to ride on the day 1 hype. Forfeit that opportunity and your game will sell like shit.

Its the PC gamers that need to wait for a lot of releases and should be starved for modern games and not twenty year old titles that top the stream charts
A lot? Dude it's just a handful of PS exclusives.
 
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DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
Different budgets lead to different expectations. Dragon's Dogma 2 wasn't really a a huge success either. And that probably played a part in the director/producer leaving Capcom.

Square Enix is simply out of touch with reality.
Final Fantasy is not a 10m seller IP like they would like it to be.
And it's their fault it isn't one with all the mediocrity they released for a decade that damaged the brand.
They're now finding out they're left with their 2.5-5m longtime fanbase and the rest of the market, especially younger generations, don't care about the IP.
They took ten years to deliver the game with no compromises, not half assed that the fanbase wanted with FF7 Rebirth.
They're also creating an identity problem with the constant deep, almost genre swapping changes to the formula they make to try to follow trends (FF16 was born with the mission to ride the success of Game of Thrones...) in the end they constantly lose groups of fans while hardly gaining others and the net effect is no growth.

Their solution to these issues with multiplatform is just a band-aid.
They need to step up the quality of their products but quite frankly I fear the opposite might happen, lower sales will lead to big budgets not being justified and even more cut corners.
Final Fantasy XV did sell 10 million.

The problem with XVI is that it’s a bland, boring, shallow game.
 
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rofif

Can’t Git Gud
Stop with the year later ports, high price, and Denuvo trash
High price? HIGH PRICE?
The game was 70$ on ps5 and was worth it.
PC players only pay 50$. You want the game for free? It's 2024
I almost exclusively play single player games.

FF16 is a bad jrpg. It should have been a spin off not a mainline FF game. it might be a good something else but who cares? its like if I bought Mario 64 and it was the best FMV game of all time but a shit platformer. I don't want an apple to be the best orange. I ordered an apple!
I don't care if it's cock rpg, jrpg or devil may cry. I care that it's a fun game.
I am palying these games with open mind, becase I only played few
 

TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Confused Dog GIF by MOODMAN
 

rofif

Can’t Git Gud
Final Fantasy XV did sell 10 million.

The problem with XVI is that it’s a bland, boring, shallow game.
FF XV imo is a better game but it's way harder to know that because for some reason everyone shits on it like dark souls 2 (which is also excellent).
But FF XVI is nearly flawless, well executed, high quality game. Nearly because it should be shorter with less bloat.
But bland, boring? Not a words I would ever use. This is an exciting rollercoaster of a game. Every evening I was fighting a boss more spectacular than last day
 

Elios83

Member
You realize that going multiplatform is a good way for publishers to try to reach out to new generations of players, and additional player base?

Not the only way, of course. Famous examples include the God of War reboot that brought in a whole new fanbase for Kratos. But not everyone can pull that off.

Square should be copying what Capcom does.

It's just the easy short term band aid the management can try in a crisis moment but alone it won't fix all the other far bigger issues they have and they have caused in a decade of fuckups.
They need a string of fantastic games like FF7, FF8, FF9, FFX were in their days.
But are they capable of such thing nowadays? I'd lean to absolutely no, FF7 Rebirth gave me more confidence but it's still not a completely original project and their latest original effort was just a mixed bag.
 

xVodevil

Member
Honestly I did very much enjoy it I guess up to 2/3 trough.. that's 49.9 hours according to my steam, but god damn it's tedious even playing with a trainer to simply just speed things up.. probably I'll try to finish next week while downloading Stalker2.
 

Astray

Member
If your product has no appeal, then it won't sell. There are countless multiplatform flops out there, probably more of them than exclusive ones.

Actually good games will sell even if delayed, look at Sea of Thieves on PS or GOW 2018 on PC.
 

TheCed

Member
Square Enix just likes to shit on all of their game sales. Its been like this for a decade. Remember when tomb raider sold 3.5 million in the first month and they were like this is a disappointment?

FF16 is a $70 game and sold 3 million in a week. Thats $210 million. SE are just being little bitches.
It's a bit more complicated than that.

For the Tomb Raider stuff... Their American studios costed way more to keep afloat (Salaries, offices, game developpement) and needed a lot more sales to recoup on investment.
Pretty sure they didn't lose money on those games but for the investors, they need results. If the investment in the game resulted in less profits than what they would've made by simply putting the money on a safer investment, then it's bad.

I'm sure that most of those titles recouped their costs but they didn't make enough profits to keep the investors satisfied.
 

BennyBlanco

aka IMurRIVAL69
No, I had to pull out sea of thieves because literally everything comes to console other than MS exclusives *

Its the PC gamers that need to wait for a lot of releases and should be starved for modern games and not twenty year old titles that top the stream charts

Meanwhile, GOTY 2023 came out first on PC in 1.0 and 2 years earlier in EA.
 

TheCed

Member
Stop with the year later ports, high price, and Denuvo trash
You have to respect the deals made while Matsuda was CEO, he's not there anymore and the new CEO does prefer the Multi Console approach... So we just have to wait for all of the Matsuda approved exclusivities to be released then we will be golden.

Saddly I'm sure Remake Part 3 was already negotiated under Matsuda, can't go back if there was already a deal.
 

ProtoByte

Weeb Underling
Next time dont make it exclusive. Day one games sell great on PC despite what some of the dumb echochamber sony fanboys would tell you. Also SE couldnt bait people to buy the game like they did on Sony since most people realized what a shallow game it is after the first few hours.
Why do people not recognize that you’d just be cutting into sales on other platforms with Day One releases?

Square Enix just likes to shit on all of their game sales. Its been like this for a decade. Remember when tomb raider sold 3.5 million in the first month and they were like this is a disappointment?

FF16 is a $70 game and sold 3 million in a week. Thats $210 million. SE are just being little bitches.
The problem is that it’s stuck at that 3 million number, and probably has barely broken even.

People misinterpret “fastest selling” with highest selling.

I hope Square takes a long, hard look at BG3. Universally loved GOTY that made a shitload of money, while staying true to the series’ roots and feeling modern at the same time.

Square instead thinks it was a good idea to make everyone mash the X button and watch the screen fill with particle effects while Clive does somersaults. I tapped out on FF after FFXV and FF7R.
Real-time combat isn’t the problem. Actually, FF15 did more to grow the base than any FF since VII. The problem is that they backslid with BD3. The gameplay systems and design for XVI were just too PS2, and the writing wasn’t nearly as good as they tried making it out to be. As it turns out MMOslop devs aren’t able to make contemporary single player extravaganzas. The world was also visually generic compared to every FF instalment since VII.

I think that a BG3 ripoff from any department in Square would be a disaster. They lack the sensibilities for that kind of game.
 

BennyBlanco

aka IMurRIVAL69
Why do people not recognize that you’d just be cutting into sales on other platforms with Day One releases?


The problem is that it’s stuck at that 3 million number, and probably has barely broken even.

People misinterpret “fastest selling” with highest selling.


Real-time combat isn’t the problem. Actually, FF15 did more to grow the base than any FF since VII. The problem is that they backslid with BD3. The gameplay systems and design for XVI were just too PS2, and the writing wasn’t nearly as good as they tried making it out to be. As it turns out MMOslop devs aren’t able to make contemporary single player extravaganzas. The world was also visually generic compared to every FF instalment since VII.

I think that a BG3 ripoff from any department in Square would be a disaster. They lack the sensibilities for that kind of game.

I don’t want them to make a BG3 ripoff. I want them to make a FFX ripoff. I just brought up BG3 as an example of an old game series that was modernized without completely switching genres.
 

dispensergoinup

Gold Member
My damaged brain led me to:

-Buy 2 copies of the PS5 fat deluxe edition for this game, one for me and one for my friend.

-Buy the PC edition on Steam.

Yet I've only played 2, maybe 3 hours.

I have game commitment problems.
 

kevboard

Member
doesn't suprise me.

it launched way later and was a very controversial entry in the series. no launch hype, and suboptimal word of mouth will do that for ya
 

SweetTooth

Gold Member
Did it meet SE lofty expectations? Lol

SE Needs to realize that FF is no longer the massive series it once were and move on.
 

MagiusNecros

Gilgamesh Fan Annoyance
It just doesn't strike me as a game about a fantastic journey with colorful characters. That's the bare minimum I expect from a mainline Final Fantasy game.
You'll only get that from Bravely series from Square these days. I really hope a Bravely Third is made. Love the cast of all 3 games.

If you want colorful characters it's Xenoblade all the way. Until FF gets on Monolithsoft's level I don't see it making a recovery. Only stagnation. If they want to talk about more player freedom in RPGs then they should start there.

You have a few outliers like Visions of Mana, Star Ocean(Divine Force was alright), Romancing Saga 2 RotS, Octopath. But Final Fantasy? Success coasting and living in the past. And it has been for a while.

XIV has been carrying the IP very hard. You'd think they would give bigger budget to make XIV the best it could be but no. It's funneled towards other projects...like FF16. And so here we stand.

I don't think CBU3 will learn this lesson but the hyperfocus on graphics and cinematic experience isn't the answer. They can do so much more with a well written narrative and art direction. And of course RPGs with RPG elements.
 

mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
I hate to break it to SE, Xbox, and Sony, but releasing games everywhere does not equate to exponentially higher sales. if you game is MID, it's going to be MID everywhere

For some reason people on GAF will NEVER understand your post. And neither will Sony or Xbox. They are all too stupid. It's only the "PC-Only" bros that make the claim that every game will sell best on PC.

Reality says...................................

Family Cbc GIF by Run The Burbs
 

MiguelItUp

Member
The game's reception was pretty divisive from the get-go on PS5. So of course a bunch of PC players weren't chomping at the bit to play it. It's a shame, but you still need an amazing game that the majority enjoy to move a ton of units.
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
FF XV imo is a better game but it's way harder to know that because for some reason everyone shits on it like dark souls 2 (which is also excellent).
But FF XVI is nearly flawless, well executed, high quality game. Nearly because it should be shorter with less bloat.
But bland, boring? Not a words I would ever use. This is an exciting rollercoaster of a game. Every evening I was fighting a boss more spectacular than last day
I thought XVI was a failure as a JRPG and a failure as a character action game. Yeah the boss battles were cool but the other 95% was so boring. I fell asleep multiple times before I dropped it around the 70% mark. And this is coming from someone who was totally onboard with the shift to a mature GoT style story + action battles.

And I know I’m not the only one who felt that way.
 

Denton

Member
Extremely predictable by everyone except the geniuses at Squeenix.

Late full priced port for a game with mediocre word of mouth on a crowded platform = much lower sales than there would be with simultaneous launch, when hype was at its peak.

Some companies need to learn this lesson over and over.
 

ungalo

Member
Don't know how much Sony paid for the exclusive deal but simultaneous release is mandatory for this kind of game.

Big single player AAA games revolve around hype train, make most of its revenue first week of release, if you want mouth to ear to fully work you can't miss the Steam release on day one.
 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Extremely predictable by everyone except the geniuses at Squeenix.

Late full priced port for a game with mediocre word of mouth on a crowded platform = much lower sales than there would be with simultaneous launch, when hype was at its peak.

Some companies need to learn this lesson over and over.
Indeed. Let's hope the success of Dragon Quest III helps with opening their eyes a little bit.
 

Hrk69

Member
I feel the need to remind people what this game is, since you could get an impression we are talking about some crappy indie game



It’s not an indie game, but I wouldn’t call those fights impressive. They quickly became stale, as all the enemies are just HP sponges.

I hated that the HP pools felt like mere checkpoints for the next phase of the fight. Especially during the Titan fight.
 
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