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Shuhei Yoshida says Horizon Forbidden West didn't sell as well as he expected

Kenneth Haight

Gold Member
It's a fuckin boring franchise that Herman Hulst is, unfortunately, obsessed with. It's tough to admit your kid's just not that exceptional, I suppose I can sympathize.

Horizon is an amazing technical showcase to see but a dreadfully dull game to play.
I’ve platinumed both games. They’re good fun and look absolutely incredible but I have to totally agree, they’re just not doing anything new now and the formula is very stale. I would say interest for a third is not very high. It will sell well but probably worse than the first two.

Guerilla need a new grittier IP or to go back to Killzone. PlayStation need a good shooter.
 
Elden Ring isn't a sequel. Helldivers 2 is a GaaS/live service game and so doesn't really go against what I'm saying. Doom Eternal I don't know if it sold more than other Dooms. Baulders Gate 3 is a good example.
Of course Elden Ring is a sequel, regardless of it's name. Doom Eternal more than tripled Doom's sales in the first month and continued to sell well.
 
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DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
With a 5 year gap between them and PS4 users switching to PS5. The reason is because people move on with the longer dev times and hype dies down and the market isn't the same anymore either in half a decade the landscape has very much changed to one of declining game sales and a rise in f2p/gaas, microtransactions and subs.

Except if you go back to the PS3 gen you're referring to you have Uncharted 2, you have Killzone 2, you have LBP2, Resistance 2.
The point is that the game industry isn't the same anymore so what happened during that 360/PS3 gen no longer applies. Name a sequel from MS or anyone really that did better than its first in sales this gen. You probably can't. Did Alan wake 2 for example on far more platforms? Nope. Did Halo? Did Gears? You would struggle to find any really. Even TotK did worse than BoTW (even outselling it recently) yet you don't hear anything about it.

MS market share has dropped like a rock, You cant compare anything from them this gen versus previous gens. I would put money that Gran Turismo 7 has sold more than Gran Turismo 6, because its a brilliant and arguably better game.

What about games like Elden Ring, spiritual successors to Dark Souls. All but the same game but an advancement in tech and game design. Armoured Core 6. Monster Hunter World. Balders Gate 3. There are plenty of sequels that sell more than the previous entry due to them being amazing.
 

Three

Member
Of course Elden Ring is a sequel, regardless of it's name.
Um not really. Otherwise you can start calling things like Bloodborne a sequel to Demon's souls.
MS market share has dropped like a rock, You cant compare anything from them this gen versus previous gens. I would put money that Gran Turismo 7 has sold more than Gran Turismo 6, because its a brilliant and arguably better game.
MS marketshare may have dropped like a rock but their instalbase hasn't since they started doing day 1 PC. None of their games doing xbox/PC have done better on a sequel. GT6 released on PS3 when PS4 was coming out and didn't get a PS4 release. That's the only reason it did poorly in comparison to GT7 (again a crossgen title that GT6 wasn't and live service too)
What about games like Elden Ring, spiritual successors to Dark Souls. All but the same game but an advancement in tech and game design. Armoured Core 6. Monster Hunter World. Balders Gate 3. There are plenty of sequels that sell more than the previous entry due to them being amazing.
Spiritual successor is not a sequel no matter how you slice it to make it count. Monster Hunter is a live service multiplayer game. Besides World is the older 2017 game, Doom eternal again 5 years ago. You have to see games more recently. I have high hopes for Wilds vs World but only due to the multiplayer live service component.
 
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Avad was the bigger candidate, in the first game you literally have a dialogue choice to tell him that you want to pass more time with him after fixing the planet, varl wasn't even close to get a line like that.

Pretty sure aloy is bi more than full lesbian.
Nah it was the king /emperor that she wanted. The chemistry was off the charts between the two. She had to pass on the romance because woe is me , I have a savior complex and need to do it alone.
 
Um not really. Otherwise you can start calling things like Bloodborne a sequel to Demon's souls.

Yeah, you can. Dark Souls literally is a sequel to Demon's Souls in all but name, which they had to change for legal reasons. All of From's soulslikes are a lot more similar to each other than many Zelda or FF games are.
Excluding Sekiro.
 

Three

Member
Yeah, you can. Dark Souls literally is a sequel to Demon's Souls in all but name, which they had to change for legal reasons.
Yeah but you can't start calling things sequels when they're not even though it's similar mechanics and the same developer. Elden ring is Bamco. Bamco already owned Dark Souls and there is a reason they didn't call it Dark Souls 4 and it isn't legal reasons. It's not a sequel.
 
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GymWolf

Member
Nah it was the king /emperor that she wanted. The chemistry was off the charts between the two. She had to pass on the romance because woe is me , I have a savior complex and need to do it alone.
Avad is the king\emperor...literally the only king inside the game because other tribes don't have kings.

Who are you talking about? Hekarro?
 
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Yeah but you can't start calling things sequels when they're not even though it's similar mechanics and the same developer. Elden ring is Bamco. Bamco already owned Dark Souls and there is a reason they didn't call it Dark Souls 4 and it isn't legal reasons. It's not a sequel.

What's in a name?

Would you consider Fallout 3 a sequel to Fallout 2? Zelda 2 to Zelda? Duke Nukem 3D? GTA 3? RDR? Castlevania SotN or Lords of Shadow? Super Mario 64? If so why not Elden Ring?

I think we'll have to agree to disagree on this one.
 

Kerotan

Member
Anyone of you saying bad things or not buying Horizon: FW is bigot.


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This didn't happen until the DLC so can't be used as an excuse for lower then hoped sales.
 

Rayjin

Neo Member
i really liked the first one, even the story was simple and interesting, the second one was boring as shit, aloy was annoying as fuck, talking all the time like a schyzo, she's the most unlikable character i ever played in a game, not to mention how they massacred the story
 

hyperbertha

Member
Forbidden West was visually very impressive, but I can't really say that I enjoyed my time with it. Aloy as a character was insufferable for the first 2/3 of the game. Easy plat though. I picked it up on PC again, so I will revisit it in future though.
You didn't really enjoy your time with it. But you platted it and bought another copy on pc. Make it make sense
 

Three

Member

samoilaaa

Member
Not in this day and age of games. I disagree.
well in this day and age most devs think that if they add some more weapons and improve graphics its enough for a sequel

no improvement in writing , level design , same hand holding bullshit , no choice and consequence
 
Why wouldn't I consider a Fallout sequel a sequel to fallout or RDR2 a sequel to RDR? Would RDR2 be a sequel to GTA 3 though?

Because Fallout 2 and 3 have completely different gameplay, and are made by different studios. They are certainly further removed than DS and ER are. And I meant Red Dead Revolver to Redemption. And GTA 2 to 3.

The IP and whether it's a sequel to said IP or not.
Nier is a direct sequel to Drakengard 3 though, without being the same IP.
 

Ridaxan

Member
You didn't really enjoy your time with it. But you platted it and bought another copy on pc. Make it make sense
I'm getting rid of my PS5 and I still want to own the game (within my family sharing pool at least) as my kid still wants to play it. Hopefully that makes sense.
As for the plat, I got the plat for Zero Dawn and felt compelled to get it for FW. I've been trying to get the plat for most first party Sony titles.
 
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Ubisoft games are far more fun, goofy and give mission freedom than this boring franchise. The gunplay is solid, the art is breathtaking at times.

You have got the graphics, got the music, got a cool world but you make the gameplay, characters extremely boring. There’s nothing memorable.

I guess I’m not the audience of this franchise.
 
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The world of Horizon has potential. The story of Aloy is quite bad though, especially in HFW. But you can't tell me fighting Robotic dinosaurs in a post-apocalyptic world isn't a cool setting. I don't think the IP is dead like most people seem to think
agreed. the whole extintion danger was told very well and gives me chills. a game set in the last hours of those defense forces would be interesting af for a more typical linear sony story game. but the actual plot around aloy, her character, the kinda forced vegetation factions whatever feel unnatural. open wolrd sucks for anything anyway, but the core premise is just great but the execution in many regards is just falling flat despite technical showcase. solid bloat/filler, but would be much better as a linear game.
 

Trilobit

Member
I've rarely played a game that looks this good with characters that give me the sensation of bland oatmeal. It's like the writers went above and beyond creating the most inoffensive characters that wouldn't offend even the most easily offended people. It's quite an achievement in a way.
 

scydrex

Member
I liked the first one. It wasn't GOTY but fine. Was looking forward to the sequel but FW is worse. They did go full Ubisoft mode. Lot of crap, armour, weapon didn't used, bad side content. Didn't like the story, too long and bad pacing.
 
There are so many ways they could have made Aloy a likeable character people can get behind - but no, she's just another typical modern female character. Every man around them has to be weak and subservient, they can't be feminine, they can't be straight, they can't even be nice half the time, they can't have anything go badly for them, they can't fail.
 
I just think companies have to do After Action Reports on all their titles and attempt to understand what prevented their games from seeing bigger success.
Well I think PS did that here and came to the conclusion that adding it to PS+ is what hurt it. Honestly reading this Yoshida interview he doesn't seem to understand a lot of how Sony is run anymore which is surprising. Like he doesn't even know who made or was involved in making all these remasters. He give a lot of guesses/assumptions but it's clear with his answer that he doesn't know.
 

Sooner

Member
I think Horizon is one of the coolest open-world action/light-RPGs out there. The problem is there are way too many games in this genre and they take too much time commitment. People are burnt out on the formula.
 
The core dinosaur combat in these games is really, really good. It's unfortunate that all the other gameplay on the fringes is pretty mid. Aloy has one of the worst feeling jumps in modern gaming, and I don't know how to put my finger on it. It's like she's a marionette and being jerked upwards by an invisible hand.

The story of the first game was incredibly interesting, but the core problem with the franchise is that everyone who is interesting, has been dead for like a thousand years. All the inter-tribe drama completely sucks, and once they explained "what happened", they didn't have anywhere else interesting to go with the story, so we got Forbidden West which goes completely off the rails. Unfortunate.
 

CellarDoor81

Neo Member
The story of the first game was incredibly interesting, but the core problem with the franchise is that everyone who is interesting, has been dead for like a thousand years. All the inter-tribe drama completely sucks, and once they explained "what happened", they didn't have anywhere else interesting to go with the story, so we got Forbidden West which goes completely off the rails. Unfortunate.
I see that a bit different. I thought that the story around the Gaia AI and the Terraforming Program which doesn't work right and has to be rebooted before it destroys the planet (again) very good. What I didn't like was the ending and the "twist" the story takes at the end.
 

Fbh

Member
The story of the first game was incredibly interesting, but the core problem with the franchise is that everyone who is interesting, has been dead for like a thousand years. All the inter-tribe drama completely sucks, and once they explained "what happened", they didn't have anywhere else interesting to go with the story, so we got Forbidden West which goes completely off the rails. Unfortunate.

Yup.
The story of the first one was pretty fun because it largely focused on what happened before. Figuring out how the world came to be this way was an interesting enough mystery to carry the plot.
But then, with the second one, that had already been resolved and they had to focus more on the present, and that's just not nearly as interesting. The inter tribal stuff is boring, the new villains they introduced are laughably bad and Aloy is even more unlikable than in the first game
 
If I'm perfectly honest, the first was kinda boring after a while. I loved the concept of robot dinosaurs and The Faro Plague was chilling when reliving it in that bunker. I still don't understand how they made HZD, ultimately, so bland though.
 
I see that a bit different. I thought that the story around the Gaia AI and the Terraforming Program which doesn't work right and has to be rebooted before it destroys the planet (again) very good. What I didn't like was the ending and the "twist" the story takes at the end.
That bit is interesting, but it's the introduction of the Superman 2 villains that I didn't jive with.
 
Yup.
The story of the first one was pretty fun because it largely focused on what happened before. Figuring out how the world came to be this way was an interesting enough mystery to carry the plot.
But then, with the second one, that had already been resolved and they had to focus more on the present, and that's just not nearly as interesting. The inter tribal stuff is boring, the new villains they introduced are laughably bad and Aloy is even more unlikable than in the first game

Yeah wtf happened with Aloy's writing. She was a little bland but mostly likable in HZD...definitely more than Jin. Then in HFW she's just a fucking bitch to everyone all the time.
 

viveks86

Member
Yeah wtf happened with Aloy's writing. She was a little bland but mostly likable in HZD...definitely more than Jin. Then in HFW she's just a fucking bitch to everyone all the time.
Someone in the writing department got too carried away with the "burden of the world on her shoulders" theme. So now we have Aloy who can't be bothered to be nice or socialize, but has all the time in the world to play Strike and participate in gladiator tournaments. I hope they correct this with the next iteration. Probably my biggest complaint with the game, outside of the awful melee.
 
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