Cashews

I cannot wait to disrobe and pleasure myself whilst enjoying Baldur's Gate 3. I'll for sure be adding to it's ingenious sound effects. No intimacy coach needed.

@Wormwood23 someone somewhere else posted "well now we know how to get them on the trains". Pretty similar post really. careful what you wish for I suppose.

saw a blind guy legit win today. The Evo scene is pretty strong right now I wish I could go to one of these things. This tourney needs a comeback

@Sequel i both hope this is a joke and hope this is real at the same time.

@CrackmanNL sometimes I can't tell if y'all are serious or not.

@Voltan i'm watching the sf6 rounds right now. I'm enjoying the casters even since it's Wong.

With them discounting the controllers as well I think they are simply trying to push out more units - rather than trying to rid of inventory.

@MrMagic it's that much a difference? How many yen does FF cost there? what a rip! that kind of gets my goat....

@theMEGAniggle all parts, supplies and labor costs are up considerably since 2021.

@ChrisDeku I guess I get it now. Not that Rise wasn't a success but it could have been bigger. That could always be.

I dont know if 16 could have been a bigger success on the switch. It would for sure be a different game. That's on them to figure out - which they will be pressed to do and soon. Triangle Strategy ain't gunna cut it.

@MrMagic WHAT? Nothing in your paragraph is 1) correct or 2) makes any sense.

what the heck is $30 cheaper? can nothing be compared to FF unless it is exactly like final fantasy? good christ almighty it is like a different planet with you fellows.

@ChrisDeku I don't get it. Are you saying Rise wasn't a success because World was a success? World is HUGE - it is Capcom's best seller of all time. Rise is HUGE. It's is like their number 3. Lol, it came out 2 years later!

...

I really don't get what you are trying to say at all.

@Sekijo but the Capcom report was a year after the release of their enormous hit - MH Rise. The article is clear in that they were down YOY because they didn't have that mega release in that quarter.

But THIS ONE does have that flagship included. That is the rub; the difference. This isn't a random bad report this is the report the entire company counts on. It is this quarterly report.

You can like their game - more power to you. I just like to separate fact from fiction - in the case of SE - success or failure.

@Beerheadgamer82 "Is this ironic"

No, that isn't irony.

Maybe Square Enix will realize putting their flagship on the powerful console was a mistake - both from a cost perspective as well as a numbers one. Perhaps they will realize that fidelity isn't as important as sheer numbers and a rabid fanbase waiting for them to return to form. Doubtful.

@Sekijo here is the problem with that statement. We aren't talking about Capcom. For weeks now I've accepted your (everyone not you) statement that FF is a huge hit and my statements to the contrary. As I've said all along - wait for the Q1 report. here it is.

So now that I am proven right, once again - as always, you want to talk about Capcom's past? How does Capcom's past and SE's failing help FFXVI today? Are they doing what Capcom did? Are people responding? The article you posted was showing YOY declines after MH. This is the Q1 that INCLUDES Final Fantasy 16 - the month it released.

@MrMagic it is stupid to compare a niche game, that has never sold well for Nintendo, to Square's biggest release - that the entire corporation clings to?

Do you think shareholders, whom are the people who actually own Square Enix, really care that the PS5 has a smaller install base than the Switch? They don't. They care about the P/L column. Which apparently, is very VERY poor.

@Sekijo lol are you going to ignore the quarter? the quarter is a story? I love it!

Here is the SE quarterly in a fairly easy to read format - which coincidentally released today for everyone.

https://www.installbaseforum.com/forums/threads/square-enix-q1-fy2024-3-financial-results-net-sales-14-4-oi-78-5.1850/

wasit show? Sales, up YOY because of FFXVI - but here is the fun line: Operating income down 80%.

That is on their biggest release - Final Fantasy. SE takes the development cost right after they release games. So they absorb all the cost this first quarter after FF dropped. Obviously it cost an insane amount to make. But they've lost the release steam. It might have barely broke even. It doesn't appear it even did that at first glance. Problem. It is the game the entire company banks on and it took many years to make. Now what?

tl;dr - like I said so many times. Square Enix is in serious trouble and you can play pretend with whatever narrative you desire, or whatever marketing fluff they push out to the blogs - the only one that matters is the financial report.

@StrawberryTurtle wut. Pikmin 4 sold more copies in one week than FF sold in 5 weeks.

That is a problem for Square Enix.

@Dark_Knight yes. everything is more popular than playstation games in japan. That was my point. It is a shame Sony is the home team and some of the best, funniest, quirkiest games ever made came during the PS2 era.

No PS no Katamari - which would be a crime against the cosmos.

@Powerplay94 thing about a fighter is - you put in the time, get gud, buy some skins...when it goes off of the sub you are likely going to stick around. People will play fighters for years after release - probably more than any other genre outside of a MOBAs or Fortnite - people will play fighters forever.

@Sekijo thank you - dunking on SE is fun. It bothers them too. which is good because they need to understand just how bad they are - how far astray they have gone. Maybe they can find some creativity in their quest for money and/or relevance.

https://kotaku.com/ff16-naoki-yoshida-troll-toxic-gamers-negative-comments-1850678166

@Dark_Knight No they need to support quirky, fun games the Japanese people enjoy. Japan buys plenty of home consoles and pcs. The whole narrative of "they only like mobile" is observably stupid. The Japanese support the PS for decades. Sony is their homeboy after all.

Sony abandoned the East in favor of Western money. Everyone knows this including the Japanese.

@StrawberryTurtle I don't know - ask Pushsquare why they don't print numbers. It makes the PS look bad because the entire top 10 software sales is the switch. Week in - week out. It isn't doing well.

@StrawberryTurtle they are fun to dunk on because 1) they are a faint shadow of their former talent 2) NFTs 3) survives just through remakes and re-releases 4) people get more upset about SE than any other company.

I realized just how bad they were after playing NEO on the switch. I looked at their landscape, their old games and realized just how bad they are now.

@StrawberryTurtle Nintendo Life prints Japanese sales numbers every week. Push doesn't because it paints a very poor light on the Playstation.

@TheCollector316 they tried with the failed Smash Bros clone PS All Stars. Maybe they don't want to travel that path any longer.

That is impressive! I may need to pick this one up.

@NinjaNicky I hear you - I'd like a shooter that got my attention as well. I haven't been excited about one in a REALLY long time. Battlefield Bad Company 2 was the last truly great one I played. There have been good ones since I imagine - but I haven't played one that got me like that one.

It had a great campaign. 15 hours though. Which is good

@Shepherd_Tallon
"Or how can FF XVI's sales numbers be a failure but other AAA multiplatform games selling similar amounts are a success?"

it is simple really - SE's brand is built on FF and it is a clear decline. If Shin Megami Tensei had sold 3M copies in a few weeks they'd be going bananas - but this is FF. FF, in the X era, was an evergreen that never left the top ten. It was like Mario Cart, God of War, Minecraft, GTA. Now it comes and goes like other common games.

It is a failure in that sense. The brand continues to erode and every quarterly report SE tells investors every game they make doesn't meet expectations. NEO: TWEWY, Forspoken, etc forever.

And they are really fun to dunk on.

@HonestHick It will not maintain this pace - especially it's drought of games in 2024. 110 is really pushing it unless they do something big - which they arent doing right now besides price slashing.

And none of it exists in a vacuum. If you hit 110M it also depends what your competitor does.

Personally I think it lands at a cool 80-90. Unless something big shakes things up like a must have game or application or VR takes off or something.

@Vega37 christ I've read that same take so many times I could be sick. but but the prices are actually cheap when you think about it!

So it's the consumer's job to understand the economics of the game industry? Right.

I'll explain economics right now. There is a point customers are willing to pay. And they are not willing to pay over that point. It is called 'Willingness to Pay'. They do not care about economics, rates of inflation, or a history lesson on game prices.

The maximum price is 70 but that is having diminishing returns so developers are standing out themselves with lower price points. This isn't an opinion.

Personally I couldnt care less if the industry wants me or thinks I should pay 80. I have not paid 70 one time. I never will. The price is 60 and I won't budge. Creativity gets less each year, the remakes keeps coming and developers love to reskin games an entire generation. Oh, and no more printing cost on manuals or boxes or carts. Industry? Get bent.

@NinjaNicky yes, you are not the target audience and will not be satiated by Call of Duty ever.

@deathaxe I've been noticing more and more publishers are releasing at the $50 and 60 price point on day 1 releases. The 70 point isn't reaching enough people. Street Fighter, Remnant 2 for examples.

A higher price over 70 simply won't fly. Now the sub prices - yes they are about to tart getting really aggressive on that.

@NinjaNicky 40-50 hours on just...a shooter campaign? That will never happen and 99.89% of people do not want that at all. 10-15 hours would be just fine. FRS campaigns are tutorials for most people.

"I am not interested in being aquired. I have so much left to give."
"Here is 2 billion dollars."
"I am very happy to be acquired with Microsoft. This has always been a dream of mine."

@bozz I would actually buy and play one if they brought back NCAA. I'm no EA fan either but they've been keeping their head low lately and making some decent stuff. No great - but decent.

@Splat All of their employees are expendable. Personally I'd carve out the core left that still have talent and clean house with the rest. I'd have at least 75% or more thrown out on the street Year 1. Rebuild from the ground up and count the days until Kotick gets lost.

tldr - who cares what they think. their best days cannot even be seen in the rearview. All they have done in the past half decade is erode their iconic brands.

@bozz they haven't done NCAA football in decades. Many people preferred it over Madden because they care about college sports more than the pros. The old NCAA games are actually some of the most valuable from the PS2 era.

@Splat lol what. No part of gamepass.

Blizzard pocketed 69B.

It's fun seeing my alma mater on this website.

People constantly talk about the need for single player games - let's see if they get support with that Immortals game. If I was betting - I'd say it is all talk.

@themightyant Yes but that chart is ignoring the huge spike the Switch got from the pandemic - which the ps will not get.

Animal Crossing Factor we can call it

@Beerheadgamer82 Switch cloud games are beyond terrible. I've played them as a demo - and because of that wouldn't buy them with someone else's money even.

I am kind of different. I was way into achievements and trophies - to the point I was playing horrible games because of them. The Switch was refreshing in that it didn't care about that stupid, addictive-on-purpose junk.

As far as a controller - the Switch Pro is basically a carbon copy of the Xbox controller - imo the best in the industry. So for a few extra bucks it's doable - I only use the pro unless I;m in a room full of people using the machine. or a game designed for the switch controllers like Mario Party.

we'll see. Nintendo's next hardware announcement is going to be watched by everyone. They are on a tear with the sales and the movies and the theme park - what they do next is a big deal imo.

I hope this fire sale leads to a really well-made PS Slim personally. The last slim I owned was the PS2 and gosh dern it - what a beautiful machine that was.

@MS7000 I gotcha. I recently bought Asura's Wrath. Haven't played it yet but I'm looking forward to it. One of the few Capcom games I wanted to play but never did - at the time I loathed their dlc practices- with that one especially.

@MS7000 inflation still very high. In the UK it is 8% - which is not fun. The US started attacking it earlier, and more aggressively - it hovers at YOY 3%. Still high compared to last 20 years but under control. Only Japan got it right.