FF7 Rebirth was Japan's no.1 selling game for March. Ampere data suggests it has sold around 2 Million copies. |UP| Analysts says it's underperforming

Danja

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Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is "underperforming", says industry analyst​


It's definitely underperforming and it's obvious. Even the PSN monthly charts shows a huge drop off. But there's definitely a media push to paint these games as failures ever since the exclusivity this generation. Sony and Square has done a bang up job horrible PR with countering the smear campaigns. I get it's the Japanese way to not address stuff, but there comes a point they need to realize they need to also protect the brand as well.
 

Johnic

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A lot of people brought up good arguments about FF outselling multiplatform games and that exclusivity isn't a problem, since 1st party games sell in the millions.

But the series definitely isn't what it used to be. FF has an identity problem. They alienate old fans and new fans they cater to don't really care for the series.

So they end up somewhere in limbo.
 
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Dabaus

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It's definitely underperforming and it's obvious. Even the PSN monthly charts shows a huge drop off. But there's definitely a media push to paint these games as failures ever since the exclusivity this generation. Sony and Square has done a bang up job horrible PR with countering the smear campaigns. I get it's the Japanese way to not address stuff, but there comes a point they need to realize they need to also protect the brand as well.
Great point about staying quiet in the face of constant smear jobs.
 

JAHGamer

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Final fantasy sales are definitely in Schrödinger cat territory. On one hand people praise Dragons dogma 2 for its sales on ALL platforms as a success but FF7 rebirth selling more or about the same on ONE platform is a failure.

People are also bringing up how Yakuza and persona are so ascendant because of their multipiplatform strategy but FF still mogs those games in sales so even if they are doing better, it’s relative to their past, not that their more popular than Ff, which seems to be the implication. Another thing is, I guarantee majority of those sales are still on PlayStation anyways. Maybe pc reaches the 30-40 percent territory but no way does Xbox cross double digits.

Another thing about yakuza and persona, I guarantee their budgets are a fraction of What 16 and 7s are so it makes sense SE would want the financing and free marketing from Sony if Sony is willing to give it. If SE were to go mutiplatfrom is it worth forgoing Sonys financial and marketing help in hopes that Microsoft makes the difference and PC fans by the game enough to possibly strain the relationship with Sony?
Yakuza Infinite Wealth sold 1m in its first week, and 200k sales were from Japan physical sales on PlayStation alone. And it peaked at 40k steam players, so its safe to Say PS made up 80+% of the sales of that game.... Xbox irrelevant as always. Meanwhile, ever since Atlus partnered with Xbox, their games actually flop and go on deep discounts very quick, which never used to happen. But no one in the media is talking about that....
 

Danja

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Great point about staying quiet in the face of constant smear jobs.
Absolutely! It's been the biggest misstep of PlayStation since Andrew House left. The PR has been terrible and they've allowed Xbox and the American Games media to control the narrative. It was so infuriating watching them allow Xbox and Nintendo and the lackeys slap them around with the orchestrated cross-play smear campaign, and they bent the knee when they should have stood firm and said No! Who would the pubs choose? The platform with the user base or the green team who needed its competition base to fill their empty lobbies?

It was all downhill from there.

Jim Ryan being absolutely horrible didn't help the situation with him constantly pouring gasoline on the brand during the first year of the PS5 launch. Him lighting Horizon Forbidden West on fire right before launch was a sight to see, only to then reverse policy once the damage was done.

But Square needs to be a bit more reactionary and protect their brand. It's been years and years of hit pieces on Final Fantasy.. Final Fantasy 16 was literally dragged into court by Microsoft last year for no other reason but to tarnish the games impact and putting the spotlight on square in hopes of putting a crack in their relationship with Sony.
 

Gods&Monsters

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Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is "underperforming", says industry analyst​


None of these shitty "analysts" cared to mention Starfield when it went exclusive. Starfield was 25 years in the making with a budget that blows away the FF7 trilogy and it sold about the same as FF. The media and these analysts called it a mega huge success 🙄
 

Gods&Monsters

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But Square needs to be a bit more reactionary and protect their brand. It's been years and years of hit pieces on Final Fantasy.. Final Fantasy 16 was literally dragged into court by Microsoft last year for no other reason but to tarnish the games impact and putting the spotlight on square in hopes of putting a crack in their relationship with Sony.
Microsoft and Phil always went out of their way to mention Final Fantasy in all the Activision documents. Even the judge was namedropping Final Fantasy as if she knew what the fuck it was because Phil was mentioning it so much 🤦‍♂️

The FF brand was dragged through the gutter the whole gen by them and their bots. Other games don't even get 1/4 of the same attention about their sales. It's the most talked about subject everywhere, hundreds and hundreds of pages.

They are manifesting bad sales until they get them.
 

ethomaz

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Few thoughts:

-If the game underperformed on PS5 it would have also underperformed on Xbox.
-Xbox made up 20 percent or less of 15s sales and that was before gamepass.
-According to maximillion dude, sony paid ALOT up front for this trilogy.
-To the last point, it may not even exist if sony didn’t foot the bill.

As to why it’s not a bigger hit I couldn’t tell you. I think it’s a confluence:
- of some people not liking remakes direction story/ gameplay
-People waiting for the complete trilogy
-It it’s name,Rebirth isn’t very descriptive where as remake part 2 is.
Multiplatform has nothing to do with it underpeforming.

Remake and FFXVI were PS exclusives too and it underperformed sales wise: Remake > FFXVI > Rebirth.

Adding others platforms should not change that.
 

ethomaz

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It's definitely underperforming and it's obvious. Even the PSN monthly charts shows a huge drop off. But there's definitely a media push to paint these games as failures ever since the exclusivity this generation. Sony and Square has done a bang up job horrible PR with countering the smear campaigns. I get it's the Japanese way to not address stuff, but there comes a point they need to realize they need to also protect the brand as well.
I can’t understand why so many guys here try to spin it…

Imagine if it had sold anything over 3 million Square Enix should had made claims that even people on Mars could hear.
 

Killer_Sakoman

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Well, you are cherrypicking using the RE example. Similarly, you could also also use many other multiplayer examples that sell more than the Sony games, like the (non-mobile gaming) most played and top grossing games on console (including PS) and PC, which are most of them multiplatform. Excluding obviously Switch, which has limited top seller 3rd party support due to lack of horsepower:

image.png



Not the case:
image.png

RE4 Remake is at 6.40M, but because released only 1 year ago. Capcom's games keep selling during many years, it will sell several millions more. Pretty likely RE3R and RE4R will end selling over 10M.

Which is more than what Ratchet, Returnal, Bloodborne, Demon's Souls, Sackboy, Demon's Souls, Days Gone or Death Stranding and many other Sony games sold. Sales that were ok back then but for future games that will cost over $300B (or even $400B) won't be enough. So they must get more money from any possible source if they want to continue making a lot of big AAA games at the same time.
Lol you're picking 99% GaaS games and comparing them to single player
 

Danja

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I can’t understand why so many guys here try to spin it…

Imagine if it had sold anything over 3 million Square Enix should had made claims that even people on Mars could hear.
I guess part of that stems for maybe some feeling the need to counter the narrative being spread about the game. But yeah, it's unfortunate what's happening with these Square games but it's their own doing, they've watered down the brand so much over the years. Too many divisive games and mediocre spin offs.
 

Zzero

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Final fantasy sales are definitely in Schrödinger cat territory. On one hand people praise Dragons dogma 2 for its sales on ALL platforms as a success but FF7 rebirth selling more or about the same on ONE platform is a failure.
FF has historicly been sales royalty, especially in Japan. If its stuck fighting it out with random one-offs like DD2 then its doing bad. As a comparison, the Crash trilogy sold "fine" or "good" on Switch but if Mario had done those numbers they'd be a major black eye for the series.
 

Jim Ryan

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People should really be supporting great games like Rebirth and FFXVI....

If they don't, we will get far less variety and quality in future.

But they keep buying madden and FC 24... :rolleyes:
 

Cool hand luke

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You have to imagine the problem is the multiplatform releases destroying the perception of quality. FFXV was one of the worst in the series. FFXIII close behind. FFXIV rejuvenated the franchise and given the scores one can hope FFXVI does the same. Rebirth is god-tier so I assume it'll have legs as a legacy title once the PS install base doubles/triples.

FF clearly has some frail-fingered fans who would benefit from a turn-based title. Makes sense to have two title lines. FF that keeps innovating and a turn-based one to grab the Persona niche.
 

klomzi

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Yakuza Infinite Wealth sold 1m in its first week, and 200k sales were from Japan physical sales on PlayStation alone. And it peaked at 40k steam players, so its safe to Say PS made up 80+% of the sales of that game.... Xbox irrelevant as always. Meanwhile, ever since Atlus partnered with Xbox, their games actually flop and go on deep discounts very quick, which never used to happen. But no one in the media is talking about that....

You love to make up numbers I see.

For all we know, PS had a ccu peak of 30k, but we don't know because Sony is too afraid to show of ccu numbers. At least Valve has the balls to show numbers.
 

ethomaz

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FF has historicly been sales royalty, especially in Japan. If its stuck fighting it out with random one-offs like DD2 then its doing bad. As a comparison, the Crash trilogy sold "fine" or "good" on Switch but if Mario had done those numbers they'd be a major black eye for the series.
I still don’t understand the Dragon Dogma comparison.

DD2 exploded in sales reaching something that DD never hoped for… Capcom is all smiles.

Rebirth did less that FFXVI and Remake… it put even a question what Square Enix “what if the 3rd game sells even lower at launch?”.
What Square Enix have is worrying instead smiles.

But keep comparing Apple to Orange situations.
 
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