GT6 Sales Discussion

[Soundtrack]

That's a lot of money to recover before hitting profit.

This sure is a lot money. But lets not forget PD benefits from being a first party developer, with Sony/PD’s pockets being somehow interconnected. Online retail in this case if not ending in “almost” net profit means a substantial increase of margins anyway. And things like Console Licensing/Authors Rights/Developer-Publisher revenues can possibly be adjusted I guess. I’d be very surprised if GT6 ended with a loss.

 

[Earth]

TTtTt

Yeah the stuff they are adding now is content for GT7. They have already stated the engine is made with next gen in mind, cars are PS4 quality, etc. It will look amazing on PS4 without the limitations of ram.

However the real question is how do you expect a driving simulator to be a big change? There's only so realistic you can get and then it doesn't change. All they can really do is add content/features.

GT still has a very long way to go in every aspect. Physics, graphics, sound, damage, AI, etc have all been done (much) better by other racers. And we still havent even started with industry standad features like a livery editor.

If you think GT is anywhere near reaching a point of diminishing returns then your expectations are pretty low

 

[mister dog]

I'm sorry, but no.

You can criticize parts of GT6 and Forza 5 without playing it. The untouched Standards and lack of interiors in GT6, Forza's puny car and track list, and their monopolistic microtransactions, some things you can.

But saying a game isn't exciting or fun you haven't played yet is akin to judging sounds without hearing them, critiquing a book without reading it, diagnosing a patient without seeing them... I guess I can now safely judge Forza 5's physiques without being within a mile of a plugged in XBo.

This place really is sinking into a hole.

Here this is for you:

https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/thre...l-after-gt6-is-out.294051/page-5#post-9164721

I think anyone who has played GT5 can very well judge GT6 by reading threads on this forum. So far i have not given my opinion about the physics as i haven't played the game, but one does not need to be a brain surgeon to see that nothing much has changed apart from the physics and the damn menu...

 

[CSLACR]

I'm sorry, but no.

You can criticize parts of GT6 and Forza 5 without playing it. The untouched Standards and lack of interiors in GT6, Forza's puny car and track list, and their monopolistic microtransactions, some things you can.

But saying a game isn't exciting or fun you haven't played yet is akin to judging sounds without hearing them, critiquing a book without reading it, diagnosing a patient without seeing them... I guess I can now safely judge Forza 5's physiques without being within a mile of a plugged in XBo.

This place really is sinking into a hole.

It's not really "fair" to judge GT6, just by having played GT5.

--However-- It is "almost" possible to *know* exactly what GT6 is like having played GT5. It is effectively a major update, GT5 Spec III.
I would argue the new content is worthy of a new game tag, but as far as actual gameplay, and the overall ownership experience of GT6, is exactly like GT5. Very few people that didn't like GT5 will like GT6, and vice versa for those that do.

 

[Griffith500]

Here this is for you:

https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/thre...l-after-gt6-is-out.294051/page-5#post-9164721

I think anyone who has played GT5 can very well judge GT6 by reading threads on this forum. So far i have not given my opinion about the physics as i haven't played the game, but one does not need to be a brain surgeon to see that nothing much has changed apart from the physics and the damn menu...

I don't know why a brain surgeon would be the gold standard on such an issue. Unless they happen to be well versed in the ways of GT; that is, you know, aside from the propagandised caricatures that like to get trotted out.

 

[synon]

There were no other games released when GT5 came out?

True but GT6 had two high selling games released a few weeks before it, and releasing slightly later than GT5 in december I think a lot of games bought as presents would likely have been COD or GTA.

 

[Lawndart]

It's not really "fair" to judge GT6, just by having played GT5.

--However-- It is "almost" possible to *know* exactly what GT6 is like having played GT5. It is effectively a major update, GT5 Spec III.
I would argue the new content is worthy of a new game tag, but as far as actual gameplay, and the overall ownership experience of GT6, is exactly like GT5. Very few people that didn't like GT5 will like GT6, and vice versa for those that do.

I agree with this and it also differentiates between how it feels and how it plays... The sim feels great, lots of improvement. But how GT 6 plays and its structure is arguably less than GT 5 in scope.

GT 5 had so many other things you could do outside of A-spec... For instance museum, online feature showing your friends progress, trading, gifting, lots of special events, some very good like AMG academy, GT TV, 3D, more than a single rally event (though not much more), b-spec, etc.

GT 6 just gave us more a-spec but that's nothing more than plugging in a few data points and that's your event... Less detailed than what you could do online. And the promise of the old features returning and some promotional stuff...

Does the feel of the sim and a few more static race events with stars really add up to a full new version? Perhaps it does to the minority core fan base, not so much beyond it.

Try this for fun; pretend to explain GT 6 to a friend that has played GT 5. Be objective and not embellish in your own fandom.

Did that sound like a new game? When you lump all things together and treat them equally it sounds more like an update to me...

If PD want to enhance GT and focus on retention, they need content updates at least half the size of A-spec and not these micro events that have us boot up the game just to gold them all in 20 min.

That being said, most of my issue is that I simply want more to do in GT 6, so clearly I'm liking it... But its racing, not really imaginative so I don't want to rely on my imagination to make the game seem more deep...

 

[Gerarghini]

Can you please explain which peripherals GT6 is lacking?

Let's see b-spec, course maker, community features, and a lack of special events. Sure they'll be added in an update but GT6 starting out is worse than GT5 in terms of content.

 

[eSZee]

True but GT6 had two high selling games released a few weeks before it, and releasing slightly later than GT5 in december I think a lot of games bought as presents would likely have been COD or GTA.

But the world is full of good parents who would never buy those kinds of games for their young children!

As for no big games around release of GT5, you had COD, Fallout, and assassins creed coming out within a month before GT5.

 

[Lawndart]

The time between GT 4 and 5 sort of instilled a type of legacy that drove a lot of hype.

When your under 25 years old a lot happens in 5 years... Collage, married, career growth, moving to new places, people die, people become very successful, buy a house, loose your career, kids become teenagers, a lot of stuff so in essence GT 5 was pushing into a new customer base filled by the reception of the old customer base.

We always talk about GT 5-6 when comparing what's "new" but some of us older guys might argue GT has always been the same game and some more nostalgic than others are probably ok with that... But the reality is GT really has always been the same game with different cloths and refinements in the driving model...

My greatest fear is that GT stopes being a game and becomes more of a marketing tool... And there are a lot of things that support that fear... Least we assume the vision GT is really for us gamers... It's real value has little to do with us and more to do with the manufactures modernizing their image to a newer customer base.

Claiming to have a unique Ferrari in a video game is more valuable to Ferrari than it is to making a better game... But there is a fine line in that argument.

 

[TenEightyOne]

When your under 25 years old a lot happens in 5 years... Collage, married, career growth, mobbing to new places, people die, people become very successful, a lot of stuff so in essence GT 5 was pushing into a new customer base filled by the reception of the old customer base.

We always talk about GT 5-6 when comparing what's "new" but some of us older guys might argue GT has always been the same game and some more nostalgic than others are probably ok with that... But the reality is GT really has always been the game with different cloths and refinements in the driving model...

So true. Darned young'uns

 

[mr_serious]

I'm sorry, but no.

You can criticize parts of GT6 and Forza 5 without playing it. The untouched Standards and lack of interiors in GT6, Forza's puny car and track list, and their monopolistic microtransactions, some things you can.

But saying a game isn't exciting or fun you haven't played yet is akin to judging sounds without hearing them, critiquing a book without reading it, diagnosing a patient without seeing them... I guess I can now safely judge Forza 5's physiques without being within a mile of a plugged in XBo.

This place really is sinking into a hole.

I think I can safely say the race from the back to the front formula is like no racing I have ever heard of (or have any interest in) and therefore don't need to buy GT6 to know it is not going to interest me in the slightest.

 

[mister dog]

But the world is full of good parents who would never buy those kinds of games for their young children!

Sadly not!...

 

[Tornado]

If that's the kind of person you are, then yes. However, most of my excitement from movies comes from not knowing a damned thing about them - tis why I hate trailers. I can still enjoy them if I do know everything about them, of course - it's just not as pure. But that's an expectation thing.

The fact that you have experience with the subject matter in your example, by way of the book, actually invalidates your point on its own. At least for that example, where the book and movies are closely tied (if you assume that The Silmarillion is more of the same, in terms of your personal appreciation) and the nature of the typical narrative structure of books and films overlap, especially in such a "faithful" reproduction as The Hobbit movies.


There is plenty of scope for misconstruing, pre-judging and just missing the point altogether by "looking in" and not actually getting your hands on an interactive form of entertainment (which movies and books generally aren't, although there is no real way to tell how someone's imagination would react to a book). If you "don't like" RPGs (as I used to), then knowing a game is an RPG might be enough to "know" you "won't enjoy it", of course, but you won't actually know without trying it (as I did once). That's why I think games really should be different, and why I hate the clamour for all the recent "sims" to be feature-identical (by way of comparison, in the sense of "X has it, why can't Y?").

Reviews are a different matter, since they're accounts of such experience, ideally framed within an explicit detail of the expectations, pre-judgements and any other kind of bias of the reviewer in question. Of course, reviews "spoil" the game as well as trailers spoil a movie, but I prefer so-called "emergent" games probably for their capability to restore that sense of unknown.

It's a giant grey area, I think.


As usual, I've come at this with no knowledge of how the discussion got here. I don't really know how it relates to sales figures, so apologies if I missed the point. That does mean I've seen it naïvely, and maybe with less bias than if I did know all of that. However, I did see "more excitement = better game", and recognise that "better" is meaningless; as is "excitement", to a degree.

This is all true, but how many people actually have come into GT6 with absolutely no knowledge of it? Even when I boycotted everything about GTA V starting in about July of last year, I still stumbled upon pretty big news accidentally.

And how different is reading a book so not wanting to see the movie version (particularly when you have experience with the creator's prior work) from playing a game and not similarly wanting to play the next one when it looks largely identical (at least in conceptual terms)? Assuming mister_dog owned/played GT5 (or anyone else, really), with the amount of threads and discussions and professional reviews and etc. that suggest GT6 is at the very least very similar, what evidence is he really lacking to make the judgement that it just isn't exciting in the way he desires? Sure, he may very miss out on the occasional diamond in the rough by acting on his preconceived notions for what he thinks he'll enjoy; but more likely than not he won't.

 

[Griffith500]

This is all true, but how many people actually have come into GT6 with absolutely no knowledge of it? Even when I boycotted everything about GTA V starting in about July of last year, I still stumbled upon pretty big news accidentally.

And how different is reading a book so not wanting to see the movie version (particularly when you have experience with the creator's prior work) from playing a game and not similarly wanting to play the next one when it looks largely identical (at least in conceptual terms)? Assuming mister_dog owned/played GT5 (or anyone else, really), with the amount of threads and discussions and professional reviews and etc. that suggest GT6 is at the very least very similar, what evidence is he really lacking to make the judgement that it just isn't exciting in the way he desires? Sure, he may very miss out on the occasional diamond in the rough by acting on his preconceived notions for what he thinks he'll enjoy; but more likely than not he won't.

Yep, agreed! I was missing context, as expected.

 

[Zuku]

Sadly not!...

Funny enough I think there are good parents only thing is Kids won't shut up about the game they want so they buy them said game to make them shut up.

Without realizing(some) what they actually got.

 

[eSZee]

Funny enough I think there are good parents only thing is Kids won't shut up about the game they want so they buy them said game to make them shut up.

Without realizing(some) what they actually got.

That's not good parenting.

 

[Tenacious D]

It's not really "fair" to judge GT6, just by having played GT5.

--However-- It is "almost" possible to *know* exactly what GT6 is like having played GT5. It is effectively a major update, GT5 Spec III.
I would argue the new content is worthy of a new game tag, but as far as actual gameplay, and the overall ownership experience of GT6, is exactly like GT5. Very few people that didn't like GT5 will like GT6, and vice versa for those that do.

The problem is that your assertion is entirely based on assumptions that have no way of being validated. Especially since it's based on your personal experience.

For some, the only Devil May Cry worth playing is the first. Others glean a common thread through the series.

For some, Final Fantasy stopped being an RPG and became an interactive movie when it became a PS1 series. For others, it grew up from the 16-bit era.

For some, Dream Theater died when Kevin Moore left. For others, Jordan is king of keyboardists and arrangers.

For some, the only Bond is Sean Connery. For others, the series didn't come to life until Pierce Brosnan or Daniel Craig came along, or Mike Myers... oops, sorry.

To some, Jesus is a swell guy, to others, he's God.

Okay, I'd better quit. Anyhow, there is a discreet difference between GT5 and 6. I didn't care for the "dinkmobiles" in GT5, any more than I did the previous GTs. But I like them in GT6 a lot. I like every car. GT6 really surprised me, because the GT Academy demo was nicely different, but subtle. The cars came to life in GT6.

So see, you can't judge anything for anyone else. They have to do it themselves.

Try this for fun; pretend to explain GT 6 to a friend that has played GT 5. Be objective and not embellish in your own fandom.

Did that sound like a new game? When you lump all things together and treat them equally it sounds more like an update to me...

Yes, but don't just limit this to GT5 and 6. "GT1 was this crazy game that dared to put you behind the wheel of street cars! Who'da thought it? It broke the racing game world wide open. Then GT2 took everything that made it great and added tons of cars, tracks, and events to it..."

Thinking about all the games, only GT 2, 4 and 6 stick out to me because they expanded the previous title so much. Well, and GT5 because it made Gran Turismo so incredibly realistic. But describing any game in the series is kind of a rewording challenge, because the core remains the same.

I know some are a little bummed because we got another small initial game like GT5 was. But the difference this time is that GT6 is built to be expanded with new features, kind of like a cellphone. And as GT6 is expanded, it's going to be creeping towards something like GT7, just lacking goodies that PS4 will make possible.

 

[trustjab]

So wheres the update on the "disastrous sales numbers"? All I see is opinions about it being GT5.5 or not. Ive looked around and can only find first week sales with others coming from vgcharts, which is supposedly incorrect.

 

[Johnnypenso]

So wheres the update on the "disastrous sales numbers"? All I see is opinions about it being GT5.5 or not. Ive looked around and can only find first week sales with others coming from vgcharts, which is supposedly incorrect.

Global results are up to December 21st here:

http://www.vgchartz.com/weekly/41630/Global/

Just change the dates if you want to compare to GT5 sales over the first, second week etc.

 

[jimipitbull]

Let's see b-spec, course maker, community features, and a lack of special events. Sure they'll be added in an update but GT6 starting out is worse than GT5 in terms of content.

Except none of those are peripherals. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peripheral

 

[Gerarghini]

Except none of those are peripherals. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peripheral

I'll admit it was late and I probably got some things mixed up. Apologies.

 

[AXEofGOD]

Thinking about all the games, only GT 2, 4 and 6 stick out to me because they expanded the previous title so much. Well, and GT5 because it made Gran Turismo so incredibly realistic.

GT3 Revolutionized Play Station. It was leaps and bounds better than 2. It was the biggest leap PD has made with the GT series. It sold more copies than any other GT before or after, and more than any previous title on PlayStation. I know you are a huge fan of the series and am not arguing that gt6 isn't fun. I just think that us hard cores have expectations of the franchise, and some are just too hard to live up to. When we complain about it, refuse to buy it, and trash it to our friends the effect is that less and less people buy the newest game. This is bad for us who look forward to future editions. ex. gt7,8,9 ect.

I did make the statement pre-release that I thought gt6 needed more tracks and all cars should be premium, very high expectations indeed. Going into gt4 I thought no game could be as good as 3, wow was I wrong. I couldn't put gt4 down for months. I don't know why my GF stayed with me(She's now my wife ;-) Then Sony/PD couldn't get 5 out. We waited, and waited, and we all waited. Then PD says well it's getting there but here's GT5P. I Loved it, I thought to myself, wow, when they release the full version it is going to blow my mind. Expectations were through the roof... It just couldn't live up to it. I love GT5 but initially i was upset. I lowered my expectations for gt6, then the demo came out, amazing, so I raised them a little bit. I am not that far in, but this game is the first game to freeze up my PS3, on my 4th race. I have a few other complaints like license tests, I love them, so let me do them all right now, I have all Gold in 3, 4, and 5, and enjoy knocking that door down first. I know they aren't a favorite of many, but what's life without tradition. I also don't like the menu. And why get rid of the lvl's in favor of stars? Weird. I think that PD should keep GT6 on PS3 only and get started on GT7 for PS4 because I will be buying them together sometime in the future...hopefully by Q4 2017.

 

[Rionmoon]

Well, according to this study:

http://www.olganon.org/?q=node/33361

It won't ever matter. The thing that will give you the most pleasure is racing against another real human.
In the study, apparently even when people were racing against other humans, as long as they were told that their opponent was a computer, their pleasure was decreased. Seems to suggest that improving the AI is a rather low benefit pursuit. Finding some way to make people believe the AI are real people...
💡

As long as Wreck Em Ralph noobs, adolescent and trolls are allowed to race online let alone the "I MUST have real collision damage so I can get hot and lathered over the destruction of my car and everyone else's car" crowd - you know who you are - I'll prefer the mentally challenged AI.

That is until the online crowd improves...and it won't.

 

[watermelon punch]

I've found loads of people to race with online who I think are great to race with.
It does take some doing... and won't happen in a random pub lobby by chance very often... but it is possible.

 

[GregOr1971]

I think I can safely say the race from the back to the front formula is like no racing I have ever heard of (or have any interest in) and therefore don't need to buy GT6 to know it is not going to interest me in the slightest.

No? Because it never happens in real life ? Someone always starts last , but not you , champion

You do know , you are spending your time on forums for a game you don't have any interest?

 

[MeanElf]

TTtTt

GT still has a very long way to go in every aspect. Physics, graphics, sound, damage, AI, etc have all been done (much) better by other racers. And we still havent even started with industry standad features like a livery editor.

If you think GT is anywhere near reaching a point of diminishing returns then your expectations are pretty low

Care to provide actual examples of games (not on a PC) that have done physics and/or graphics much better than GT? I don't know of any - well, not other than WipEout HD.

 

[jimipitbull]

TTtTt

GT still has a very long way to go in every aspect. Physics, graphics, sound, damage, AI, etc have all been done (much) better by other racers. And we still havent even started with industry standad features like a livery editor.

If you think GT is anywhere near reaching a point of diminishing returns then your expectations are pretty low

GT is the industry standard for console racing games. Has been since GT1. No other racing game has outsold it.

Unless you have a different definition for industry standard? If so, please share that with us.

 

[andy0a]

GT is the industry standard for console driving simulators. Has been since GT1. No other driving simulator/racing game/forza/need for speed/anything involving driving as a main focal point/you get the drift has outsold it.

Unless you have a different definition for industry standard? If so, please share that with us.

Fixed that for you mate.

Of course with every game there are the ups and downs. I spend an equal time waxing about the downs as well as the ups. I've never seen a game that had a perfect release without issues (not since Pong in the 80s) but GT is the flagship for Sony and the reason why games like Forza and Need for Speed even feel the need *pun for making the games better and competing for sales.

Industry standards are quite hard in the racing department. Some are arcadey like NFS, others go for the realistic approach. If we are talking about what makes a GT game, a GT game, then physics and the plethora of cars, and simply the pure attention to detail seen at times when it comes to racing itself. I mean come on, GT actually makes race car drivers. Its like saying Call of Duty produced better military sharpshooters but give some props for GT, cause its most certainly due.

 

[Tenacious D]

Actually, I'll state again that I think the physics in both Gran Turismo and Forza have reached well into the range of some of the best PC sims. Say what you will, but I've played some of the best of their day, such as Live For Speed - spent a day torture testing the physics, and their advantage over GT6 isn't very great to me.