Feargus Urquhart interview on Gamasutra

[LionXavier]

First, I didn't say that top-down is dead, but I will say that from a business standpoint, Bethesda's decision to use Oblivion mechanics over the old ones was the better move.

Well, I can't really question that; ovbiously, making a mod of their previous game was way cheaper than making a proper game from scratch. What I can't totally understand from a business standpoint is the move of buying a franchise to make a game with hardly any resemblance to its games.

Because, like you said, if it were a matter of names, Oblivion at the time had a larger fanbase to draw on.

Then they could have been better off by making the next installment of Oblivion/TES instead of wasting money on another franchise just to make a clone of it. If it REALLY were a matter of names (like those who explain the success of recent top-down games by it belonging to a particular brand affirm) then, judging by the considerable amount of money the Fallout name cost to Bethesda, there really aren't excuses for not making Fallout 3 in the line of its predecessors. At least, not others than the mere will of its owners.

Not that top-down couldn't have sold well, but FPS was going to sell more. For proof, try to imagine a Bethesda-made top-down F3 outselling the current one. I just can't picture it.

Unfortunately, we'll never get to know that. And no, I doubt any judge would accept someone's imagination as evidence.

Second, fanbase and brand loyalty are one of the biggest reasons sequels can outsell their predecessors, especially considering the first days of release. People are more likely to buy things they are familiar with. This is true in any media. I don't know how this contradicts anything.

The only thing that fanbase/brand loyalty explain, if anything, is the guarantee of a number of sales, by logic no more than the number of sales of the previous game (and that is considering that EVERYONE who bougt it liked it enough to buy the new one, which is a stretch). If the new installment sells more than the previous did, then the phenomenon goes far beyond simply fanbase loyalty. That is what contradicts those who affirm that top-down is dead/outdated/unprofitable and attribute the success of recent games that have it to just the fidelity of fans; those who consider that that's the only thing that allows companies to be able to afford making their game with such a horrible and outdated PoV.

 

[Kerr-Plomb]

Second, fanbase and brand loyalty are one of the biggest reasons sequels can outsell their predecessors, especially considering the first days of release. People are more likely to buy things they are familiar with. This is true in any media. I don't know how this contradicts anything.

The only thing that fanbase/brand loyalty explain, if anything, is the guarantee of a number of sales, by logic no more than the number of sales of the previous game (and that is considering that EVERYONE who bougt it liked it enough to buy the new one, which is a stretch). If the new installment sells more than the previous did, then the phenomenon goes far beyond simply fanbase loyalty. That is what contradicts those who affirm that top-down is dead/outdated/unprofitable and attribute the success of recent games that have it to just the fidelity of fans; those who consider that that's the only thing that allows companies to be able to afford making their game with such a horrible and outdated PoV.[/quote]

Sales tell us nothing other than how hyped a game is, especially preorders. The best example is Spore, Will Wright said that nothing is a better indicater telling how good a game is than sales, while the game was still decent, the majority of buyers seemed to be heavily disappointed.

 

[LionXavier]

Sales tell us nothing other than how hyped a game is, especially preorders. The best example is Spore, Will Wright said that nothing is a better indicater telling how good a game is than sales, while the game was still decent, the majority of buyers seemed to be heavily disappointed.

You didn't need to go that far to look for a good example; you simply could have resorted to Fallout 3.

In any case, I don't totally disagree with you. Notice how I said that greater sales are something beyond purely fandom impulse; this "something" (or at least part of it) could pretty much be the hype. But also notice that even this theory supports the fact that there are no objective excuses for not having made Fallout 3 like a true Fallout game: if hype is what really sells, then no matter what PoV or combat mechanics you implement provided you've planned a well designed and exhaustive hype campaign. With Bethesda's impressive hype machinery, they could have pretty much developed a top-down turn-based Fallout 3 (if that were their intention, that is).