Red Steel 2 Sells Only 50k
posted Sunday Apr 18, 2010 by Scott Ertz
According to analysts, the Wii title Red Steel 2 sold only 50,000 copies its first week. In comparison, the original Red Steel sold over a million. The game itself is good, abandoning everything that was wrong with the first game, and has received glowing reviews from critics and gamers, yet there have been nearly no sales.
There are a couple of possibilities as to why. The first being that the terrible gameplay of the first game killed any hope of success for this one. It was a Wii launch title, so everyone bought it because it was the only non-minigame disc available at the time. That doesn't indicate that they ever finished it, and if they did, were immediately jonesing for some more. The fact that the developers made so many changes indicates even they knew it was a terrible game.
A second possibility is that the Wii just can't support hardcore games. The hardware is definitely lacking compared to its grown-up cousins the 360 and PS3. The control style certainly makes it a departure from what hardcore gamers are used to and comfortable playing, and the Wii's controls have never really been accurate enough (even with Wii Motion Plus) to rely on them for aiming. In fact, the commercial for this very game shows a guy slowly wielding a "sword" and the image on the TV isn't the same as what he is doing.
The last possibility I can think of is actually a branch of the previous one. Perhaps this is Nintendo's fault and they have actually driven hardcore gamers away. I believe that Nintendo made a huge strategic mistake waiting so long before encouraging developers to make Wii titles for the hardcore gamer. Everyone bought a Wii at launch because it is Nintendo and they always make what we want. When they didn't deliver what we wanted, everyone moved away, sold their Wiis and accepted their fate of being a Microsoft or Sony fan, vowing never to return to Nintendo.
What do you guys think? Is it a bad first game, unimpressive hardware or uninterested gamers that have caused Red Steel 2 to be such a major failure? Let us know in the comments section below.
