LogFAQs > #986146888

There are multiple reasons why FF16 didn't do well but it being a third party dedicated home console exclusive is definitely part of it. PS5 might not be a complete flop but most of their and Xbox players are less keen on buying new games than playing live service.

https://twitter.com/Griggity/status/1892977812371312827

https://www.eurogamer.net/live-service-games-continue-to-dominate-accounting-for-40-of-time-spent-on-ps5-and-xbox-in-us-last-month

Players are still very much focused on a handful of live-service games, as over 70 percent of PS5 and Xbox Series X/S players in the US played at least one of the top 10 live-service games in January.

Further, more than 40 percent of all playtime in the US in January across those consoles was spent on those same 10 live-service games.That's according to Circana analyst Mat Piscatella, based on Circana's Player Engagement Tracker. "Used to be that players would jump from big game to big game to some other games but they were most often moving to something new that they purchased," he surmised. "Now, the live-service games suck out a ton of available time, and it's hard to beat free if it's good."

More:
https://www.thegamebusiness.com/p/bringing-your-games-to-other-platforms

Were way beyond the point where people will swap game consoles for exclusive games, says Circana games boss Mat Piscatella.

Speaking on The Game Business Show after the release of the latest Circana market data for the US, Piscatella discussed the success of Forza Horizon 5 and Stellar Blade.

Microsofts Forza Horizon 5 was published on PS5 in April, having initially launched in 2021 for Xbox and PC. The PS5 release helped the game reach No.3 in May in the US, and was still going strong at No.6 in June. Its now the 11th best-selling game of the year in the country and one of the best-selling PS5 games of the year worldwide.

Meanwhile, Stellar Blade was a PS5 exclusive from 2024 that transitioned to PC in June this year. As a result, the Sony game rose from No.185 in May to No.5 in June in the US charts.

Weve been seeing this now for about a year or so, Piscatella said. Every month youre seeing a game pop up thats been gone for a while. And youre like, how did that happen? Well it came out on another platform.

People who buy a hardware system these days, theyre doing it because of the ecosystem, because of their friends list. Youre not going to get people to transition consoles because of exclusives anymore. Were way beyond that point.

People are entrenched into their systems. And bringing the content to them is the only way to win. And that is what everyone is doing, except for Nintendo they tend to do their own thing. Even they could benefit from it, but of course they wont, thats not their MO.

Although Nintendo sticks with exclusives, its worth noting that The Pokmon Company is increasingly releasing its games across mobile and Switch platforms, including the upcoming Pokmon Champions and the newly released Pokmon Friends.

Piscatella believes that in a market as competitive as this one, going to where players are is proving essential.

In the US at least, the Top Ten live service games suck up half of all gaming time every month, and every other game has got to fight for the remainder. So, bringing that content to where people are is the only way youre going to be able to win in an environment like were looking at right now.
Forza being this strong thats great. That really bodes well for its next iteration, if they come out day one across systems. Every game finding its way to more stores and ecosystems that is how youre going to survive and win.

Mat Piscatella: "I've been talking about this issue in video games for months. Low income consumers had already been getting phased out of buying hardware. Now we may (are lilkely to) see the same thing McDonald's is, with middle income consumers also getting squeezed. Same conditions, same behaviors." Bluesky

https://www.windowscentral.com/gaming/fortnite-biggest-competitor-new-game-analyst

Speaking with Greg Miller on Kinda Funny Games about everything going on across the gaming industry, Piscatella laid out some sobering figures for the video game audience in the U.S, pointing out that 30% of players won't buy a game this year.

The players that do? Only 12% of them are buying a game once a month. The vast majority of players buy only one or two games, meaning free-to-play games like Fortnite are fighting every new release for attention

https://www.installbaseforum.com/forums/threads/industry-q-a-mat-piscatella-answers-your-questions.3249/#post-289443

The availability of Fortnite, Minecraft, Roblox, GTA, COD, etc is far more important to a platform today than exclusive content. Sure, exclusive content still has its value, but nowhere near the level it used to. And for 3rd parties, there's just no reason to make a single platform exclusive unless that platform holder is going to provide the investment and support necessary to dramatically lessen the risk of overall development. Making games available on several platforms, and even device types (Mobile, PC, etc) helps provide more bites at the apple, and less dependance on one audience or manufacturer. The bets are so big now and carry such tremendous risk (so often now one release is make-or-break for a studio) that there's really no option to place the entire bet in one place. Again, not unless some platform holder pays a lot of money for it.

Sega which includes Atlus and Persona has outright said that their recent success comes from being multi-plat rather than staying locked to one system as they used to be.

https://www.gamesradar.com/games/persona/as-the-persona-and-yakuza-series-fly-beyond-20-

million-sales-each-sega-says-its-jrpg-successes-are-thanks-to-the-power-of-multi-platform-releases/