On the New Release Date: March 24th (EDIT: Now in April, FYI)

[Castruccio]

In case you didn't know Chris, I just wanted to say that the expansion for Diablo 3 comes out March 25th, as does the final DLC for Bioshock Infinite (after which Irrational Games is closing down).  I have seen you say that the sales for Valley 1 were hurt because it came out just before  Diablo 3 launched, and I don't want it to happen again.  I realize that TLF may not appeal to the same crowd as D3, but I would think most small companies would need to be wary of launching anything around the time that Blizzard does. 

[Aklyon]

Well thats rather annoying, I'd expect.

I'd heard Irrational is not quite closing down, however.

[Castruccio]

Well, Irrational Games as we know it will apparently no longer exist.  Levine will go on to make games at Take Two, presumably under a new studio name. If 2k makes another Bioshock game, my suspicion is that the studio name won't be "Irrational Games."

[orzelek]

On a small offtopic - are those bioshock infinite DLC's worth it?
I have the base but none of the dlc's.

[x4000]

Grah. Thanks for the heads up on that. We've been more concerned about Titanfall than anything else, but this is also definitely concerning. I doubt that an expansion pack for Diablo 3 could do what Diablo 3 itself did, but I guess with Blizzard one never knows.

[Castruccio]

They did report that Diablo 3 had sold 15 million copies in the latest Activision conference call, so who the heck knows.  They put the designer of the original game on another project and brought on a new lead for the expansion, so people are looking forward to seeing what he can do.  The beta phase, especially in recent weeks, has been received very positively after a rocky start.  Apparently the expansion is something of a return to the spirit of the series.

Either way, that's a big week with Titanfall and Diablo. 

[Riabi]

They did report that Diablo 3 had sold 15 million copies in the latest Activision conference call, so who the heck knows.  They put the designer of the original game on another project and brought on a new lead for the expansion, so people are looking forward to seeing what he can do.  The beta phase, especially in recent weeks, has been received very positively after a rocky start.  Apparently the expansion is something of a return to the spirit of the series.

Either way, that's a big week with Titanfall and Diablo.

Also, that X-pack is actually going to FIX some of the serious issues that game had, so it might do better than expected.

[junker154]

In case you didn't know Chris, I just wanted to say that the expansion for Diablo 3 comes out March 25th, as does the final DLC for Bioshock Infinite (after which Irrational Games is closing down).  I have seen you say that the sales for Valley 1 were hurt because it came out just before  Diablo 3 launched, and I don't want it to happen again.  I realize that TLF may not appeal to the same crowd as D3, but I would think most small companies would need to be wary of launching anything around the time that Blizzard does.

Arcen games develops pretty niche games with a specific audience, I don't think that everyone that played Diablo or Bioshock didn't buy the game because of that. They're pretty different in terms of genre and gameplay, they appeal more towards a smaller audience.

I like to play Diablo 3 but I still need my Arcen fix from time to time.

[x4000]

As a bit of history, when we released Valley 1 it was doing very well on launch.  Diablo 3 then came out something like a month later, and our sales just absolutely tanked that exact day, and then never recovered.  Lots of other developers, even developers not on PC (!!), reported sales drops as well.  Diablo 3 was kind of an unprecedented event for a lot of us, in terms of the business reverberations it created.

The other thing is how much press attention we're able to get at any given time; it's kind of a roll of the dice when major stuff is going on.

[junker154]

As a bit of history, when we released Valley 1 it was doing very well on launch.  Diablo 3 then came out something like a month later, and our sales just absolutely tanked that exact day, and then never recovered.  Lots of other developers, even developers not on PC (!!), reported sales drops as well.  Diablo 3 was kind of an unprecedented event for a lot of us, in terms of the business reverberations it created.

The other thing is how much press attention we're able to get at any given time; it's kind of a roll of the dice when major stuff is going on.

Well, that's expected but I didn't know that it was that devastating. I guess Diablo 3 really affects a lot of people. Although to be honest Valley 1 didn't look like a great game to begin with. A lot of people look at the steam page and dismiss it as a typical indie flash game that isn't worth your time or money. I bought the game because I was really intruiged by it and it got me into your games. I liked Valley 1 for it's unique gameplay but I seldom replay it because it's just not that great of a game.

So if your initial marketing doesn't work all that well, you might never really recover.

[Aklyon]

The other thing is how much press attention we're able to get at any given time; it's kind of a roll of the dice when major stuff is going on.

Well theres a heck of a lot of excitement related to Titanfall, definitely something to watch out for. (theres also grumbling about the titanfall devs not liking battletech, but I doubt that would have a sales effect)

[mrhanman]

titanfall devs not liking battletech,

I've been leery of all the praise and hype constantly heaped upon Titanfall, but that right there just killed it for me.

[Aklyon]

I don't remember the exact quote, but it went something like "Those mechs are really slow and like tanks, slow is boring. We want to still have agility."

[x4000]

@junker154: What I'm saying is that Valley 1 was selling exceedingly well, and then the day that Diablo 3 came out, we saw like a 10x drop in sales immediately.  And then it never recovered.  So say what you will about our marketing, the game itself, the graphics, or whatever other factors, that's what happened empirically.  Why the game didn't recover after Diablo 3's launch is indeed a matter for speculation of that sort, but the effect of the launch itself was devastating to us and other devs in terms of how much attention it redirected even from games that were otherwise already doing very well.

[Misery]

I don't remember the exact quote, but it went something like "Those mechs are really slow and like tanks, slow is boring. We want to still have agility."

That.... just....


After seeing some of Titanfall, the "mechs" they have in that game seriously arent even mechs to me.  They're the normal, average FPS soldiers, except bigger and made of robot.  They even have to manually reload their guns and all.  Because, you know, it's totally logical to give a giant mech fully articulated hands JUST so that it can reload it's amazingly impractical bus-sized gun.   As opposed to, you know, having guns for arms like most proper mechs do.

But yeah, that was the impression I got.  That the whole thing was VERY gimmicky, and the robot combat seriously does look to me like inflated normal soldier combat, except that you're able to step on players that arent yet inflated.

Looks terrible to me.   If I want mech combat, I'll play MWO, which is great.   If I want FAST mech combat, I'll play Hawken, which is good but I'm horrible at.  But Titanfall.... just.... no.