Your link still only says "beyond 2 million." 2.6 was shipped with no other hard proof of what actually sold.
Crysis 2 stayed in the top 10 the next month while Homefront dropped off. And
according to this investor report in may, Crysis 2 sold "more than 2 million." If that number was close they would've said "Nearly 3 million."
In what other industry do businessmen consider any consumer "part of the problem?" The problem is the model isn't sustainable like it is for COD, and their solution is to pass that expense on to consumers. The model won't change until more companies like THQ go under and darwinism plays itself out.
Consumers want a product that is good regardless of budget. The critical and sales success of games like TT's The Walking Dead and Journey are a testament to that.
I'd hardly consider Just Dance 4 or Lego Batman 2 blockbusters. 2 of the top 10 are COD and 3 are sports titles and I'd argue that those games did not utilize their insane budgets with new gameplay and innovation. That leaves Halo, Assassins Creed and Borderlands 2. What about Medal of Honor: Warfighter? How'd that work out? or Syndicate? or Inversion? For every COD hit there's a lot of copycats that bomb, that's where the problem is.
Your still on about Homefront? Look, the actual quarterly results call clearly said Homefront was a win for the company, not a loss. They also said it clearly sold more then 2 million units. Probably less then 2.5, but more then 2. So, no it was not a failure for the company, you were wrong, ok? It's perfectly acceptable to be wrong on occasion, just admit it like a man and move on.
I would say in every industry businesses think consumers are part of the problem. That's the nature of business. The design of products are, by nature, against what the average consumer wants.
You can go back 100 years, and in every decade find a example. The Model T, Cell Phones, the MIcrowave, Smartphones, etc etc. In all of those examples, people did not feel they needed or wanted that type of capability. The customers were the enemy in essence, and needed to be convinced of the need for said product. Why do I need a car? My horse is fine! I dont NEED to check my email on my smartphone, I just want to make a call! Etc Etc Etc.
You bring up Journey. You do know that the game bankrupted the studio, correct? Oh, you didnt know? Oops. While it did garner very good reception from gaming magazines, it simply did not sell well to the casual gaming crowd.. further proof that the casual gaming crowd wants the three things I already listed, not a indie game.
Walking Dead is hard to classify, because Tell Tale is a privately held company, thus we have no financial data on them. How much did it cost to develop? Who knows. We know how much it's sold (8.5 million-ish.. 25%+ of that being on iOS alone) but other then that.. nothing.
Your last paragraph is actually perfect. Games fail. That's part of the process. That does NOT mean the industry is broken! That is a completely naive assumption. Companies can hit the "perfect" sauce by spending 1 million or 100 million, and while gameplay is certainly part of it... it's not the only part. As you yourself said, you could argue that Madden, Fifa, etc did not do much to enhance their gameplay, yet are blockbusters every year.
So far, you've proven absolutely none of your points about why the game development industry is broken. You've pointed out a few failures in game development, which occurs in every industry on earth.
Guess I'll be waiting for a actual reason as to why game development is "broken" aside from your personal opinion which means absolutely diddly squat.
you having it both ways, and Sony is at least on that path already.
