Blockbusters will sell well any time of the year.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GTA_IV#Commercial_success

With the number of quality games that are coming out every month, I'm not too upset if one game (or five, or twenty) get delayed. It's not as though most people sit around twiddling their thumbs waiting for game X to come out. They go play game Y, game Z, and so on in the meantime. I also wouldn't take gaming message boards and podcasts to represent the majority of gamers.

I like your example better.

Just offering a general example to show the vast difference in game sales. You seriously think people buy equal or less games in the holiday season compared to Febuary? Doesn't matter what game I picked. Nothing sold in the millions during that time frame.

The closest you get to those numbers in March 09 where Resident Evil 5 sold over 900K.

Ahah, we found the problem. We are all too stupid to see why you are right. Duh!

edit: Nice, I see you quickly edited out that final little jab at us. Too bad I quoted you before you removed it.

And with your swiss cheese theory I call out Prince of Persia and Tomb Raider: Underworld, both of which got plenty of praise but failed to sell well at all last year. Both were released in your magical time frame that seems to guarantee millions in sales.

And where are you coming up with this "millions" number that a game needs to sell to be profitable? Both Lost Planet & Dead Rising raked in a couple million in sales each and have sequels on the way and neither were released in the fall.

Clearly, companies should only ever release games during the holiday season since that is when games sell best. Never mind that 500 games will come out within a 3-month period...

Listen, I'm just stating my opinions and venting a little, and you guys are the ones acting like assholes.

I never claimed any game released in the holiday season was guaranteed millions in sales. My claim is simply that holiday releases = higher number of sales. The NPD numbers show it, and every major game publisher shoots for holiday release date for this very reason.

Keep it up, and you might find yourself on a little break.

Like others have said, if a game is good enough and it's advertised well, it can sell well any time of year.

But, ignoring the business side of things, just as a gamer, why does it matter when a game is released? Does it really make a difference if a game you love is released in February instead of November? You might have more free time over the holidays, but most of us have some free time to spare throughout the year.

I think people are arguing with you so much because you seem to be putting an undue amount of focus on when a game gets released. Most of us would rather have fun games to play throughout the year instead of having 9 months of sparse releases and 3 months that are jam-packed.

Well to be fair...we totally are. It just happens to be justified.

True, we are...but he can't call us names! It's in the rules!!!

I am sorry if I violated a rule. I tend to lose my cool when it is mob mentality against me.

I wouldn't say it's mob mentality but a matter of being overly 'pushy' with your opinion to the point that no matter what any of us say, we are wrong. It kinda limits the discussion.

But what do you expect, we are stupid after all!

HEY!

Wait...you included yourself. Insult stands.

And it's been the best selling RE yet, according to this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resident_Evil#Sales

Smash Bros Brawl came out in March of 08 and it's sold 8 million copies so far.

I think you would've gotten a better response to the topic had you released the thread in November.

But that wouldn't be because November is a better time for threads. It would be because he'd had time to polish the thread and get all the bugs out.

How bad is God of War 3's March release going to impact its sales?

It's going to flop and they should hold it off 6-8 months for the Holiday season, but that might be seen as an unnecessary delay. Bit of a Catch-22.

Top-selling games that came out prior to the holiday season:
Wii Play (Feb)
Wii Fit (May)
Mario Kart Wii (April)
SSB:B (March)
Mario Party 8 (May)
Halo 3 (September)
GTA IV (April)
Forza 2 (May)
Madden (August)
Oblivion (March)
GT5 Prologue (April)
MotorStorm (March)
MGS4 (June)
RE:5 (March)
New Super Mario Bros (May)
Nintendogs (August)
Brain Age (April)
Pokemon Diamond and Pearl (April)
Brain Age 2 (August)

Obviously there is more total money spent on gaming in the holiday season, that isn't exactly a stunning revelation or any new brilliant conclusion that you're the first to stumble upon. However, the pie is also sliced more ways, with far more releases at that time. Also included in that pie are games release earlier in the year. Those games will still sell during the holiday season, even if they are no longer new releases.

There is absolutely nothing to prove that a game released in November will, at the eventual end of its sales life some years later, have more sales than if it had been released in another month. The sales number for an early release for a particular month in the holiday season will be lower than that of a new release, but the final number when all is said and done isn't necessarily lower. It seems more likely that a holiday release just front-loads the sales, and that an earlier release will have a relatively flatter sales pace, but the final numbers will still be essentially still be the same.

I canceled my pre-order once I saw the ridiculous date.

I welcome discussion and a difference of perspective, but the responses are either bathed in sarcasm or broad generalization. If I'm wrong, give me some supporting evidence then. Prove to me that game sales are just as strong in Feb than during the holidays. Stating that delays are wonderful becuase it gets the bugs out is pretty broad stroke. They took that approach with Duke Nukem Forever, and look what happened.

No game is going to be perfect. Even the original Starcraft was constantly patched almost a decade after release.

This article suggests the economy as a primarily factor for game delays:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/lifesty...-economy_N.htm

Vaporware is not a delay.