Rare Staffer Unhappy with Microsoft’s Marketing of Viva Piñata
By Chris on Monday, October 15th, 2007 at 12:30 PM PST In Computer, Games, Gears of War, Microsoft, Microsoft
We all know by now that Viva Piñata didn’t do particularly well when it was released late last year. It was published by Microsoft along with Gears of War, which did do well. Very well, in fact. Thanks to a hefty marketing campaign, it topped sales charts and was the most played game on Xbox Live for a long period of time. But now rumblings are coming out of Rare that the Viva Piñata developer feels its game wasn’t given the support it deserved.
James Thomas, a software engineer at Rare, told Gamasutra, “Most interestingly I think from our point of view, it was interesting to see how the marketing budget was split last Christmas, because obviously everyone knew that Microsoft were publishing Gears of War and Viva Piñata.
“Yet, so much of the money went towards publishing Gears of War, which is going to sell millions anyway.
“It was a bit like, ‘what about the other franchise?’ I think we got left in the wake somewhat. Hopefully the PC version this Christmas, it might get something of a second wind.”
According to the interview, Viva Piñata has sold nearly half a million copies, which is an extremely poor amount for what has been referred to as an important franchise by Microsoft. It’s truly a shame, as Viva Piñata was really a terrific game. But, as Thomas said, maybe the game will get more of the recognition it deserves when the PC version is releases, as well as the Mario Party-style game, Viva Piñata: Party Animals.
Gamasutra via GamesIndustry.biz
The 360 doesn’t really need to spend huge amounts advertising games to shoot em up fans because the console already appeals to them but it doesn’t appeal to fans of this kind of game. Having said that I don’t really know how you could even begin to go about marketing a game like this.
The traditional method is to make some reference to the item whilst sellings its good points and, conveniently leaving out the bad
To be honest, I’ve heard a lot about how little this is spoken of. It gets my interest. I might have to find it second hand in a cheapy shop and buy it.
Leave Microsoft and join Nintendo, I know its impossible.
would be cool if they remake Battle toads, Killer Instinct, and Jet Force Gemini.
I really, truly, honestly think that Microsoft shouldn’t spend any money on advertising any more games except for games they think won’t sell well.
the way they advertise halo 3 was just garbage, the game was going to sell like crazy without any kind of advertising, I don’t know what their problem is.
The Halo 3 ad campaign I think was more designed for after sales than before. Sure, they wanted people to buy it (there were about a million, at least, pre-orders, right?) but by having the game you’re going to want to play it…perhaps more so than any other games offered by other consoles. The way I think Microsoft thinks it sees it, is that one more hour playing Halo 3 is one more hour playing a 360 and liking it, supporting it with new games, accessories etc. and one less hour for the same on the PS2/3 and Wii.
Agree to disagree.
Heh, fair enough with me. I do agree with you though on the aspect of changing ad focus. Game’s like this, which to be honest of the what little I’ve heard, little of it is bad, do need more attention.