Civ3 - The Marketing Plan

[Father Beast]

Originally posted by Moral Hazard
Kull et al:

I couldn't disagree more; the size pf the market for an expansion pack is determined purely buy the number of people, who purchased the game! Game companies do not pull features from a game to put into an expansion pack later, because you can always improve any game. Take the Sims for example ( a game I'll never understand) by all standards the first release was both polished and finished. EA has gone on to release two expansion packs which have both sold extremely well, because their was a large market already and the player wanted more. Pulling important features from initial release will lower sales for the original game, lowering sales for an expansion pack. Which also explains why patches come before the expansion pack.

ummm... looking at the sims, for example, every time they release an expansion pack, the sales on the original game JUMP. it seems thatpeople who werent inspired enough to buy the game before are attracted by the new features in an expansion

[korn469]

Father Beast

i would argue that the reason each new release of The Sims increases sells is because The Sims gets excellent word of mouth and each new release brings greater awarness of the game. For one things The Sims is in kmart and walmart, and because they (the sims and its expansion packs) are selling so well they are going to stay their. When Hot Date comes out for The Sims a person will walk into walmart and see four boxes with the sims on it...i'm sure that this will at least make the person curious about it, then when they ask around most likely they will get good word of mouth

My girlfriend bought The Sims and loves it, while she falls into a coma and her eyes roll to the back of her head when i start recollecting on my attempts at making it big on the starcraft ladder back in 1998-1999...for some reason she doesn't want to hear about dragoon containment, or a muta rush, or a tank push.

This shows the true power of The Sims, and that is the power to attract people who wouldn't buy computer games otherwise. For the vast majority of people deer hunter and Who Wants to be a Millionair are their idea of a computer game, The Sims attracts both hardcore gamers and people like my girlfriend who thinks that computer games are stupid.

We are in the smallest minority of all...i (like many others here) have been making suggestions about civ3 for over two years! I mean you have to go deep into the dork woods before you find people like us...hell we sent firaxis basically a novel length list of suggestions! We have done something akin to CIA photoanalysis of the screenshots, and we have spent hours discussing even the smallest tidbit of information on civ3.

For the average gamer they will be in walmart a month after the game comes out looking for christmas presents will see a tons of games, and hopefully they are male between 14-40 and have a passing interest in history or war and then they will pick up Civ3, if they are a 16 year old female they would most likely rather spend computer time chatting with guys than they would playing civ, so that limits the overall market and the smaller the market the less word of mouth (good or bad) their will be. Also hardcore players are harder to satisfy, I mean i will be throughly disappointed with civ3 if it doesn't include M.A.D., and the lack of nuclear winter will dishearten me. Other people here all have their own little things they want to see in civ3 more than anything else, and many of us are going to buy civ3, and then be at least somewhat dissatisfied with some little thing in it, but that is because we are discriminating in our games, and not because we are whiners. The average gamer on the other hand wouldn't even have a clue about such features.

The Sims=mass appeal across a large segment of the population (especially female)
Civ3=strong appeal to the strategy gamer, with limited appeal to other segments of the population
Space Empires IV=appeals only to hardcore space strategy game fans

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Nemo

ummm....NO. just becuase they are a company does NOT mean that have the right to do whay ever they want (dispite their current belief in this)

so you are saying that a coorperation should have more rights that the individual? this is BS.

Exactly which of your rights would be violated should the above marketing scenario be true?

The right of the consumer is simply to have a working product that lives up to its predefined function upon purchase. It is up to Firaxis, or Infogames, to define that function prior to your purchase. They will do so on the back of the box. Neither you nor I can dictate to a company what the function of their product should/will be. The fact that Firaxis has been as responsive to our wishes as they have is amazing, considering that most computer game companies couldn't care less about consumer input prior to release.

Once Infogames has a working product from Firaxis, they have every right to market it as they wish. You have every right not to buy it if you don't like how they do it. But in no way are your rights violated by them doing what they please with THEIR product.

All the indications I have seen are that it will indeed be released with MP. A beta tester has said as much, and as another thread says, Firaxis has been very quick to deny things that aren't in the game, but has been very stubbornly quiet about confirming things that are in the game.

Oh, and as for whoever praised EA: they are one of the worst companies out there when it comes to releasing unfinished and shoddy products. Look no further than Ultima 9. EA's rush to the shelves transformed what should have been the jewel of one of computer gaming's greatest series into a festering pile of doggie poo. Origin shoulders some blame for the faulty design concept, but EA's release-then-fix method ended up infuriating fans and resulted in them issuing a massive patch CD to gamers and an apology. It will take me a long time to try their products again.

Cheers.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by korn469
all of this talk about economics has so far left one thing out, namely competition

a company could have a good product and sell it at a good price, but if a competitor has a better product and sells it at a lower price then the first company will be in trouble

i personally think that Civ3 will be better than SMAC which was better than Civ2, but lets face it, civ3 is a single player TBS game, certainly not a genre which many people rave about, and games even with a great new graphic overhaul don't automatically sell...look at Emperor: Battle for Dune, great new graphic engine same old C&C gameplay, and it did ok but didn't shatter any records

First, I don't see any companies coming out soon with a product of the same genre that will be even close to better. EU II may be the closest, but as enjoyable as EU is, it is no Civ.

Second, you left out one teeeeeensy fact. Namely that Civilization is one of the top 3 most popular game series ever. It has sold millions of copies around the world. The fan base for it is absolutely huge. Emperor: Battle for Dune didn't shatter any records because 1.) Didn't have the same broad brand recognition, 2.) there was a glut of RTS in the market, and the competing RTS games were also excellent (AOE II, Starcraft, etc.)

Civ has no comparable competition and far greater name recognition among gamers than E:BFD did. Judging by the fact that there are 11,000 people registered on this board alone, and many many other boards, I think Civ3 will be a major success. And everything I've seen about the game leads me to believe it will be so much more than just a slapping on of new graphics.

Now, as for your new scenario...minus the MP part (which is a moot point if the patch is free anyway), it sounds suspiciously like how Diablo II and The Sims have been marketed. And those games have done astoundingly well. So Infogames has their example for their product marketing.

Diablo II cost (with expansion) - $90
The Sims cost (up to Hot Date, soon to be out) - $140

And yet they still sell!

Cheers.

[korn469]

All the indications I have seen are that it will indeed be released with MP. A beta tester has said as much, and as another thread says, Firaxis has been very quick to deny things that aren't in the game, but has been very stubbornly quiet about confirming things that are in the game

a beta tester? you do realize that firaxis is neither conducting an open beta, nor a closed one and that the only "beta testers" are firaxis employees who have shown great restraint in leaking information...as far as i know the closest thing to a beta test is firaxis making use of the infogrames compatability lab to make sure that civ3 works on a number of different computer configurations

so i would think twice before trusting any so called beta testers

[korn469]

Boris Godunov

Second, you left out one teeeeeensy fact. Namely that Civilization is one of the top 3 most popular game series ever. It has sold millions of copies around the world. The fan base for it is absolutely huge. Emperor: Battle for Dune didn't shatter any records because 1.) Didn't have the same broad brand recognition, 2.) there was a glut of RTS in the market, and the competing RTS games were also excellent (AOE II, Starcraft, etc.)

first where did you get your facts from? i find it highly unlikely that Civ is in the top three most popular game series ever, most likely the top ten, but certainly not the top three

if i had to guess on the top three i'd go with...

myst (myst, riven, myst3)
the sims (TS+exps)
doom/quake (doom, doom2, quake, etc)

also E:BfD was a C&C game...same as red alert 2 which has been huge! i would say that the most competition for E:BfD was actually Red Alert 2 and not Starcraft nor AoK

First, I don't see any companies coming out soon with a product of the same genre that will be even close to better. EU II may be the closest, but as enjoyable as EU is, it is no Civ.

well i think that civ3 will be in the strategy/wargaming genre and you should really checkout empire earth, which has the same concept as Civ except its scope is a little bit larger and its a RTS

and if we are only talking about strategy games, then very shortly it will have to compete with WarCraft3 and Age of Mythology, along with MoO3 and EU2

And everything I've seen about the game leads me to believe it will be so much more than just a slapping on of new graphics

i agree, but many of the upgrades are very subtle, so the feel will be the exact same, which if civ3 turns out to sell a record nimber of qualities will be the secret of its success, and if it flops then it will be the reason for its failure

Now, as for your new scenario...minus the MP part (which is a moot point if the patch is free anyway), it sounds suspiciously like how Diablo II and The Sims have been marketed. And those games have done astoundingly well. So Infogames has their example for their product marketing.

Diablo II cost (with expansion) - $90
The Sims cost (up to Hot Date, soon to be out) - $140

And yet they still sell!

it was the exact same strategy for TA: Kingdoms, and Majesty and they don't sell, so what does that mean?

plus kingdoms and majesty are both startegy games unlike Diablo2 or The Sims...so they probably make a better comparison

[Boris Godunov]

first where did you get your facts from? i find it highly unlikely that Civ is in the top three most popular game series ever, most likely the top ten, but certainly not the top three

Computer Games magazine says Civ has sold over 2 million copies. In truth, I don't know if it's in the top 3, but that has to be up there. My point was that, compared to Emperor, Civ popular name recognition.

I wonder if Myst would really be up there? I'm biased because I hated the game, I guess. As for the Sims, I also wonder if we shouldn't include the whole Sim franchise with that, as they all sort-of tie in. Undoubtedly at the top then.

I was merely citing examples of other RTS, so wasn't asserting that those were necessarily the best examples.

I tend to draw a distinction between RTS games and turn-based, so I wouldn't put Warcraft III in the same category. I view Civ closer to SimCity than Warcraft.

i agree, but many of the upgrades are very subtle, so the feel will be the exact same

While the overall feel is the same, the mechanics are being very much altered. I think maintaining the feel is essential to its being Civilization. Why mess with what is known to be popular?

it was the exact same strategy for TA: Kingdoms, and Majesty and they don't sell, so what does that mean?

See my point about name/brand recognition. Neither of these games had the built-in fan base either Diablo II or The Sims had, as they both had wildly successful predecessors (less direct for The Sims, but the word "Sim" on a game title is usually potent). Likewise, Civ3 has the advantage of two extremely popular predecessors.

Cheers.

[korn469]

Boris Godunov

here are some stats from firing squad about high selling games


The 10 best selling PC games of 1998 (full year) were:

1. Starcraft
2. Deer Hunter
3. Deer Hunter 2
4. Myst
5. Big Game Hunter
6. Titanic: Adventure Out of Time
7. Lego Island
8. Frogger
9. Riven: The Sequel to Myst
10. Unreal


The 10 best selling PC games of all time were:

1. Myst
2. Roller Coaster Tycoon
3. The Sims
4. Flight Simulator
5. Who Wants To Be A Millionaire
6. Riven: The Sequel to Myst
7. Age of Empires II: Age of Kings
8. Monopoly
9. Lego Island
10. Diablo

those stats pretty much ensure that the Myst franchise is in the top three franchies, but if you count every maxis Sim game together, then it is most likely the #1 franchise, plus those stats are from a few months back, so i'm sure The Sims has climbed even higher on the list and might become the highest selling game ever

My point was that, compared to Emperor, Civ popular name recognition.

emperor is part of the Command and Conquer line, and it certainly isn't unheard of

I tend to draw a distinction between RTS games and turn-based, so I wouldn't put Warcraft III in the same category. I view Civ closer to SimCity than Warcraft.

i see mostly strategy players buying Civ3 but i can agree that the fan base overlaps more with the SimCity crowd than the WarCraft one, but drawing a distinction between RTS and TBS is a mistake, because the number of people who only buy games based on the fact that they are turned based is very small

Likewise, Civ3 has the advantage of two extremely popular predecessors.

Oh, and as for whoever praised EA: they are one of the worst companies out there when it comes to releasing unfinished and shoddy products. Look no further than Ultima 9. EA's rush to the shelves transformed what should have been the jewel of one of computer gaming's greatest series into a festering pile of doggie poo.

i think that having popular predecessors certainly helps, but like you said, each game must stand on its own merits eventually...a great game will sell, and a crappy one won't no matter which franchise it belongs to

the gaming market has changed since Civ2 came out, multiplayer is more important, the strategy market has shifted from TBS to RTS, and the gaming market is more competitive than ever

so i am arguing that i think Civ3 will be a hit game, that it isn't immune from market forces, and if infogrames greenlights the idea of introducing each new feature one 30 dollar expansion at a time, that gamers will abandon Civ3 and find their gaming fix somewhere else whether it is EU2, Empire Earth, MoO3, or something else

[dainbramaged13]

gawd! i would never have thought some of those games were best-sellers!

[Boris Godunov]

Deer Hunter...who would think rednecks would have computers?

Roller Coaster Tycoon?????

ROLLER COASTER TYCOON?!?!?!?!

My faith in the consumers is now shattered.

[Moral Hazard]

Just thought I'd say that I for one haven't completed a game of Civ for 2 years, haven't played single player for 1 year, and haven't touched a Civ game for 6 months(used to play PBEM). What my point, I'm considering getting Civ3 but you know what, I might get Throne of Bhaal, Max Payne, Serious Sam2 instead. Probably not.

To me other video games are competition to Civ. I don't have any numbers on it but I'm willing to bet that if Civ3 is good, the majority of it's sales will come from gamers such as myself; where they have to debate whether to spend the money (in my case time) on Civ3 or a different game.

BTW RC tycoon is down at $20 it may finally be worth buying

[civcop]

so you are saying that a coorperation should have more rights that the individual? this is BS.

The quote is from Nemo. Exactly what rights are you talking about? The right to have a game released when it is convenient for you? The only rights a consumer has (at least in the USA) is the right to not be blatantly ripped off by false advertising. And before anyone says that Firaxis saying Civ 3 will be a good game is false advertising, this would apply when they say you get X and Y with your purchase but you only got X when you opened the box...and Firaxis knew about it in advance (as but one example).

Firaxis is operating in a free market economy that exists within a free democracy. Within legal bounds, they most certainly may do whatever they want. If they are wrong and conduct bad business, their sales will suffer and they will eventually no longer be in business anymore. If they want to release the game in October to maximaze their profits there is nothing preventing them. If a collective of consumers show their disapproval by not buying the product, you will have sent an effective message. As an individual gamer, none of us possess any rights regarding the release date of this game.

[dainbramaged13]

RC tycoon is actually a pretty good game. Of course, i wont buy it, but my friends have it, its pretty much well made and worth looking at.

my faith is more shattered by deer hunter, big game hunter, lego island, frogger, titanic, millionaire, and MONOPOLY! i simply cannot believe that the computer version of a board game sold more that civilization 2! OMFG!

[korn469]

my faith is more shattered by deer hunter, big game hunter, lego island, frogger, titanic, millionaire, and MONOPOLY! i simply cannot believe that the computer version of a board game sold more that civilization 2! OMFG!

dainbramaged13, Boris Godunov, et al

i think you are finally begining to see what i am saying...civ is a great game but it certainly isn't immune from competition

if you look at both lists i posted, out of the 20 games only two were strategy and both of those were real time strategy games which have sequals coming up shortly which civ will have to compete with, then you have one builder so i think that civ3 will do well, but i don't think they can screw the customer seven ways from sunday, it's not like they are microsoft

[Sarxis]

Sid Meier really doesn't have a monopoly. Well, maybe on all things CIV, but not as far as PC games go. There are, and soon to be, plenty of games that are similar to Sid's Civs, and plenty of gamers will be buying those other titles [not really worthy to be mentioned along side Civilization, but....] instead of or in conjunction with Civ3.

[Flurry-of-fun]

So somebody explain to me how 100 people have more rights than just 1? I suppose a majority could vote themselves more rights, but then that would be found unconstitutional in most countries and thrown out in a court of law. That technique works better with budgets than with the rights of individuals.

[dainbramaged13]

Well, I've realized that we dont need to worry about sales of civ3. It is a given that it will at lest sell well, we dont NEED it to even be the bestseller of the year. In fact, we might not even want it! More Money equals Bigger Company does NOT equal Better Game. I think the main reason people are worried is that if civ3 'fails' (ie. does not even surpass other strat games) firaxis wont provide patches/expansions/further strategy games, ala CTP2. Stop worrying. Even if it doesn't succeed in the epic sense, it is a given that it will at least succeed enough for them to support it.

[Ozymandous]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov

Now, as for your new scenario...minus the MP part (which is a moot point if the patch is free anyway), it sounds suspiciously like how Diablo II and The Sims have been marketed. And those games have done astoundingly well. So Infogames has their example for their product marketing.

Diablo II cost (with expansion) - $90
The Sims cost (up to Hot Date, soon to be out) - $140

Actually Diablo2 with Expansion is out for $50 (also with D1), so all the loyal customers who bought D2 & D2 expansion pack had to live (thus far) with NINE patches and are essentially spit on by Blizzard who sells the bundle pack less than 4 months after the release of their expansion for the cost of the initial game.

Diablo2 did sell, but from all the game sites I used to visit (hard core D2 players) you can bet that D2 will be gone this time next year because the X-pack essentially killed the game like a bad virus, slowly from inside with broken treasure drops, massively unbalanced skills vs. monster resistances, people selling stuff all over E-Bay and the grief players & cheaters who continuously degrade the game daily.

Just wanted to throw out more information since people still seem to (blindly) assume that Blizzard is the be-all, end-all of gaming companies.

[Ozymandous]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
Deer Hunter...who would think rednecks would have computers?

Roller Coaster Tycoon?????

ROLLER COASTER TYCOON?!?!?!?!

My faith in the consumers is now shattered.

Heh, you forget the "average gamer" makes up the MAJORITY of the market base and not the minority like the folks here, at "The Lurker Lounge (D2)", "MrFixitOnline (all strategy games)" etc.

Your "average" consumer is the one who has made The Sims, Deer Hunter and RC Tycoon so successful.

Besides, RC Tycoon is fun, you can design your orn coasters (who's never wanted to do that??), and even crash them sometimes...

Don't be a snobby elitist.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Ozymandous

Don't be a snobby elitist.

Sorry, I can't do that. It's in my blood.

I will confess to owning the Sims and loving it.

Actually Diablo2 with Expansion is out for $50 (also with D1), so all the loyal customers who bought D2 & D2 expansion pack had to live (thus far) with NINE patches and are essentially spit on by Blizzard who sells the bundle pack less than 4 months after the release of their expansion for the cost of the initial game.

As one of those loyal customers, I feel their pain. On the plus side, I have gotten smart about ordering games and usually do so through dragonCA in Canada. I get the games much cheaper there. I refused to pay $40 for the D2 expansion, so got it there for about $28, including shipping.

I have much more faith in Firaxis, based on their history, than almost any other software company.

[Steve Clark]

Sigh. my respect for Boris just went down a notch (for buying and playing The Sims).

Moral Hazard: There is one other factor about the market for expansion packs, there were many (like myself) who's first Civ game was Civ2 MGE.

[HalfLotus]

Originally posted by Steve Clark
Moral Hazard: There is one other factor about the market for expansion packs, there were many (like myself) who's first Civ game was Civ2 MGE.

Ditto.

[Moral Hazard]

MGE is not an expansion pack:

It's similar to say Shogun: Warlords Edition or Half-life: blue shift. It's another full game and usually comes out at a time when the game company figures that the market for the expansion pack has dwindled immensly or that it's good enough to be a seperate game.

These are different from GOTY editions or Gold editions, which are merely a renewed marketing push to sell the game again.

The point is these games were never planned on initial launch.

PS. Shogun:WE is a high-bred. I guess EA figured that the existing Shogun market was too small.

[korn469]

here is the most recent chart i could find

Best-selling games for the week of September 16-22, 2001:

Rank / Title / Publisher / Average price
1. The Sims / Electronic Arts / $40
2. Diablo II: Lord of Destruction / Vivendi Universal / $35
3. Operation Flashpoint / Codemasters / $41
4. Flight Simulator 2000 / Microsoft / $31
5. Red Faction / THQ / $42
6. The Sims: House Party / Electronic Arts / $30
7. RollerCoaster Tycoon / Infogrames / $23
8. Max Payne / GodGames / $47
9. The Sims: Livin' Large / Electronic Arts / $29
10. Diablo II / Vivendi Universal / $40

so all the loyal customers who bought D2 & D2 expansion pack had to live (thus far) with NINE patches

those nine patches by blizzard haven't been because the game is seriously flawed but because Blizzard support their games like no other company i know of

Blizzard added replay ability to StarCraft in a free patch almost three years after the game came out! Replay wasn't a bugfix, it was a new and useful feature, a fairly major feature in fact

Do you really think that firaxis is going to add a major feature to SMAC which came out about 10 months after starcraft? nope SMAC(smax) is dead, firaxis said as much when they wouldn't even release the SMAX bug fixes for SMAC

so basically less than one year after SMAC came out it firaxis had completely stopped supporting it on moved on...this is what most game companies do, and blizzard is one of the few exceptions

my biggest fear is that civ3 will have awsome sells till about january then it will fade away, and firaxis will stop supporting it

however after seeing the MoO3 screens i want them to release civ right now!!! because MoO3 comes out three months after civ3, so the sooner civ3 comes out the sooner MoO3 will be out

i'll pick them both up so it'll be all good

and one last thing, i don't blindly assume that blizzard is the be all end all of computer games, they have over the years built their trust with me and i have owned warcraft2, diablo, starcraft, broodwar, diablo2, and diablo2: lord of destruction and i have throughly enjoyed each one of those games, which is the most important benchmark of any game, but not only that i have seen blizzard support those game long after other companies would have moved on to something else, and battlenet has certianly built a community...maybe it is a community of bratty, immature, cheating lamers for the most part, but there are some really great players (good skills, but more important nice and helpful) out there...that community is there because battle.net is an aswome concept that more games should implement, and it is certainly one of the best multiplayer interfaces they have came up with so far

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Steve Clark
Sigh. my respect for Boris just went down a notch (for buying and playing The Sims).

Hey, don't knock it 'till you've tried it. I, too, thought at first it would be a dumb game, but man o man, it is addictive. I am finding myself eagerly awaiting Hot Date...oh lord help me...

[Moral Hazard]

I'm the oposite of Boris here. I thought it would be fun. Then I got the game from EB (thankfully). Try to play it the intended way got sick of it really quickly (I mean the game centers around everything, I hate IRL. getting up, time management etc.) Had fun killing off my Sims, but that got old fast. Returned it for Europa Universalis.