Sonic Frontiers Charts As the 18th Best Selling Game of 2023 in US

To me that's not bad at all 18th best selling game for the results.

More than likely gonna be kicked out since June had a number of high profile releases, but that does bode quite nicely for future sales.

Pretty damn respectable, all things considered for a seven month year old game. Being only a few under God of War Ragnarok, and The Last of Us Part 1 is really good, especially given TLoU1 would've been relying on a PC release and the publicity push from the TV series that Sony said resulted in a gigantic sales boost. 

Given consistent price drops and the third update being really substantial, I wouldn't be surprised if it still manages to last out for awhile yet, if not making a sales comeback when Update 3 drops.

1 hour ago, ZinogreVolt said:

More than likely gonna be kicked out since June had a number of high profile releases, but that does bode quite nicely for future sales.

I can seeing it circling back in if Update 3 comes out as well as it seems to be cooking.

It could actually hold on until Update 3 comes out as well, what with the good word of mouth coming from Update 2's QoL implementations.

Gonna backfire so hard on the next 3D sonic game...

3 minutes ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

Gonna backfire so hard on the next 3D sonic game...

I doubt they'll overlap to that point.

1 hour ago, Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon said:

I can seeing it circling back in if Update 3 comes out as well as it seems to be cooking.

It could actually hold on until Update 3 comes out as well, what with the good word of mouth coming from Update 2's QoL implementations.

I won't discount the possibility, but some of the games later this year have to either drastically underperform or Frontiers needs to show killer legs (and not have any potential sales overlap with Superstars).

7 minutes ago, ZinogreVolt said:

I won't discount the possibility, but some of the games later this year have to either drastically underperform or Frontiers needs to show killer legs (and not have any potential sales overlap with Superstars).

Well, in spite of some competition, Frontiers has shown the legs quite well. I could definitely see it dipping in the big Fall session, but depending on when Sonic Team and SEGA time the third update, they could potentially find a sweet spot date.

54 minutes ago, Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon said:

I doubt they'll overlap to that point.

Nah you don't get it.

People look at videogames and go "Oh wow! This sold Eighty Bazillion copies! WE WIN!" like that's some metric of future success, whilst that is true to an extent.

When you look at what public play data metrics are available for this game, it's not set those owners worlds on fire. When you look at the play data, and granted it's not the best, there's a HUGE drop off when people make it to the second island. 

Frontiers, is not that great a time, it's average at best. A lot of those owners are probably going to skip out on the next 3D one, especially if it's of a similar design, just because this game hasn't really done it for them. It's certainly not the first time a game has sold mega numbers, but the sequel, for being 'about the same' or arguably better than the one the sold mega figures, performs poorly. Dexus Ex Human Revolution -> Mankind Divided being the classic example.

7 minutes ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

Nah you don't get it.

People look at videogames and go "Oh wow! This sold Eighty Bazillion copies! WE WIN!" like that's some metric of future success, whilst that is true to an extent.

When you look at what public play data metrics are available for this game, it's not set those owners worlds on fire. When you look at the play data, and granted it's not the best, there's a HUGE drop off when people make it to the second island. 

Frontiers, is not that great a time, it's average at best. A lot of those owners are probably going to skip out on the next 3D one, especially if it's of a similar design, just because this game hasn't really done it for them. It's certainly not the first time a game has sold mega numbers, but the sequel, for being 'about the same' or arguably better than the one the sold mega figures, performs poorly. Dexus Ex Human Revolution -> Mankind Divided being the classic example.

I highly doubt that this game seeing the sales it does is going to ultimately lead to it backfiring into the sequel.

Now, if whatever comes next is largely a janky followup, then yeah, you've got more of a case for reduction.

But as it is, overall, we've seen more of a positive outcome from these updates and the game having strong legs to go with it.

So, if anything would backfire onto the next 3D game, it would be said next game itself not being as good a followup honestly. Blame wouldn't largely lie with Frontiers, as it's not like the game has been doing the brand overall negative favors.

32 minutes ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

Nah you don't get it.

People look at videogames and go "Oh wow! This sold Eighty Bazillion copies! WE WIN!" like that's some metric of future success, whilst that is true to an extent.

When you look at what public play data metrics are available for this game, it's not set those owners worlds on fire. When you look at the play data, and granted it's not the best, there's a HUGE drop off when people make it to the second island. 

Frontiers, is not that great a time, it's average at best. A lot of those owners are probably going to skip out on the next 3D one, especially if it's of a similar design, just because this game hasn't really done it for them. It's certainly not the first time a game has sold mega numbers, but the sequel, for being 'about the same' or arguably better than the one the sold mega figures, performs poorly. Dexus Ex Human Revolution -> Mankind Divided being the classic example.

People not finishing games isn't really a new thing, or even something to be concerned about in regards to future sales. The reality is that just about every game player hoards stuff to play -- that they'll then either only play a little bit of or never touch at all. It's the cheaper option, and as such that kind of data isn't a reliable metric for how much the general public "enjoyed" something, or how much better or worse a potential sequel is going to sell. What Sega is going to look at in regards to results are the long term sales, as that's what tends to make up the bulk of Sonic game sales. Frontiers had an uncharacteristically great start and shows legs that's far exceeding every single game since since as far back as Sonic 2 (which suggests something good about word of mouth, if anything). It's also worth keeping in mind that all signs point to the Switch version being the most popular iteration of Frontiers by a wide margin, which doesn't have an achievements system to base any sort of reception off of. Nothing about Frontiers' data, so far, suggests that a sequel would for some reason sell substantiality worse. Sales are usually also more about things like market saturation, niche, branding, and marketing, all of which Sonic has in spades presently.

33 minutes ago, Jovahexeon Jax Joranvexeon said:

Well, in spite of some competition, Frontiers has shown the legs quite well. I could definitely see it dipping in the big Fall session, but depending on when Sonic Team and SEGA time the third update, they could potentially find a sweet spot date.

It would have to be a lot. Like, about as much as it managed in its first two months. I can see Sega "re-launching" the game around Christmas time and update 3 to give sales another big boost, but competition this year is extremely stiff. 2023 is an extremely prolific year in terms of high profile releases. This month alone saw a new Final Fantasy and Street Fighter. And later down the line there are gonna be two whole Mario games. That's a looot of stuff that Sonic has to keep up with.

6 hours ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

Nah you don't get it.

People look at videogames and go "Oh wow! This sold Eighty Bazillion copies! WE WIN!" like that's some metric of future success, whilst that is true to an extent.

When you look at what public play data metrics are available for this game, it's not set those owners worlds on fire. When you look at the play data, and granted it's not the best, there's a HUGE drop off when people make it to the second island. 

Frontiers, is not that great a time, it's average at best. A lot of those owners are probably going to skip out on the next 3D one, especially if it's of a similar design, just because this game hasn't really done it for them. It's certainly not the first time a game has sold mega numbers, but the sequel, for being 'about the same' or arguably better than the one the sold mega figures, performs poorly. Dexus Ex Human Revolution -> Mankind Divided being the classic example.

I think that mostly depends on the next game, if it's gonna be like Frontiers DLC pack, and more of the same, I can see people not buying it, if it builds on the premise of Frontiers, that's already different. I'm not worried because Frontiers main issue is that it lacks budget and people working on it, it shows when the game stops after island 3 and reuses a lot of assets and stuff like that, if Frontiers makes money, the next game won't have that problem, it will probably have the opposite problem where they spend a lot of resources and don't make a profit... I do want Sonic games to be successful but also enjoyable, if they keep making money there is a chance more effort will be put into the next one.

And I am kinda tired of short and low budget games a la Forces.

Also, how do we know people are not having a good time with Frontiers?

9 hours ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

Nah you don't get it.

People look at videogames and go "Oh wow! This sold Eighty Bazillion copies! WE WIN!" like that's some metric of future success, whilst that is true to an extent.

When you look at what public play data metrics are available for this game, it's not set those owners worlds on fire. When you look at the play data, and granted it's not the best, there's a HUGE drop off when people make it to the second island. 

That entire mindset falls flat on its face when you look what happened with Forces. 

That game (thanks in part to the movie and the free offering on PSN ect) was one of the highest downloaded games on the platforms history and was put in front of more people than any modern 3D Sonic game.

Under your logic, Any gamer who picked that game up, even for free, would have spiked it in disgust and then held contempt for the next 3D game, but as we can see, that simply was not the case. Frontiers kicked butt. 

The next game will sell or fail on its own merits. The idea of a game like Frontiers dragging down the franchise by having a wide audience is laughable.

Sonic games on average tend to sell pretty well... or at least decently enough. Like it's never gonna be selling 10M units like other popular franchises, but the games usually break 1M units at least.

If they don't sell that well, there's usually an outlying reason and it's generally dependent on the game system more than the game itself. 

Lost World didn't sell very well because it was on the Wii U, a console that did notoriously bad. Meanwhile Forces allegedly sold better despite both games being vastly different from each other and reception to the latter being very lukewarm overall. That's a result of the game being available on every platform.

Sonic's kind of at a point where it sells mostly off brand recognition now. 

Also it is really early to talk about the next game.

I only see this success as a positive, not even talking about eventual budget increase for future releases which I think already impacts Superstars, without these solid sales there would have been no free updates, no fixing the game, no extra playable characters and no post game stuff. Besides update 3 possible spoiler

Which was exactly what I didn't like in Frontiers. Although I can definitely see those who didn't like the game at all seeing this as a defeat.

On 6/29/2023 at 1:10 PM, Sega DogTagz said:

That entire mindset falls flat on its face when you look what happened with Forces. 

That game (thanks in part to the movie and the free offering on PSN ect) was one of the highest downloaded games on the platforms history and was put in front of more people than any modern 3D Sonic game.

Under your logic, Any gamer who picked that game up, even for free, would have spiked it in disgust and then held contempt for the next 3D game, but as we can see, that simply was not the case. Frontiers kicked butt. 

The next game will sell or fail on its own merits. The idea of a game like Frontiers dragging down the franchise by having a wide audience is laughable.

No it doesn't. Read what I said...

"Frontiers, is not that great a time, it's average at best. A lot of those owners are probably going to skip out on the next 3D one, especially if it's of a similar design"

The marketing for Frontiers revolved around the overworld and the giant boss fights, the Cyber Space stages which were more akin to what had come before it were barely shown.

People bought into this because of the promise of the overworld, even in September when I got early access to the game, almost nobody was talking about the Cyberspace stages, certainly not in detail, it was completely on the overworld.

Even now with the updates, they're marketing the game on the over world, not cyberspace stages. It's obvious to anyone why there was an appeal for this game, the open overworld.

5 hours ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

No it doesn't. Read what I said...

"Frontiers, is not that great a time, it's average at best. A lot of those owners are probably going to skip out on the next 3D one, especially if it's of a similar design"

The marketing for Frontiers revolved around the overworld and the giant boss fights, the Cyber Space stages which were more akin to what had come before it were barely shown.

People bought into this because of the promise of the overworld, even in September when I got early access to the game, almost nobody was talking about the Cyberspace stages, certainly not in detail, it was completely on the overworld.

Even now with the updates, they're marketing the game on the over world, not cyberspace stages. It's obvious to anyone why there was an appeal for this game, the open overworld.

Nothing you said answered a single thing they said. Forces is easily seen as the worst of the boost games, as well as being the fourth game with a similar design, yet many people sought to seek it out and play it, provided they don't spent too much on it. If it didn't suck, not "average at best", suck, it would have easily sold well.

And no, Cyber Space being a minor part of Frontiers doesn't negate the fact that it is advertised and is the same design. It is literally the same gameplay and levels.

If the open zone alone had SUCH an appeal to negate pretty much ALL of Forces' bad will, why would people suddenly not buy a damn sequel?

The crux of your argument is that people who played Frontiers don't like it; this is you projecting your personal feelings onto the 3+ million, going on 4 million people who bought the game, by the way. Not the actual consensus, considering Frontiers' glowing Metacritic and Steam user scores. People like Frontiers. They think it's a good game, a return to form. The fact that the game KEEPS selling well six months later is also evidence of good word-of-mouth. Sonic games, even when good, NEVER did THIS well.

Even if the game was "average at best" to people, how does that translate to people not buying the sequel? Even negative review are like "this style has potential." People who don't like Frontiers want to see it done better. Frontiers 2 being "the game you kind of liked but even better" is an incredibly easy marketing pitch. Unleashed got much worse reception, yet Colors and then Generations did better critically and in sales, so I don't get this logic.

I have to say, though, it's pretty inspired to try to twist the game being a rousing success despite its terrible first impression and the general negative reception of Sonic into a bad thing, somehow.

I'm in no mood to defend the game right now, but if people bought Frontiers after Forces, why wouldn't they buy the game after Frontiers? As you said, Sonic is popular now, so he will likely sell regardless of quality for better or for worse...

This game like it or not, is popular. Sega seems pretty happy with it so I can definitely see them trying to improve upon it.

12 hours ago, NoKaine said:

Nothing you said answered a single thing they said.

I don't care. 

My point still stands and so far absolutely none of you have shown anything to suggest otherwise. 

Frontiers was and continues to be marketed on the open world and giant boss fights, not the traditional 3D Sonic'y style games we've been used to, that's why it generated such hype and interest. 

Look at the publicly available data, there's a huge drop-off of people who beat the 1st island to the 2nd, for a $60 game, that is absolutely telling of a game people dropped all their interest in.

1 hour ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

I don't care.

You should, because your just haphazardly defining statistics to suit your theory.

Dang near every game has a colossal fall off in terms of people who buy it vs actually giving it the time of day. That doesn't mean the game is doomed to sequel failure. Its not some OMG News flash that people don't finish the games they buy. Its been that way forever. Games that 50% of people reach the end credits are more an anomaly than the norm.

But if your soooooo desperate to push the open world angle. Lets look at some open world games and compare.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1222397/most-completed-open-world-playstation-games-2021/

Horizon Zero Dawn

Witcher 3

Red Dead Redemption II

Assassins Creed Val

According to PSN trophy data for beating the main story, All of those games have completion % under 30. Which would mean 70% of gamers are buying those games and putting them down before they reach the end.

Are any of those Dev's quaking in their boots about people "loosing interest"?

I seriously doubt it.

(and for comparisons sake, the trophy for completing Frontiers story rests at a Healthy 44% on PSN, which is way above all the titles listed above)

I mean its no GOW Ragnarok, but 44% completion rate is on the high end industry wide. Why you seem to think this is even an issue is beyond me. If anything, the completion rate suggests the exact opposite. People liked this game and want more.

1 hour ago, Badnik Mechanic said:

I don't care. 

My point still stands and so far absolutely none of you have shown anything to suggest otherwise. 

Frontiers was and continues to be marketed on the open world and giant boss fights, not the traditional 3D Sonic'y style games we've been used to, that's why it generated such hype and interest. 

Look at the publicly available data, there's a huge drop-off of people who beat the 1st island to the 2nd, for a $60 game, that is absolutely telling of a game people dropped all their interest in.

That's an unabashedly huge reach to try and knock a game that's been a sales success and kept the momentum going to boot.

You will see companies tally the sales and money a game makes for value. Completion rates? No, those don't call on how well a game has done, its value or how well the sequel is going to do.

There's way too many variables on how far people get into a game to claim that a drop-off in the player point in time reached on a game is somehow going to translate to the sequel not doing well.

Backlogs are a thing for a reason. Players can be juggling multiple games. Sometimes people really just play a game for a specific feature.

None of your logic correlates to a strong reason to support your idea that Frontiers has inherently "backfired" on sales of the future followup(s).