In an Interview with Bloomberg Japan, Yoichi Wada revealed that DQ 9 is nearly finished. He stated that many people want this game ASAP but they are still tweaking the Online mode and the Single player for its "Balance". He also stated that DQ 9 is a big title release for them so they don't want to rush it. He did not mention a release date window.
Where is the data from that chart taken from? Unless I know I have a hard time believing it. I agree that sales will increase due to this being on a popular portable system. I will have to take more time later to dissect this stock, as you probably noticed, I'm going through old stocks at the moment and trying to revive discussion on them.
In this URL, you'll notice that DQVII (aka Dragon Warrior 7) is only 190K, while DQ8 is 539K (183% improvement)
The article you mentioned read like a fanboy rant, so I wouldn't put much stock on it. I mean, hating Akira Toriyama is one thing, but insinuating that Koichi Sugiyama is not real ? Come on, get real, author (not you, Gaara42).
One thing to remember when comparing DQ9 vs DQ8 : DQ9 is on portable, which mean one household might buy more than 1 (1 for each brother / sister), while DQ8 is on console, which more often mean only 1 copy per household (brother & sister share the game).
IF (a big if, may not happen) DQ9 enjoy 150% improvement in sales # compared to DQ8, it will get 1.3 Million US sales. In Japan, it is possible to get 4.2 Million (only 20% improvement over DQ8 #).
Those two region give us possibility of 5.5 Million. I don't have figure for Europe sales, so I could not estimate what is the reasonable LTD for DQ9, but expecting 1.2 Million from Europe & others is not too farfetched, IMO.
People in America don't buy Dragon Quest games because they are one big long (and boring) level grind that don't introduce anything new (no good twist, bland story, derivative character design, etc.)
Read this article and you will understand why this game sell horribly in America compared to Japan. If Dragon Quest IX doesn't fix these problem, then I doubt it will be a commercial success in America either.
The first day sales of various titles have now been unveiled and Square Enix's Dragon Quest IX remake for Nintendo DS has sold an amazing amount on just its first day. According to leaked data, the game has shot through 70% of its stock to pass the 360,000 mark, so perhaps there is more stock available than first reported. Whatever the case the game should be able to fly towards the 500,000 mark with ease and creep towards a million as the holiday period takes full hold
HOw many copies did dragon quest 8 sell. I could easily see this surpassing it quite easily. BUt it's not in japan where i see it making up ground. Handhld games tend to be less of an investment. The cheaper price will make it easier to sell to people that havent bought the games in the past, primarily North America and Europe.
You also have to remember that there arent a huge amount of hardcore RPG's on the DS. Especially compared to the PS2. The genre isnt really canibilizing itself in this situation.
The release date of Square Enix's 9th iteration of its multi-million selling Dragon Quest franchise has been delayed from late 2007 to sometime in 2008. According to the company, the game launch was delayed because "it needed more development time to improve the quality of the game."
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