Sege gambled and lost with mature Wii games, moving on
Last year Sega took a big risk by launching three mature-skewed games on the Wii:
House of the Dead Overkill,
Madworld and
The Conduit. I reviewed
Conduit and
Madworld and found a lot to like in both, and I recently picked up Overkill and I'm loving it. Unfortunately sales just weren't there and Sega's Constantine Hantzopoulos said in a recent 1Up podcast that his company is done publishing mature games on the Wii. It's a shame because all three games were really good, but I guess most hardcore gamers left the Wii for greener pastures long ago.
It's too bad that we probably won't see sequels to Madworld or HOTD Overkill--they both had a lot more style and humor than you see in the more mainstream M-rated games on the 360. A Conduit sequel is still up in the air, but if High Voltage Software wants to put anything like a Conduit 2 or
The Grinder on the Wii, they'll have to get a different publisher.
Is the Wii doomed to be the senior citizen console for the rest of its lifecycle, or will Nintendo change that with first party games like
Metroid Other M, and turn the console into a respectable gaming platform that truly is for everyone? Let us know in the comments!
Sega finished with mature Wii titles
via VG247 by Johnny Cullen on 1/4/10
Sega’s revealed in the latest 4 Guys 1UP podcast that it is done with developing mature Wii titles.
Never saw that coming.
Constantine Hantzopoulos of Sega of America said that low sales of Madworld and The Conduit has made the company rethink about its strategy for the console.
“Are we going to do more mature titles for the Wii? Probably not,” said Hantzopoulos.
“I have to say that it was a space that was open and we took a gamble on it. It’s like, ‘Wow, there’s no mature games on the Wii. Is there an audience out there?’ We did some research, it said there was an audience out there.”
The Conduit moved around 150,000 units in its launch week , while Madworld only sold 66,000 units in March last year.
