Sony’s Starhawk, the follow up to Warhawk, has charted this week but at a disappointing 17th place, with 505’s Sniper Elite V2 still at the top, even though sales for the title were down nearly 40%.
EA’s dominance of the rest of the charts, along with strong games from the likes of Ubisoft and Activision, complete the picture.
We’re not really sure what went wrong with Starhawk – the game’s great but perhaps the advertising wasn’t up to scratch and, maybe, people would have preferred it on PSN rather than disk.
1. Sniper Elite V2 (505 Games)
2. FIFA Street (EA)
3. FIFA 12 (EA)
4. Prototype 2 (Activision)
5. Mass Effect 3 (EA)
6. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13 (EA)
7. Kinect Star Wars (Microsoft)
8. Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games (Sega)
9. Battlefield 3 (EA)
10. Assassin’s Creed: Revelations (Ubisoft)
11. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (Activision)
12. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda)
13. Saints Row: The Third (THQ)
14. Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure (Activision)
15. Batman: Arkham City (Warner Bros)
16. The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (Namco Bandai)
17. Starhawk (Sony)
18. Foobtall Manager 2012 (Sega)
19. SSX (EA)
20. Forza Motorsport 4 (Microsoft)
halbpro
I think Starhawk will probably have quite a long tail, but it doesn’t seem like they’ve advertised it all that much.
Forrest_01
Fact is that if i didn’t visit here so often, i woulnd’t have even known about it. Not seen a single piece of advertising about it.
tonycawley
While this is bad news for Sony and whoever the developers are, its quite possibly good news for me. These sorts of first week sales (starhawk) often result in a quick price drop. I’m yet to buy it, but am interested so may wait now til it drops in price.
Cutter.T
Well LittleBigPlanet ‘bombed’when it first came out, and now its Sony’s 3rd best selling IP of the generation (Behind only Uncharted and Gran Turismo, and yes ahead of God of War!). However, a lot of games seem to ‘bomb’have a price-cut and then get a long tail. Warhawk had an exceptionally long one (and still does.)
Honestly though I hope it does well, but I really would only get it as a 30 quid download. A game like that needs to on a hard-drive for quick diving-in.
The Lone Steven
I suspect the reason why Starhawk has done so badly in the charts this week was because of the SCEE only confirming it would be retail only a few days before release and i suspect a lot of people had already bought a PSN voucher just for that thus rendering them unable to get it. Shame really. :(
It seems despite the bad things i’ve heard about it, Fifa street is doing well. :O
nofi
That’s really not why.
Cutter.T
Sony’s invisible marketing force strikes again!
Tuffcub
Well I was planning to get it via PSN so didnt preorder it on physical and have to buy it.
Tomhlord
Worth bearing in mind that FIFA Street, ME3, Tiger & SSX are all reduced down to £25 seemingly across all outlets, in the usual EA price cut that comes a month or two after release.
quinkill
I know this is the case as a few of my buddies were so pissed when it didn’t come out on PSN day and day!
JoshHood
Maybe Sony should actually hire someone in distribution. It only went up for preorder on UK retail websites a couple of weeks ago, and half the stores here in York at least aren’t even stocking it.
cc_star
Exactly
ron_mcphatty
Yeah you’re right, Amazon are out of stock too. Thats gotta be a kick in the teeth for poor Dylan and his faithful minions.
Tomhlord
Yup, sad but true.
cc_star
SCEE have been up to their usual standard with regards to advertising & distribution, haven’t even seen so much as a banner ad online for it, nevermind something substantial.
Also looking around to pre-order it, most publishers you can pre-order months or even year or so in advance, up until a couple of weeks ago most online sites had a variety of different release dates, Amazon never even had it listed & neither did GAME… So Europe’s biggest retailer & one of, if not /the/ biggest online retailers never even had it for pre-order.
This low key, shower of shit approach to publishing & distributing the game this side of the pond must be why my local GAME only received a few copies on launch day… Of which I had the last one by midday, anyone arriving later would have been told they were out of stock.
So, whilst I’m sure SCEE has some good eggs working there, as a structure it stinks & is barely, if at all, fit for purpose.
Aside from SCEE, I think the addition of a campaign was a mistake although plenty of people like it, but as a PSN multiplayer only title it wouldn’t have been able to command the £40 price they so obviously need to cover a few years of development.
Anyway if you like multiplayer mayhem, there is nothing better really. This will live on with a long tail of activity for a few years so it could well be the best value purchase you ever make, even if SCEE can’t be arsed to point out why.
jikomanzoku
Precise-a-bloomin’-lutely.
Only I and a few others who had pre-ordered got copies at my local store, and whilst I was in store 3 people were turned away on launch day due to their not having pre-ordered it.
Sony’s typical and usual pish poor marketing, combined with the Parlous state of Game have combined to damage early sales of this frankly great game.
As an aside, I also read the Guardians review of it on the weekend and it was moronic, Nick Gillet knows little of anything of gaming. Of the whole review it focused almost entirely on the Single Player campaign, saying only of multiplayer that “even with multiplayer Starhawk is a slight game”. Facepalm. Missed. The. Point.
Bilbo_bobbins
well said cc_star…I’ve not seen any advertising for it at all. It was only a few weeks that I realised from TSA that it was coming out so I pre-ordered online.
Its a good game online that needs a few tweeks but its enjoyable.
Oh and cc_star, I see you got me good in a hawk the other night you bastard. ;-)
An-dz
I was really suprised how few people signed up for the starhawk meet, there are so few servers on too there is often barly enough to scrool down at all, leaving little choice of matchs.
Mickey2010
Well i went to buy it in my local Gamestation (Carlisle) on Friday and was told they were not stocking it until next week
Death_In_Flamez
I have said countless times that I would love to get Starhawk if a good number of mates were playing it. 4 people really is not enough.
Forrest_01
I’m sorry, i’m afraid there were only 5 copies made by the sounds of it! :D
An-dz
not holding it aginst anyone. but you have a poin, playing by yourself really is not fun, more so when you end up with a team thats wont leave the spawn zone. I hope they do something to pick the numbers up. im starting to remember certain players that show up everywhere from lack of people. ( that or they are stalking me )
gazzagb
SCEE really need to get some infrastructure in place for future releases, it all seems a bit last minute, the way in which pre-orders only appeared a few weeks before release, it was a couple of days before release when they confirmed it wouldn’t be appearing on PSN – it’s these sort of things which lost them sales.