Obviously December is a bad time to release a product, I mean look how poor the movie did...

I was just surprised that this wasn't another 3rd party blaming wii. Wow! I wonder if no one bought it because, well, licensed games tied to movies seldom come out good?

I've yet to see a licensed game do well, or at least break half a million.


Easycure: The CEO was talking in general. None of the versions of the game broke the top 20. So the game is a failure overall.

My reaction to TV commercials of this game, which I assumed used footage from the HD consoles, was that it looked awful compared to the movie. There are those that believe the 360 and PS3 approach photo-realism, but this instance really drives home how much of a distance there is between game graphics and movie CG.

If it counts, some Disney games on the Super Nintendo managed to break a million: Aladdin, The Lion King, and Magical Quest, to name a few.

Everyone learned their lesson after the unfortunately wildly successful Enter the Matrix.

This is how you fill up pre-owned game shelves.

Funny you should mention that...

Both Lion King and Aladdin were made to create hype and awareness of each film, yet you wouldn't know that if you played them. They may not have been stellar but the graphics actually managed to capture the look of the films, as well as the sound and music.

If Ubisoft had been able to truly replicate Avatar with great gameplay would it have been a bigger success?

I know Pap, i read the article..

I was just a pleasant surprise that the CEO didn't throw in some anti-wii statement in there somewhere, given the atmosphere of the industry as of late.

So i wasn't the only one who thought that huh? I actually thought i was watching footage from a PSP version of the game though, it looked awful.

Batman: Arkham Asylum, unless you were specifically referring to movie-based games.

I was referring to movie based games. Even though they are made to ride off the hype and success of a movie I've yet to see the game versions do just as well as the movie.

As an example, Ice Age 3 is currently the biggest animated movie of the year. You would think that with that kind of success people would pick up the game in the same manner as Enter the Matrix. Yet not a peep. Same with Up, same with Monster vs. Aliens, and note that these are games based on family movies, which should have a big following.

If there were a shortcut that easy, turd parties would've found it by now.

Ubisoft should start licensing Uwe Boll's movies and making video games based on them.

But seriously, at least this game flopped on all platforms which means there won't be the usual Nintendo directed blame this time around.

Good games usually do well. This isn't a good game. It's mediocre at best.

It's because there was a Wii version that the game became a critical and commercial failure.
If they did not have to spread out resources to create a Wii version then they could have used that time and resources to add the polish that was needed to make this game truly capture the experience of the movie.

Avatar has been in the making for 14 years. 14 YEARS!!!
how much time to you need to finish the game?

Add the following to my post: ;) :P:

Jeez, is it ever a third party's fault for anything these days?

Zap called them "turd parties", which I think is hilarious. That's how we should all refer to them from now on. Lol.

To clarify for those who don't know (I know BlackNMild is joking), James Cameron first came up with the idea of Avatar in 1994 and he intended to start making it after releasing Titanic in 1996. He changed his mind though because he didn't think special effects were advanced enough to make the movie he wanted. In 2005 he finally though special effects were good enough and started working on the movie.

The game got terrible reviews. Maybe they might have gotten a few more sales if they released it on the same day, but I think it still would have done terribly.

pap, many licenses games do "well" (by which I mean they sell enough to make a profit). If you mean big sellers, the PS2 version alone of "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers" sold 2.51 million, the PS2 version of "Spider-Man 2" sold 1.93 million, the PS2 version of "Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith" sold 1.7 million, etc. Movie based licensed games usually sell pretty well. If you want to count games based on movie licenses but not based on specific movies, you could add games like "007: Agent Under Fire" to the list of million sellers.

My vocabulary has increased tremendously.

That might make things confusing. According to google, that term is already in use... by soccer moms no less.

That's just flat out wrong. The film is both a critical and commercial success.

From Wikipedia:

Edit: My mistake, you were talking about the game. I thought you meant the film, so that was definitely my bad. Please disregard this post.

I didn't like the movie very much, so there was no chance I'd waste my time even touching the game.

But generally, I don't play licensed games unless they're approached with a different or unique philosophy, a la Astro Boy on the GBA or Batman: Arkham Asylum.

Yeah, I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that licensed games are all mediocre trash piles, right Ubisoft?

If you didn't like Avatar, you probably hate filmmaking.

The Lord of the Rings games on the Gamecube weren't too bad. They did deviate from the movie a good deal, but then again the movies also deviated from the books, so its all good...

No idea why they were rushed with this particular game.  Avatar is a mega-movie that will be talked about for the next several months, so really, was it absolutely necessary to release it at the movie launch?  I know it's "common sense" to do that, but why not make a really good game that does the movie justice, and release it a few months from now?

Honestly, a crappy game damages the Avatar brand.  If I was Cameron I'd be more concerned with that than having a game out on the same day as the movie.

Before the game came out he said he worked closely with the developers (he even said he liked some of the original content the developers were creating so much that he ended up putting them in the movie). Nobody thought the movie would be the mega hit it has become. The trailers were terrible and a lot of people were expecting it to possibly flop.

outside goldeneye right?

Right. It seems this generation has truly lacked solid licensed games. Not to mention that Goldeneye was released years after the movie was released in theaters, so the extra time helped it become a great title.

Wasn't there some Star Wars game on the N64 that was really awesome?

There were several if I am not mistaken...

Shadows of the Empire was a midquel of some sort, taking place between Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. It was an N64 launch game, so it was very rough, but people liked it. Then there was the Rogue Squadron games by Factor 5 which were awesome and very popular. Then when Episode 1 was released there was Star Wars Racer, based on the Pod Racing sequence. I believe one of the last N64 Star Wars games was Battle for Naboo, also made by Factor 5.

I still maintain that Star Wars: Racer on the N64 is by far the best thing to come out of the prequels, and very nearly makes them worth it single-handedly.

No joke. That game was awesome. Hard if I remember correctly, but awesome.

It's amazing that nobody learned the lesson of that game as far as licensed games go and the game's popularity only had the opposite effect.    GoldenEye was so good because it wasn't rushed to meet the movie deadline.  The deadline had already passed and Rare was like "screw it, let's make something good."  But unfortunately, other developers saw GoldenEye and thought "this proves licensed games could sell well!"  and didn't see that GoldenEye was the exception that proved the rule.

It's still the best selling movie licensed game, and we've had movie licenses from far more popular movies than James Bond circa 1995 (Like Matrix and Lord of the Rings and stuff.)

Its so stupid, that game should have never been crappy. Thats the failure.

Ubi is just poopy

I loved the code that let you use two controllers to steer. Made the game even funner since it was closer to how you really would drive a pod racer.

Yet wasn't there a James Bond game that came out years later that still flopped? (the one where Sean Connery permitted his likeness to be used) I think that was From Russia With Love. I recall it getting really poor ratings. Though it was an EA title.

I think there might have been a Tomorrow Never Dies game on the PS1, but that must have been bad because nobody seems to remember it much.  The World is Not Enough got the FPS treatment on the N64, but it was pretty clear it was no GoldenEye.

It was a PS2/XBox/Gamecube game.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Russia_With_Love_%28video_game%29

I think most of us can agree that games based on movie franchises work out best when the games aren't rushed to coincide with the movie's release. So with that being the case, games made years after the movies will tend to be better than games like Avatar that have to sync up with the movie's appearance in theatres.

The Star Wars based games are usually considered great, and that's because the movies came out 30 years ago so there's no rush to make these games now. Another good example would be the Godfather game, which was excellent on the Wii. The Godfather movie is like what, 35 years old now? The game is great and has a strong connection with the movie, but it wasn't rushed.

So I don't think its fair to say that movie licenses will always create terrible games. The problem is with the rushing. If the developers take their time the movie games can be just as good as anything else. But on the other hand, its also kinda understandable why developers rush them. I mean, how well would an Avatar game do if it came out a year or two later after the hype of the movie had faded away? But if the game was excellent it would probably sell even without the hype of the movie to drive it.

The people who are going to buy movie games like Avatar are the consumers who don't read reviews and most likely consumers that are buying the games for their kids. Their kids might be fans of the movie, so they might think the game would be a good idea. So they buy it and take it home, and a few hours later both parent and child are pissed off at the crappy game, but Ubisoft has their money so from Ubisoft's perspective that's not a bad arrangement. But informed consumers like us who read reviews online or elsewhere are going to know to avoid games like this.

I just remembered another licensed game that was pretty damn good despite being made to coincide with the release of a movie: Peter Jackson's King Kong. Funny enough, that too was made by Ubisoft and launched right beside the movie IN DECEMBER NO LESS!

The game may have been a limited FPS/Adventure game, but I thought it was really good. It used the franchise very well, the graphics were pretty good and it felt like playing the movie.

I think Ubi took the development of that game more seriously than Avatar. While King Kong didn't get stellar reviews they were far better than Avatar's current reception. It was directed by Michel Ancel (who did Rayman and Beyond Good and Evil), and that benefitted the game greatly.

I don't know how well that game sold across all platforms (I recall it was also an Xbox 360 launch game), since it was released in December, but I think it must have done better than Avatar.