THQ boss Brian Farrell has graded his team’s launch of Red Faction: Guerrilla with a ”B”, commenting they need to do ”a better job” with day one demand next time.
The game has sold well, being a ”top ten best seller” in the US and UK back in June. It’s not over yet with Farrell pledging ”continued advertising” and ”new downloadable content.”
”I’d give us a B on the launch of Red Faction Guerrilla. I think we did a good job, but I think we can do a better job with the next generation creating day one demand,” Farrell said during THQ’s fiscal chinwag. ”As you know we moved the title a couple of times. That’s doesn’t help. I’m very pleased with a lot of the strides we’ve made recently, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do some things better.” Like more adverts and more ‘consumer retainment’.
”The amount it’s been dropping off, week after week, has been something that would indicate good word of mouth on the game based on the high Metacritic ratings,” he went on.
”We are pleased to have established Red Faction Guerrilla as a franchise on current gen consoles. Red Faction Guerrilla achieved an average Metacritic rating of 85 and we have shipped more than one million units of this title to date. The game was a top ten best seller in the U.S. and the U.K. in June.”
”We plan to drive future sales of Red Faction with continued advertising support and new downloadable content. We plan to continue to build this franchise by leveraging Red Faction Guerrilla’s outstanding technology platform in the future.”
Downloadable content is now the ‘consumer retention’ weapon of choice, and can work if done right. Call of Duty: World at War and zombies anyone?
”We look at it as a revenue opportunity, but more importantly what we’ve learned with DLC is customer retention and customer engagement, primarily to prevent trade in and used games and to keep that brand active with the consumer.”
”So when we look at DLC, the revenue, it’s not that great. It’s good, but we also like the fact that it keeps the customers engaged with our games for a long period of time.” A prequel DLC piece is planned for Red Faction: Guerrilla, it’s called ‘Demons of the Badlands’.
The PC version of the game hits at the end of August, with the prequel add-on launching for Xbox 360 and PS3 versions on the 13th and PC later, obviously. Are you feeling the revolution?
Source: VG247
