Titles such as MadWorld and The Conduit didn’t really get a great response from gaming audiences when they released a few months back. Both the games are compatible with the Wii and have been developed by Sega. Despite the poor impact the games had on the market, the company still insists that it will develop more hard-core games in the future for the Wii.
Sega COO Mike Hayes spoke to Wired saying, “It’s difficult because it was a critically acclaimed title; it was extreme but good. The thing that we’re saying is, Sega would be extremely arrogant to have a title that didn’t do as well as we thought on a platform and then say, ‘Those kind of games don’t sell on that platform’.”
Hayes elaborated, “I think if you take our slew of more mature games, House of the Dead Overkill did really well in Europe, and for some reason even though it’s a big (intellectual property) it did less well in North America. So that’s kind of like a win and a miss that’s kind of come out neutral.”
Hayes expressed his dismay about MadWorld not living up to its expectations in the gaming market. But he questions what actually made the title a flop. Could it be the platform on which it was released for, maybe the people didn’t like the art style used in the game or it just could be that the gameplay did not appeal to the audience? Whatever the reason may be, the Sega COO stated that their people are still looking into and researching the matter.
When asked whether the company would still continue to make these kinds of mature games for the casual console Hayes responded in the affirmative saying, “Absolutely. You’ll see more games in that genre coming from us.” He also added, “What we can say is that we’ll still do mature games for the Wii market because with an install base of some 34 million in Europe and America.”
Further commenting on the console, Mike Hayes said, “So I think the sheer scale of the Wii allows a shooter, or a mature game, to be a niche but a successful niche. And because the development costs can be less on Wii, that means you can sell less to be successful… We can take more risks on the Wii.”
Relying on what the bigwigs at Sega had to say, hardcore gamers can look forward to some more mature titles on the Wii in the near future.