Biggest Bogon Emitter - Game Theory

[AnCap Dave]

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This video is so bad, it's deserving of a nomination

As I said in Fail Quotes, the guy completely cherry picks his data to get his statistics.

Call of Duty:


If you're familiar with the Call of Duty series, you might notice there's something missing. The two most recent titles, Black Ops II and Ghosts are completely omitted from the chart. This would be fine if this video came out two years ago when the two games were not released, but this video just came out last night!

Thankfully statisticbrain.com has the numbers for Black Ops II AND Ghosts.


Look at the numbers for Black Ops II and Ghosts. You might notice Black Ops II actually sold less than Modern Warfare 3, and Ghosts sold even less. The trend is starting to go down, and Mr. Theorist here decided to omit that in order to prove his point.

That's not the only series with cherry picked data as well.

Battlefield (his source:


Notice that his source is from 2012. Since then, Battlefield 4 has been released. Now of course the game was just released this past November, but if we look at its predecessor, we can still see that the trend isn't actually fitting Mr. Theorist's "theory."

From VGChartz:
All versions of Battlefield 4 as of now total in 8.97 million globally.

Battlefield 3 on the other hand made almost that much within its first month!

While you could argue it may still be too early to add Battlefield 4 to the chart, the fact remains that Battlefield 3 still did better within in the same amount of time that Battlefield 4 has been released which goes against the trend that this guy is trying to throw at us.

Madden:


I don't think I need to say much as far as the omissions from this chart. All releases from 2007 to now are missing.

However, let's look at 2007 and onwards.

Madden NFL 07 - 8.62 million units sold in North America

Madden NFL 08 - 7.08 million units sold in North America

Madden NFL 09 - 6.77 million units sold in North America

Madden NFL 10 - 6.49 million units sold in North America

Madden NFL 11 - 5.73 million units sold in North America

Madden NFL 12 - 4.81 million units sold in North America

Madden NFL 13 - 5.21 million units sold in North America

Madden NFL 25 - 4.05 million units sold in North America

As you can see, after 2007, it clearly shows a downward trend, which completely goes against what he's saying in the video!

Super Mario Bros:


This one I find the most offensive. He makes the claim that best selling Mario titles are the ones that copy the original Mario Bros. formula, while at the same time saying that the games that change things up get the least amount of sales.

There's a few problems with this.

1. Look at the chart. Notice how New Super Mario Bros. 2 and New Super Mario Bros. U have the least amount of sales overall? They're in the same category as the other New Super Mario Bros. games and yet they sold the least.

2. He ignores background history on some of these titles. Namely the fact that the original Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario World were launch titles that were bundled with the system when you purchased it. Chances are, if you owned an SNES or an NES when the systems were still relatively new, you owned those two games simply because they came with the system. Same thing with Super Mario Land, which was one of the launch titles for the original Game Boy. I also like how he adds Super Mario Land 1, but omits Super Mario Land 2, which many consider one of the best titles for the platform. There are also other omissions, including Super Mario Bros. 2 US and Super Mario Bros. 2 Japan

3. One of his main examples of a Mario game that didn't sell well is not an actual Mario game in the main franchise. Yoshi's Island was only called Super Mario World 2 in North America and Europe, and is not considered an actual Super Mario title according to Nintendo. Basically, this would be like throwing Mario Kart or Mario Party into the numbers. It's not an official Mario game, therefore it does not belong in this chart. Even if we played Devil's Advocate and said that the game WAS a proper Super Mario game, we would have another omission of Yoshi's Island DS and the recently released Yoshi's New Island as well.

All in all, with blatant cherry picking of data, and blatantly ignoring background information such as games being bundled with consoles, this guy is absolutely a candidate for Biggest Bogon Emitter.

[VectorM]

Even then, he still has a point - there really isn't any evidence that people like "innovation" as much as they pretend. 

The CoD example still makes the point, regardless, as people were still buying more or less the same thing for years. Same with Battlefield and Super Mario. You just don't see people going for the innovation, they go for what is the most familiar to them. Even the Kickstarter thing, that was supposed to bring innovation and whatnot, ended up getting us newer versions of very old ideas.

[MrBogosity]

Even then, he still has a point - there really isn't any evidence that people like "innovation" as much as they pretend. 

The CoD example still makes the point, regardless, as people were still buying more or less the same thing for years. Same with Battlefield and Super Mario. You just don't see people going for the innovation, they go for what is the most familiar to them. Even the Kickstarter thing, that was supposed to bring innovation and whatnot, ended up getting us newer versions of very old ideas.

That's probably another reason why most innovations happen incrementally.

[Travis Retriever]

@Shane & VectorM:  What exactly do you both mean by 'innovation'?  Because I'd wager if I were to invent a pill that insures perfect health (cures and prevents any and all possible illnesses ever--be they mental or physical or parasitic or whatever) until the person's genetically determined lifespan limit for a few pennies of marginal cost to myself, or, say to make $5/month 50 TB/s upload & download speed internet the baseline and norm around the world--including sparsely populated areas like where I live-- for a $1/month marginal cost to myself, I'd pass Bill Gates in wealth so fast It would make the Flash's head spin.  Well, barring government bullshit, natch.

I mean, I'm sorry, but I just find it irratating this talk of "well innovation:  too fast?" despite the facts that:
1) in a free market (according to the government's OWN figures) technological innovation occurs the fastest
2) these people say those things...while enjoying the fruits of innovation on their computer sharing their opinions on it via the internet
3) the IP laws that allow companies to get away with being stagnant will necessarily increase the value of those things simply by virtue of the supply being lower (supply/demand anybody?), thus giving them less reason to innovate and less ability to do it efficiently via economic calculation (IP IS something invented by government and is absolutely subject to the economic calculation problem).  It's one reason I put my money where my mouth is (when I have money to spare, ha!) and generally stick to more small time indie-ish games on Steam (Okay, Skyrim and a brief stint of WoW that I will NOT be repeating, notwithstanding).  Much more bang for my buck, really.

[MrBogosity]

I didn't say it didn't happen fast. I said it happens incrementally.

[dallen68]

@Shane & VectorM:  What exactly do you both mean by 'innovation'?  Because I'd wager if I were to invent a pill that insures perfect health (cures and prevents any and all possible illnesses ever--be they mental or physical or parasitic or whatever) until the person's genetically determined lifespan limit for a few pennies of marginal cost to myself, or, say to make $5/month 50 TB/s upload & download speed internet the baseline and norm around the world--including sparsely populated areas like where I live-- for a $1/month marginal cost to myself, I'd pass Bill Gates in wealth so fast It would make the Flash's head spin.  Well, barring government bullshit, natch.

I think what Game Theory is describing as innovation and what is generally accepted as innovation are two different things. In the sense GT means it, I would say he has a point: Even if the tech becomes faster, better, more with each title - I still expect a Elder Scrolls game to play like an Elder Scrolls Game; CoD to play like Cod; Forza to be Forza, etc.

On the other hand, sometimes the sales chart doesn't tell the whole story. For example, of people that play Cod, World at War - many of them are not playing the main title (which might get a once through), they're playing the nazi zombi game that's included.

As far as the normal definition of innovation goes - I would love it if I could not tell that I was playing a game.