Write your local congressman for VF5r

Quite funny this is.
I am a freelancer who writes for whoever is crazy enough to pay me.
I dont do reviews and rarely do previews.
My field of expertise is event coverage, analysis and interviews.
Never cared about commercial interests and have made a lot of people pissed along the way by not caring about it and asking the questions I wanted to ask instead.

Another funny thing is the fact I got a lot of shit on this very forum when I mentioned that Yu Suzuki/AM2 was full of shit with some of the claims they made in the past.

Regardless, as I have said several times in the past R is out of AM2 hands and Sega home has decided their resources are better spend elsewhere so not much they can do about that.
And with that in mind why would we want them to do R now when a likely newer version would spring up soon in arcades.
If they start R now it will be too late in the game and you guys will be bitching for the next update.

 

Yup, they are looking for exclusives, exclusives that is that can sell millions and not a few hundred K.

 

Damn fishie, what a knockout. Still...

 

I'm going to blame Microsoft/Sony for being a bunch of dickheads with their licensing fees. It's practically mandatory that a game that goes on the shelf be priced at $60 dollars. No one can come in and sell a game at a bargain price. Even if they wanted to, the entire bureaucracy that one would have to wade through wouldn't allow it.

Sega sold VF4:Evolution for 20 bucks a few years back and they ended up selling over a million units. Why? Because the game was 20 dollars. It's much easier for a person to put down 20 or 30 bucks on a game than it is to risk dropping 60 on a game you probably won't like (a la Halo 3). It's all in the perceived value of the product and a game like Virtua Fighter is primed for bargain pricing: it's a fighting game with pretty graphics and simple as fuck controls and it even has online play. It's practically begging to be sold! The market for bargain bin games is gigantic and you can bet that Sega was thinking of this when they announced VF5. VF4:Evo was a tremendous success afterall. Of course, Sony and Microsoft turned their faces on the developers

A series like VF can't compete against the juggernauts that dominate the industry. Games like Halo, Mario, God of War all have the media backing them. They have all the hype and all the nostalgia and the legions of fans waiting for the next game to appear. VF simply doesn't have that hype and the only way it can compete is through word of mouth and pricing. Microsoft and Sony took that away. The only good thing to come out of that was the bittersweet online play: Sweet because it allowed you to experience VF's sweet gameplay with more people, bitter because it cost Sega a shit ton of money to produce a product that was doomed from the start.

Sega doesn't have a lot of money to spend. They make the worst decisions. It basically cost them a takeover by Sammy a few years back and are now stuck following the same shitty corporate trends. They've made some horrid decision but, goddamn, pricing VF4:Evo at 20 bucks wasn't one of them.

Fuck Microsoft and Fuck Sony for screwing publishers and developers.

 

You can blame Sony for wanting a rushed port of VF5 and Sega for caving in. But when it comes to the VF series there is no question that VFDC should be eternally loyal to MS. I hate MS and the 360. But everyone must realize that without MS demanding that Sega include an online mode and update the game to version C that VF would be in the dark ages for this generation of fighting games. No online would have been an even quicker death for VF. And let's not forget MS lobbying VF5 Online for the WCG year after year.

VF4 outsold VF4EVO on consoles if I remember correctly. And VF4 was full price and EVO was greatest hits in the states. I also don't think EVO eclipsed a million sales on the PS2.

And people perceive items of higher value as being worth more. Gamers are more likely to buy a game that's $60 because they think a $60 game is worth more and because it's priced higher it must be a better game. Gamers often equate bargain bin games with bargain bin experiences. It is rare for a success story like Valkyria Chronicles to happen.

VF4 and 4EVO got some of the best reviews that fightings game have probably ever gotten. So many game of the year awards and those games regularly appear on greatest games of all time lists. The media liked those games and promoted them a ton (and still do)...the media didn't like VF5 on the PS3 because it had no online and the 360 version was too little too late to ride any VF5 hype train.

Sega had enough money to squander into 110 arcades that went out of business. I bet instead of dumping money into a few of those failed ventures they could have produced VF5R Online for the consoles. If they had not over expanded into all 110 of those arcades they could have ported VF5R Online and not even given it a second though fiscally.

Without MS there is no VF5 Online. Sega lied and lied over again about VF5 not being able to be played online. MS put them in their place, rewarded the fans of VF series, and pushed VF5 Online into the WCG permanently. MS sucks for many reasons but they did a tremendous service to this community and it must be recognized. Sony wanted VF5 out immediately on the PS3 and that's why we got a rushed port with no online mode and animation issues. Sony at least wanted a VF5 port something I'm sure Sega needed pushing for.

As far as service to VF fans goes for VF5 MS is the best, followed by Sony, then Sega. Sega does nothing for the VF community besides insult it, deny it games, refuse to communicate with it, oh and of course sue it.

 

Outside of the US the game was a full price release.
It was Sony US who forced em to release at 20$ or not release at all since Sony argued it wasnt a new game but rather a small update.

 

Strange news from my side of the world. I've been noticing that
Best Buys all over town are restocking V4 Evo for the PS2

At one point there were no copies of EVO to be found, now I've
noticed 6-8 copies in the store. Same with Walmarts. What up wit dat

 

Are they the ones with the greatest hits logo? Most giant retail stores keep stocks of greatest hits games for the PS2 around. I wish they kept VF4 Vanilla in stock as both of my copies somehow have disc rot and need replacing.

I picked a PS2 up and the entire GTA series plus both God of War games last week to give to one of my friends to repay a favor he did for me recently. PS2 greatest hits titles are some of the best games of all time (like VF4EVO).

 

[/quote]
If that's true, then I take back what I said about Sony. However, there's a reason why the used game market is so huge and that's because people buy cheaper games. I've heard stories of developers who wanted to price their games cheap but were flat-out denied by Microsoft due to that whole '60 dollar games are perceived better' nonsense. Even if Sega didn't intend to do this with VF5, it's not like they had the option to go cheap anyway.

Price is the biggest barrier when it comes to games.

 

Wasn't a full price game here on release day, pretty sure it was £25 - £30.

 

Yea its greatest hits, but still
I can understand have 2-3 copies, but its between 4-6 and for VF which supposedly doesn't sell. Don't get me wrong, I happy anytime I see the stores stocking VF, its the number of copies that has me wondering.....

 

I thought it was Greatest Hits price outside of Asian territories for everyone. The U.S. release was Greatest Hits but had the extra of the VF10th anniversary game built into the EVO options menu right on the disc.

 

It was released full price over here. No 10th anniversary bonus but we got it much earlier than the states.

 

VF4:Evo debuted as a "Greatest Hits" title in the States. Probably the only game in the PS2 library to do so.

 

VF4 EVO was my favorite game of all time hands down.

That being said I still have hope that VF5R Ver C will come for home consoles (no real need for a ver d of R). We still have 2 big gaming events this year in japan SBO and TGS. Are we addressing the right people the game informer staff don't know but you have to admit it would be awesome to see VF5R get a cover on game informer.

 

If really VF5R Ver C will hit consoles, I hope there would be a new installment of new characters, more customization, lots of mini games and story mode. Virtua Fighter have no storyline and any introductions during gameplay. It's about how you win every game with different fighters with various fighting style. Any suggesions for the new version?

 

I suspect Sega is finished with the era of VF5 now. Even if there's a Version C, chances are there will be no gameplay changes if we look at the current update pattern.

We're gonna have to wait for an eventual VF6.

 

I'm completely pessimistic about Sammy's commitment to this franchise. I would love to see even a leaked "6" graphic at some point in the next 1.5 years, but I'm already expecting to not see a new VF until well into 2012-2013... if even at all.

 

Good morning. In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world. And you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind. "Mankind." That word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can't be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it's fate that today is the Fourth of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom... Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution... but from annihilation. We are fighting for our right to live. To exist. And should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day the world declared in one voice: "We will not go quietly into the night!" We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day!

 

Did the driver of the short bus forget to pick you up today?