"No Brothels to be in DA4" as per Mark Darrah Tweet.

From the same article: "To be sure, overall unit sales may be better than the NPD and Gfk Chart-Track sell-through numbers as the data thus far only tracked physical game sales in retail stores not digital game sales."

"Analysts said part of the reason for the sales decline may be because it launched on two less console platforms versus the first title. In addition, some gamers may be waiting for the PC version, which launches on Oct. 24. However, the installed bases of Sony Playstation 4 and Microsoft Xbox One consoles increased significantly since 2014, counteracting the game not being released on Xbox 360 and the Playstation 3 this time."

In other words, most of this analysis is made based on incomplete data. And TBH, in this day and age, I have no idea why digital sales aren't included - is it because they're harder to track?

Also - this: www.rollingstone.com/glixel/news/destiny-2-had-the-biggest-console-launch-week-of-the-year-w503384

Given that Destiny 2 shattered all records in terms of copies bought within first week, I am entirely not surprised the numbers have dropped significantly past September.

A lot of Bioware games were made to follow trends, which includes the whole of Mass Effect and Dragon Age so the point is moot. It's not a 'let's eat a cookie and have a cookie too' situation. One can follow trends and do their own thing. One of my favorite franchises is LotR (a franchise that is also largely responsible for existence of Dragon Age in the first place), and it's a product full of passion, talent and dedication, even though the original reason for its existence was to make money. ESO was made to follow MMO trend of not-distant yore and, after messy launch, it became one of most popular MMOs there is for very good reasons.

Is any of that 50% due to a general collapse of the physical channel? I don't follow console sales trends.

Actually DAO wasnt made to follow a trend. It was made to be a spiritual successor to BG. It looked internally for influence.

That is different from DAI where they looked externally (Skyrim) for influence.

DAO being a spiritual successor for Baldur's Gate is irrelevant to the point I was making. It's the success of LotR that has opened up the market for more fantasy movies and games. Hence Bioware could "follow the trends" and follow-up BG with DA in the first place. It's not a coincidence that they began thinking up the game a mere year after tremendous success of Fellowship of the Rings. Heck, the devs don't even hide that they wanted the franchise to be what LotR was for books and then movies.

Like I said, following trends and 'doing own thing' are not mutually exclusive.

Also - you seem to be assuming that "looking externally" for influence is a bad thing. Or is it yet another thinly veiled attempt to discredit Bioware and you didn't really think it through?

Because you know who looked externally for influence too? CDPR. Not only the whole game is based on existing book series, not only Witcher 3 totally looked at Skyrim for influence (from gameplay perspective it's actually more similar to Skyrim than DAI ever was), it looked at Bioware games too. They even got direct help from BW with their first title.

Me? I don't care if something is based on trends. I don't care if something is 'influenced externally' or not. It's the result that matters - the 'how it's done' will almost always matter more than 'what is it' for me. People can make fantastic AAA games or blockbuster movies based on what seemed to be the most derivative idea ever and crappy indie titles where "the author follows his/her vision to a T" and vice versa. You don't have to look far to find those, or anything in between.

You're not a very careful reader, are you? I said that LotR allowed BW to follow-up BG with DA, not that LotR is responsible for BG

So, very sorry... you tried to 'gotcha' me and only shot yourself in the foot. Again.

I am going on what Bioware said, which was that DAO was a spiritual successor to BG. Please provide where Bioware acknowledged that LOTR was a driving factor behind DAO.

Also outside of SW, KOTOR was influenced by Neverwinter Knights.

LOTR has been the "driving factor" for all Fantasy media since it was written. That's why everything is so homogenous and bland.

Oh, and I dont need to discredit Bioware, EA is already doing that.

You just refuse to see that just like you probably refused to see that MEA would not get SP DLC.

Clearly they are not but I picked those 2 games to show that there can be a wide variance of Fantasy video games.

There seems to be some fundamental misunderstanding that disallows you from getting that "spiritual successor" doesn't mean "this game led to the other game existing". That's not even what the term means. It means something that shares themes or style or elements or some other things that makes it a successor on creative level, not "something that guaranteed a more-or-less sequel".

"Baldur's Gate II" was great success for BW, but it never did for fantasy titles across different mediums what LotR movie did - it made fantasy mainstream and fantasy titles desirable. It was a trendsetter, like the book it was based on was for fantasy genre as a whole. David Gaider did say (in interview for VGS) that before Lord of the Rings came out the idea that traditional fantasy could have commercial weight wasn't really a thing. He should know - Baldur's Gate II success didn't save their previous publisher from bankruptcy after all.

Like you said - Baldur's Gate II is a 1998 title. And they began developing Dragon Age in 2002, a year after first LotR movie. I'm also fairly sure that success of the whole trilogy allowed them to justify DA's long and choppy development.

Nice speech but EA is still discrediting Bioware just as it has done Visceral, Maxis, Pandemic, Bioware Montreal etc....