Critically Acclaimed Hi-Fi Rush "Didn't Make The Money It Needed To Make" - Report

"Game with zero advertising secretly released ON gamepass didn't sell well", not even gonna read the article, has to be a fucking joke. I didn't know about this game until I saw a friend playing it. Let people know about your game if you want them to buy it, don't put the game on an abused subscription service if you want them to buy it.

Wasn't this on Gamepass? So how many copies was Microsoft expecting to 'sell'? I for one, bought it on Steam, but one would think that once a game appears on Gamepass, the number of units sold ceases to be a topic for discussion.

Day 1 gamepass, MS exclusive not from Bethesda is doing ok at best, is anyone even surprised by this?

MS exclusive.

This was already debunked.

Have they seriously still not figured it out?

I LOVE HiFi Rush. I also have Gamepass. Therefore, I did not buy HiFi Rush.

Even Halo Infinite's sales were worse than abysmal. Like, *shockingly* low for a game in a franchise that IS Xbox and reviewed well. I would have bought both these games day 1. I did not. Shadow drops are cool and all, but the tactic left both aforementioned releases destined for failure. I know it's been decades, but did everyone really already forget about the car wreck that was the Sega Saturn launch?

MS terribly underestimated the selling power of launch day. For big titles, it becomes a communal event. It's a talking point. It's publicity. Don't get me wrong; I'm not complaining... but I will be when they start hiking up the cost of the sub and finding creative ways to still charge for day 1 releases.

Sony did it the right way- tiered, perks, extended demos... and myself and everyone else with a PS5 still bought God of War on launch day.

Gamepass wasn't designed for developers but for a way for Microsoft to keep pulling money for old games and usually heavily discounted games, sure it may work for someone who only plays on xbox but when you game on 4 different platforms gamepass is a waste of money...and its gonna go up in price

Microsoft new it wasn’t going to sell since it was going into Gamepass so they did zero marketing to hype the game up!

Gamepass Fodder #231 didn't make anything. What a surprise.

The most overrated game of the year. I couldn't take it anymore after the first boss. The game is a slog and boring. No soul to it.

I didn't really like it much. It's a rhythm game, without proper rhythm, lol. So basically a button masher. I maybe played half way through and quit.

A REALLY good, smaller, game is High on Life. Funny as hell and solid gameplay. The Alien cartel is making humans a new drug for other aliens. Like they literally stuff humans in a big bong, lol.

I dont know if it was good or bad but it reminded me of jet set radio. I didnt like that game.

It really doesn't bode well if Microsoft is going to put out a service like Game Pass, but then punish devs for players using the service instead of purchasing the game. Likewise if they're going to try to guilt everyone who enjoyed a game over Game Pass by saying it didn't meet sales expectations. It just feels manipulative, and like the game was put out to die as an experiment. What is even going through people's heads in a situation like this...?

Well, it didn't do well because you never bothered to market it. Nobody knew about the game until it came out and while it got praised it never got hype. Trailers and developer announcements are far more key to sales than we give them credit for.

I do hope either someone is incorrect with the numbers or they will allow this game to get a sequel because I LOVED it! I'm in the minority who played this on GP, stopped in the middle of the game, and bought it on stream for the total price.

Oh, that game nobody actually had to buy to fully experience didn't sell as well as they expected? Really? Wow, who would of thought that's how business works?

Maybe it will get new life as a TV series. I enjoyed watching it more than playing it.

Why would MS be surprised? They're paying for every game they put on Gamepass and every developer that takes up their offer should know not to expect much from game sales. After all you can play their latest game for a handful of bucks on MS's service.

So MS certainly doesn't expect to make any money with Gamepass. And I don't know how anyone else could expect to from a service that costs $10 per month and divides those few bucks among dozens if not hundreds of developers. At a time when big titles cost $70 at launch.

It did a number of things, which when combined are almost a certain death sentence.

1. It was cartoony with a relatively high price. Higher prices don't mix well with less “serious” games.
2. It didn't have any gunplay. People associate this visual style with accessibility, but they perceive melee combat to be less accessible than ranged combat. It's been a long time since melee combat was simple in games. Sunset Overdrive avoided this pitfall.
3. It put “Rhythm” right up front. It's the first genre tag on its Steam page, even before “Action”. That's a niche. Most people associate “rhythm” in a game context, with restriction. The people who do like rhythm games, probably aren't used to paying this much.

Couple that with coming out of nowhere,
and loads of amazing games coming out recently,
and it's frankly a miracle it sold as well as it did.
It must be a really amazing game.

Gamepass?

The game got great reviews and looked great, so I definitely would have bought it *if* it weren't on Game Pass. So yeah, it makes a difference. Having read this article, I will probably buy it now out of sympathy for the dev.

Some of the greatest games didnt sell well...it may be too niche to hit the mainstream taste.

Weird how Tango Gameworks would be expanding, even though their latest outing didn't do well.

Almost like this claim is total, baseless hogwash.

About 100,000% sure it was the shadow drop.