NoA, XSEED on Xenoblade/Last Story sales, Reggie on localizing Monolith’s next game
Xenoblade came out in Japan in June 2010. It hit Europe about a year later. North America had to wait another eight months for the title.
What took so long? Reggie Fils-Aime explained:
“We needed to make sure that there was really an opportunity for it. We wanted to see how it would sell in Europe, and based on the performance in Europe, we would look to bring it here to the U.S. It did well in Europe; we decided to bring it in here. We took a very smart approach and we sold it ourselves online in terms of physical goods as well as a focus on GameStop as a retailer, and it was a very good effort for us.”
Reggie was further asked how it sold. He responded with “Quite well.”
What about another Wii RPG? The Last Story launched in the states not too long ago. How’d that perform on the market?
It’s also doing well, according to XSEED’s Jessica Chavez:
“The Last Story has definitely gotten the support of the fans. It’s doing really well, and we hope word of the game’s quality/sexy packaging will continue to entice more to check it out.”
Back to Reggie for a moment. Xenoblade did, eventually, come to North America.
As far as Monolith Soft’s next game – in the works for Wii U – is concerned, he said:
“We know that they’re working on a game. I personally haven’t seen it, but I know there’s a lot of excitement in Japan and Kyoto about what they’re working on, so I look forward to seeing it. In the end, if it’s a game that we decide to publish from… what would be a second-party standpoint, certainly we’d love to bring it here to the US. The way we look at the opportunity is, given a level of marketing support, how much are we gonna sell and is it gonna be a profitable venture?”
