White Knight Chronicles Series Hits The Million Plateau

It's a great achievement but here's an interesting question: is the number higher or lower than you expected?

As reported by Siliconera, Sony Computer Entertainment public relations representative Taku Nishijima recently Tweeted that the White Knight Chronicles titles have surpassed the 1 million mark. This includes all released games in the series- White Knight Chronicles, White Knight Chronicles EX Edition, White Knight Chronicles International Edition (the US/EU version), White Knight Chronicles 2 (launched in Japan last year), and White Knight Chronicles Origins (for the PSP; it'll release in Europe, too). The total sales tally will rise when WKC2 arrives in North America this summer but can Level-5's franchise be considered a rip-roaring success? Or does that million seem lower than you might've thought? The Japanese really tend to like their RPGs, after all; it'd be interesting to see the Japanese number...

We're certainly hoping the sequel sells well when it launches here; otherwise, they may not opt for an overseas release next time around.

Related Game(s): White Knight Chronicles, White Knight Chronicles 2

Tags: white knight chronicles, white knight chronicles 2, wkc sales

4/12/2011 9:43:41 AM Ben Dutka

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Comments (30 posts)

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robinhood2010
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:25:16 AM
Reply

I guess this is doing fairly well.

You would have thought the numbers would be higher considering how much the Japanese love JRPGs, but the sequel and prequel have not been released internationally yet, so we will see this number rise.

Is a million a lot? Black Ops has sold over 18million now, so I would still consider 1 million a success!

1 up, 0 down

Lotusflow3r
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:29:24 AM
Reply

Extremely underwhelming considering the quality of the title.

I expected those numbers for WKC1 alone.

Yet another title plagued by the corrupted gaming public thanks to the dumbing down.

I have hope, though, that great work eventually gets rewarded. WKC deserves it.

On the plus, a million means big profit for L5.

If Second Land doesn't sell.....i will protest. But that game is already half way to these figures on DS and in Japan alone.

Last edited by Lotusflow3r on 4/12/2011 10:31:03 AM

4 up, 0 down

Highlander
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:29:59 AM
Reply

I think it can be called a success, but I suspect I am in the minority on that score. If you look back on previous generations, say the PS2 for example, a million selling franchise was a big deal. the distortion caused by hyper successful games like Black Ops continues to dilute the relative success of other games.

Last edited by Highlander on 4/12/2011 10:30:58 AM

6 up, 0 down

Lotusflow3r
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:40:38 AM

And that's another way of looking at it, good point.

4 up, 0 down

Temjin001
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:46:28 AM

I'm sure development expense is a big factor, too. That, and advertising expense. Some games can go nuts with topographical referencing, quality voice actors/actors, and licensing fees. I'm thinking WKC could have turned a large percentage based profit seeing that it doesn't have to do a lot of what I listed.

3 up, 0 down

Highlander
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:53:02 AM

Temjin,

I agree with that, I don't know the size of the full team for White Knight Chronicles, but rather like Valkyria Chronicles, I supsect that the costs associated with making the game are not so out of line with those for making a PS2 game. the initial upfront costs of getting to HD on the PS3 would be weighed against the first game, re-using and evolving all of that for the second one is much less expensive.

The very low advertizing budget in the west can't hurt (the costs) either, although a little more targeted advertizing might help sales. These games sell mostly on word of mouth in the Western markets.

3 up, 1 down

Scarecrow
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:40:39 AM
Reply

It really comes down to how much money/time they spent making these days. If they didn't spend a lot of money then 1 million is a big success for them.

Just like Demon's Souls, From Software didn't spend COD type numbers to create it. So selling around 1mil was a success to them too.

Though, personally I feel like WKC1 alone should have sold 1 million... I guess people do enjoy Final Fantasy XIII's easy mode/twitchy gameplay more than WKC's more complex and more turn-based style. I also blame review scores though, I think people pay way too much attention to that. WKC1 was better than FFXIII.

3 up, 0 down

WorldEndsWithMe
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:46:20 AM

The scores on WKC were mostly wrong, divvied out by those who think JRPGs need to go away entirely.

5 up, 1 down

Highlander
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:54:24 AM

Agreed Worlds. I know I like the game and so it's easy to say I'm biased, but I felt my review scores were closer to the mark than most reviews I read elsewhere. The PSX review was pretty good too.

6 up, 1 down

WorldEndsWithMe
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:45:01 AM
Reply

It's about what I expect, but not as high as it should be. That alone doesn't bode well for JRPGs, but you know how people are this generation, if the game doesn't have a number after it then it isn't worth a buy. So let's hope WKC2 grabs lots of new fans, and since they will get the first game too perhaps the franchise will grow into a bigger success.

I want Origins too, bring it here. Love Level 5. Now about Rogue Galaxy 2...

3 up, 0 down

Highlander
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 10:55:57 AM

I'm beginning to think that like minded JRPG fans need to band together to mount a guerrilla marketing campaign by posting real reviews and recommendations at every game review site and online retailer that we can.

4 up, 0 down

Scarecrow
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 11:33:05 AM

That wouldn't be a bad start Highlander. I'll start with a psxe review and go from there.

Though at every site I do a review at I'm going to give it a perfect score just to make fun of the point system for video games which I feel is NOT necessary. A review without a score is a better review.

Last edited by Scarecrow on 4/12/2011 11:33:57 AM

2 up, 0 down

Qubex
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 9:01:57 PM

Is the JRPG then a dying breed World?

Q!

"play.experience.enjoy"

0 up, 0 down

A2K78
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 11:38:24 AM
Reply

10 years ago a developer needed to sell in the area of 500,000 copies for a game to be considered commercially successful. In this day and age where the production budgets have shot past the $50 million(mainly for AAA title) a game need to sell in excess of 3 million to be considered technically commercially successful.

To put it straight, this console cycle have not only raised the bar in terms of production cost, but as a result developers are taking far less risk and playing it safe too much with established franchises hence the barrage of sequels. If you think this is bad, then the next cycle of consoles will desimate the vast majority of game developers out there.

0 up, 0 down

Wissam
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 4:17:21 PM

This is a success. since we have fps and shooters
craze these days.

0 up, 0 down

___________
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 @ 9:54:21 AM

are you a recorded message?
could of swore ive heard this a million times before!

0 up, 0 down

bebestorm
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 11:40:46 AM
Reply

WKC was a game I anticpated for the longest time and when I got it I found myself not liking it. From what've read about the sequel they've improved on alot of things. So Im going to wait and see how 2 goes before buying.

1 up, 4 down

WorldEndsWithMe
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 12:13:16 PM

It wasn't out of this world fantastic, but delivered in a lot of areas lacking in this generation and I felt it was a great start to an IP that could just get better and better like FF did. Gotta watch that unlucky XIII number though.

4 up, 1 down

bebestorm
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 12:40:37 PM

Im a jrpg gamer at heart so I put alot hours into it. I gave it a fair chance.

2 up, 2 down

Dreno
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 11:51:26 AM
Reply

Congratulations to l5 and the white knight franchise. 1 million is a good job. And just because games like black ops sell 18 mil doesn't mean that they are the best games. I was a fan of the cod games but after codblops I felt really let down. The game sucked. I still play it from time to time, but its not that good a game.

So for white knight to hit the 1mil mark, especially since every where but here prettty much blasts the game is an excellent achievment. Personally I loved the game. In my opinion its one of the many better games this gen.

So to you level 5 and wkc, cheers!

0 up, 0 down

WorldEndsWithMe
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 12:14:08 PM

codblops, lol

0 up, 0 down

kraygen
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 12:22:14 PM
Reply

While I'm glad it hit the million mark it deserves better. I will never understand the remarks made about this game, especially as far as the graphics go. It had a very JRPG look to it and it was clean and detailed and beautiful. Not to mention that it had no graphical issues. I never had any screen tearing or blinking screens or anything of that nature.

I loved WKC, my favorite game I own on ps3. It had everything that I look for in a great rpg and I know WKC2 and the psp version will be great.

I'm hoping that the american and european ps3/psp owners will wake up and start buying. WKC had the most delusional reviews I've ever seen and it deserves much better.

2 up, 0 down

kraygen
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 12:24:11 PM

I would like to add though that I think Arnold got it about right, 8.5 I can understand and it well deserved. Thumbs up for Arnold.

1 up, 0 down

shadowscorpio
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 1:22:12 PM

I only experienced screen tearing when playing on a standard television. Once I upgraded to HD problem was gone. I agree with you, this game was beautifully put together and I think people tend to base too much of a decision on scores.

I can tell you that if Tales of Graces F gets a score of 5 or below, its not going to stop me from owning it. Everyone should ultimately be their final reviewer.

2 up, 0 down

Lawless SXE
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 1:37:05 PM
Reply

I thought the sales figures would have been a lot higher. I mean, clearly the first did well enough to warrant a sequel, and Sony had the faith to create a portable spin-off game, so perhaps 1 million isn't so bad. And to think... NT refused to do a Heavenly Sword sequel because 1.5 million wasn't enough.

I suppose that perspective is stronger than most give credit for.
Peace.

2 up, 0 down

MyWorstNightmar
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 6:45:44 PM

If they complained of only 1.5 million being sold, they either had a very poor contract that paid them very little for the product, OR their developement costs were through the roof. Which I could believe since it was basically a launch game, and they had a steep learning curve, which boosts labor costs with that alone.

0 up, 0 down

duomaxwell007
Tuesday, April 12, 2011 @ 2:07:58 PM
Reply

Well thats hardly impressive considering that number accounts for ALL game sin the WKC series and across all the regions it was sold in.. so if you take that in to account thats 2000k sales per game.... thats pretty bad.. now if WKC1 ALONE sold 1mil THEN id be impressed

0 up, 0 down

___________
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 @ 5:07:37 AM
Reply

considering its a RPG, and did not release outside JP for quite a while i think its pretty good!

1 up, 0 down

Highlander
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 @ 1:30:16 PM

I agree with you!

0 up, 0 down

Highlander
Wednesday, April 13, 2011 @ 1:32:05 PM
Reply

Just read that the US release of WKC2 may not be until 'late summer'. It was a line in an article, but a worrying one. if the European release does happen in May, and the US release is pushed back to late summer; there's absolutely no doubt in my mind that I will import the European version. I imagine a significant number of fans of the game will do likewise in the Us which will inflate Europe's numbers and hurt US sales.

Way to go SCEA, great job guys.

0 up, 0 down

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