During its latest financial results briefing session, Square Enix revealed that Just Cause 4 performed below expectations and that it sold fewer units than what Square Enix had anticipated. Given the state of the game we are not really shocked by this news, though we don’t know whether this is the final nail in the Just Cause series coffin.
As Square Enix stated:
“Our 3Q plan was premised on the HD Games sub-segment offsetting sluggishness in the Games for Smart Devices/PC Browsers sub-segment, but results were disappointing as we sold fewer copies of the HD game “JUST CAUSE 4” on launch than we had expected. Both net sales and operating income declined YoY at the Digital Entertainment segment. 3Q at the HD Games sub-segment was marked by growth in the holiday season of digital sales, especially of “SHADOW OF THE TOMB RAIDER,” and by the launch of “DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS 2.” Meanwhile, while we released “JUST CAUSE 4,” we sold fewer units on launch than we had anticipated and were therefore unable to offset charges such as the amortization of development costs.”
As we wrote in our PC Performance Analysis, Just Cause 4 looked worse than Just Cause 3 and demanded more powerful GPUs than its previous part. The game suffered on the PC from some really awful textures and water effects, and everything looked and felt worse than what we got in Just Cause 3.
Square Enix tried to explain the game’s low sales (as well as those of Shadow of the Tomb Raider), claiming that it was unable to provide an experience that would make gamers prefer this game over the other titles that were released during the game’s launch period.
“We think the main reason is that we were unable to provide an experience that was novel enough that players would choose to buy them before any of the other numerous major titles on the competitive landscape. Also, while it is true that we are seeing a shift away from sales of boxes to digital downloads, with this many titles competing with one another, initial sales are definitely an important element in increasing user awareness. For that reason, we do need to engage in a certain amount of advertising just ahead of a new title’s launch.”
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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No surprise. Just Cause has always felt like a bargain bin series to me, and keep in mind JC3 had a lot of issues and was poorly received at launch. Even on consoles, where JC4 was actually functional unlike JC3, there were still pretty substantial frame rate issues and major visual downgrades are never good for PR.
LMAO that is Square Enix for you, completly clueless. Yeah sure the reason why JC4 failed hard is because it was “lacking in advertising” and not because the game was a complete mess.
jc3 was heavily advertised by every youtuber and it still dint sell good enough for square enix
I never saw anyone on Youtube talk about it…
Perhaps they were using the wrong channels.
Oh no bro he’s right, they went “full YouTubers” for the advertising of this game. Down to the game reveals and Q&A’s were done by devs talking over YouTubers playing. It was a disaster to watch. You couldn’t even find any just cause 4 content from a dev, it was all via ShillTubers. Was the nastiest thing I’ve ever witness in all of my marketing career. Durka Durka is 100000% right. I thought I was the only one noticing that mess back then. Was very painful to watch. Cause all you got was YouTubers Yelling an be overly excited by every explosion on screen…. “Noooooo-Wayyyyyy” “Awesomeeeeeeee” ????
They always blame their western studios for not selling an insane amount of copies.
Well that way their eastern studios working on Final Fantasy are never over budget…
You mean heavily cringed… YouTubers Yelling and screaming that they unlock rares don’t sell games. Making sure the game is not a bloody mess is what sells games.
no they just showed the fun stuff you can do in the game.
So people consider the cheesy story and lines a success but the game itself a mess? Bro, this game should’ve never gotten to 4 in the first place. It’s a joke of a game.
Probably becouse its one of those perfect bargain bin titles that many just end up picking up for a few hours of fun.
Honestly, i wouldnt even be surprised if 2 years from now they announce JC5 but with actual co-op.
That to be expected since it crashes dor most people and even on
monsters pcs like my ryzen 1700 gtx 970 16 gb ddr4 3200mhzcl15
dell2p416d 24” 1440p 60z ips looks like crap even on max settings
1440p! i havent play it yet but that what i read on steam and most tech
forums that even pc like mine or better at maxed 1440p and 4k have crap
graphics. that the game fault not pc!!
That to be expected since it crashes dor most people and even on
monsters pcs like my ryzen 1700 gtx 970 16 gb ddr4 3200mhzcl15
dell2p416d 24” 1440p 60z ips looks like crap even on max settings
1440p! i havent play it yet but that what i read on steam and most tech
forums that even pc like mine or better at maxed 1440p and 4k have crap
graphics. that the game fault not pc!!!
Well, at least they were honest about why the game bombed… unlike EA
Good. F*** SquareEnix.
I can say that the reason I haven’t bought it was Denuvo. You hear that Square Enix ? Denuvo won’t make your game a seller it will only hurt it. Especially if it isn’t great to begin with.
lol Oh, SE. You truly are EA Japan. Just die already, and make the gaming world a better place.
Jesus Christ man, well said. EA Japan they are indeed . Couldn’t have said it better. You Own Big Time, ?
It’s a buggy mess, and even if it ran perfectly, it’s just not a worthy sequel, especially the boring as hell “story” and insomnia curing characters.
Why, did they sell 8 million units instead of 10 million that they forecast? 😉
They do acknowledge there was nothing new with the game, just the same old, same old.
Plus a lot of people are bored, sick and tired of these open world sand boxes with repetitive activities, mmo sidequests, drive from point a to point b to shoot bad guys and huge maps that take forever to discover with the same things plastered all over them.
These games are old, look at Crackdown 3, looks like a bad Saints Row clone.
Tomb Raider was more of the same and has been on sale at least 2 dozen times since release, for like 20 bucks or something like that.
People want new experiences and the Just Causes, Tomb Raiders, Crackdowns and Anthems are not it!
Look at Capcom, Resi 2 is amazing and heres hoping DMC will be as good too!
tomb raider didnt selll because it had little action. i liked more 2 previous oens than it due to them being ful of action i play all action g ames no matter what but will play just cause 4 later when technical issues are fixed!
good
I love this series, but I think it’s better suited to a “one per generation” cadence. For me, there just wasn’t enough to differentiate 4 from 3 (hell, even 3 from 2).
They expect to sell the same garbage (sometimes worst like in this case) every year and break records ?
The story is awful as … What did they expect is basically just cause 3 but seems less enjoyable.
Just Cause 3 + TORNADOS
Which was Just Cause 2 + Volcano.
no 2 was awful
All them are awful 😀
who cares, just give me metro exodus crack.
New patch today : improve vegetation and water rendering https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/36ef2fb40fc19c2453ffe6653b131f662b2db564a73a4ea08e441164209e8fce.jpg
New patch today : improve vegetation and water rendering
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/11c3180981a72d85238a01475eccae2a56f1b8dd77e6060617c323404647513f.jpg
Nope, today’s patch simply fixes an achievement. The vegetation and visual improvements will be coming in a future patch.
No mention of the prerendered cutscenes getting fixed either, eventhough they showed better looking ones in E3 2018. I’m honestly mind blown by their decisionmaking. This update will probably arrive with some kind of DLC or the first expansion as well, just like it happened in JC3.
How about not putting denuvo if you think the game offer nothing new??
At least they didnt blame piracy this time, so they knew that their game not performed well simply because it isn’t a good game
Yeah lots of refunds I would imagine including mine. Just to give some context I have 2345 games on Steam and I have refunded only 2 games ever, Arc Survival Evolved and Just Cause 4.
don’t give what should be a AAA game to a AA developer.
Let’s face. Just Cause is a shallow and terrible piece of sh&&& GTA clone. With some absolute dumb gameplay mechanics. They hoped streamers will pick it up and make it popular by luring little kids with : hey look what a cool glitch i can make with this grappling hook!
I am glad it failed! Saints Row was better than this steaming POS.
Oh come on, Just Cause 2 was awesome. 3 was alright too. It’s just that 4 got released in a sh**ty state but there’s potential there. I doubt they’ll fix it but it’s still possible…
Saints Row, Just Cause and GTA are both good series with good and bad games.
2 was awful to me.
Good, they completely shat all over what made the first two games great and now there’s not a hint of atmosphere, campiness or self awareness.
Yeah everyone hated those god awful challenges of JC3 and they said no problem, “WE SHALL MAKE THEM THE MAIN FOCUS OF JC4. How dare you tell us how to make our game”. That’s when I realize these fools don’t read their forums and I don’t believe they are gamers either. Oh look another Pizza Chef that doesn’t eat pizza. Oh my…
Everytime the financial results are bad Square Enix put the blame on its western studios. It happened in 2013 when they blamed the Tomb Raider reboot and Hitman Absolution but they were completely silent about FF XIII-3. I think it’s what pushed IO Interactive to stop their partnership after the Hitman reboot.
And that 2013 debacle is what kicked off the EVIL SQUARE ENIX REIGN. I was a Square Enix die-hard and after that year is what result Just Cause to go down the constant messy road it has been going down. if you play JC3 you can see where it was suppose to be an ONLINE-ONLY Micro-transaction piece of mess. that’s why Avalanche Sweden abandoned the franchise. The original avalanche has nothing to do with Just Cause franchise anymore. They got sick of Square-Enix flip flopping on the franchise and peaced out.
I wish the old Avalanche studio made another Mad Max instead of a Rage reboot for Bethesda.
why? It was very repetitive, rage 2 looks more interesting.
But FFXIII launched in 2010, 2009 in Japan lol. It was well before 2013 when the might fell.
I like in particular, how SE “SquareEnix’d” the hell out of DX: MD, with their pre-order bullshit, and sickening cash grab garbage.
SE has a stigma to it these days, consciously, or subconsciously, and it ties directly back to the Japan headquarters.
True, I completely forgot about DE:MD. That game was a huge let down, from the microtransactions and pre-order nonsense to the lame story.
you forgot sleepingdogs
Yeah the sales numbers of sleeping dogs and TR 2013 is what spooked Enix and then they went full Darkside with all the DRM and lootboxes. You know those imaginary sales targets. Also at the time they had a game called Nosgoth in closed alpha 2012, then closed beta 2013-2014-ish, open beta 2015 and then they canceled the hell out of it in 2016; when people wouldn’t pay for the most rediculous loot boxes. They even had a closed alpha/beta for A Sleeping Dogs MMO.
But, I was primarily an Enix fan because they had a “No Console Port Rule”. Which meant all their games on PC, was always to be developed FOR THE PC/seperately. But once they went crazy, I dropped them like a bad habit.
Now I get to sit and watch my beloved Just Cause Franchise be destroyed. I wished Avalanche Sweden would come back but I don’t think they want anything to do with square enix after the development hell they put them through for Just Cause 3. So that’s that, Just Cause is now dead to me. I’m Sad AF… They don’t fully support their Western Devs but expects crazy returns in the process. Its been a thing they are most famous for.
Because it looked and played EXACTLY LIKE THE LAST TWO. Absolutely no differences. At least Ubisoft tries a little to gussy up their recycled content to make it look a little different. The JC devs don’t even bother. It’s bizarre.
Wrong.
JC4 has balloons, vehicles that spin out of control and promoted by 10 yo you tubers who think screaming every 5 seconds is excitement.
When you target small kids who like sh**ty colored candy bars what else do you expect.
The you tubers promoting JC4 were horrifyingly cringy and it didn’t help that JC4’s characters and story so just so lame….not yo mention the awful textures.
A game like JC needs to be fully self aware and should have outrageous ott characters and story. (there are just too many films made in Hollywood and Bollywood from where these idiots could have taken some inspiration w.r.t crazy ridiculousness….but what do they do…give us a sh**ty story about Rico’s father that no one cared about.)
Despite having a fantastic destruction engine, avalanche are completely clueless when it comes to melding explosion and a zanny story for their game.
when people argue that 3 was like 2, can you even take any of these opinions seriously?
Oh I wonder why?…………… You’ve single handily ruined my favorite franchise. Thanks Guys 🙂
*only*
JC1 is a total mess. JC2 is basically a miracle. JC3 is “more JC2 but more cancer too (e.g. always online, horrible optimization on all platforms)”. JC4 is “Ok guys you know what? We gave up!”.
2 was a mess.
i like it more than 2
True. Got 100 hours into. In fact, I am going to play it later this week 🙂
Never played it, but got the complete game for 2 bucks on Steam sale the other day, so excited to see what it was all about 🙂
I think real reason is Denuvo.
story comes first
who will play a 4th sequel to a game because it has only destruction mechanics
Good. Both JC3 and 4 were terrible. Time for Avalanche to bring their A-game instead of just reheating yesterday’s leftovers.
That’s Avalanche NY, there begins/sustains the problem. Avalanche Sweden abandoned the franchise long ago. They got tired of feeling with Square Enix and their garbage self. Avalanche NY is a garbage studio.
I wasn’t and still aren’t bothered with it. I have to assume it will it take them 2 years to get it running at 30fps on PS4 like the last game. And if it was running at that then oh well, I guess don’t release your last game in such a terrible state.
Ubisoft learned from AC Unity to Syndicate that gamers weren’t going to take crap, Capcom even learned from RE6 to RE7 sales how a game can damage the rep of the next installment no matter how actually decent it is.
This game was cracked the first day! No wonder they did not sell much.
No one wants yours or anyone elses boxed games, because there aren’t really games in the boxes anymore. Fix this, and I’ll buy nothing but boxed games.
Why is nobody mentioning the fact they completely altered the core gaming mechanic from JC2 which had you exploring the world in full to locate things such as all of the widespread Vehicle Parts, Weapon Parts, Armour Parts, Cash Staches, Skull locations? Plus that game 100% was based around Chaos created during play to complete settlements along with said feature not completing silly stunt or wingsuit missions as the main staple of the game. In 4 I barely know what I’m supposed to be doing half the time the game design is so poorly done and trust me JC2 is my all time favourite game so to have this new outing almost completely devoid of most of the stuff so I loved in that is downright heartbreaking. Yes the world is large but there’s hardly anything to do do making much of it feel empty I lose the will to actually explore it very quickly compared to the hours I would spend tracking down Parts in 2.
You drastically change the design you lose the heart of the game and as fun and random as 4 can be at times there’s very little in it compared to JC2 a last gen game that set a new high for open world gaming all on its own.
Just cause 2 was the last good one for me. Phenomenal port, fantastic humor, hilarious voice actor(hate the voice actor of rico in just cause 3 and 4), minblowing environments, great soundtrack, etc.
That to be expected since it crashes dor most people and even on monsters pcs like my ryzen 1700 gtx 970 16 gb ddr4 3200mhzcl15 dell2p416d 24” 1440p 60z ips looks like crap even on max settings 1440p! i havent play it yet but that what i read on steam and most tech forums that even pc like mine or better at maxed 1440p and 4k have crap graphics. that the game fault not pc!