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Hellblade II’s big global marketing campaign has begun

King Dazzar

Member
Yes, the one thing I'll agree with is that the marketing is pretty late but looks like they're doing about the game thing most games would in terms of adverts etc.



They're going all the usual stuff most games would, tv/social media ads, and we did have hands on previews a few days ago too.

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Dunno man. I've just done a search in youtube for Hellblade 2 and all I get is this:

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SJRB

Gold Member
I don't know how many copies they need to sell to break even, but man, the outlook is dire.
 

King Dazzar

Member
Ads don't usually show up in searches, also just for giggles I did this on a clean window and aside from that Luke guy's video, mine were mostly the usual trailers / preview / Direct etc and a side bar with stuff about the game:




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Yeah so the hits are similar to mine. But there isnt anything much recent, which was my point.... maybe as you say its all being captured via ads and not channel engagement.
 
Folks forget but this is the 2nd game from NT for MS. Bleeding Edge was the first. Bleeding Edge is also one of the few games whose servers MS actually shutdown in the wake of its reception and engagement, and this is during the GP era. Let that sink in.
Xbox didn't shut down Bleeding Edge's servers. It's just near impossible to find a game because of the population.
 
They're treating this like it's Halo back when it was actually popular. But it makes sense when you literally have nothing else of note.
Avowed, Indiana Jones, Starfield: Shattered Space DLC, Cod Black Ops, Stalker 2, and more. They have 10 products in total coming out this year. They have more to advertise and sell this year than any other gaming company on Earth and it's not even close. It's ok to be critical of a company like Xbox especially after they closed Tango but let's try making at least some kind of sense, yes?

This ain't the year to come at Xbox for not releasing enough games. Come at them for the mistakes they are making and their shit messaging.

Btw Sony is not launching any first party IP until at least March 2025 according to Sony. Just fyi.
 

Flabagast

Member
Avowed, Indiana Jones, Starfield: Shattered Space DLC, Cod Black Ops, Stalker 2, and more. They have 10 products in total coming out this year. They have more to advertise and sell this year than any other gaming company on Earth and it's not even close. It's ok to be critical of a company like Xbox especially after they closed Tango but let's try making at least some kind of sense, yes?

This ain't the year to come at Xbox for not releasing enough games. Come at them for the mistakes they are making and their shit messaging.

Btw Sony is not launching any first party IP until at least March 2025 according to Sony. Just fyi.
It's not the amount of content that matters, but the quality. This is a critical error of thinking that MS and Xbox fans still continue to make.

How many of these games have a shot to be GOTY ? probably zero.
 
It's not the amount of content that matters, but the quality. This is a critical error of thinking that MS and Xbox fans still continue to make.

How many of these games have a shot to be GOTY ? probably zero.
Better shot than any sony first party games since thats literally 0 games. Just weird to pick on Xbox for lack of games THIS year. Even with the Xbox tax I think Hellblade has a shot. Even though it's a shirt game. I have NO idea what to expect from Indy and Avowed and no matter how good COD is, the media doesn't consider it a "real game" so it would never win. Dont need to be GOTY to be a great quality game either.


All that said I won't be the least but surprised if Xbox completely fucking fumbles as usual lol
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
Xbox has officially hit absolute meltdown status. There is no conversation to be had but who is next on the chopping block. Games are expected to be shit and not perform well by almost everyone. The conversation is basically those two things.

Shit do. I would hate to be Ninja Theory right now...or any xbox owned studio.
 
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nemiroff

Gold Member
I am in the opposite camp.

Gimme Hellblade combat, double the amount and complexity of puzzles, I would gladly play that.

Mental illness, I would rather read about it than experience first hand in a video game.
Yeah, we need to strip it of the staples that makes Hellblade Helblade and add it to the pile of generic slop.
 
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Alebrije

Member
Where is the promotion? Have not seen an ad at least here in México and Microsoft uses to promote thier games here.

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Xbox has officially hit absolute meltdown status. There is no conversation to be had but who is next on the chopping block. Games are expected to be shit and not perform well by almost everyone. The conversation is basically those two things.

Shit do. I would hate to be Ninja Theory right now...or any xbox owned studio.
 

Audiophile

Member
Wouldn't surprise me if they try to sink it with bad marketing so they can cut more costs.

At best this might do.. "well".
 
It's not wierd at all. One side has had back to back exclusives for the past four months. The other has had nothing. (well, except palworld)

In that situation the semantics of first party mean fuck all
It's not semantics. We were talking about first party specifically. I was responding to someone who was giving Aaron Greenberg shit by saying Aaron"doesn't have anything else to promote this year" so yea we were very specifically talking about first party. Greenberg doesn't promote for third party games.

My only point was that Greenberg and the rest of Xbox has A LOT to promote this year bc they have so many first party games that they are directly responsible for promoting
 
It's not semantics. We were talking about first party specifically. I was responding to someone who was giving Aaron Greenberg shit by saying Aaron"doesn't have anything else to promote this year" so yea we were very specifically talking about first party. Greenberg doesn't promote for third party games.

My only point was that Greenberg and the rest of Xbox has A LOT to promote this year bc they have so many first party games that they are directly responsible for promoting

No you weren't. Hence why you tacked on Stalker 2 to the list
 

Saber

Gold Member
And if this game didn't sell, chopchop

No pressure though. But think about the chopchop part.
 
It's not semantics. We were talking about first party specifically. I was responding to someone who was giving Aaron Greenberg shit by saying Aaron"doesn't have anything else to promote this year" so yea we were very specifically talking about first party. Greenberg doesn't promote for third party games.

My only point was that Greenberg and the rest of Xbox has A LOT to promote this year bc they have so many first party games that they are directly responsible for promoting


Two of the biggest successes this year (Helldivers and Stellar Blade) are games funded by Sony, also considered second-party.

It doesn't matter what XBOX has in the pipeline, none of those games will be better than these two.
 

King Dazzar

Member
It doesn’t work like that. Do you really think fucking Google taking and using your data is shielded by clicking “log out”?


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Again, who cares not a big deal, but all you’re showing when you post a list of YouTube search results is a list of videos curated for you.
Well, lets take it from another angle. If my signed out browser is still only returning targeted hits. Then why would I not be targeted for Hellblade 2? It would know that I'm a gamer. It would know that I was subscribed to Xbox channels. And also, why are my signed out search results similar if not identical to adamsapple adamsapple when he's signed out to.
 

Crayon

Member
They are hiding this game. It's probably going to be fine but they built it up for years as a headliner. It'll be a showpiece graphically, but there's no way it's going to compare to the best games of the year. I do think it's better to let a game come and go quietly if it doesn't shape up.

Note what sony did with destruction allstars. Who knows how the game came that far, but they saved face by releasing it quietly and even launching it on the plus sub so nobody felt ripped off.
 

Braag

Member
I feel like people who enjoyed the first game will most likely enjoy this. It doesn't seem to be doing anything hugely different from the first one.
No way will it sell any huge numbers as it is a fairly unique and niche game and I hope MS understands that too.

Arkane and Tango came bundled with Bethesda when MS bought them. But they separately went out of their way to buy NJ when they were working on Hellblade 2, so I don't think MS is gonna close them down quite that easily.
I'm fairly sure MS will put NJ to work on something much more mainstream once Hellblade 2 is out though.
 

Humdinger

Member
It's a feminist mental health game.......who doesn't want to spend a few hours listening to a mad woman talking to herself......I'm sure it will do gangbusters,lol.

I don't think it's a feminist game. Just because feminism and mental illness often go hand-in-hand doesn't mean every mentally ill woman is a feminist.
 

GHG

Gold Member


Interestingly enough, no mentions of gamepass in their marketing anymore.

Not true, it's right at the end of the trailer but not on the poster.

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