Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

UFC video game could surpass expectations

UFC 2009: Undisputed, released today, is expected to sell about 2 million units within THQ’s current fiscal year. But those expectations may be on the conservative side based on recent MMA and gaming worlds trends:

And remember – most people don’t watch UFC PPV’s at home alone, and tons of folks pack themselves into bars each month to watch the fights. So for the hottest UFC events, there could be upwards of 10 million people watching, a great deal of whom fit into the key video-game demographic of 18-34 year-old males. That’s one heck of a powerful captive audience that guarantees a hot start for UFC 2009.

But what could turn the game into a mainstream video-game hit is positive reviews, which can have a dramatic effect on sales figures. Just read this excerpt from a Wall Street Journal article published a couple years back:

About 18 months ago, Activision also conducted a study of 789 games made for Sony Corp.'s PlayStation 2 console and found a strong correlation between some high game scores and strong sales. Activision Chief Executive Robert Kotick says the link was especially notable for games that score above 80% on Game Rankings, which grades games on a 1-to-100 percentage basis, with 100% being a perfect score. For every five percentage points above 80%, Activision found sales of a game roughly doubled. Activision believes game scores, among other factors, can actually influence sales, not just reflect their quality.

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