Alien: Isolation Sells ‘Weak’ Two Milliion Copies

Despite solid critical response, Alien: Isolation was apparently a bit of a disappointment for Sega. The company released its financial report earlier this week, deeming console game sales across the board weak.

Creative Assembly's first foray into the Alien franchise was a big hit here at Arcade Sushi, but even sales of 2.1 million units didn't stop Sega from being disappointed by the final sales figures for Alien: Isolation. And that's considering it did well above its expected and projected sales numbers. Still, that 2.1 million was the biggest number in all of Sega's console game portfolio, which also included two Sonic games, Persona 4 Arena Ultimax, a Yakuza prequel and Football Manager 15.

According to Destructoid, Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric and Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal combined to sell 620,000 copies. Yakuza 0 managed to move all of 380,000 copies, Persona 4 Arena Ultimax did 280,000, and Football Manager 15 slipped 810,000 copies past the shopkeeper. If you're adding that all up in your head, each of those five games totaled just under what Isolation did on its own.

The publisher blamed the poor performances of its biggest titles on a "harsh market environment," while failing to recognize the market for Sonic was harshed by its own hand. Still, somehow the company managed to sell 1.23 million more copies of packaged games than it did the year prior. Additionally, thanks to mobile and PC efforts, Sega believes its consumer branch "remains strong," as the video game side of the business saw an 11.2% increase over last year. Of course, Sega suffered a $93 million loss last year, but small victories and all that.

It's unfortunate that despite what could be perceived to be strong sales by consumers are viewed as massive failures by corporations. The AAA marketplace is still struggling to keep developers in business due to the dramatic rise in development costs, and not hitting gigantic sales figures often means layoffs and closures. There's been no word of such things happening so far at Sega, but given the past few years of outrageous turnover at AAA studios, you have to wonder how long it will last.