Exclusives Watch 2008 Rev. 1.1

Quality of Exclusives

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Overview

Using MetaCritic as a guide, we were able to give the number of exclusives a bit of context. “Just how many Nintendo Wii exclusives are worth owning?” “Is it really quality over quantity for Sony?” We finally have the numbers and evidence, folks. Each of the platform holders had roughly the same amount of “favorable” exclusives with Microsoft edging out with about 25. When it came to exclusives with “mixed” receptions, Microsoft and Nintendo lead the way with about 30 and 38 respectively. As for the platform with the most “unfavorable” exclusives? That title belonged to Nintendo with approximately 17. Sony’s had only two “unfavorable” blemishes with “Go! Sports Skydiving” and “Novastrike” which were both released on PlayStation Network. Titles marked “N/A” means that MetaCritic is awaiting more reviews before a rating can be fairly assigned. Sony had a handful of “N/A” titles, but they were tagged to games which were released in late December; where reviews have slowed to a crawl for the holiday season. On the other hand, Nintendo’s high number of N/A titles is damning . A vast majority of these titles can be considered shovelware that reviewers have ignored. It’s a bit of a concern when reviewers don’t even want to take the time to rate the game.

Closer Look

Breaking down the exclusives by format yielded some interesting results. Did you know that not single disc based PS3 exclusive received an “unfavorable” rating on MetaCritic? That’s something to be proud of. In fact, only three titles were given “mixed” reviews which included SOCOM: Confrontation, Haze and SingStar ABBA. Microsoft’s trio of “unfavorable” games included Atlus’ “Operation: Darkness”, “Zoids Assault” and “Destroy All Humans! Path of the Furon”. Unsurprisingly, Nintendo lead the way in the “unfavorable”, “mixed” and “N/A” categories.

Microsoft boasted the largest amount of “favorable” downloadable titles, but it also lead the with most “mixed and “unfavorable” games. Nintendo’s WiiWare service sprouted and grew quickly, but why haven’t the reviews followed suit? Sony have managed their PSN output well by keeping their ratio of quality games as high as possible. It’s a commendable effort.

Microsoft Xbox 360 Platform

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Retail Disc Exclusives

Quality Share

Listings

* – Timed Exclusive

Downloadable Exclusives

Quality Share

Listings

Nintendo Wii Platform

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Retail Disc Exclusives

Quality Share

Listings

Downloadable Exclusives

Quality Share

Listings

PlayStation 3 Platform

Retail Disc Exclusives

Quality Share

Listings

Downloadable Exclusives

Quality Share

Listings

Frequently Asked Questions

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Quantity of Exclusives F.A.Q.

1. What’s the point of this article? Isn’t it just ammunition for list wars?!
   The goal of this article is to find exclusives that can only be found on specific gaming platforms. We’re looking to find games which we cannot find on any other platform for the year 2008. We’re making this list out of curiosity, if fanboys/fangirls and other fanatics are going to use it in their console wars, feel free to do so. Just keep it off our site.
2. What do you mean by ‘exclusive’?
   According Dictionary.com, the word ‘exclusive’ means ‘limited to the object or objects designated’. The aim of this article is to find all the exclusives for each of the specified consoles. If the game appears on any other platform, including the PC, it will not be counted. We are looking for games which were made for a particular console in the year 2008.
3. What about ‘timed exclusive’ games?
   If a game’s exclusivity window ends within the year 2008, it will not count. This year’s example would be Rock Band 2 which will debut on the Xbox 360 first in September, but will launch on other platforms by the end of 2008. If a game is announced as a timed exclusive with no specific launch date set for other platforms, it will count as an exclusive for that console until further notice.
4. What platforms and regions are being covered?
   North American Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and Sony PlayStation 3 platforms are being covered for this article.
5. What’s the period being covered and why?
   January 1st, 2008 til December 31st, 2008. We’re curious to see how many publishers will put exclusives within a given year and it would be quite arduous to accommodate for future titles.
6. Are remakes counted?
   Yes. Most remakes are counted since they offer substantial changes over the original.
7. How about rereleases?
   No. Most rereleases are not counted as the core game itself usually remains intact with subtle improvements.
8. Do you only count games with firm release dates? What about ‘to be announced’ and to be ‘determined games’?
   Along with games with firm release dates, we’ve also included games which were announced for 2008 releases. Even if the publisher gives a vague “2008 release” window: we’ll count it. As time passes and the year draws to a close, we’ll be weeding out the unreleased games. Obviously, we’ll remove games which have been pushed outside of the 2008 window.
9. Where are you getting all this exclusives info from?
   Our sources include IGN.com, Gamespot.com, Wikipedia.org and just about any other website which may have the necessary information.
10. Hey, wait a minute, should/shouldn’t be there! What should I do?
    Feel free to post a comment and point us in the right direction. With justified proof, we’ll add or remove the specified game.

Quality of Exclusives F.A.Q.

1. Where did the ratings info come from?
   The ratings come from MetaCritic. We’re using MetaCritic’s score ranges (red, yellow, green and grey) to determine how the exclusives were received by the critics
2. What’s up with the grey?
   The grey represents games which have not been rated yet. If a game has been released for some time and critics have not weighed in, that’s not a good sign. As more games are released, the amount of grey should diminish. With the final revision for 2008, there should not be any games with grey.

Change Log

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We’ll be keeping the list of changes made to the exclusives here: Thursday, August 6^th, 2008 – Rev. 0.1

• Initial release

Sunday, September 7^th, 2008 – Rev. 0.5

• Moved Major League Eating: The Game to Wiiware
• Removed Wild Earth: African Safari since it came out on PC as well.
• Removed TRON from XBLA
• Added Tekken 6 to PS3
• Added Ikaruga to XBLA
• Added Savage Moon to PSN exclusive.
• Added Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket Powered Battle Cars to PSN
• Added GTI + to PSN
• Red Baron Arcade to PSN Sept. 18
• Removed Rapala Fishing Frenzy from Wii as it is coming to Xbox 360 and PS3 as well.
• Added Death Tank to XBLA
• Removed MLB 08: The Show since it’s on PSP and PS2 as well.
• Removed Echochrome since it’s on the PSP as well.
• Added My Aquarium to WiiWare
• Fixed a bunch of dates
• Overhauled layout

Tuesday, December 29^th, 2008 – Rev. 1.0

• Updated with the rest of 2008’s worth of exclusives

Monday, April 13^th, 2009 – Rev 1.1

• Updated charts
• Updated scores
• Removed rereleases (thanks to phosphor for helping me establish rereleases vs remakes)
• Updated the presentation