THQ Blames Poor UFC Sales on RDR

Sales of UFC 2010 Undisputed have been very disappointing for THQ this year, with them having fallen 59% year-over-year for the first month. A number of factors for the tumble can be contemplated however THQ believes it is due to the release of Red Dead Redemption, which crushed with huge sales. It released one week before UFC 2010.

In an interview with MCV, THQ’s UK marketing director had the following to say:  “Our sales were softer than where we would have liked them to be,” Rooke told MCV. “We know our UFC and MMA fans have bought it, but we haven’t delivered the broader sales yet. That’s largely down to Red Dead Redmeption. Rockstar have probably taken a fair amount of our market share. They shipped 5m units, taking a lot of consumer dollars.”

Of course competition in the marketplace is a factor there is no denying that, but the extent to which sales dropped is a sign that much more is going on. Pushing out a product that didn’t feel fresh (lack of drastic improvements and a demo that did little to show them, no big roster turnover), had issues at release (gameplay faults, online play troubles), and had the impression of deceiving consumers (with their online pass like program that was hidden until the last minute) should all be looked at when examining what went wrong. It may just be that consumers aren’t going to feel as though the value is there on a year by year basis making it potentially better placed in the market by going bi-yearly.