MGS4 must sell 1m on day one

Metal Gear Solid 4 has to sell over a million copies on day one if it is to be profitable, GamesIndustry.biz reports.

Still, game producer Ryan Payton is adamant it will not become multi-platform to recoup costs, and stands eagerly beside his old friend PlayStation.

"The PlayStation brand has always been good to us, and we're pretty bullish on the PS3," Payton told Reuters. "We're telling our fans that if you want to play Metal Gear Solid 4, you have to buy a PS3."

Reuters' report adds: "Payton said the new 'Metal Gear Solid' needs to sell over a million copies on the first day it goes on sale due to its costly production."

It is no secret rising development costs mean it is tougher to make money on exclusive titles these days, but PS3 has a particularly hard struggle as it hasn't sold as many consoles as its rivals.

Fantastically named IDC analyst Billy Pidgeon believes this new batch of games cost around USD 10 and 50 million to develop. Coo.

"You might be able to weather one title coming in at 500,000 in sales," warned Pidgeon, perched atop a power line. "But two or three failures like that and even big publishers are going to be hurting."

But Sony has looked into this miserable future and prepared against the demise of third-party exclusives by ramping up its own internal development. It now has 15 studios working on games, according to marketing boss Peter Dille, which is more than both Microsoft and Nintendo combined.

Apparently we will also see the same number of PS3 exclusives released between September 2007 and April 2008, too.

Dille added: "We understand publishers are needing to recoup their investment. From our perspective, as long as the games aren't going exclusive to other platforms, PS3 gamers are not actually losing anything."

What a wise old fellow.

Bringing it all to close is news that only two PS3 games have ever sold over one million copies, where as its older brother PS2 has had nearly one hundred surge over that mark. Still, Uncharted: Drake's Fortune at the end of next week, wink nudge.