Abstract:
The remake of "The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time" has not yet been officially released, but it has already caused a sensation in Brazil: the physical version was sold out in just a few hours, and pre-orders were completely sold out. IGN spoke with Ricardo Vieira, commercial director at Gamer Hut, one of Brazil's largest brick-and-mortar game retailers, to understand the scale of the rush.
According to Vieira, Gamer Hut has been preparing for nearly four months since the game was announced and placed a large order. "Ocarina of Time is our main bet. We joke internally that if we had to choose between GTA and Ocarina of Time, we would choose Ocarina of Time. We have a very strong connection with the Nintendo audience and the team themselves are fans."
Even with experience in large-scale sales, the team did not expect this batch to sell out so quickly. "To us, this result is worthy of attention across the market. It demonstrates that we still need to better understand the scale of demand for physical media."
Vieira pointed out that the vast majority of buyers purchased only one copy. He believes that the rush to buy is also affected by this year's overall trend: more and more players are beginning to value their collections and are worried that some physical games may no longer be available for purchase in the future. "They want to make sure that big works get into their collections, and Ocarina of Time is proof of that."
When asked whether the quick sell-out was related to the smaller production volume, Vieira replied: When Gamer Hut made its predictions, it did not yet know that the game was limited to tin foil packaging. After learning this, the retailer asked to double the already large order, but it was too late to produce.
He also pointed out a problem in the Brazilian market: some merchants only purchase goods when they are released and no longer maintain inventory after that. As a result the game quickly disappeared from the shelves and remained out of stock for long periods of time. According to Vieira, Gamer Hut works hard to give players choice and looks for import opportunities, but it can't always source the required quantities in a timely manner. He believes that the Ocarina of Time incident is an important signal for the entire industry - an opportunity for manufacturers, distributors, stores and players to join forces to better understand demand and plan supply.
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