All purpose Sales and Sales Rumors and Anecdotes [2017 Edition]

[Silent_Buddha]

Many thanks for the reply

Would explain the lack of retail options on the high street and supermarkets seemingly giving smaller space to games.

It's a sad reality, and when physical is all gone we will be in the lap of the gods WRT pricing as to if we will see deals or not at launch

I imagine that much like PC, even when the vast majority of sales are Digital, there will still be a small amount of physical sales for AAA titles. However, if consoles ever reach that point, I feel that physical distribution will transition to just being an alternate distribution method for a digital copy of the game. IE - instead of the disk being copy protected, it'll feature a code that will activate ownership digitally and all that the disk contains is the digital install package. Which would mean no more reselling of used disks unless a method is implemented to allow for transferal of digital ownership.

Regards,
SB

 

[zed]

Only 26% of games in the US are purchased in a physical format now compared to 69% in 2010

Supply any information that proves this 26% number WRT consoles only (this is a console forum after all), you have only supplied info that disproves it.
The numbers that you are using to try and prove your assertions are 'muddied' with PC & mobile numbers, and Im sure we all agree yes digital is way larger than physical there (mobile = 100% dig and PC > 95%).

yes I agree with consoles digital is becoming more and more important each year but console game physical sales are nowhere near 26% of console game revenue, in fact I will comfortable assert they make up greater than half a consoles game revenue.
My proof? Activision/EA/Nintendo statements

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Supply any information that proves this 26% number WRT consoles only (this is a console forum after all), you have only supplied info that disproves it.
The numbers that you are using to try and prove your assertions are 'muddied' with PC & mobile numbers, and Im sure we all agree yes digital is way larger than physical there (mobile = 100% dig and PC > 95%).

yes I agree with consoles digital is becoming more and more important each year but console game physical sales are nowhere near 26% of console game revenue, in fact I will comfortable assert they make up greater than half a consoles game revenue.
My proof? Activision/EA/Nintendo statements

Read further.

Physical still makes up the majority chunk of full game sales on console but it's portion of full game sales continues to shrink each year as consumers move to buying digitally. Data is pretty conclusive that sales are gradually moving away from physical to digital. The only question is to what extent and how quickly it is going so.

I've already noted that physical still maintains the majority of sales on console. I'm not sure where there is confusion on that.

Activision-Blizzard data from their latest financial report shows that they may already be at approximately 50/50 for physical versus digital on console. Meanwhile data from EA shows that they are around 75% physical. Things are complicated for gauging exactly where they stand as their subscription service offers full game digital downloads of games while you are subscribed. IE - people paying for that subscription service aren't buying any physical copies of games in that subscription service.

9 months ending Dec 2016. for EA.

Full game digital - 400 million USD
Packaged goods and other - 1.378 billion USD.

77.5% physical. Not counting subscription to their full game digital download service.

Regards,
SB

 

[Silent_Buddha]

And just because I have a bit of free time on my hands today. Here's some information from Take 2 Interactive.

9 months ending Dec, 2016. Rounding to the nearest million because I'm feeling lazy.

Digital Online - 643 million USD
Physical Retail and other - 565 million USD

Console - 961 million USD
PC and other - 247 million USD

So, it won't be entirely accurate since some small number of Physical Retail will be PC sales, we can still get a rough idea of where the console mix is. But Physical Retail and other is ~58.8% of the sales revenue of Console.

I think it'd be safe to say that physical probably represents somewhere between 60-70% of console full game sales depending on how much PC revenue is physical and how much console revenue is DLC.

And I took a look at UBIsoft as well. UBIsoft unfortunately offers almost no breakdown of numbers.

However, one of their highlights from their 3rd quarter release is that digital revenue now accounts for 47.2% of all revenue up from 27.0% a year ago. This is despite revenue increasing very little. In other words, physical sales revenue decreased to 52.8% from 73% a year ago on relatively flat revenue.

What makes this more interesting is that in their 1st half (2nd quarter) release one of their goals for FY ending 2017 is for digital to make up ~40% of total revenue. What this means is that physical sales revenue is falling faster than they predicted and digital revenue is climbing faster than they predicted.

Regards,
SB

 

[bunge]

I'm guess [add ons] that are only available as downloads are lumped in with the digital sales. If so, then we're not necessarily looking at what we think we are.

*autocorrect edit

 

[BRiT]

I'm guess add-one that are only available as downloads are lumped in with the digital sales.

What else would you lump their sales into, meth?

 

[bunge]

What else would you lump their sales into, meth?

If we're comparing like for like, then we should be clear. If we're lumping together all digital sales even though they don't have a physical equivalent we're no longer comparing like for like.

If we want to compare ALL digital vs. ALL physical, well then there's a whole bunch of caveats. We would have to separate out physical cards people buy at stores that allow them to buy digitally. They bought it physically. It's a physical sale.

Unless you want to skew a discussion. Then carry on.

 

[BRiT]

Who said we're comparing like for like? I thought the point was how are console games being sold? Does it matter if there is no physical item for some games? It only matters if you're trying to artificially prop up physical material sales.

 

[bunge]

Who said we're comparing like for like? I thought the point was how are console games being sold? Does it matter if there is no physical item for some games? It only matters if you're trying to artificially prop up physical material sales.

An add on for a game isn't a game.

 

[BRiT]

An add on for a game isn't a game.

Yes, I understand your point for the one tiny subtopic you seem to want to box in on, game vs game sales.

A point beyond that subtopic is that companies are making more off of digital sales and they will continue to head down that path and defocus on physical products. It doesnt matter to them if its a game or not. They are shifting their focus to digital sales.

 

[bunge]

Yes, I understand your point for the one tiny subtopic you seem to want to box in on, game vs game sales.

A point beyond that subtopic is that companies are making more off of digital sales and they will continue to head down that path and defocus on physical products. It doesnt matter to them if its a game or not. They are shifting their focus to digital sales.

You just said we were discussing how games were sold. I tried to clarify that an add on isn't a game. That just means the numbers we're looking at aren't necessarily game sales vs. game sales.

If not, then depending on the volume of digital revenue on the non-game portion of those sales numbers, physical game sales could be INCREASING in relation to digital game sales. We just don't know.

 

[iroboto]

You just said we were discussing how games were sold. I tried to clarify that an add on isn't a game. That just means the numbers we're looking at aren't necessarily game sales vs. game sales.

If not, then depending on the volume of digital revenue on the non-game portion of those sales numbers, physical game sales could be INCREASING in relation to digital game sales. We just don't know.

yea you make a valid point, but this is unlikely to be the case.

DLC is often if not always digital. If publishers are bundling original game with DLC (they do) then you can quickly see why it would be hard to separate DLC revenue from game revenue (it is the game), and making it unlikely that physical sales for games are increasing for the sake of purchasing DLC.

It's most likely that if they do not have the game already, the incentives are available to purchase the game + DLC at a discounted rate are more beneficial than sticking with physical disc and buying the DLC separately.

Not only are they nearly the same price, but if you lose that disc you can no longer access your DLC (which was likely part of the driving factor for purchasing).

 

[bunge]

yea you make a valid point, but this is unlikely to be the case.

DLC is often if not always digital. If publishers are bundling original game with DLC (they do) then you can quickly see why it would be hard to separate DLC revenue from game revenue (it is the game), and making it unlikely that physical sales for games are increasing for the sake of purchasing DLC.

It's most likely that if they do not have the game already, the incentives are available to purchase the game + DLC at a discounted rate are more beneficial than sticking with physical disc and buying the DLC separately.

Not only are they nearly the same price, but if you lose that disc you can no longer access your DLC (which was likely part of the driving factor for purchasing).

You may be right and the revenue difference is just a rounding error and statistically insignificant. I just thought it was a potentially useful data point for the discussion, methamphetamines notwithstanding.

 

[iroboto]

You may be right and the revenue difference is just a rounding error and statistically insignificant. I just thought it was a potentially useful data point for the discussion, methamphetamines notwithstanding.

it is something to take note of, and I'm glad you brought it up. We'd need additional detail about those graphs to break out the information you've identified.

 

[wco81]

I guess Sony and MS will get enough data on digital sales to decide whether to abandon optical drives on their next console designs.

 

[DieH@rd]

I guess Sony and MS will get enough data on digital sales to decide whether to abandon optical drives on their next console designs.

Data like viewership numbers of this video?

 

[MrFox]

The same things are being said here for the last 10 years, the whole "this time for sure" about a supposed discless generation. They have internal metrics to decide if a BR drive is necessary, they have sales estimates and predictions, they hire consumer research firms. The XB1 have a BR drive, the slim have a UHD BR, and scorpio will have a UHD BR drive too. MS must know something...

http://www.eraltd.org/news-events/e...-three-quarters-of-gamers-still-prefer-discs/

Maybe in 2020? This time for sure?

 

[BRiT]

Maybe they know peeps like owning 4K Movies and the decision has nothing to do with games.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

The same things are being said here for the last 10 years, the whole "this time for sure" about a supposed discless generation. They have internal metrics to decide if a BR drive is necessary, they have sales estimates and predictions, they hire consumer research firms. The XB1 have a BR drive, the slim have a UHD BR, and scorpio will have a UHD BR drive too. MS must know something...

http://www.eraltd.org/news-events/e...-three-quarters-of-gamers-still-prefer-discs/

Maybe in 2020? This time for sure?

That's actually some nice data for the UK market to counter the data from NPD for the US market.

So it would appear that in the UK, demand may be moving more slowly towards digital, while in the US, demand is moving more rapidly towards digital.

That said, however, I'll re-iterate for those that haven't read my complete posts, physical still remains the way the majority of game titles on console are sold regardless of territory. But for some publishers it may reach a tipping point in the next year or two where digital full game sales revenue tops physical full game revenue for the first time. Also note: that this would be revenue and not unit sales or profit as the average ASP for digital full game sales is lower than physical while simultaneously having higher profit margins.

Regards,
SB

 

[wco81]

Maybe they know peeps like owning 4K Movies and the decision has nothing to do with games.

It would be great if UHD Blu Ray movie sales took off.

But the recent trends with Blu-Ray and DVD sales indicate this isn't likely.