All purpose sales and sales rumors/anecdotes thread next gen+

[djskribbles]

^Remember that the Halo 5 bundle has been up for pre-order since August though. The monthly amazon ranking only counts October, not August+September. Mind you that the majority of the sales seem to be in October though, judging by camelcamelcamel (link in my above post). Plus Abdiel at GAF says that the PS4 sold more at BestBuy.

I think that it will be a close month and that it could go either way. My guess is they will both sell between 400-480k.

 

[zed]

The Amazon predictions have all been right towards the monthly NPD winners... and judging by the October standings, Sony has this bagged (hardware wise) for October.

yes looks like about 20-50k lead pretty close anyways, I think the problem is halo 5 seems to have performed worse than halo 4, when it was (amazon ratings) #1 oct & #1 nov & #2 dec, its only been out a few days and has already dropped down to the #5 game

 

[AzBat]

Halo 4 was 343's first game. So nobody had a tainted view of their work. Now Halo 5 has to contend with what Halo 4 & MCC actually brought. I wouldn't be surprised if Halo 5 had a slower start but then I look at their #17 position on the Amazon's Best Sellers of 2015(So Far) List & then I wonder if they are probably doing better than expected. Too much doom & gloom from most of you guys in here. Sometimes I wonder if you enjoy it.

Tommy McClain

 

[Rangers]

yes looks like about 20-50k lead pretty close anyways, I think the problem is halo 5 seems to have performed worse than halo 4, when it was (amazon ratings) #1 oct & #1 nov & #2 dec, its only been out a few days and has already dropped down to the #5 game

I hope so...from what I have seen it's a train wreck that 343 deserves to be punished for.

Not so sure it's going to sell badly though. Marketing...it just HAS to sell a few million, MS will be pimping it everywhere.

 

[djskribbles]

No doubt it will sell a lot, but I think it's going to sell a fraction of what Halo 3/R/4 sold (which all sold over 3M in the first month according to NPD). My guess is <1.5M.

 

[BRiT]

I don't know what trainwreck talk you're seeing but Halo 5 is significantly and substantially a better game than Halo4.

 

[zed]

then I look at their #17 position on the Amazon's Best Sellers of 2015(So Far) List & then I wonder if they are probably doing better than expected.

look at halo 4, it was #1 for 2012
http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/2012/videogames/ref=zg_bs_tab_t_bsar#1
so better than expected? Yeah nah

 

[BRiT]

look at halo 4, it was #1 for 2012
http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/2012/videogames/ref=zg_bs_tab_t_bsar#1
so better than expected? Yeah nah

You're ignoring the trainwreck of a release Halo MCC is/was. Even a year after its release H:MCC is still very tempermental. That combined with the negative impression from Halo4 has soured a lot of people to the Halo franchise or at least made them cautious enough to not purchase H5 until its proven it has functional multiplayer.

So the fact it even sold at all makes it better than what I expected.

 

[AzBat]

look at halo 4, it was #1 for 2012
http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/2012/videogames/ref=zg_bs_tab_t_bsar#1
so better than expected? Yeah nah

Terrible comparison since you're comparing to the last generation where the players are reversed. Should have looked at 2014 where the #1 Xbox One game on Amazon was Destiny @ 17 & the #2 Xbox One game was MCC & was ranked at 25. You guys love to use Amazon to look at trends. Try to spin it however you want.

Tommy McClain

 

[NRP]

Yeah, H5 isn't my favorite iteration but it's certainly better than H4.

 

[djskribbles]

Terrible comparison since you're comparing to the last generation where the players are reversed. Should have looked at 2014 where the #1 Xbox One game on Amazon was Destiny @ 17 & the #2 Xbox One game was MCC & was ranked at 25. You guys love to use Amazon to look at trends. Try to spin it however you want.

Tommy McClain

What's considered "better than expected" though? Considering Halo 3, Reach and 4 all sold over 3M in the first month of sales in the US, better than expected to me would be >3M in sales. I'd bet money that Halo 5 won't sell that many in the first month, not even close.

Destiny XB1 sold <900K in the first month IIRC. I'm guessing Halo 5 will sell between 1-1.5M, which is still great in its own right, but a huge drop compared to previous titles. But we'll see in a few weeks.

 

[BRiT]

And Halo 3, Reach, and Halo 4 had how many hardware consoles in the US as potential consumers? I think each of those games had far more consoles available than the current US xbox one install base.

 

[Pixel]

Halo Launched in late Sept 2007. According to NPD Xbox 360 had an estimated +9million US only install base in Q1 2008. They estimated 1.3 million sold in december 2007, so obviously +7.7 million US install base prior to december 2007.

I knew Halo 3 was huge, but I am surprised there was a near 40% attachrate for Halo 3 in just the 1st 12 days of the game release. Unless the 3 million is software units shipped, not sold-through.

http://www.ripten.com/2008/01/19/xbox-360-is-king-of-the-consoles-microsofts-spin-on-npd-data/

 

[AzBat]

Halo MCC had 1.01 million sales in the first week. Guess we'll see if they will make some kind of an announcement this week. But I think a lot of you are relying too much on the historical numbers for the 360 gen. The XB1 gen is different & enough that I think will have an effect on their numbers. MS may want the numbers to be bigger than Halo 3, which they keep comparing to with their "Greatest Games Launch in Xbox History" campaign, but I think they will expect their numbers to at least be better than MCC & Halo 4 the first month. Anything less than that & I think they will feel it's a failure. Personally I think they will get 1.5-2 million but won't get Halo 3 numbers. The awful XB1 & MCC launches hurt them pretty bad, but still think that they have the potential to do much better going forward though. MCC only did about 5 million in 9 months. If Halo 5 can't get to 5 million quicker than MCC that will be crazy.

Tommy McClain

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Halo 4 was 343's first game. So nobody had a tainted view of their work. Now Halo 5 has to contend with what Halo 4 & MCC actually brought. I wouldn't be surprised if Halo 5 had a slower start but then I look at their #17 position on the Amazon's Best Sellers of 2015(So Far) List & then I wonder if they are probably doing better than expected. Too much doom & gloom from most of you guys in here. Sometimes I wonder if you enjoy it.

Tommy McClain

It's certainly interesting that for 2015, thus far, Halo 5 is the best selling video game on the "core" consoles for Amazon US. The only game that is selling better than it, on Amazon, is the 3DS version of Zelda.

I'm not sure that can be considered a trainwreck. In less than one week it has sold more copies that Bloodborne for the entire year. More than the 2015 sales for the PS4 version of GTAV.

You have to go all the way down to #45 (COD: BO2 pre-order) to find the next best selling XBO title with tons of PS4 titles in between.

And that is with an install base deficit compared to the PS4. Halo 4 got to benefit from a relatively massive install base lead in the US compared to the competition. Halo 4 should sell better just because it sold into a significantly larger install base. But that isn't to say Halo 5 won't beat it in terms of % of install base. It isn't to say it will either.

If NPD tracks with Amazon, then Halo is quite likely to be the #1 single SKU title. I'm not sure what multiplatform titles released in October, but if they aren't really good then Halo 5 has a chance to grab the top spot despite being a single SKU on a combined multi-SKU top 10.

Regards,
SB

 

[DieH@rd]

Let us not forget that Halo 4 launched to the MUCH larger install base than Xbone currently has.

 

[djskribbles]

It's certainly interesting that for 2015, thus far, Halo 5 is the best selling video game on the "core" consoles for Amazon US. The only game that is selling better than it, on Amazon, is the 3DS version of Zelda.

It's not really interesting... we all know Halo is a monster in the US. Just look at the attach rate when Halo 3 was released for X360. The only games that have ever competed with Halo in the US are GTA and CoD, none of which have a release in 2015 (yet). I bet Black Ops III will sell more than Halo 5, possibly on PS4 alone.

I'm not sure that can be considered a trainwreck. In less than one week it has sold more copies that Bloodborne for the entire year. More than the 2015 sales for the PS4 version of GTAV.

I don't think anyone is predicting Halo 5 to be a trainwreck in sales. I believe Rangers used the term trainwreck to describe 343's product.
No doubt Halo 5 will sell really well. Some of us are just predicting a big drop in sales compared to previous titles.

And that is with an install base deficit compared to the PS4. Halo 4 got to benefit from a relatively massive install base lead in the US compared to the competition. Halo 4 should sell better just because it sold into a significantly larger install base. But that isn't to say Halo 5 won't beat it in terms of % of install base. It isn't to say it will either.

The install base deficit in the US is only ~900K I believe.
Why jump right to Halo 4? As Pixel posted above, Halo 3 was released with a similar install base to the XB1 now but still sold 3.3M, which is even more than Halo 4 sold in its first month of release. And Halo 3 was released in September whereas Halo 4 was released in November, a far busier shopping month. Halo Reach also sold over 3M, so it seems like there was a very loyal Halo fanbase on X360.

If NPD tracks with Amazon, then Halo is quite likely to be the #1 single SKU title. I'm not sure what multiplatform titles released in October, but if they aren't really good then Halo 5 has a chance to grab the top spot despite being a single SKU on a combined multi-SKU top 10.

Regards,
SB

Halo 5 will grab top spot, no doubt about it.

 

[DieH@rd]

UK report for last week is out. Halo 5 took the #1 software spot, but it sold only 50% more than MCC [which was around 100K mark].
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/halo...-the-master-chief-collection-week-one/0158358

Previous UK Halo openings:
[Week 11, 2002] HALO: COMBAT EVOLVED (MICROSOFT) -
[Week 46, 2004] HALO 2 (MICROSOFT) - 260,000 / NEW (85%)
[Week 39, 2007] HALO 3 (MICROSOFT) - 370,000 / NEW (90%)
[Week 09, 2009] HALO WARS (MICROSOFT) - 65,000 / NEW (90%)
[Week 39, 2009] HALO 3: ODST (MICROSOFT) - 212,000 / NEW (90%)
[Week 37, 2010] HALO: REACH (MICROSOFT) - 390,000 / NEW (90%)
[Week 46, 2011] HALO: COMBAT EVOLVED ANNIVERSARY -
[Week 45, 2012] HALO 4 (MICROSOFT) - Slightly over 332,000 / NEW (90%)
[Week 46, 2014] HALO: THE MASTER CHIEF COLLECTION (MICROSOFT) - Between 80,000 and 105,000 / NEW (95%)

 

[Clukos]

God damn Halo 3 and Reach were massive

 

[djskribbles]

So Halo games typically open in the UK at ~10-12% of US sales. If that holds true, we're looking at 1.25-1.5M in the US. My prediction is looking pretty good.