All purpose Sales and Sales Rumours and Anecdotes [2021 Edition]

[Deleted member 86764]

Sold out - Xbox Series S 512GB Console | Best Buy Canada
About to sell out - Xbox Series S 512 GB All-Digital Console (Disc-free Gaming) - White | Walmart Canada
and refuses to sell without a membership - EB Games | The largest video game retailer in Canada. Play. Trade. Save. - EBGames.ca (they no longer sell the Series consoles standalone)
Sold out - XBOX Series S Digital with Wireless Controller | Costco

This is not 'widely' available. You have it available at just Amazon. And you don't know if you're checking today and seeing that Amazon just got hit with a large stock. THe other retailers need stock too, so eventually Amazon will run dry while the other retailers are fulfilled.

Series S is available, the idea that it's widely available and not selling is just not true.

And it also shouldn't account for 50% of Series consoles sales either.

Being available in Canada outside of scalpers is the only metric we need.

It's available in major retailers.

We can derive that demand for the Series S is not equal to the demand of the other consoles.

 

[iroboto]

s is not 'widely' available. You have it available at just Amazon. And you don't know if you're checking today and seeing that Amazon just got hit with a large stock. THe other retailers need stock too, so eventually Amazon will run dry while the other retailers are fulfilled.

Series S is available, the idea that it's widely available and not selling is just not true.

Yes, this is not about demand but about manufacturing capacity considering that both consoles are selling out.

If manufacturing capacity weren't a thing I wouldn't be surprised if the ration was 3:1 or even 4:1 in favor of PS5. However, manufacturing supply is less than 2:1 in favor of PS5 hence why the gap is narrowing over time.

Regards,
SB

This is what I'm more interested in. If supply was infinite I would agree that Sony could be way ahead. But because supply is not infinite, do the numbers suggest on whether it's possible for MS to close the gap. They have misjudged demand, but they know this is a critical time to get boxes in teh hands of players, people will only wait so long for PS5. Series consoles are substitute goods for the non-hardcore.

 

[iroboto]

Being available in Canada outside of scalpers is the only metric we need.

It's available in major retailers.

We can derive that demand for the Series S is not equal to the demand of the other consoles.

but I never said it was. I just indicated it not selling as well as the other two is not the reason for MS being behind 2:1. Which is often where I see this discussion veering.

 

[goonergaz]

This is what I'm more interested in. If supply was infinite I would agree that Sony could be way ahead. But because supply is not infinite, do the numbers suggest on whether it's possible for MS to close the gap. They have misjudged demand, but they know this is a critical time to get boxes in teh hands of players, people will only wait so long for PS5. Series consoles are substitute goods for the non-hardcore.

Demand is still higher for PS5 though? It’s hard to measure how much higher but it’s selling 2:1 better and more people are trying to buy it and willing to pay over RRP to a higher value.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

but I never said it was. I just indicated it not selling as well as the other two is not the reason for MS being behind 2:1. Which is often where I see this discussion veering.

I wasn't making any comment on the ratio between PlayStation and Xbox.

I personally think that if either manufacturer wants to sell in an emerging market, they they need a super cheap consoles and games available in the $1-5 USD bracket.

I remember when I was a kid and buying ZX Spectrum cassettes on the shelves for £1-2 back in the 80s. That increased the market for videogames back then. They'd likely need to replicate a similar scenario in regions with low income in proportion to the west.

 

[iroboto]

Demand is still higher for PS5 though? It’s hard to measure how much higher but it’s selling 2:1 better and more people are trying to buy it and willing to pay over RRP to a higher value.

its way higher for PS5.
The debate should be focused around manufacturing.

 

[iroboto]

I wasn't making any comment on the ratio between PlayStation and Xbox.

I personally think that if either manufacturer wants to sell in an emerging market, they they need a super cheap consoles and games available in the $1-5 USD bracket.

I remember when I was a kid and buying ZX Spectrum cassettes on the shelves for £1-2 back in the 80s. That increased the market for videogames back then. They'd likely need to replicate a similar scenario in regions with low income in proportion to the west.

oh, well I was =P Because I'm curious to see why there would be shortages for PS5 all the way through to 2022, and for MS, they are still selling everything they make. I mean, someone's lying because someone is making more lol.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

oh, well I was =P Because I'm curious to see why there would be shortages for PS5 all the way through to 2022, and for MS, they are still selling everything they make. I mean, someone's lying because someone is making more lol.

If Xbox Series X is always sold out everywhere and the Xbox Series S is available in most areas, then we can safely assume Microsoft are manufacturing more XSX. At least I *hope* they are considering the popularity differential.

I'm looking forward to reading a retrospective on the sales of both Xboxes at the end of this generation and whether splitting between two prices brackets caused sales to increase or not.

As others have mentioned, I doubt console sales are their first priority. I think if they really wanted to increase sales, an Xbox based on some mobile chip with Microsoft's marketing would have been a better bet for those emerging markets.

 

[JPT]

We aren’t yet sure what part of the manufacturing process is the bottleneck to supply.

Well what seems to be the problem is that TSMC can not keep up with demand for production. We just had a 40k delivery that was supposed to arrived in May moved to December, because TSMC moved Broadcom's production slot. Which meant that Broadcom moved delivery of chips to my vendor, who again passed on the buck to us.
"Luckily" we where able to get chips from a broker at the mere price raise of 50%, so I get products in July. Who has to pay? Well the end-user, or he wont get an internet connection (its all across my industry, which is Telecom)

 

[iroboto]

Well what seems to be the problem is that TSMC can not keep up with demand for production. We just had a 40k delivery that was supposed to arrived in May moved to December, because TSMC moved Broadcom's production slot. Which meant that Broadcom moved delivery of chips to my vendor, who again passed on the buck to us.
"Luckily" we where able to get chips from a broker at the mere price raise of 50%, so I get products in July. Who has to pay? Well the end-user, or he wont get an internet connection (its all across my industry, which is Telecom)

Oh. That’s a serious shortage issue.

 

[eastmen]

Well what seems to be the problem is that TSMC can not keep up with demand for production. We just had a 40k delivery that was supposed to arrived in May moved to December, because TSMC moved Broadcom's production slot. Which meant that Broadcom moved delivery of chips to my vendor, who again passed on the buck to us.
"Luckily" we where able to get chips from a broker at the mere price raise of 50%, so I get products in July. Who has to pay? Well the end-user, or he wont get an internet connection (its all across my industry, which is Telecom)

This is why its silly to have production focused in one part of the world. TSMC is already making the majority of chips for the world , we had covid and then a historic drought hit them.

We need TSMC with plants in the United States and Plants in Europe so that something like this doesn't happen in the future.

 

[JPT]

This is why its silly to have production focused in one part of the world. TSMC is already making the majority of chips for the world , we had covid and then a historic drought hit them.

We need TSMC with plants in the United States and Plants in Europe so that something like this doesn't happen in the future.

I do not follow the semi-conductor industry. So this might be 180 degrees off, but TSMC have not really been hit by covid nor the drought in any significant way.
Issue has been increased demand for products/production and that chinese companies hoarded stuff when they got banned from buying American tech.
Also Apple booked a ton of production and they also bought Huawei slots when Huawei gave up theirs.

Now, semi-conductors is not my business, but this is the stuff we get told by our vendors to explain all issues. We already had 25% price hikes on our products and now we are looking at anything fromo 25 to 50% more.... YMMW in regards to this info...

But with this all in mind, production capacity is basically a wild west territory, you got cash, you get what you want. And this affects everybody including Sony and MS.
Someone told me that the German state is subsidising Audi so they can get chips and also putting pressure on Taiwan/TSMC, what to belive, I do not know.

 

[Johnny Awesome]

I often see posts talking about average GDP of countries etc... and thinking there us no market for consoles there. Remember that the top 5% of Indian consumers is larger than the Canadian market. Same goes for places like China, Nigeria and Brazil. These 100 million people can afford consoles, especially the XSS with GamePass.

On the other question, it all boils down to manufacturing capability. No one really knows anymore about who is ahead there. I just bought two All-Access XSX as gifts that aren't going to show up in any of these charts. For all we know MS is making more units than Sony right now.

 

[zed]

I often see posts talking about average GDP of countries etc... and thinking there us no market for consoles there. Remember that the top 5% of Indian consumers is larger than the Canadian market. Same goes for places like China, Nigeria and Brazil. These 100 million people can afford consoles, especially the XSS with GamePass.

Thats all well and good and china even more so

But the actual reality even though theres a lot of ppl, and the upper-middle class is huge the actual number of ppl that buy consoles is tiny, its like south korea or china (they just dont buy consoles) eg from this article they are hoping the console market can expand and hit 100,000 in the year in the future for the whole of india.
https://www.indiatvnews.com/technol...n-rules-gaming-console-market-in-india-663526

To compare that to canada, the switch sold 148,000 in november last year.
A single console over one month in canada outsells what India manages in a year

The console markets are not even comparable, maybe you can compare india to NZ or something, actually from googling it looks like NZ is a larger console market than India.

and for MS, they are still selling everything they make. I mean, someone's lying because someone is making more lol.

Lying? But mate I dont know where you get this idea that MS are selling every series S they make, ppl have shown you data proving this is not true.
I just googled NZ for another data point, series S available to pick up in shop (no series X or ps5) for a laugh I checked a few stores, seems like 90% of shops have them available to pick up
https://www.thewarehouse.co.nz/p/xbox-series-s-512gb-console/R2708604.html

The question is why is the series s not so popular, personally I think they have fucked up compared to the series X in making it much too underpowered (extra 2GB mem & 6TF would of been so so much better), looking at some of the game comparisons this is very apparent, and this is with the xbox not releasing many next gen games yet, with the release of these more demanding games the difference is gonna become more apparent.

 

[goonergaz]

Thats all well and good and china even more so

But the actual reality even though theres a lot of ppl, and the upper-middle class is huge the actual number of ppl that buy consoles is tiny, its like south korea or china (they just dont buy consoles) eg from this article they are hoping the console market can expand and hit 100,000 in the year in the future for the whole of india.
https://www.indiatvnews.com/technol...n-rules-gaming-console-market-in-india-663526

To compare that to canada, the switch sold 148,000 in november last year.
A single console over one month in canada outsells what India manages in a year

The console markets are not even comparable, maybe you can compare india to NZ or something, actually from googling it looks like NZ is a larger console market than India.


Lying? But mate I dont know where you get this idea that MS are selling every series S they make, ppl have shown you data proving this is not true.
I just googled NZ for another data point, series S available to pick up in shop (no series X or ps5) for a laugh I checked a few stores, seems like 90% of shops have them available to pick up
https://www.thewarehouse.co.nz/p/xbox-series-s-512gb-console/R2708604.html

The question is why is the series s not so popular, personally I think they have fucked up compared to the series X in making it much too underpowered (extra 2GB mem & 6TF would of been so so much better), looking at some of the game comparisons this is very apparent, and this is with the xbox not releasing many next gen games yet, with the release of these more demanding games the difference is gonna become more apparent.

Regarding why XSS isn’t popular- likely digital only is the biggest barrier, let’s face it XSS is a Trojan horse to get people onto game pass, nice a cheap and low monthly regular payments for games.

Problem is (IMHO) the target audience doesn’t usually buy at launch...I bought one but only because I have GPU for next couple years and knew I would buy PS5 exclusives and 3rd party games on PC.

It’s actually a really good deal for parents IMHO if they are prepared to swallow the ongoing monthly GP.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

Thinking more about the market in India, I get the impression that nobody has really made any appropriate measures to break into it.

There's roughly a 10x salary difference between US and India, so that makes the GamePass price equivalent to $150/month. I can't imagine many people in the US paying that price for it either.

Taking a shot in the dark, but I think that in order to "break" India we'd need to have a disc and mobile APU based console that's somewhere between €30-50 for the machine, with games in the €1-5 range.

And, most importantly, region specific games. The Halo, Gears of War and Last of Us games likely would never work in this territory. Unless a small minority are specifically interested in American culture.

Happy to stand corrected, but I predict very little change with the new generation in India (or China). A marginal price difference for the XSS is not the solution.

 

[BRiT]

There's roughly a 10x salary difference between US and India, so that makes the GamePass price equivalent to $150/month. I can't imagine many people in the US paying that price for it either.

That's still far better than the $700 for a single game equivalent.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

That's still far better than the $700 for a single game equivalent.

Yes! Neither are workable solutions though

 

[AlphaWolf]

All of the 1.4 billion people in India do not make average salary some make less, but some make quite a bit more. There are likely more people in india who can afford a console than in many Eurozone countries.

 

[Deleted member 86764]

All of the 1.4 billion people in India do not make average salary some make less, but some make quite a bit more. There are likely more people in india who can afford a console than in many Eurozone countries.

Having a lot of people with a high salary will actually make that average number higher than is perhaps representative of the average person.

No matter which way you choose to cut it, the current methods are categorically not working in that region. How about creating local development teams that understand the interests of people in that area? And make a proportionally priced machine.

I doubt "PlayStation" or "Xbox" carry much weight across the country. Labelling a completely new box (that's region specific) would likely work better.

Unsurprisingly, mobile gaming is quite big there. Which happens to have low cost games and high advertising.