French sales : first quarter 2007

[oli2]

1. Nintendo DS : 260 000 units sold
2. Nintendo Wii : 144 000 units sold
3. PlayStation 2 : 92 000 units sold
4. PSP : 90 000 units sold
5. Playstation 3 : 81 000 units sold
6. Xbox 360 : 43 000 units sold

http://www.clubic.com/actualite-73135-france-xbox-360-ventes.html

Firstly given by an national economical newspaper, and quoted among numerous french sites.

Sorry if already posted
@mods : feel free to move / delete if it is the case.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

Seems like the DS is doing very good in every part of the world. X360 isnt doing well in europe as we heard before and Wii is doing good thoug probably still supply limited.

Most suprising is the ps3 imo, those numbers are untill the end of march, so the ps3 only sold 81k in its launch month, doesnt seem like a awfull lot to me especially since it wasnt supply limited.

 

[manuvlad]

Do you remember that PS3 was released in march 23rd, right? So, 81k was sold in eight days (23 to 31 march).

 

[PatrickL]

Yes but Sony claimed to have sold 78 k the first 2 days So 3 k last week of march ?
Anyway we just don't have enough reliable infomations on HW sales in france to draw a conclusion We just know that PS3 sales dropped fast after launch but no official number.
Look at the software sales in France week 2 april to 8 april


1.NEW SUPER MARIO BROS. (Nintendo) NDS (+2)
2.DRAGON BALL Z BUDOKAI TENKAICHI 2 (Namco Bandaï) Wii (-1)
3.Wii PLAY (Nintendo) Wii (R)
4.ANIMAL CROSSING: WILD WORLD (Nintendo) NDS (+5)
5.MOTORSTORM (Sony) PS3 (-3)
6.PROGRAMME D'ENTRAINEMENT CEREBRAL DU Dr. KAWASHIMA (Nintendo) NDS (+1)
7.THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: TWILIGHT PRINCESS (Nintendo) Wii (+5)
8.MARIO KART DS (Nintendo) NDS (+5)
9.FINAL FANTASY XII (Square Enix) PS2 (-3)
10.RESISTANCE: FALL OF MAN (Sony) PS3 (-6)
11.NINTENDOGS: LABRADOR & FRIENDS (Nintendo) NDS (+7)
12.VIRTUA TENNIS 3 (Sega) PS3 (-7)
13.RAYMAN CONTRE LES LAPINS CRETINS (Ubisoft) NDS (E)
14.SPECTROBES (Disney Interactive) NDS (+2)
15.F1: CHAMPIONSHIP EDITION (Sony) PS3 (-7)
16.TAMAGOTCHI CONNEXION CORNER SHOP 2 (Namco Bandaï) NDS (E)
17.RAYMAN CONTRE LES LAPINS CRETINS (Ubisoft) Wii (-3)
18.SUPER MARIO 64 DS (Nintendo) NDS (R)
19.MEDAL OF HONOR: AVANT-GARDE (Electronic Arts) PS2 (E)
20.POKEMON RANGER (Nintendo) NDS (E)

As you can see PS3 sw sales were already way down 2 weeks after launch.


Here a Blog were you can find weekly software chart for france (unfortunatly no sale number)

 

[Deepak]

No 360 title in top 20 ....360 is doomed!

 

[Corwin_B]

360 is (sadly) doing pretty badly in France, for a couple of reasons :
1) France is pretty much Nintendoland (Germany too, to some extent). There are weeks were the SW charts for France look a lot like JP charts.
2) the marketing for 360 is bloody atrocious. Even Gears of War didn't get much hype, apart from specialized press. We get a couple half-assed ad campaigns every few months, that last for a couple of days, and the rest is only advertising for multiplatform releases. Although MS France did a couple nice guerilla operations (the 360 boat for the PS3 launch was a briliant idea), they have yet to learn how to get a stable presence into the mainstream, something both Sony (from a long time) and Nintendo (started with the DS) know very well how to do.

 

[ManuVlad3.0]

Yes but Sony claimed to have sold 78 k the first 2 days So 3 k last week of march ?

Why not? According to this numbers X360's average sales was a little more than four hundred units by day. So 3k for six days is better than X360.

 

[rekator]

360 is (sadly) doing pretty badly in France, for a couple of reasons :
1) France is pretty much Nintendoland (Germany too, to some extent). There are weeks were the SW charts for France look a lot like JP charts.
2) the marketing for 360 is bloody atrocious. Even Gears of War didn't get much hype, apart from specialized press. We get a couple half-assed ad campaigns every few months, that last for a couple of days, and the rest is only advertising for multiplatform releases. Although MS France did a couple nice guerilla operations (the 360 boat for the PS3 launch was a briliant idea), they have yet to learn how to get a stable presence into the mainstream, something both Sony (from a long time) and Nintendo (started with the DS) know very well how to do.

Sorry, France was more a Sonyland than a Nintendoland, PS2 sell a lot better than Gamecube.
And France have a tendancy to follow the market for the high-tech, and we'll prefer to buy a product from a "well know" company (on the marketting side) than a better product from a "well know" company (on the performance side). This it's not a opinion on the consoles, it's a generality.
We are very conservative on the money aspect…
Personnaly I think that some TV spots for X360 was really good ( PES6, Gears, etc) more than Wii or PS3 (the worse is the "this is living"campaign).
And don't forget that in the French heart the Second is the First (see Poulidor a french ciclist who never win the "Tour de France but have a more popularity than the winner).

 

[Silent]

No 360 title in top 20 ....360 is doomed!

I think that this is the case for most European countries. Here in Belgium the situation is the same. I don't know how its in the other benelux (Netherlands / Luxemburg) countries, but I think the situation will not differ so much.

 

[PatrickL]

Why not? According to this numbers X360's average sales was a little more than four hundred units by day. So 3k for six days is better than X360.

Yes it is better, but the console are not at the same stage too

Anyway, it is well known that the 360 sells poorly now and without a price drop/huge hits there is no reason for a change.

 

[Ben-Nice]

Can that be correct. 43,000 x360 sold from january to end of march?

 

[zed]

have there been any studies done on why the xbox/xb360 doesnt succeed outside english speaking countries?
ie ~2/3's sold worldwide are in the USA the majority of the rest is canada, uk, nz + oz.
ie why arent ppl in the rest of europe + asia buying them, there seems to be the realization by ms that their software needs to be more varied this time round, but it doesnt really seem to be helping.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

I think because x360 is more of a american product than a worldwide product. As I see it, if you buy a x360 you mainly get western style games. Lots of shooters, sports games and that kind of stuff. Thats what sells in the states. I think we europeans are alot more like the japanese gamers. Not that we dont buy sports and shooters by the masses by I think we like more diversety. Except for the English, they always want to do things different

As for Japan, its MS own fault. Xbox1 didnt sold bad at all in Japan at the start. But instead of releasing games the japanese gamers like, they released western stuff. MS tried to somewhat change that with x360 but they still only have 2 or 3 typical Japanese titels wich just isnt enough. They dont only want the big titels, but also those weird and anime based games. With xbox1 failing them, and now x360 again its not strange japanese gamers dont buy x360.

 

[Nesh]

I think because x360 is more of a american product than a worldwide product. As I see it, if you buy a x360 you mainly get western style games. Lots of shooters, sports games and that kind of stuff. Thats what sells in the states. I think we europeans are alot more like the japanese gamers. Not that we dont buy sports and shooters by the masses by I think we like more diversety. Except for the English, they always want to do things different

I agree about the description you made on us Europeans.

I sometimes feel that Americans are going for the console that will offer the most faithful in quality games to their PC counterparts, while Europeans are aiming for the console that will offer the best possible diversified experience away from PC gaming.

Probably thats why in US they are more addicted to shooters than in Europe. Games such as Halo, CoD, FEAR, GROW etc are extremely demanded and praised in US and I think much more than we do in Europe

I think MS knows how to offer that kind of gaming in consoles better than anyone else since they are extremely familiar with the audience on Windows gaming, and I think that American devs are also more used to such a gaming audience.

Sony on the other hand judging and from their own second and first party studios most of them are either Japanese based or European based houses.

Perhaps its a cultural thing. I think a similar observation can be seen in movies as well. A great deal of Hollywood movies are more known for their direct and action oriented approach. On the other hand Europeans dont emphasize as much on action especially on that relies on gun shooting. As for Japanese? They can be extremely strange.

I ve also noticed that Europeans and Japanese often try to give a kind of theme that reminds of literature and story telling. Pan's Labyrinth and Babel come to mind as recent examples from European directors.

I should say that we are perhaps in the middle with a slight lean towards japanese

 

[Pozer]

I ve also noticed that Europeans and Japanese often try to give a kind of theme that reminds of literature and story telling. Pan's Labyrinth and Babel come to mind as recent examples from European directors.

Oddly both those 'European directors' are North American they typically shoot in Europe and set many films in Europe but they're both 100% North American. But I agree about the literature themes. It's a major generalization but I see the point of many non-american devs treating games more like art than product. But I also think there are many instances where this more false now than ever. I see alot of devs like Capcom, Criterion, Rockstar, and Square developing more product than art though. While I also think many American devs could learn more subtlety and atmosphere in storytelling. I think devs like Bungie and Tecmo have created a nice balance of delivering both.

 

[Nesh]

Oddly both those 'European directors' are North American they typically shoot in Europe and set many films in Europe but they're both 100% North American. But I agree about the literature themes. It's a major generalization but I see the point of many non-american devs treating games more like art than product. But I also think there are many instances where this more false now than ever. I see alot of devs like Capcom, Criterion, Rockstar, and Square developing more product than art though. While I also think many American devs could learn more subtlety and atmosphere in storytelling. I think devs like Bungie and Tecmo have created a nice balance of delivering both.

just out of interest were the directors of the movies I mentioned north American?


Yeah I agree that generalisations are rarely 100% informative but its very hard to explain a "general" trend otherwise. So ofcourse I can accept the examples you mentioned. None of the regions mentioned are absolute and stuck with only one way of treatment.

edit: Just searched. It seems they were Mexican. Well ok then Mexican directors are different then

 

[assen]

I think a similar observation can be seen in movies as well. A great deal of Hollywood movies are more known for their direct and action oriented approach. On the other hand Europeans dont emphasize as much on action especially on that relies on gun shooting. As for Japanese? They can be extremely strange.

Yes, but still the American movies destroy everything locally made at the box office - why don't the games follow the same pattern?

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

Marketing maybe. Alot of smaller budget movies never get to alot of cinema's so they never really got a chance to compete with the big budget titels. Also the big budget titels get alot of marketing so its not suprising most people visit the big budget film wich is running at every cinema instead of searching for the low budget movie.

 

[PatrickL]

I think the problem with the 360 is rather simple: most of the people that wanted to pay 400 € for it got it since the launch and it should find more buyers if MS makes a price cut this fall.