Is Wii interest dropping in Japan?

[Shifty Geezer]

Wii continues to outsell other consoles in Japan by a significant margin, but that margin is dropping over time.

]Wii outsold PS3 by 3 to 1 during August, but the ratio was 4 to 1 the previous month and 6 to 1 in May and June.

Between July and August Wii sales fell by 38 per cent, while Xbox 360 was down 37 per cent. The number of PlayStation 3 units sold dropped by 11 per cent.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=28266

What could be causing this relative downturn in interest?

 

[DJ12]

All the people that want one have got one

Some analysts predicted the Wii bubble would be short lived, maybe they are right.

At the end of the day it is a niche machine that caught everyone's attention, but after you've enjoyed Wii Sports what else is there to do. There doesn't seem to be much more they can do other than invent more controllers to try and change things up.

Maybe if they didn't make Wii Sports just about the perfect game for the controller they'd have more scoop.

 

[Arun]

Since Wii tends to favour social games, I ponder if the 'maximum number of concurrent units' is lower: if one of your friends already has one and you only enjoy playing Wii Sports socially, why bother buying one yourself? Of course, this doesn't apply to everyone, and I could be overestimating the effect of this scenario significantly, but I thought it might be worth discussing.

 

[DeadlyNinja]

Or you could look at it as once Mina No Golf's popularity has saturated, the PS3's sales will start to go back down. If you look at the pass 3 weeks, you'll notice the PS3 got a huge boost from Mina No Golf, but the Wii continues to sell at it's normal pace. Last week every single system had a huge drop in sales after the the Japanese holiday.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

Wii continues to outsell other consoles in Japan by a significant margin, but that margin is dropping over time.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=28266[/URL]

What could be causing this relative downturn in interest?

Isnt it more likely that its just because its a slow time of year or nintendo is producing a bit less (or stocking up for christmas)? I find it amazing how people over analize the wii numbers everytime they drop a bit and for example never notice the ps3, the console from the company that was domanating for over a decade now sells like bad on a weekly basis and dropped 11% while you can already get a ps3 for 300 euro's in Japan which is only 100 more than a Wii. I'd say that is a hell of alot more interresting than wii sales that dropped. DS sales dropped quite a bit too, but nobody talks about DS suddenly loosing interest either.

Anyway I do think interest might be dropping which I dont find very strange as you buy a console to play games on and the Wii hasnt exactly been getting amazing amounts of games so its not suprising people might wait or buy a other console. However looking at what comes out by the end of the year I think it will just be a temporary drop which probably has more than one reason.

 

[thatdude90210]

Maybe it's dropping, the market is saturated... or maybe Pachter was right, that Japan shipments were diverted.

Or it's a little bit of both.

Couple of points about the ratio, PS3 had a bump from the golf game, and the ratio of 3 to 1 was present the after the first month of sales of both consoles, before the PS3 sales became saturated. There was a 2 to 1 month, might have been a PS3 bump from that Gundam game.

Someone at gaf calculated the ratio from the beginning:

November	8:1
December	3:1
January		3:1
February	3:1
March		2:1
April		4:1
May		6:1
June		7:1
July		4:1
August		3:1

 

[DeadlyNinja]

November	8:1
December	3:1
January		3:1
February	3:1
March		2:1
April		4:1
May		6:1
June		7:1
July		4:1
August		3:1

Well according to these numbers, a vast majority of the time the Wii outsells the PS3 3:1. If anything, it actually makes the recent bump from Mina no Golf look insignificant. The lowest number was March where it was out sold only 2:1 with no major games whatsoever. If the PS3 didn't get a bump from Mina, it'll probably hover around 4:1 or 5:1.

 

[one]

you can already get a ps3 for 300 euro's in Japan which is only 100 more than a Wii.

Wii is 25,000 yen (158 euro) in Japan. 20GB PS3 is 49,800 yen (315 euro). 60GB PS3 is 59,980 yen (380 euro).

 

[Cryect]

Or you could look at it as once Mina No Golf's popularity has saturated, the PS3's sales will start to go back down. If you look at the pass 3 weeks, you'll notice the PS3 got a huge boost from Mina No Golf, but the Wii continues to sell at it's normal pace. Last week every single system had a huge drop in sales after the the Japanese holiday.

Yep, thats the big thing. PS3 sales when MNG came out were triple what they were before the release of MNG. They've slowly been returning to the previous numbers of before (peaked at around 30k last numbers for 2 weeks ago was at 15k which is 50% higher still than the 9k-10k sales it was getting before MNG).

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Isnt it more likely that its just because its a slow time of year or nintendo is producing a bit less (or stocking up for christmas)? I find it amazing how people over analize the wii numbers everytime they drop a bit and for example never notice the ps3, the console from the company that was domanating for over a decade now sells like bad on a weekly basis and dropped

That's going off topic, and this is a polite warning to keep to the topic, which is Wii sales. If you want to discuss perpetually low PS3 sales, start a thread on it (like that discussion has been done to death already!). The reason Wii sales are brought up is because, in this case, there seemed to be a change that a website reported on that give us something different to analyze. If the PS3 sales change to go up or down, they'd get similar attention, like any other console, assuming there's something like a website news report bringing it to our attention.

Now the issue here is Nintendo sales dropping relative to PS3. At first glance they're just the drop due to it being the slow Summer period for consoles, but then that phenomena should affect all consoles equally. As it was, XB360 and Wii sales dropped the same amount but PS3 didn't. That could point to PS3 being more buoyant at the moment.

thatdude90210's post is useful (if accurate!) as it shows significant long term fluctuations. Rather than this being a drop, it could in fact be a leveling back to normals. In essence sales for Wii are on average 3x sales for PS3, with large peaks. Or the average is 5x sales with occasional dips and peaks. Still, it seems reading these as a downturn in interest would be inaccurate given prior figures. It'd be good to get monthly sales for the year.

 

[infinity4]

Well, It looks to me though this is cyclic process, the overall narrowing of the gap is either PS3 has sold better or Wii has been selling worse.

Seems PS3 is selling better since launch with retailers themselves cutting prices and more games being available & announced.

I must be missing something

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

Wii is 25,000 yen (158 euro) in Japan. 20GB PS3 is 49,800 yen (315 euro). 60GB PS3 is 59,980 yen (380 euro).

Hmm I didnt know the Wii already dropped that much, I thought it was still around 200 like at launch. But wasnt there a 300 euro golf ps3 pack? I remember inifficent saying that (he gave the yen number but google said that was 303euro).

That's going off topic, and this is a polite warning to keep to the topic, which is Wii sales. If you want to discuss perpetually low PS3 sales, start a thread on it (like that discussion has been done to death already!). The reason Wii sales are brought up is because, in this case, there seemed to be a change that a website reported on that give us something different to analyze. If the PS3 sales change to go up or down, they'd get similar attention, like any other console, assuming there's something like a website news report bringing it to our attention.

Well I didnt ment to start a ps3 discussion but I just gave it as a example that I find it a bit amazing how people jump on the Wii numers everytime there is a slight difference while there is another console which numers are alot more interresting but nobody seem to bother about them.

Now the issue here is Nintendo sales dropping relative to PS3. At first glance they're just the drop due to it being the slow Summer period for consoles, but then that phenomena should affect all consoles equally. As it was, XB360 and Wii sales dropped the same amount but PS3 didn't. That could point to PS3 being more buoyant at the moment.

Could be, but the ps3 had that golf game which caused a spike while the wii didnt had anything decent for ages now so that could cause the difference.

 

[one]

Hmm I didnt know the Wii already dropped that much, I thought it was still around 200 like at launch. But wasnt there a 300 euro golf ps3 pack? I remember inifficent saying that (he gave the yen number but google said that was 303euro).

I'm just citing the retail prices, 25,000 yen is Wii's launch price and nothing has changed so far.

PS3 Beginner's Pack (the golf game bundled version) is 61,980 yen (392 euro) for 60GB, 51,980 yen (329 euro) for 20GB. Conversion is by today's rate.

 

[thatdude90210]

Could be, but the ps3 had that golf game which caused a spike while the wii didnt had anything decent for ages now so that could cause the difference.

The Wii did have DQ:Sword recently, which I think is close to half a mil copies sold, and Mario party 8, which should make it to a mil copies eventually.

Granted, MNG, which I think passed 300,000 has been a bigger seller in the past than the Mario Party series, but that was because it was selling to a bigger install base in the PS2.

Overall, I don't think Nintendo has too much to worry about the rest of the year. Some of the Wii's biggest guns have yet to be fired, such as Mario Galaxy, Smash Brawl, and even WiiFit. With those, Nintendo should probably be more worried about being able to keep up with demand.

 

[Acert93]

Maybe it's dropping, the market is saturated... or maybe Pachter was right, that Japan shipments were diverted.

So, this is the part where Faf owns me, right?

 

[Cryect]

That's going off topic, and this is a polite warning to keep to the topic, which is Wii sales. If you want to discuss perpetually low PS3 sales, start a thread on it (like that discussion has been done to death already!). The reason Wii sales are brought up is because, in this case, there seemed to be a change that a website reported on that give us something different to analyze. If the PS3 sales change to go up or down, they'd get similar attention, like any other console, assuming there's something like a website news report bringing it to our attention.

PS3 sales appear to be relevant since the reason Wii sales are being said to be down is because the ratio between WiiS3 sales is lower which is due to two parts. One, Wii sales are slightly down from high points but still doing quite well while two the PS3 sales are 3 times higher went up to 3 times the amount they were when the Wii had a 7:1 ratio .

Anyways instead of trying to explain this in words I should just show a graph thanks to JoshuaJSlone's website.

Thats weekly sales for the year 2007 through 2 weeks ago. (The peaks btw each represent various games)

 

[RobertR1]

Hot Shot Golf5 gave the PS3 a good boost.

And remember the PS3 numbers were so low at points that the ratio were going to come down quick the moment the PS3 started selling better.

If the Wii sells 50K units a week, the ratios look like this for PS3 sales.
6:1 = 8,333 PS3's sold
5:1 = 10,000 PS3's sold
4:1 = 12,500 PS3's sold
3:1 = 16,667 PS3's sold
2:1 = 25,000 PS3's sold

As you can see the increment of volume increase is most dramatic when you go from 3:1 to 2:1. The PS3 needs to be under a 2:1 ratio to start giving the Wii a run for it's money.

The 360 is beyond even a miracle state

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Well I didnt ment to start a ps3 discussion but I just gave it as a example that I find it a bit amazing how people jump on the Wii numers everytime there is a slight difference while there is another console which numers are alot more interresting but nobody seem to bother about them.

This IMO is quite a silly comment. Wii is the big, interesting phenomena. Surely it's going to get more coverage? There'll be reports how it's selling well, and reports wondering if they'll drop because some people think it will. People aren't 'jumping' on the Wii numbers, but discussing them. There's been plenty enough threads saying how well Wii is doing as well, in case you haven't noticed!And as long as the discussions are legitimate, they're allowed. We're not going to refuse any talking about Console X until there are the same number of discussions on Consoles Y and Z now, are we

Nice graph Cryect

PS3 sales appear to be relevant since the reason Wii sales are being said to be down is because the ratio between WiiS3 sales is lower which is due to two parts.

Although that was somewhat inferred in the article, I don't think that was the crux. They talk in terms of ratio of WiiS3 but of course PS3 sales going up would make Wii appear to be going down by that metric. The real point is Wii sales have gone down in the past 4 months that the article tracked, at a rate greater than the other machines. Of course, as the graph demonstrates very clearly, that downturn is from a spike, and not at all consistent with a downwards trend for the system.

 

[ShaidarHaran]

I have to wonder how the Wii is still selling at the rate it's selling at worldwide. There aren't any 3rd party titles for it, and even the 1st party titles are rather lacking. You can only get by on hype for so long, and then you have to start delivering some substance if you want to have continued success.

 

[Cryect]

I have to wonder how the Wii is still selling at the rate it's selling at worldwide. There aren't any 3rd party titles for it, and even the 1st party titles are rather lacking. You can only get by on hype for so long, and then you have to start delivering some substance if you want to have continued success.

Same is true of about every console I can think of for the first year. You don't buy a console for its first year's worth of games you buy it for the potential of games that is believed to come. Whether those games will come or not of course is another question. At the moment Wii software is selling quite well in comparison to other consoles. Its not selling at DS level for software but there isn't the selection, variety, or install base of the DS yet either (the DS is the only system handily beating in software sales the Wii at the moment worldwide).