scooby_dooby
Legend
Agreed.
Wii sales are slowing and PS3 will become to come into it's own in Japan very soon. I don't know if it'll outsell Wii, but it should at least be able to match it.
Japan Sales Thread *renamed
- Thread starter 22psi
- Start date
Agreed.
Wii sales are slowing and PS3 will become to come into it's own in Japan very soon. I don't know if it'll outsell Wii, but it should at least be able to match it.
I may be mistaken but the US, PAL and maybe Japan hasn't even seen a notable price cut from Nintendo yet. With all the price cutting and new skus being released by Sony, the results have done little to force Nintendo to enact major price cuts. This is one area the Wii has a huge advantage and is Nintendo's trump card, which Nintendo hasn't come close to playing.
Until Sony can show it can compete even with Nintendo putting on a full court press in terms of pricing, the PS3 is no where near the turning point.
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DuckThor Evil
Legend
Nintendo however has a slightly different business model, they like to make money on the unit itself too and imo Wii was designed to do exactly that. Also Wii being 25k Yen means that it already is at a mass market price so price drop probably wouldn't do as much, but maybe they'll release slightly changed Wii lite or something to boost it up...
Yeah what Dr Evil said. The Wii is already too cheap. A price cut on Wii wont be as noticable as on the PS3. I doubt it will increase sales enough to make Nintendo more profitable and consider a price cut necessarry.
The playstation brand has build its name for two generations and an amount of titles are identified under the brand name Sony has managed to build all these years.
The consumers are used to expecting certain titles under the PS brand and they "grew" up with those framchises on the PS.
There are many who wouldnt give up these titles for the "alienated" (but unique experience) Wii is offering and it is hard for the 360 to replace the Playstation in Japan.
Europe is between the middle. US is probably MS's market but I have hopes that the PS3 will atleast reach a significant userbase closer to its competitors even at third place
The playstation brand has build its name for two generations and an amount of titles are identified under the brand name Sony has managed to build all these years.
The consumers are used to expecting certain titles under the PS brand and they "grew" up with those framchises on the PS.
There are many who wouldnt give up these titles for the "alienated" (but unique experience) Wii is offering and it is hard for the 360 to replace the Playstation in Japan.
Europe is between the middle. US is probably MS's market but I have hopes that the PS3 will atleast reach a significant userbase closer to its competitors even at third place
tongue_of_colicab
Veteran
I dont believe in brand recognision. If that really was true, that n64 and gc would have never failed as most titels associated with ps these days originated on nintendo consoles. People are probably more likely to follow the franchise the like than the console brand (that effectivly is the reason why sony became so dominant, because people followed the games, not the console). As long as sony keeps the mgs and ff's of this world it will probably work out atleast decent, but the problem for sony is that unlike MS and Nintendo they dont own most of their majory franchise. If for example SE decides to do a main FF game on Wii than sony might have a problem.
Personally I hope Wii gains more japanese support as I think the console deserves big projects from the big japanese devs as its a chance to do something new instead of the more western style of keep on doing the same everytime but only make it better looking and stuff like that (not trying to say western devs dont make good or unique games btw).
Personally I hope Wii gains more japanese support as I think the console deserves big projects from the big japanese devs as its a chance to do something new instead of the more western style of keep on doing the same everytime but only make it better looking and stuff like that (not trying to say western devs dont make good or unique games btw).
You ve got a point, but it is not simply brand recognition of the console alone I was talking about.
Playstation consoles have had the biggest userbase and expanded the gaming industry with PS1. There are certain games that got popularity and gained a huge amount of fanbase from new consumers. Gran Turismo is one of these games. Final Fantasy is another game that the japanese as well as many from the west are eager to get and in the mean time are expecting it on the Playstation only. There are many also that found about FF for the firs ttime on the PS1.
Also unlike in the past were Sega and Nintendo had a similar market share in a much smaller industry, Playstation consoles had more than 70% of market share and the rest was split for two other consoles. This happened for two generations. During these two generations consumers had experiences with the certain console and have learned to expect smilar games and quality.
PS3 may or may not reach first spot or 70% of market share but they can still maintain a high market share nearly as much as their competitors if Sony continues to offer the quality of games they have been offering recently and have a strong marketing campaign
A price cut now would do little if current PS3 sales related to the 40Gb and price drop aren't sustainable but if the PS3 continually moves 40-50k a month and Wii's sales continue to drop and unable to keep pace. Nintendo will easily drop the price to increase demand.
Two generations ago you could say the same thing for Nintendo and we see how that turned out.
Two generations ago people gave up Mario and Zelda to migrate over to the PS1, there should be no expectation that 1st party franchises can by themselves can keep gamers from migrating to other platforms.
As I said the more affordable something is, the less difference a price drop does. Also check last post: "if Sony continues to offer the quality of games they have been offering recently and have a strong marketing campaign"
True but check last post for differences
edit: Also notice that Wii offers a much different experience.
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Thats not true. Sony has chopped $200.00 off the PS3 to encourage sales. Imagine if Nintendo could meet any demand for the Wii and start selling them for $50.00 dollars.
The more pricely you product is, the bigger your price cut has to be to spur sales in relation to cheaper products.
tongue_of_colicab
Veteran
I get your point but I dont really agree with it. When FF moved from the Snes to the PSX most people who knew the serie and were going to play it on PSX were people with a nintendo system, still that didnt hold them back at all to move over to PSX. Your average gamer couldnt care less whether the label on his/her console is from nintendo, xbox or playstation. They just want to play the games they like. Even the more die hard gamers would probably buy a different platform if that is whats needed to play the games they want. I really think there is only a very small amount of people that only wants to associate a certain series with a certain platform. People can change their minds very easily, we've seen that with the move from nintendo to sony and it could happen again if everything is in the right place.
I dont think sega had even close to the marketshare nintendo had. The nes ruled, and at the time the Snes came out sega must have released atleast a dozen of consoles in the same time frame which all didnt make it. It took them untill dreamcast to get it right but sony screwed that up for them.
Yes playstation ruled for the last 2 generations, just like nintendo did before that. Ofcourse they sold more than the NES and Snes, but with 60million and 50million consoles sold you cant say the nes and snes are totally unknown either. Both did better than xbox and gc combined and probably most people you ask will atleast have heard of the xbox brand. And just about everybody will have atleast heard of the name Nintendo.
Ofcourse. But the problem for sony is that unlike the last 10+ years their competitors seem to be in a better position than they are. They lost alot of exclusives to MS, they dont have alot of games out and most that are out are ports or not as good as people expected. They still hold some important exclusives, but most of them are 3rd party so no 100% guarantee they might go MP and its not like MS doesnt have anything to put against those games. And then there still is nintendo ofcourse.
Where sony used to have things going for them the last 2 generations with alot of games, and alot of quality games, low prices and a good name and competition that nobody had alot of trust in now they seem to be in a bit of a opposite situation. They lack games, they lack good games, they cant make their hardware cheaper than the competitors, they had some bad press, though that seems to be going positive again and maybe most important the competition both have very strong machines.
Not saying sony is doomed, ofcourse not, but imo its pretty clear that the way things are going now wont make them beat ms or nintendo and on or two exclusives like FF or MGS wont change that unless each of them suddenly sells 5million consoles.
I think that just like nintendo dropped the ball with n64 sony might have done that with ps3. And thats not bad (except for sony ofcourse), keeping stuck with the same to long isnt good either. Nintendo brought us alot 20 years ago, sony did after that and now its up to MS or nintendo and after one or two generations we might as well see sony on top again.
Bah I forgot about cross price elasticity which is what resulted to your observation:
the PS3 was still far from reaching pricing levels that were considered normal during the first price cut and games were scarce.. A $200 reduction as a percentage change is "smaller" the more esxpensive your console was intially. Wii is already squeezing out potential sales from average income concumers while the PS3 was above normal pricing levels. Thats because cross price elasticity is involved and Wii is already very low priced. At the same time PS3 was simiar to the 360 and more expensive.
Now for simple price elasticities:
$50 for a Wii is farfetched and unrealistically too low at this point of time. Dont expect such price cuts to happen soon. That will mean Nintendo will have to reduce price up to 75% approximately. But in reality reductions will be far smaller. An asumed 10% price reduction on Wii does little difference in our pockets since it is already low priced. A 10% price change on either 360 or PS3 is a far bigger difference for our pockets and as the PS3 approaches what is considered normal pricing, from that point and onward, price cuts and simultaneous good offerings will start generating more sales. Wii will need larger percentage changes because it is already enjoying sales from lower price.
tongue_of_colicab
You are replying to me as if I am expecting the PS3 to reach first position when I said thats not what I am expecting so I wonder why your effort. What are you trying to convince me?
My only point is that the PS3 can improve enough its sales to be nearer its competitors (even at third place).
edit: I posted an extensive reply but I deleted it because I see the discussion as unnecessary. I am still unsure what you are trying to tell me. I have it saved if you want me to post it though
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Which in itself is interesting, because there's little in Wii to reduce and make savings on. The CPU is tiny, so a switch to 65nm isn't going to make big savings there. The drive is DVD, standard, no cost reductions to be had there. Seems to me that Wii cannot be cost reduced effectively, and any price reductions will come at the cost of Nintendo's profits per unit. A $50 off pricepoint may spur sales, but will also lose Nintendo that load of profits, which is why they'll remain hesitant to drop prices.
tongue_of_colicab
Veteran
I understand you are not trying to say ps3 will be #1. I got a bit carried away telling my own thoughts on things while I was replying to your post.
From Neogaf:
Famitsu
DSL 82000
Wii 35000
PSP 55000
PS2 9400
PS3 56000
360 7000
1.Mario Party DS 242000
2.Musou PS3 176000
3.SMG 78000（335000）
4.Musou360 27000
5.FFTA2 24000（235000）
6.Castlevania PSP 20000
7.Wii Sports 18000（2091000）
8.西村サス 16000（112000）
9.Wii Play 15000（1648000）
10.Mario Kart DS 13000（2528000）
15.Ratchet & Clank Future 11000
Famitsu
DSL 82000
Wii 35000
PSP 55000
PS2 9400
PS3 56000
360 7000
1.Mario Party DS 242000
2.Musou PS3 176000
3.SMG 78000（335000）
4.Musou360 27000
5.FFTA2 24000（235000）
6.Castlevania PSP 20000
7.Wii Sports 18000（2091000）
8.西村サス 16000（112000）
9.Wii Play 15000（1648000）
10.Mario Kart DS 13000（2528000）
15.Ratchet & Clank Future 11000
OT/Also, since I think Wii has shown a trend to not cater to the hardcore and therefore may face a lifetime of low attach rates, one way Nintendo can make that up is make loads on the hardware, much like Apple with the Ipod.
Don't know but it looks more of a color change jump than a price drop one.
Price drop is 5000 yen less than the 20 GB model, which received a 5000 yen drop in October.
The most interesting race here is not just PS3 versus Wii, but Sony versus Nintendo. Sony are actually in spitting distance of combined console & handheld sales from Nintendo's previously unassailable combination!
The most interesting race here is not just PS3 versus Wii, but Sony versus Nintendo. Sony are actually in spitting distance of combined console & handheld sales from Nintendo's previously unassailable combination!