More sales charts... (US)

NPD was ~300k both Nov/Dec 05 for 360. Total was around maybe ~650k I believe. Even adding 10% for Canada gets you 700k. Guess that's why 900k was a shipped number right?

It's got to be scary for Sony to see PS3's sitting on the shelf so soon. I reference my earlier post-these consoles are apparantly just too expensive (you can no longer say 360 is the only slow seller...).

BTW, the hubbub about 360's "slow" sales from the likes of Pachter and croal is a bit bunk. It all depends on how you look at it. You can look at it that, it has steadily sold significantly better than Xbox1 every month since supply cleared up, all at a price 1-2 hundred dollars higher than Xbox was (more typically a full 200 more, since premium is more popular, which is in fact 2X Xbox1 price).

The way to say it should be selling better is basically expecting PS2 (at same life point) style numbers from it. It's not approaching those. But I dont know how realistic it is of Pachter to expect that.

 

Will wonders never cease

Surprise, surprise, the walmart I'm at got a ps3 resupply on Saturday afternoon. Four 60 gigs. I didn't expect to get anything until some undetermined point in the future.

After several announcements over the PA, there wasn't any stampede for them. Eventually, one family bought two. Don't know why they wanted two. They evidently planned on keeping at least one for themselves because they bought Resistance and the kid was asking about Blu-ray movies.

When I left at 2 am, one was locked away in the display case and the other back in the locked storage room.

There's demand for the system but it's clearly softer then the must-buy-on-sight rabidity the Wii's attracted. I expect both units to sell by closing time. If they don't... well, unsold systems sitting on the shelf right before Christmas would be an anecdotal bad sign.

I don't know how widespread the resupply is but if anyone wants a ps3 before Christmas it'd be worth it to check out your local walmart.

 

I didn't expect this, either.

It's Christmas Eve, the store is closed, and two ps3's remain on the shelf.


Somebody, somewhere, just had a conniption reading that because they wanted one but couldn't find it.

Two expressed interest during the ~4 hours I was there. The first asked if he could buy both, excitedly said he had to make some phone calls, and then promptly disappeared. The next one, after reviewing the amount of money he'd already spent today, said he'd get one "after the bugs are worked out".

 

Ouch

 

I have some more anecdotal evidence the PS3 is doomed! I saw a 60GB PS3 just sitting in a store wating to be bought in Tokyo this past Friday! I was so surprised

They also had a 2 Wii's just waiting to be bought... That was even more shocking! I was tempted to buy one.

But to be fair, this was in a small inconsipicuous 5th floor import shop in Akihabara. The PS3 was priced at around $750 US. Both Wii and PS3 in all the major channels is still impossible/very hard to find.

There was a mob/line of what seemed like 80 people in the games section of the Yodobashi camera (like a best buy). I thought maybe they just got in a Wii or PS3 shipment in, but it turns out they were all sold out of those, all those people were actually just queuing up to buy a DS! Yes DS is still that hard to get a hold of.

 

So Wii's twice as doomed as PS3?!

I don't understand why people think these things should spend no more than 10 minutes on shelves waiting to be bought. If we consider the US market for example, let's say there's 3 million people there willing to buy PS3 early on at full price. Of a population of 300 million, that's 1% of the population. So if PS3's arrive and are announced, at best only a couple of people in store will care.

If consoles sit there and don't get sold between restocking, it's an issue. Otherwise it's just waiting for consumers to locate available hardware. Anyone seeing stock on shelves shouldn't regard that as reducing sales interest. The only reason you weren't seeing PS3's on shelves before was because there were so few of them!

And speaking of which, what are the restocking figure for Wii like? We're hearing plenty about groweing PS3 supplies, but nothing at all about Wii supplies that seem even more constrained.

 

Can all those DS sales draw development resources away from PS3/X360/Wii?

 

Not really. Ofcourse if you got people devving on a DS game you cant have them working on something else but the amount of time and people needed for a DS game dont even come close to what is needed for a wii/ps3/x360 game so it wont really make a differance.

 

Remove Wii from the equation. I would say yes. In Japan at least, a definite yes. DQIX is testament to that. Actually Square-Enix as a whole is a testament to that.

 

DQIX is coming out way too early in the PS3/Wii-lifespan. PSOne and PS2 got DQs over four year after they came out.

PS2 was the only alternative really.. but it's maybe too late in the cycle.

 

I thought DS was a fad before, it had all the characteristics of a fad. DS isn't a fad though, it is part of an underlying paradigm shift in the business (I get all sorts of fixed-line to mobile telephony vibes from it)

In terms of user base it would have been a no-brainer to have it as a PS2 game - 19mn sold (not shipped) in Japan, with PS3 users also able to play.

Yet Hori still chose DS. That freight train left the station and shows no sign of slowing down, DQIX will make a mountain of money for Square - maybe the decision for the DS version, a technological regression of the series, was a hedge against possible poor next-gen sales of their multi-million dollar Final Fantasy's?

Fact is Dragon Quest numbered has switched platform, has switched company, has switched allegiance (IMO). Sony should be thinking long and hard about this (I would strongly advise them considering obtaining a majority stake in SE - jettison whatever they need to from SPE/SME and get private equity aboard to do it)

It's my view that DQ and FF numbered are not just the key titles in Japan, they define the underlying psyche of the Japanese development community (barring Capcom it would seem). DS is now the number one platform in their minds. PS2 was before.

I don’t see DS itself taking away resources away from 360/PS3, I see it indirectly causing a fall in expenditure on next-gen development. For me, the day FF numbered switches to a handheld is the day console gaming dies. I hope to never see that day.

 

Question: did 1M become the target before or after launch -- officially?

I believe a Sony rep had commented on this (but could be confused) stating that goal, but it is less clear than the 4M and 2M goals. When did 1M become their goal for 2006?

Have they stated a spring 2007 number?

 

That's going to be the new line from detractors.

"Sure they sold 1 million. But that's only half of the 2 million they promised!"

"They promised to launch in the spring so 1 million or 2 million by the end of 2006 spells DOOM for Sony! X360 FTW!"

 

why remove Wii when it is outselling PS3 3:1?

 

Support/resources shifting will not affect Wii. In fact Wii will be the benficiary.

 

I would just like to know how vgcharts is getting weekly updates to NA numbers, given that NPD is a monthly charting system. Anyone know?

 

The problem with VGCharts is, that they listed X360 sales as 4,5 million worldwide, when MS annouced they just reached 6mill

 

Isn't 6 million the shipment number? VGChart is the sold number collected from tracking services IIRC.