The state of Xbox in Japan
Are we seeing the start of an Xbox renaissance in Japan?
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Xbox in Japan
- Thread starter Dr. Nick
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Silent_Buddha
Legend
The state of Xbox in Japan
Are we seeing the start of an Xbox renaissance in Japan?
Considering it's still selling considerably worse than the Xbox and X360, I wouldn't exactly call it the start of a renaissance.
We'd have to see a significant uptick for it to become a major player in the Japanese market. Unfortunately, there's a possibility of a global recession on the horizon that could make the one back in 2008 seem cute. If that happens then it goes from a miniscule possibility to a dead possibility.
Even if that doesn't happen, the strength of the dollar versus the yen has climbed drastically (approx. +18%) since Feb. as well as YoY (approx. +27% YoY), if that trend continues it'll become increasingly difficult for MS to compete in Japan.
Global uncertainty about conditions in Europe (War in Ukraine) and Asia-Pacific (China's intentions in the area) are combining to make the dollar seem like the safest global currency at the moment. Great if you are in the US and want to buy foreign goods. Not so great if you are in a foreign country and want to buy US goods.
Or another way to think of it. Great for foreign countries that want to sell product to the US. Not so great for US companies that want to sell product to other countries. One of the reasons that Japan's economy exploded in the 80's was because of how strong the dollar was to the Yen (1 dollar would get you almost 240 Yen). One contributing factor to their economy slowing quite significantly in the 90's was because of how strong the Yen became (1 dollar could get you a bit over 100 Yen and dipped down as low as ~94 Yen back in 1995).
Regards,
SB
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I wonder how much of that data was skewed by exports to other regions where Xbox is still unsupported. For example, the cheapest Xbox series in my region comes from Japan. Same with oculus quest
Even if that was the case, the Xbox is doing very well. Remember, the Xbox One could have been selling like the Series is but did not. Microsoft could have been shipping the same amount of Xbox Ones to the region, and the systems could have been exported out of the country the entire time. That is part of the reason I don't buy that in the case of the Xbox, most of them are being shipped out of the country, as people are saying is the case with the PlayStation.
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Maybe Xbox series s was much more popular on unsupported region than xbox one? As gamepass seems to be a hit everywhere
On PS4 era, Sony also much better (than now) in catering to their supported markets with regional pricing.
ChuckeRearmed
Regular
They are supply restricted but they are closing to OG Xbox level and potentially Xbox 360 slightly further down the road. If it is not renaissance, I don't know what it is then lol
Silent_Buddha
Legend
Uh, it's not even close and it's been about 1.75 years since launch. 1.75 years and it's at almost 175k versus roughly 400k for OG Xbox. At the current rate of adoption it should surpass the OG about when the OG Xbox generation ended.
The thing is we can't just expect that sales will continue at the same or greater pace as there are numerous factors involved. For example, if Sony get their supply issues sorted in Japan that might once again suppress Xbox sales. If a recession hits Japan, sales will definitely take a hit. And even if none of that happens demand might still flatten.
Of course, to be fair there's also a chance that sales could potentially increase if something catches the imagination of Japanese gamers or if they find Game Pass such great value that it's worth getting one.
However, going only by sales up to this point, XBS consoles are currently selling greatly below OG Xbox and X360 levels. And neither of those were anything that MS could be proud of.
Regards,
SB
You're using OLD data. Xbox Series consoles is over 232K in Japan sales. Data from 2022-06 IGN using Famitsu data @ https://www.ign.com/articles/xbox-series-xs-outselling-ps5-in-japan
Silent_Buddha
Legend
Gotcha so that would be around week 80-84 depending on which week in June.
So that would compare to about 405k-ish for OG Xbox and 425k-ish for X360. Still pretty disappointing compared to either of the consoles. However, it is a nice jump in install base although not as dramatic of a jump as X360 had from week 52 to week 57.
So, yeah, certainly something to keep an eye on.
Regards,
SB
If Microsoft can send enough supply, I do think they will surpass the OG Xbox within the next 12 months. It seems like a miracle, but about 15 years ago, that would not have seemed that remarkable. When I started gaming again, I was surprised by how much Microsoft had fallen in that region after all of the efforts that they had put in during the 360 generation. It is nice to see that it is managing to do this much without any made-in-Japan exclusives on the horizon.
I do think they have made some missteps again this generation, though. They did not even bother making sure there were physical copies of Elden Ring or Tales of Arise to sell in Japan. Scarlet Nexus was the last 3rd party physical release in Japan, as far as I know, and it has been on the most played list in Japan since it was released before it even hit Game Pass. Elden Ring is on the list, but Tales of Arise was never on the most played list for Xbox in Japan. I understand Elden Ring, but Tales should have been a no-brainer. Maybe they can do something for Star Ocean 6.
I do think they have made some missteps again this generation, though. They did not even bother making sure there were physical copies of Elden Ring or Tales of Arise to sell in Japan. Scarlet Nexus was the last 3rd party physical release in Japan, as far as I know, and it has been on the most played list in Japan since it was released before it even hit Game Pass. Elden Ring is on the list, but Tales of Arise was never on the most played list for Xbox in Japan. I understand Elden Ring, but Tales should have been a no-brainer. Maybe they can do something for Star Ocean 6.
If Microsoft managed to grab it at launch for Japan gamepass, it'll probably be make some nice increased interest (and maybe locked Japan people to be addicted to gamepas)
There’s a chance it can beat OG Xbox. Not sure about 360. The market has changed across the board and trying to deliver what it is the JPN market wants may be out of reach for MS here.
Some games the US won’t allow, but surprisingly Nintendo will. I don’t think JPN cares for AAA games all that much, so to get more sales they need to do something else
Some games the US won’t allow, but surprisingly Nintendo will. I don’t think JPN cares for AAA games all that much, so to get more sales they need to do something else
ChuckeRearmed
Regular
You can catch imagination if the consoles are lying on the shelves and nobody is buying them. So far there is nno indication that this happens.
The global recession could actually boost xbox in Japan. 5nm series s with its lower ram would still allow for lower prices than the ps5/xbox series x. Couple it with the value of game pass and MS could have a really good hand. That's without accounting for the fact that a 5nm series s should allow it to be even smaller and consume even less power.
Will be interesting to see what happens
D
Deleted member 11852
Guest
I've not seen anything that would suggest moving from TSMC's best 7nm process to 5nm would result in significant power and thermals savings and Microsoft will be paying through the nose for a more expensive process. If Microsoft want to sell Series S cheaper, it would cost them less to take a bigger hit on he console.
I haven't seen anything to suggest moving from 7nm to 5nm wouldn't result in power and thermal savings. Have you seen anything that would suggest that? MS would also be able to produce a lot more chips per wafer. 5nm wont stay expensive forever. I don't think MS will move to 5nm for the consoles this year but it is a possibility for 2023 and imo most likely in 2024. Once sub 5nm processes come online current production on 5nm like the m1/2 and other chips will move to those new processes. I am sure MS and Sony will be ready to purchase fab space on 5nm
We already see the difference 7 -6nm makes on AMD's mobile line and later this year zen will move to 5nm and we will see improvements there.
D
Deleted member 11852
Guest
Yeah, mostly from Apple who are the only people can to afford these prices in volume. What Apple's products taught us, was that changing one chip, the APU/SOC - from 7nm to 5nm didn't actually result in massive thermal changes. It allows performance to push up and battery life to eek out but nothing got materially smaller and neither are useful for Series S rev.2.
TSMC are focussing on N3 right now, with some tail improvements to the old processes (e.g. N4P), but N5 is still the most expensive commercial process and that's not going to change whilst the semiconductor shortage continues and TSMC expect that to run a few more years.
It remains to be seen what an xbox series s soc would do on 5nm. Remember Apple launched chips on 5nm 2 years ago. We also don't know what their main focus was when moving from 7-5nm.
WE already see AMD going from 7nm to 6nm netting larger / higher clocked apus in the same power profiles. Taking the series s chip design and moving from 7nm to 5nm while keeping clock speeds and core/cu counts the same should result in a much smaller and lower power consuming chip.
I personally think that we wont really see mid gen refreshes instead we will get totally new designs based off of zen 5 and rdna 3. But I still think we will see shrinks of the ps5/xbox series consoles.
D
Deleted member 11852
Guest
It was performance and battery life, just like Apple said.
Sure, and the rest of the PC industry has cost partially subsidised with the higher-end paying for bleeding edge performance and everything else shaking out through mid-to-lower specification components - CPUs, GPUs, RAM, solid-state storage - through binning. Something that isn't relevant to console APUs.
There is no point comparing apples to oranges.
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