Captain Smoker
Member
Third parties sold at least 505.000.000 software units on the Wii and 600.000.000 units on the NDS.
-
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NPD Sales Results for February 2015 [Nintendo Numbers, Majora's, MH4, ~XB1]
- Thread starter vinnygambini
- Start date
Plinko
Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
I find the idea that the Wii "didn't affect" third parties to be ridiculous. Didn't Ubisoft start putting out more exercise/dance/shovelware because of the success of games on Wii and Kinect?
I'd also argue that third parties could have made more money had they actually put out quality games for the Wii. I believe the Tiger Woods series on Wii outsold the PS3/Xbox versions as well. The opportunities to reach that market were there. Many publishers just didn't take advantage.
I'd also argue that third parties could have made more money had they actually put out quality games for the Wii. I believe the Tiger Woods series on Wii outsold the PS3/Xbox versions as well. The opportunities to reach that market were there. Many publishers just didn't take advantage.
Captain Smoker
Member
Third parties actually generated a lot of money with Wii & NDS, some of them more than others, but after the downfall of the Wii they also stopped supporting the system and therefore they didn't generate any money, or didn't know how to please the audience in the long run.
Note that this data is incomplete in some fiscal years and also quite old (from this thread: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=720827), we know that those publishers generated a lot of money on PS3 and 360 after the Wii slowed down.
Examples of publishers who benefited from Wii & NDS
Two that didn't care because of Call of Duty and being EA
To those of you not counting, that figure is quite a bit higher than Nintendo's software sales on these systems. Third parties sold more units than the myth would suggest.
People have had this argument a lot in NPD topics in the past, but dude, you can't just arbitrarily cut out Nintendo because they're not part of a "core," market. They were the market leader for a significant portion of last gen, you can't just cut that out of the picture. Like it or not the Wii affected software and business decisions across the board for all third-parties and changed the landscape of the industry as a whole. The lengths people still go through to pretend like the Wii didn't exist are ridiculous.
IGN gets tons of ad payment from MS. Doesn't surprise me at all that they'll mimic MS PR. Frankly I haven't trusted a gamin media's news since GS editor's Jeff Gerstmann?? Was fired over Kane and Lynch scores. GAF to me is the only impartial gaming site that doesn't brown nose all the 3 consoles, they call a spads as shown.
The thing people are pointing out about the wii was that it was an anomaly. It didn't follow any previous sales trends or start a new trend. Ive seen graphs with it taken out and you can see hardware sales follow a similar trend a good ways back. The wii didn't fit the trend and things have went back to normal after it.
The Wii was not healthy for the industry, for the exact reason you mentioned. Publishers made decisions based on the wii fad and we are now seeing the software contractions due to the spending that went on during it.
GiantBreadbug
Member
that sure is an interesting reality you live in
I want to see these graphs because it absolutely does not. Take out the Wii, 360/PS3 adoption rates were much slower and different than PS2/Xbox/Gamecube's and the market would look like it's in decline because there was no PS2 equivalent.
The Wii wasn't a fad or an anomaly, it was Nintendo seeing a market for a different audience and being successful with that audience, the console was successful in ways that were originally intended. The problem is that none of the big three could sustain that audience which is a big part of why we're seeing the console market contract here.
KillerMan91
Member
Well out of those only THQ was unable to adapt to life without Wii and DS and died off. All others are doing quite well at the moment even with this market contraction.
Captain Smoker
Member
Yeah, but the point was that people always say things like "third parties didn't generate money on Wii/NDS", which is obviously not true.
That they managed to generate money (or even more money) without them is right, would be a pitty otherwise lol.
StrongBlackVine
Banned
Yeah I know people that never bought console before the Wii and never will again. It's appeal to non-gamers is a fact and not offensive in any way. Ellen didn't promote Xbox or Playstation.
Plinko
Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
This is the most ridiculous thing I've seen all day. This is just like the Fox News "Bush economic recovery" stuff.
http://www.wp7connect.com/2011/12/0...o-crazy-for-xbox-kinect-laptop-and-htc-radar/
http://www.ellentv.com/2011/12/09/see-all-of-ellens-12-days-of-giveaways-prizes-from-day-7/
She's apparently also given away Wii U w/ MK8. PS4 and XB1 will probably be given away sometime in the next few years, too, based on her track record.
Also, there were people who bought a NES who never bought another console. And there there people who bought a SNES or Genesis who never bought another console. And there were people who bought a PS1 or N64 (and maybe even Saturn) who never bought another console. And ...
etc., etc.
Maybe there was more churn than usual with Wii with the rise of mobile during that gen giving a different path for them to take than to go with another console, but there's always churn. There will be someone who owns an XB1 this gen, and it'll be the only console they ever own. Maybe console gaming just won't click with them. There are many different people out there.
How is it that so many years later people still don't accept it, month after month.
Everyone else is doing well? How well?
Refreshment.01
Member
We should be fair here. Publishers used a low investment - high profits model with the Wii and used that revenue to fund research and development of other platforms. Generating lots of bombs and some big success stories. While generating the perception in a part of the user base that motion gaming "suck" because the low quality of said proyects.
It's a shame what's happening here and as always when this subject is discussed. People make false claims about software performance on the Wii platform, they get shown otherwise just to persist ignoring the facts and continuing with the same old agenda.
Enter a discussion to reach the truth not personal satisfaction.
Absolutely, I think that this misconception comes from the fact that the Wii was not getting the same games as the PS3/360. Third parties were making money from the wii, just not on the same type of games. I think to this day Wii still sells a boatload of Just dance for example. Enough to sell more games on the original Wii than on XB1 unil very, very recently (~2-3 months ago). This is the sales of all ubisoft games by platform.
http://www.statista.com/statistics/269679/breakdown-of-ubisoft-sales-by-platform/
KillerMan91
Member
Well some of the japanese publishers are in quite dire state (Like Konami who has become MGS&Pro evolution soccer factory) but the big four of the west are doing better than they were at the start of the last gen (EA for example was losing huge amounts of money during late PS2 - early Wii era). Of course part of the reason is that we have reached pretty much oligopolistic market in the west . EA, Ubi, Activision and Take-Two have pretty much the whole market in theirs hands (outside of first parties) and no one has money to threaten their status.
I'd say Warner Bros is becoming a big player too nowadays.
KillerMan91
Member
Oh. Completely forgot about Warner. ZeniMax is the other one that survived last gen and still releases big titles.
The big four became the big four because they were good at serving the Sony/MS audience. That they've carried on being successful doing what they were good at isn't too surprising. They've done the right thing in terms of being loyal to their core audience. Other publishers haven't done so well though, and there have been many development studios shut down. Even the big four have closed down many studios.
ZSaberLink
Media Create Maven
Thanks for the info Smoker! Very interesting to see.
ninjablade
Banned
exactly people can't seem to understand this, to put it in perspective kinect sold 24 million units, more then the wiiu ever will, thats how big the fad is, silly motion control device like kinect out sold a mainline Nintendo console with all of it's great franchises. unless you want the industry to turn into mostly low quality shovel-ware and not get proper hardware upgrade every 5-7 years, we should be happy the wii/kinect fad is dead.
Calamari41
41 > 38
Gen 7 total console install base in USA as of end of 2014: 110.6m
Pretty crazy, it took the Wii 3 years to sell in the US what the PS3 has sold LTD in the region. No wonder Sony fans go apoplectic with "bu-bu-but soccer moms!" nonsense any time the Wii is mentioned.
MrNyarlathotep
Banned
Kinect had a $500 million marketing budget.
To put that into perspective, they could have just given every single person who ever bought a kinect a $20 bill with it, and still have cash left over.
Do you mean they decided to make average games on huge budgets for the PS360 instead, and that led to studios being closed down?
There are lots of reasons that there are less AAA games being released, but I'm not sure the Wii is at fault- it famously had little support from the studios you are lamenting the loss of. How was rising development costs in the AAA space the fault of the Wii?
ZSaberLink
Media Create Maven
The money made from Wii games is actually what probably helped a lot of these studios stay afloat. Didn't Carnival Games fund a bunch of Take-Two's projects?
Good thing shovelware didn't exist on other platforms </sarcasm>
Why should we be happy that the traditional industry may have lost a good portion of the market? You realize that that last generation and now mobile were huge in making gaming a far more prevalent and acceptable hobby? It's also really likely that folks who played on the Wii are now buying the PS4/XB1? Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's bad. We've had this discussion before. The reason the Wii ended up with a lot of the lower budget software that it did really comes down to third parties being completely unprepared for the success of the Wii. However, there was an audience chomping at the bit for games. Sure, there were Carnival Games and other titles like that, but early on things like RE4: Wii, Umbrella Chronicles, Red Steel, etc. did decently well. Eventually however, the planned big projects released for PS3/360, and that more core audience started moving towards the HD twins. Anyways, moving on...
pixelation
Member
And rightfully so IMHO.
Welfare
Member
Maybe if the 360 actually got a price drop a while ago, it would be so much closer to the PS2.
We should all be happy that our industry is smaller, less accepting and more insular! Especially when they need to monetize us more to try to make up for the lost revenue
Psycho_Mantis
Banned
There's like a 10 million gap between them isn't there?
Welfare
Member
More like 4 million. The entirety of NA I have no idea but PS2 was over 50 million.
~4 million.
Just to add some perspective of how well the PS2 actually sold, here is how the PS2 sold before the PS3 came out, and after the PS3 came out:
Oct 2000-Nov 2006 - ~30m
Nov 2006-Dec 2012- ~16m+
So as you can see, the PS2 sold 65% of its total LTD before the PS3 came out and 35% after. Where as the Xbox 360 is on track to only have sold around 85-90% of it's total before the Xbox One came out. Shows you how much Xbox 360 sales dropped. For example, the 12 months of PS2 sales after PS3 launch was more than double the amount of Xbox 360 sales after Xbox One launch.
zero shift
Banned
Am I the only one who actually misses motion controls? So many good gameplay ideas/enhancements were born because of it. Not to mention the pointer and two hand set up.
"Waggle to pay respects"
EdReedFan20
Member
A little off topic, but do we know where 360 and PS3 are LTD worldwide? The only two places I've seen numbers are not reliable (at all) for this sort of stuff. Wikipedia says 84 million for 360 and >82.7 million for PS3. Chartz says 85.3 million for PS3 and 84.6 million for 360. I've said this before, but (if Chartz is closer to being right) I think there's a chance when this generation is over, of the top five selling home consoles, four of them could be PlayStations. To me that's nuts considering PlayStation would possibly not exist if Nintendo hadn't switched partners at that fateful CES oh so many years ago.
As of March 31st 2014 the Xbox 360 sold 83.7 million units worldwide with total sell in exceeding 84 million by June. I would estimate that the Xbox 360 has now exceeded 87 million units worldwide and will exceed 90 million in 2016.
The Sony PS3 exceeded 80 million units worldwide before the end of 2013 and whilst we don't have an official LTD number from them recently I'd estimate that total sell in has exceeded 87 million worldwide.
I expect neither the PS3 or Xbox 360 to exceed 100 million, nor do I expect them to cross 95 million.
EdReedFan20
Member
Yeah, no way that happens, unless they drop the prices to sub-$100. Maybe not even then. As of right now, even with the current numbers, one of those consoles is at 5th place among the top 5 selling home consoles. I think PS4 will end up selling better than either of them.
Once the US well has dried up for the 360 I expect the PS3 to take the lead between the two (if it hasn't already). It's just a matter of when. December NPD was still pretty strong for 360, so whatever Sony could sell in excess in their renowned rest of the world countries the US (and UK) nullified that. If that is no longer the case the PS3 should sell more because Sony is active in much more countries than MS and Nintendo. That's the reason how PS1, PS2 and even PSP had those "mystery" sales even though they were no longer relevant in the big three regions (Japan, Europe and NA).
theprodigy
Member
Amazon.com, PS4 v.s. One v.s. Wii U (+3DS)
As of March 16th, 22:15 GMT
Final Fantasy Type-0 HD
PS4 ($59.96) - 3rd
One ($59.96) - 65th
Bloodborne | Standard ($59.96) - 5th | Collectors (not available anymore?) - 295th
PS4 ($393.91) - 7th
Mario Party 10 | Standard ($49) - 8th | amiibo bundle ($59.96) - 13th
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 3D ($39.96) - 9th
Battlefield Hardline
PS4 | Standard ($59.96) - 132h | Deluxe ($69.96) - 21st
One | Deluxe ($69.96) - 17th | Standard ($59.96) - 24th
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate ($39.96) - 14th
One AC bundle ($347; sold by third party and fulfilled by Amazon.com) - 20th
Grand Theft Auto V
PS4 ($52.88) - 26th
One ($51.48) - 28th
Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS ($37.11) - 29th
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U ($50.43) - 30th
Halo: The Master Chief Collection ($36.98; sold by third party and fulfilled by Amazon.com) - 36th
Call of Duty: Advance Warfare
One ($36.80) - 37th
PS4 ($39.37) - 41st
Pokémon
Omega Ruby ($32.93) - 38th
Alpha Sapphire ($34.33) - 58th
MLB15 The Show | 10th Anniversary ($69.99) - 55th | Standard ($59.96) - 89th
Wii U Super Mario Deluxe Set ($300; sold by third party and fulfilled by Amazon.com) - 61st
NBA 2K15
One ($35) - 63rd
PS4 ($35) - 76th
Mario Kart 8 ($58.30) - 67th
Kirby and the Rainbow Curse ($39.96) - 71st
Dragon Age Inquisition
PS4 ($39.99) - 76th
One ($39.99) - 174th
Dying Light
PS4 ($49.90) - 78th
One ($49.99) - 111st
Borderlands: The Handsome Collection
PS4 ($59.96) - 81st
One ($59.96) - 100th
Destiny
One ($38.96) - 95th
PS4 ($39.99) - 121st
Other recent / upcoming releases
Devil May Cry Definitive Edition
PS4 ($38.38) - 137th
One ($38.38) - 618th
Resident Evil: Revelations 2
PS4 ($39.96) - 166th
One ($39.96) - 598th
GUNSHOT FADE TO BLACK?!? 1886 ($38.89; only 2 left in stock; sold by third party) - 199th
Fossil Fighters Frontier ($29.99) - 227th
Dragon Ball: Ghost Nappa
PS4 ($59.99; temporarly out of stock) - 268th
One ($59.99) - 372nd
Codename B.O.M.B.A. - Bombing On the Market a Bit like Advance wars ($37.34) - 299th
Evolve
PS4 ($49.99) - 388th
One ($49.99) - 409th
Possible indicators of New Nintendo 3DS's performance for Amazon.com?
Nintendo 3DS/3DS XL AC Adaptor ($9.99) - 27th
HORI Screen Protective Filter for New 3DS XL ($8.99) - 49th
Xenoblade Chronicles 3D ($39.99) - 82nd
Note: This is the hourly chart, the one changing every hour of every day, not the one relative to the whole past week / month / year. While weekly / monthly charts allow us to see how things have been up to now, hourly charts could help us in seeing what could be the incoming sales trends. But Amazon.com charts still need to be filtered and rightfully weigthed, you can't take literally everything they say as the exact truth
As of March 16th, 22:15 GMT
Final Fantasy Type-0 HD
PS4 ($59.96) - 3rd
One ($59.96) - 65th
Bloodborne | Standard ($59.96) - 5th | Collectors (not available anymore?) - 295th
PS4 ($393.91) - 7th
Mario Party 10 | Standard ($49) - 8th | amiibo bundle ($59.96) - 13th
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 3D ($39.96) - 9th
Battlefield Hardline
PS4 | Standard ($59.96) - 132h | Deluxe ($69.96) - 21st
One | Deluxe ($69.96) - 17th | Standard ($59.96) - 24th
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate ($39.96) - 14th
One AC bundle ($347; sold by third party and fulfilled by Amazon.com) - 20th
Grand Theft Auto V
PS4 ($52.88) - 26th
One ($51.48) - 28th
Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS ($37.11) - 29th
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U ($50.43) - 30th
Halo: The Master Chief Collection ($36.98; sold by third party and fulfilled by Amazon.com) - 36th
Call of Duty: Advance Warfare
One ($36.80) - 37th
PS4 ($39.37) - 41st
Pokémon
Omega Ruby ($32.93) - 38th
Alpha Sapphire ($34.33) - 58th
MLB15 The Show | 10th Anniversary ($69.99) - 55th | Standard ($59.96) - 89th
Wii U Super Mario Deluxe Set ($300; sold by third party and fulfilled by Amazon.com) - 61st
NBA 2K15
One ($35) - 63rd
PS4 ($35) - 76th
Mario Kart 8 ($58.30) - 67th
Kirby and the Rainbow Curse ($39.96) - 71st
Dragon Age Inquisition
PS4 ($39.99) - 76th
One ($39.99) - 174th
Dying Light
PS4 ($49.90) - 78th
One ($49.99) - 111st
Borderlands: The Handsome Collection
PS4 ($59.96) - 81st
One ($59.96) - 100th
Destiny
One ($38.96) - 95th
PS4 ($39.99) - 121st
Other recent / upcoming releases
Devil May Cry Definitive Edition
PS4 ($38.38) - 137th
One ($38.38) - 618th
Resident Evil: Revelations 2
PS4 ($39.96) - 166th
One ($39.96) - 598th
GUNSHOT FADE TO BLACK?!? 1886 ($38.89; only 2 left in stock; sold by third party) - 199th
Fossil Fighters Frontier ($29.99) - 227th
Dragon Ball: Ghost Nappa
PS4 ($59.99; temporarly out of stock) - 268th
One ($59.99) - 372nd
Codename B.O.M.B.A. - Bombing On the Market a Bit like Advance wars ($37.34) - 299th
Evolve
PS4 ($49.99) - 388th
One ($49.99) - 409th
Possible indicators of New Nintendo 3DS's performance for Amazon.com?
Nintendo 3DS/3DS XL AC Adaptor ($9.99) - 27th
HORI Screen Protective Filter for New 3DS XL ($8.99) - 49th
Xenoblade Chronicles 3D ($39.99) - 82nd
Note: This is the hourly chart, the one changing every hour of every day, not the one relative to the whole past week / month / year. While weekly / monthly charts allow us to see how things have been up to now, hourly charts could help us in seeing what could be the incoming sales trends. But Amazon.com charts still need to be filtered and rightfully weigthed, you can't take literally everything they say as the exact truth
Dragonborn
Member
Why did the X1 drop so much in the hourlies?
It's an amazon chart by the hour. Hardly worth considering or using the data.
Welfare
Member
Monthly sales shows Xbox One is pretty close to the PS4.
PS4 - #7
XB1 - #9
2014 was
PS4 - #1
XB1 (Titanfall bundle) - #11
XB1 + Kinect - #76
Just on the whole Wii/console growth/casuals/etc topic (note, the entirety of the below refers to the console industry only).
There's two ways to achieve growth in a business:
- Grow the number of people who participate in the market.
- Grow the amount of money the people already in the market are willing to spend.
Now, even without any sort of analysis it's easy to see how those two approaches have played out in the video game market over the past decade.
Late gen PS2, the Wii and late gen 360 all tried growing the number of people who would be interested in video games. On the PS2 you had EyeToy, Singstar, Guitar Hero, etc - these were titles which went outside the usual video game demographic of males aged 7-35 (obviously there's two separate demographics there, but I'm grouping them together). Even earlier on the PC you had a game like the Sims.
Sony, in their infinite wisdom, completely ignored that entire market segment which was really responsible for the growth the PS2 saw coming off the back of the PS1. They turned to the second strategy and said "We'll get the traditional video game market to spend $600 on our console, it will be great!" Obviously it turned out to be a huge financial disaster which nearly killed their business, but due to some good work in the second half of the generation they were able to rebuild their brand to the degree where they could launch the successful PS4 (take note, Nintendo!).
So while Sony and Microsoft were off trying to squeeze more money out of the traditional market, Nintendo comes in with the Wii and actually tries to grow it in terms of people. And it was wildly successful. They pick up their traditional fans, the late gen PS2 crowd that I mentioned earlier, and thanks to their unique interface, an entirely new crowd. That goes great for four years until they basically stop supporting the console with new ideas/content and instead just try and repeat what made it successful in the first place. More Wii Sports, more Wii Fit, more party games! It was clear at this point Nintendo had either run out of ideas. It becomes stale and, no longer being serviced, the crowd leaves to Kinect/mobile/tablet gaming which can offer them what they're looking for.
So Nintendo shift gears and tries to sell HD games at a higher price to their traditional audience with the Wii U. They throw a bone to the Wii audience with the touch screen but it's clearly not what anyone is interested in (as an aside, I love off-screen play, so it worked out fine for me). It's the biggest disaster the company has had since the Virtual Boy and it's still to be seen if they can recover.
Anyway, I'm rambling a bit, but my point is that we've now got the three console makers, plus the major western publishers, all following the exact same template for growth: get the traditional market to pay more. You can see it in the increase of paid subscription services, DLC, pre-order bonuses, etc. As an illustration - if you need to make $100 on a product to make a profit. The console industry isn't saying "Okay, no matter what I've got this one over here who will buy it for $50. How can I get someone else to buy it for $50?" They're saying, "How can I get this one guy over here to give me $100?"
Long term it's a very risky strategy. The traditional market has the highest standards in terms of production values. Your costs have to rise every year to continue to stay on the same level as your competition. And if you can't compete, you drop out. So things get more and more concentrated at the top of the market. Everyone else gets squeezed out, because how can I get one guy to pay $100 when I can't put in anywhere near the investment the other company can? And when the point of difference between games becomes largely based on production values (who can create the biggest world, who can make the most sophisticated online service, who can produce the most 'content', who can spend the most on marketing, etc), how can anyone else compete? So you see how it goes. Costs increase -> price increase (and clearly this is being presented in the form of DLC, subscriptions, etc) -> standards increase -> costs increase -> prices increase -> standards increase, and on and on.
This is basically what's happening at the moment. It started last generation, but you had Nintendo actively working at trying to grow the market in terms of people. Microsoft sorta tried to do something this gen with their whole 'entertainment integration' thing, but it failed and they've reverted to type.
There's two ways to achieve growth in a business:
- Grow the number of people who participate in the market.
- Grow the amount of money the people already in the market are willing to spend.
Now, even without any sort of analysis it's easy to see how those two approaches have played out in the video game market over the past decade.
Late gen PS2, the Wii and late gen 360 all tried growing the number of people who would be interested in video games. On the PS2 you had EyeToy, Singstar, Guitar Hero, etc - these were titles which went outside the usual video game demographic of males aged 7-35 (obviously there's two separate demographics there, but I'm grouping them together). Even earlier on the PC you had a game like the Sims.
Sony, in their infinite wisdom, completely ignored that entire market segment which was really responsible for the growth the PS2 saw coming off the back of the PS1. They turned to the second strategy and said "We'll get the traditional video game market to spend $600 on our console, it will be great!" Obviously it turned out to be a huge financial disaster which nearly killed their business, but due to some good work in the second half of the generation they were able to rebuild their brand to the degree where they could launch the successful PS4 (take note, Nintendo!).
So while Sony and Microsoft were off trying to squeeze more money out of the traditional market, Nintendo comes in with the Wii and actually tries to grow it in terms of people. And it was wildly successful. They pick up their traditional fans, the late gen PS2 crowd that I mentioned earlier, and thanks to their unique interface, an entirely new crowd. That goes great for four years until they basically stop supporting the console with new ideas/content and instead just try and repeat what made it successful in the first place. More Wii Sports, more Wii Fit, more party games! It was clear at this point Nintendo had either run out of ideas. It becomes stale and, no longer being serviced, the crowd leaves to Kinect/mobile/tablet gaming which can offer them what they're looking for.
So Nintendo shift gears and tries to sell HD games at a higher price to their traditional audience with the Wii U. They throw a bone to the Wii audience with the touch screen but it's clearly not what anyone is interested in (as an aside, I love off-screen play, so it worked out fine for me). It's the biggest disaster the company has had since the Virtual Boy and it's still to be seen if they can recover.
Anyway, I'm rambling a bit, but my point is that we've now got the three console makers, plus the major western publishers, all following the exact same template for growth: get the traditional market to pay more. You can see it in the increase of paid subscription services, DLC, pre-order bonuses, etc. As an illustration - if you need to make $100 on a product to make a profit. The console industry isn't saying "Okay, no matter what I've got this one over here who will buy it for $50. How can I get someone else to buy it for $50?" They're saying, "How can I get this one guy over here to give me $100?"
Long term it's a very risky strategy. The traditional market has the highest standards in terms of production values. Your costs have to rise every year to continue to stay on the same level as your competition. And if you can't compete, you drop out. So things get more and more concentrated at the top of the market. Everyone else gets squeezed out, because how can I get one guy to pay $100 when I can't put in anywhere near the investment the other company can? And when the point of difference between games becomes largely based on production values (who can create the biggest world, who can make the most sophisticated online service, who can produce the most 'content', who can spend the most on marketing, etc), how can anyone else compete? So you see how it goes. Costs increase -> price increase (and clearly this is being presented in the form of DLC, subscriptions, etc) -> standards increase -> costs increase -> prices increase -> standards increase, and on and on.
This is basically what's happening at the moment. It started last generation, but you had Nintendo actively working at trying to grow the market in terms of people. Microsoft sorta tried to do something this gen with their whole 'entertainment integration' thing, but it failed and they've reverted to type.
AstuteClass
Banned
Well let's be fair, the X1 is now:
1) - $150 cheaper
2) - Cheaper than PS4 from more expensive
Nobody would have pegged the PS4 outselling it in under these conditions. Not in NA anyway.
Oh and it's only fell on the hourly best sellers to 20+ for the past 48 hours. If it continues, that monthly chart will have the X1 slipping down it, too.
Does anybody feel like we are seeing the beginning of the snowball event for PS4? Whereby due to the growing gap, its ubiquity will push prospective next gen adopters towards "what everyone else has"?
It feels that way because it's looking like a $50 cheaper X1 isn't cutting it now and it needs to be $100 cheaper, which I don't think even MS can drop to, especially given the inevitable PS4 price drop this year.
There's not that big of a split in the US for the PS4 (and XB1 obviously) to be viewed in the same "what everyone else has" way that the 360 was over the PS3 last gen (at least not anytime soon).
It doesn't need to be $100 cheaper right now. Again, why should more people get an XB1 over the PS4 right now when the latter is getting bigger (exclusive) games?
Why should MS lose money during lower console selling months that they could probably make up during the Fall (with some of those sales possibly coming from special edition SKUs that are higher than the Xbox One's price now)?
It would be a bigger problem if the PS4 was outselling the Xbox One by 150K+ during these early months of the year but its not.
Phoenician_Viking
Banned
Not once have i said that third party games did not sell on the Wii. I said the majority of the Wii audience that moved on from the Wii had little to no effect on today´s third party publishers bottom line, which is true. Especially when these third parties main audience are core gamers.