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[Welfare]

Out of curiosity, how does that compare to first NPD Titanfall and Destiny Xbox One sales?

Titanfall did 1.1m back in March of 2014, with the bundle selling 218k units. Standalone sales were ~880k.

Destiny did <945k, but this was helped by a week long deal where you could pick a free game if you bought an Xbox One.

Without bundles, Destiny (4 weeks) > Titanfall (4 weeks) > Halo 5 (1 week)

 

[Conflict NZ]

Is there a list of all leaks/calculations so far. It's a shame OP doesn't get updated with these.

 

[orochi91]

Black Friday is several hours away.

When do we typically get PR/info about who sold the most tomorrow?

 

[nib95]

Titanfall did 1.1m back in March of 2014, with the bundle selling 218k units. Standalone sales were ~880k.

Destiny did <945k, but this was helped by a week long deal where you could pick a free game if you bought an Xbox One.

Without bundles, Destiny (4 weeks) > Titanfall (4 weeks) > Halo 5 (1 week)

Interesting, so both roughly the same as Halo 5. Titanfall doing a little better actually, and with a smaller install base at that.

I think more than ever, it illustrates the fact that a big title doesn't have to be released in Fall to do the big numbers. Titanfall, a new IP, sold better in March of all months, than Halo 5 did in Fall, over a year later.

 

[Chuckwagon]

That sucks because Tomb Raider is a damn good game.

 

[Nightengale]

Dropping the ball?

My question would be "a conscious decision" or "incompetence"?

 

[Kagari]

My question would be "a conscious decision" or "incompetence"?

Can it be both? I honestly don't know what they were thinking.
Well, I know they thought the XB1 would be doing better than it is...

 

[Boke1879]

Black Friday is several hours away.

When do we typically get PR/info about who sold the most tomorrow?

Technically BF has already started. I also doubt we'll get info tomorrow. the $299 Sony bundle is all weekend. It''ll be interesting to see how everything plays out. I would say we'll get PR or reports from tracking entities sometime next week.

 

[Mister Megative]

Another Best Buy and PS4s are pretty much flying off the shelves. XB1's not doing so bad either.

And no one is touching the Tomb Raider stack. It's in pristine condition.

And no Diablo 3 either dammit.

I just bought the TR bundle from Best Buy

 

[Welfare]

Interesting, so both roughly the same as Halo 5. Titanfall doing a little better actually, and with a smaller install base at that.

I think more than ever, it illustrates the fact that a big title doesn't have to be released in Fall to do the big numbers. Titanfall, a new IP, sold better in March of all months, than Halo 5 did in Fall, over a year later.

Attach ratio at time of release.

Titanfall - 35% [2.53m Xbox Ones]
Destiny - 27% [3.49m Xbox Ones]
Halo 5 - 10% [8.46m Xbox Ones]

Technically BF has already started. I also doubt we'll get info tomorrow. the $299 Sony bundle is all weekend. It''ll be interesting to see how everything plays out. I would say we'll get PR or reports from tracking entities sometime next week.

If there is any PR, it'll be after Cyber Monday, so probably Wednesday at the latest.

 

[ULTROS!]

Can it be both? I honestly don't know what they were thinking.
Well, I know they thought the XB1 would be doing better than it is...

Well, that's what they thought until the release Type-0 HD, after that all their games became PlayStation exclusive.

I wouldn't be surprised if the XB1 version of FFXV and KHIII was shoddy or even cancelled.

 

[nib95]

Attach ratio at time of release.

Titanfall - 35% [2.53m Xbox Ones]
Destiny - 27% [3.49m Xbox Ones]
Halo 5 - 10% [8.46m Xbox Ones]

Interesting. Appreciate the follow up posts. I wonder what Microsoft's internal reviews are telling them are the reasons for not only the decline in franchise sales, but the lower than expected numbers in general?

 

[Nightengale]

Can it be both? I honestly don't know what they were thinking.
Well, I know they thought the XB1 would be doing better than it is...

I mean from MS's end.

Last year I would've guessed TR to get the lavish love that AssCreed got aka cheap bundle option, and if that happened, I can at least rationalise why they even signed this deal.

Almost feels like after seeing how poor the preorders are for TR, MS fears that putting their eggs into TR as their volume champion would be a mistake and instead broadened it up with Gears and Fallout.

Their current situation cuts Square off from being subsidised in large volumes since it's not the volume driving bundle.

 

[Three]

Guys $500 is a lot. MS totally priced their Halo bundle out of relevance thinking they could ride the brand through a wave of profitability. Clearly it didn't work that way.

That said, no doubt in my mind we will see Halo bundles drop price big time next year. I would not be surprised to see it become one their entry level bundles in order to clear stock similar to the drop we saw for the collectors edition of the game.

I'm not sure, it may have worked pretty well in terms of profit. It was very obvious they were going to price it high. It was a good short-term strategy for their bottom line. It was fully expected by Nightingale and even obvious to a fool like me they would price it high to maximise profit.

There is nothing to suggest it didn't work in terms of profit (it certainly did in revenue ) even if it didn't move the needle that much in install base.

 

[FranXico]

I wouldn't be surprised if the XB1 version of FFXV and KHIII was shoddy or even cancelled.

I doubt that. Development for XB1 still costs money and they would naturally like to recover at least some of their investment.

 

[Kagari]

I mean from MS's end.

Last year I would've guessed TR to get the lavish love that AssCreed got aka cheap bundle option, and if that happened, I can at least rationalise why they even signed this deal.

Almost feels like after seeing how poor the preorders are for TR, MS fears that putting their eggs into TR as their volume champion would be a mistake and instead broadened it up with Gears and Fallout.

Their current situation cuts Square off from being subsidised in large volumes since it's not the volume driving bundle.

All I know is the marketing situation soured after the timed exclusivity backlash and how that whole situation was handled.

 

[Elandyll]

Can it be both? I honestly don't know what they were thinking.
Well, I know they thought the XB1 would be doing better than it is...

Would you happen to have an idea of when the decision about this deal was made by CD/ S-E?

I just wonder, because pretty early in this gen it was already clear that at the very least on a WW basis the PS4 was going to dominate, which made the announcement even more jarring imo.

 

[FranXico]

All I know is the marketing situation soured after the timed exclusivity backlash and how that whole situation was handled.

What impact does look it like to you that this whole debacle will have on future partnerships between Square Enix and Microsoft, long term?

 

[StrongBlackVine]

All I know is the marketing situation soured after the timed exclusivity backlash and how that whole situation was handled.

Can you elaborate? How was the that supposed to be handled ideally?

 

[Welfare]

Interesting. Appreciate the follow up posts. I wonder what Microsoft's internal reviews are telling them are the reasons for not only the decline in franchise sales, but the lower than expected numbers in general?

Franchise fatigue, FPS consumers going over to PS, and probably potential buyers that heard about MCC and are waiting for good word of mouth would probably be the big ones.

I would say releasing next to other big franchises would be an issue and that Halo might have to be a September release for maximum exposure, but Halo 4 launched right beside Black Ops 2 and sold 3.2m units in November, so I don't know how much Halo 5's sales were affected because of its time of release. November NPD will be able to provide a clearer picture on that.

 

[Shoeless]

What impact does look like to you that this whole debacle will have on future business partnerships between Square Enix and Microsoft, long term?

I'm also pretty curious about how things are going to play out in the future. I don't know if we're at a burned bridge scenario, but I can't imagine Squenix is happy about getting thrown under the bus like this. It's probably unlikely that Microsoft will get exclusive deals like this going forward.

 

[Three]

Would you happen to have an idea of when the decision about this deal was made by CD/ S-E?

I just wonder, because pretty early in this gen it was already clear that at the very least on a WW basis the PS4 was going to dominate, which made the announcement even more jarring imo.

Must have been finalised between E3 and Gamescom I would think because the game went up for preorder on other platforms after the E3 reveal then was announced exclusive at gamescom.

 

[The God]

Well, that's what they thought until the release Type-0 HD, after that all their games became PlayStation exclusive.

I wouldn't be surprised if the XB1 version of FFXV and KHIII was shoddy or even cancelled.

Come on now.

 

[RexNovis]

I'm not sure, it may have worked pretty well in terms of profit. It was very obvious they were going to price it high. It was a good short-term strategy for their bottom line. It was fully expected by Nightingale and even obvious to a fool like me they would price it high to maximise profit.

There is nothing to suggest it didn't work in terms of profit (it certainly did in revenue ) even if it didn't move the needle that much in install base.

I doubt they were expecting sell less than 100k of them. Basically I was saying that it didn't work because the price handicapped it's sales instead of guaranteeing them the expected number of sales at a higher profitability. There no question the bundle is extremely profitable at that price pint but the opportunity cost in sales was likely much higher than they expected.

 

[Die Squirrel Die]

Would you happen to have an idea of when the decision about this deal was made by CD/ S-E?

I just wonder, because pretty early in this gen it was already clear that at the very least on a WW basis the PS4 was going to dominate, which made the announcement even more jarring imo.

I'd like to know where the various parties of Crystal Dynamics, SE west (formerly Eidos) and SE Japan stood in terms of making the deal happen (not that I'm suggesting that Kagari should know).

 

[Kagari]

Would you happen to have an idea of when the decision about this deal was made by CD/ S-E?

I just wonder, because pretty early in this gen it was already clear that at the very least on a WW basis the PS4 was going to dominate, which made the announcement even more jarring imo.

Well, last year there was still some doubt I guess.

Can you elaborate? How was the that supposed to be handled ideally?

Specifically the backpedaling, having to admit the timed exclusive situation, the pressure put on MS from the games press/public etc.

What impact does look it like to you that this whole debacle will have on future partnerships between Square Enix and Microsoft, long term?

I can't imagine it will happen again, at least this generation. And we've already seen a mountain of SE games announced for PS4 and not Xbox so there's that too.

 

[Game Guru]

I doubt that. Development for XB1 still costs money and they would naturally like to recover at least some of their investment.

Yeah, we shouldn't worry about FFXV and KH3 being cancelled for XB1, but if they end up doing as bad on XB1 as Type-0 HD and Rise of the Tomb Raider has on XB1, Square Enix might just cut their losses and focus on PS4 & PC for future games with an XB1 version only happening if the sales and porting costs justify it.

 

[Kagari]

Come on now.

Not canned but putting out subpar ports isn't beyond SE. Lest we forget the hot mess that was FF13 360.

 

[Mister Megative]

Well, that's what they thought until the release Type-0 HD, after that all their games became PlayStation exclusive.

I wouldn't be surprised if the XB1 version of FFXV and KHIII was shoddy or even cancelled.

Nah.

 

[Three]

I doubt they were expecting sell less than 100k of them. Basically I was saying that it didn't work because the price handicapped it's sales instead of guaranteeing them the expected number of sales at a higher profitability. There no question the bundle is extremely profitable at that price pint but the opportunity cost in sales was likely much higher than they expected.

I see, you are probably right. Can't imagine why they couldn't lower the price if it was not meeting expectations because of price alone though. Making $500 from something that could go for $300 is still pretty impressive even at 93k units. I imagine they were happy with its trajectory not to do it yet. That's much more than 4+ fewer games or yearly subscriptions you have to sell to those owners.

 

[ULTROS!]

Yeah, we shouldn't worry about FFXV and KH3 being cancelled for XB1, but if they end up doing as bad on XB1 as Type-0 HD and Rise of the Tomb Raider has on XB1, Square Enix might just cut their losses and focus on PS4 & PC for future games with an XB1 version only happening if the sales and porting costs justify it.

I think their future release are set in stone already:

Japanese games = PS4/PS3/Vita
Western games = PS4/XB1

FFXVI will probably be multiplat though, but I wouldn't count on it.

 

[Boke1879]

Well, that's what they thought until the release Type-0 HD, after that all their games became PlayStation exclusive.

I wouldn't be surprised if the XB1 version of FFXV and KHIII was shoddy or even cancelled.

The big guns. FFXV and Kingdom Hearts will be on XB1 at this point because they already committed to it. You know the games will sell a significant amount better on PS4.

Outside of that though. I don't see SE announcing many JRPGS for the Xbox. Like Kagari said. You can already see it now. And didn't Nomura say outright they want the Playstation to be the place to go for their RPG's?

 

[Shenmue]

Guys UC bundle was 349 halo was 499. Let's not compare them like for like.

 

[Guymelef]

I think their future release are set in stone already:

Japanese games = PS4/PS3/Vita
Western games = PS4/XB1

FFXVI will probably be multiplat though, but I wouldn't count on it.

FF XVI will be PS VR

Spoiler

3

exclusive.

 

[StrongBlackVine]

Specifically the backpedaling, having to admit the timed exclusive situation, the pressure put on MS from the games press/public etc.

So Microsoft basically sent the game to die because the media/public would not allow them to pretend it was a real exclusive? That seems awfully petty. It's not like SE or CD sabotaged that plan.

SE should be irate if that is true, but at the same time that was a risk they took. I said early on ROTR potentially failing doesn't mean anything to Microsoft, but it could have lingering consequences for the IP.

 

[Sydle]

Not canned but putting out subpar ports isn't beyond SE. Lest we forget the hot mess that was FF13 360.

Really? I played about 40 hours of it and it seemed fine to me beyond how fucking awful the design of the game is, but that's not the 360's fault.

I'll have to look up what was better about the PS3 version.

 

[sörine]

I think their future release are set in stone already:

Japanese games = PS4/PS3/Vita
Western games = PS4/XB1

FFXVI will probably be multiplat though, but I wouldn't count on it.

PS3/Vita are dropping off already. PS4/Steam seems like the more likely trajectory, plus maybe NX depending on exactly what it turns out to be.

PS4/One/Steam for the west is a lock though.

 

[Elios83]

Well, that's what they thought until the release Type-0 HD, after that all their games became PlayStation exclusive.

I wouldn't be surprised if the XB1 version of FFXV and KHIII was shoddy or even cancelled.

No reason to cancel them but it's likely XB1 versions won't get a lot of development time and there will be a significant technical disparity like seen in Episode Duscae and FFXIII.
Sony will also get the marketing deal and the exclusive bundles plus all the fanbase is on Playstation anyway.
Those games on Xbox will be a minor affair although they will probably be profitable enough to justify the development costs.

 

[Game Guru]

PS3/Vita are dropping off already. PS4/Steam seems like the more likely trajectory, plus maybe NX depending on exactly what it turns out to be.

PS4/One/Steam for the west is a lock though.

So long as the NX Handheld can use modern middleware engines with ease like Unity and Unreal Engine 4, PS4/NX/Steam for Japanese games is practically a lock once the NX actually releases. Japanese companies are going to want something for their domestic market where Nintendo handhelds reign supreme.

 

[CosmicQueso]

Right but I'm talking about the digital sales info Cosmic was hinting about

So this is still a thing.

Usually that data would have come Tuesday. Didn't happen.

 

[spatenfloot]

So this is still a thing.

Usually that data would have come Tuesday. Didn't happen.

Two years later is "quickly"?

 

[RexNovis]

So this is still a thing.

Usually that data would have come Tuesday. Didn't happen.

Whoa! Hell yea! That's fantastic news! So I take it this means it's coming soon then? That article was published ages ago.

 

[CosmicQueso]

Two years later is "quickly"?

NPD man, NPD.

Coming soon? No. Relies on pubs self reporting, which is problematic for lots of reasons. Lots of delays and restatements and missing titles.

Not everyone participates, so it's only partial to market.

 

[RexNovis]

NPD man, NPD.

Coming soon? No. Relies on pubs self reporting, which is problematic for lots of reasons. Lots of delays and restatements and missing titles.

So when do you think they are they going to start reporting them then? Cause that's like the major glaring flaw with NPD at the moment. If they can fix that then it answers a lot of questions we have every single month.

I wonder if they will group digital and physical together for the rankings it if they will report then separately. I also wonder if they will give us splits for physical:digital. The pessimist in me thinks they might just group it in with the overall software rankings which would effectively tell us nothing without insider info.

 

[ULTROS!]

So long as the NX Handheld can use modern middleware engines with ease like Unity and Unreal Engine 4, PS4/NX/Steam for Japanese games is practically a lock once the NX actually releases. Japanese companies are going to want something for their domestic market where Nintendo handhelds reign supreme.

Somehow, I really doubt NX will get a stream of releases from SE and many Japanese companies even if it's a handheld. Maybe a few ports at the start then it will wane down.

I don't want to be negative but it's starting to look like the Wii U all over again. Non-GAF people who I know don't really talk about it and don't even know what NX is.

 

[RexNovis]

Somehow, I really doubt NX will get a stream of releases from SE and many Japanese companies even if it's a handheld. Maybe a few ports at the start then it will wane down.

I don't want to be negative but it's starting to look like the Wii U all over again. Non-GAF people who I know don't really talk about it and don't even know what NX is.

Well of course they don't. I mean it hasn't even been announced officially yet. Most of Nintendo GAF is stuck in a state of perpetual delusion when it comes to anything Nintendo related so of curse they are going to take absolutely no info and run crazy with it. We really have no way of knowing anything either way until we have a clear picture of what NX actually is.

 

[Boke1879]

So Microsoft basically sent the game to die because the media/public would not allow them to pretend it was a real exclusive? That seems awfully petty. It's not like SE or CD sabotaged that plan.

SE should be irate if that is true, but at the same time that was a risk they took. I said early on ROTR potentially failing doesn't mean anything to Microsoft, but it could have lingering consequences for the IP.

I don't think that was the case at all really.

I still think at the time MS just needed a game to match up against Uncharted. When that shit failed I'm sure a lot of that hype got deflated. Then Fallout 4 happened. I still to this day don't know why they decided to launch the game alongside probably the biggest release of the year. And they had a bundle to boot?

At this point I think MS just wanted bundles for the holiday season. Thinking they'd get consumers so focused on those they'd just buy one.

 

[sörine]

Somehow, I really doubt NX will get a stream of releases from SE and many Japanese companies even if it's a handheld. Maybe a few ports at the start then it will wane down.

I don't want to be negative but it's starting to look like the Wii U all over again. Non-GAF people who I know don't really talk about it and don't even know what NX is.

I think it's too early to really say with any certainty in either direction for NX, but if it's a handheld (in some form) Japan will back it. And Square Enix has been at the forefront of NX interest talking about potential DQX, DQXI and FFXIV ports. This doesn't really feel like Wii U at all, it's more like 3DS.

 

[Boke1879]

Somehow, I really doubt NX will get a stream of releases from SE and many Japanese companies even if it's a handheld. Maybe a few ports at the start then it will wane down.

I don't want to be negative but it's starting to look like the Wii U all over again. Non-GAF people who I know don't really talk about it and don't even know what NX is.

I agree. The NX will need to get 3rd party support if it wants to be even mentioned alongside the PS4 or Xbox1. If not it's just business as usual. Early support from Japanese devs that just wane over time as the system fails to pick up interest.

 

[Cornbread78]

PS4 vs. XB1 sales are dead even tonight here so far.