anexanhume
Member
Don't discount Last of Us Remastered. I know several people personally who didn't get a PS3 and are foaming at the mouth for it.
I've been wondering about that myself. For most of April, $450 would get you an XBone ($400), Kinect ($100), and your choice of their two biggest games. For a while, Target was even throwing in a year of Gold. Despite all of that, they only sold 115K in their strongest market. If you wanted any of those extras, the bundle was the better offer than the new SKU, but no one was biting. So who is it that wants to pay $400 for an XBone, but doesn't want Kinect or Titanfall or Gold, much less all three of them?I certainly agree we have yet to see enough to truly start predicting how the future will go for the overall console market [maybe the contraction will be larger than simply Wii -> Wii U] but I still cannot fathom how in this day and age anyone can claim the PS4 being a dominant console is going to somehow create a monopoly scenario when PC gaming is as strong or stronger than ever and a new sector, mobile gaming is literally killing off dedicated portable consoles with how powerful a market force it has. It's strange to think that somehow if the XB1 and Wii U were pulled tomorrow the PS4 would somehow have a monopoly of any sort on gaming when there is such strong competition from an old sector and fierce competition from a brand new one.
As an aside and perhaps more to your point, I fully expect the PS4 to have some poor months in summer namely June and July [May should be ok with the Show and Watch Dogs] as there simply is not enough releases. No idea how the XB1 baseline goes since it gets a new cheaper SKU. Wii U will do well in May and June relatively due to MK8 but don't see much past that.
I think this Fall though has strong lineups for PS4 and XB1 so next-gen adoption should pick up massively although not Wii massively
I've been wondering about that myself. For most of April, $450 would get you an XBone ($400), Kinect ($100), and your choice of their two biggest games. For a while, Target was even throwing in a year of Gold. Despite all of that, they only sold 115K in their strongest market.
Kind of interesting that we still have no PS4 sales numbers yet..
I've been wondering about that myself. For most of April, $450 would get you an XBone ($400), Kinect ($100), and your choice of their two biggest games. For a while, Target was even throwing in a year of Gold. Despite all of that, they only sold 115K in their strongest market.
If you wanted any of those extras, the bundle was the better offer than the new SKU, but no one was biting. So who is it that wants to pay $400 for an XBone, but doesn't want Kinect or Titanfall or Gold, much less all three of them?
I just don't see how the disKinected SKU really increases the appeal of the platform over their slow-selling April offer. They're losing the voice commands and TV integration, leaving them no advantages at all over the equally-priced-but-still-more-powerful PS4. It seems like they need to rely on their first parties to overcome the power stigma, and I'm not sure if they're really up to that. Halo, Gears, and probably Quantum Break are probably not coming this year, so what's going to sell XBones in the mean time?
I wouldn't say it has the same impact, but I would think demand would prevent prices from rising to unreasonable levels, kinda by definition. Even if PS4 was the only game in town, I don't think they would've sold 7M of them at $700, for example. People aren't going to buy your product if they don't see value in it, regardless of competition. At Walmart, I saw this funnel-with-clips thing for consolidating shampoo bottles and stuff. I thought it was a cool idea, but I didn't buy it, because I didn't think it was worth $4. I didn't look at it and say, "Well, I don't see a $2 one, so I guess I'm now forced to buy this $4 one. :'("
WRT exceptions, I was mostly referring to the things you really can't live without, like the water company and stuff like that. We may feel like we "need" video games, but we really don't.
For all the conversation here about consumer rights, one would think it understood that an intense competitive market is what will ensure them more than any single other thing.
Developers win because we don't have to spend time writing 3 different fucking engines. More time is focused on the actual gameplay.
Consumers win because they don't have to split exclusive DLC to choose between platforms.
Publishers win because they don't have to the same old song and dance with as many 1st-parties.
Xbox:
1st November - 712K
1st December - 691K
1st January - 127K
1st February - 139K
1st March - 135K
1st April - 78K
SNIP
Xbox One:
1st November - 909K
1st December - 908K
1st January - 141K
1st February - 258K
1st March - 311K
1st April - 115K
Except that she's comparing it to the original Xbox in that post, not the 360. People are complaining about Sony having no competition (basically about as much, or less, than the PS2 era), but the XB1 is clearly selling better than the original Xbox. Now the Wii U - Gamecube comparisons, on the other hand...
So your conclusion is that in economics, elasticity of demand has the same impact on pricing as competition, and that competition is not necessary or productive in any way, unless the product happens to be an "exception", of which there are few?
The former point is that demand (price sensitivities) would keep prices down. This is incorrect. A platform holder wants to maximize profit. If, due to the lack of competition, a platform holder could sell fewer units at a higher price, they would gladly do so. They would retain the monopoly position and make far more in profit whether they sold 7 million units or fewer.
Now, in a monopoly situation, let's say the platform holder raises the console price $100, meaning about $75 is pure profit after retail margin. Now they're making $125 per Console
Ouch, Xbone already dipping lower than Xbox OG?
And people laughed at me when I said it would only manage similar sales overall.
Lordt I should learn to read, I thought Xbone was 71k. My bad.I fail to see how you came to this conclusion, considering every month so far has been higher (May might not be, but we're not there yet).
Thank you. It appears that XB1 is doing better than the original Xbox did at the same point in time. It is concerning, but it does mean that XB1 will surpass the 24 million that the original Xbox sold if trends continue like it has. While one might say Titanfall boosted the XB1 in sales, also note that Halo 1 was a launch title for the original Xbox, which makes the two systems comparable.
Yeah, the bigger worry should be if MS decides to pull out because of the relative failure of the XB1. MS has enough money to continue being in the console race but may choose not to because their hopes and dreams of being the one set-top box are dashed. In addition, people should be worried about Sony and Nintendo's current financial situation, seeing as they aren't doing well in terms of finances.
So is 199k for PS4 really bad for a console in it's first April ?.
Really bad wouldn't be accurate especially as we've never had a launch with so much supply ready at the start
I would qualify PS4's numbers as decent considering comparisons made thus far in this thread
It's around 50k less than PS2's first April. More than double PS3s first April and I think comparable to 360's first April? I can't remember all the numbers
Target starting throwing in the year of Gold on April 6th, which was the first day of the reporting period, which itself was only four weeks. I don't know when the bundle went back up to $500, but apparently Target were still including the year of Gold for a while after it did.From what I saw deals lasted the first week of April at best and after that it was $499 everywhere again.
Sure, but the point was their sales weren't that great even at the $450 entry point. Now you're saving another $50, but losing another $160-$220 worth of stuff in the process. I'm not sure how many people will see that as increased value, especially when for the same price you can get the more powerful PS4, which also has the cheaper online service.A true pricedrop of $100 is always more worthwhile sales-wise than an equivalent bundle would be. Now of course kinect + TF is worth more than $100 [at least in March before the TF XB1 SKU likely becomes cheap used] but you still have to contend with the $499 barrier that's in play.
I got to much the same conclusion, but took a slightly different route. Sure, there are people out there who love XBox and hate Kinect, and I think we'll see a bump from those holdouts in July and maybe even a little in to June. But once that niche is filled, I'm not seeing how they've significantly increased the appeal of the platform. I think PS4 is becoming the default choice in Gen8, meaning you need a compelling reason to go against the grain and choose something else. IOW, you gotta love Halo so much you're willing to accept reduced performance in all of your other games, and not being able to play and trade games with your friends, who all got PS4s like everyone else did. I think that's a pretty tough sell, especially if Halo and Gears aren't coming until next year.Personally I am fairly confident the XB1 kinectless SKU will have a better effect than the TF/Kinect bundles at even $450 for the long haul if only because MS will be advertising the thing from high heaven. Everyone will know you can just go out and buy an XB1 for $400. I could see XB1 winning June as they have likely successfully pushed some of their May sales into June for anyone that doesn't want a Kinect. After that though I think it will simply represent an incremental bump up of their baseline [i.e. I expect the baseline for the monthly gap between the PS4 and XB1 to decrease somewhat after June but the PS4 still to lead at least to the holidays]
That's not exactly the point I was making. Rather, I expect that most people making video games would prefer finding a palatable price point for their products rather than finding another line of work.I'm seeing you make 2 different points.
The latter point is that since video games aren't a "need" it would be okay if a monopoly existed. Okay. In the grand scheme of life, the universe and everything, video games are a luxury product and if they went away the world would keep spinning. I concede this point.
Blah blah blah. I too can present a bunch of ass-sourced numbers to make my point look convincing. Where will that get us?The former point is that demand (price sensitivities) would keep prices down. This is incorrect. A platform holder wants to maximize profit. If, due to the lack of competition, a platform holder could sell fewer units at a higher price, they would gladly do so. They would retain the monopoly position and make far more in profit whether they sold 7 million units or fewer.
For example, say the platform holder could now make a $50 per Console, with a $8 royalty per game disc sold. Let's say they sell 5 million consoles and 20 million games. Ballpark, that nets them $410m or so in profit.
Now, in a monopoly situation, let's say the platform holder raises the console price $100, meaning about $75 is pure profit after retail margin. Now they're making $125 per Console. And then, because they are a monopoly, they choose to raise the royalty to $12 per game disc sold. Now, in order to make the same profit of $410m (assuming all other costs are equal, which they wouldn't be, but let's keep it there for simplicity), now all the platform holder needs to sell is 3m consoles and 13m games.
So you would pay higher prices for the Console, and you would pay higher prices for the games (as the raised royalty would net out to a higher retail price), or you would choose to not purchase at all (which, again, would be fine with the platform holder. They will sacrifice some customers for the higher pricing).
So nothing would prevent pricing from being raised, and the monopolist would raise those prices until they believed their profit was maximized.
Doomsday predictions based on faulty assumptions, and you're conveniently ignoring any possible benefits from having a single, dominant platform.Fewer units sold, you're paying more, the retailer is hurt, the truck driver is hurt, the developers are hurt... and again, here we are, the only entity with a huge advantage is the monopolistic platform holder.
Just to set the record straight, I'm not arguing in support of monopolies or anything of the sort. I'm just not buying the narrative that gaming is doomed if we don't all rush out and buy a couple of XBones, because that's pure bullshit.If you're a devout PlayStation fan, or a zealous Xbox fan, the best thing that could happen to you would be for the platform you don't like to be successful. Only then will you pay less, will you receive more features, and will you be more valued.
For all the conversation here about consumer rights, one would think it understood that an intense competitive market is what will ensure them more than any single other thing.
Really, I think April was one of the worst months to buy a PS4 since launch, from a consumer's perspective. It's right after inFamous, so if that was the game you were waiting for, why wait until April to buy the console? If you're waiting for Watch Dogs and/or The Show, why buy your console before they come out? I think 200K is fairly decent performance for a lull like that.So is 199k for PS4 really bad for a console in it's first April ?.
Blah blah blah. I too can present a bunch of ass-sourced numbers to make my point look convincing. Where will that get us?
Sorry, you're right; it's only polite for me to make some stuff up too. If they give the hardware away for free and charge $1 for games, they'll sell and earn billions, so obviously, that's what's going to happen.I see. So that's what kind of conversationalist you'd like to be. Easier to go this route than actually discussing the points I guess.
What I was responding to was the implication that the only option would be $700 consoles if people don't hurry up and buy more XBones.The discussion was about platform monopolies. That's what you responded to. Nice to see you change what your points were in order to avoid applying any kind of thought.
Should numbers waifu be a tag or is that sexist?
I wouldn't want to make Aquamarine feel uncomfortable. We already have to deal with Kyle Bosman hitting on her from across the internet.
Was it that long ago that Sony took its ball home? I still wonder why they won't release those numbers now, when they're finally actually outselling their counterpart on regular basis and when MS still mans up with their numbers despite being lower. Not like the only people who really pay attention to their PR don't end up figuring it out via leaks or deducing it from other known figures. Oh wait, Vita.
I wouldn't want to make Aquamarine feel uncomfortable. We already have to deal with Kyle Bosman hitting on her from across the internet.
What did Bosman say exactly? He seems like a pretty harmless guy from what I've seen.
i believe what he said is banned according to neogaf's tos.
She replied a page or two back to the idea and said she thought it was a great tag, and that "Member is just so boring :-(" if I remember without bothering to actually look back.
Anyway -
It's interesting that this thread has marched on the way it has, with none of the intense drama and chaos of last month's numbers granted. Sure the PS4 selling *almost* 2-1 over the XB1 was eye-opening (obviously, with the way certain announcements hit the gaming news so swiftly)... but it wasn't like the month before, where the narrative that had been set by assumption/games media speculation was a solid win for XB1. This month there really wasn't anything major to impact customer buying habits. No big, nearly universal sales across all major retailers, desperation moves by any platform sellers, etc.
I just hope that the release of the 2000 Vitas will help push their numbers back into the double digits, and closer to respectable numbers for the platform. I'm not asking for Japan numbers there (though I'd love to see it!) after our Best Buy stores were literally bone dry on Vita hardware to sell to customers. There's been pretty good word of mouth on borderlands Vita, too.
i believe what he said is banned according to neogaf's tos.
lmao
whoa Vita sold <10 this month?
i believe what he said is banned according to neogaf's tos.
Boo AniHawk. I had to go and watch it after you said that and he literally just quoted a posted from Aqua here and says she does a great job analyzing NPD numbers, etc.
We haven't had worldwide XB1 sales (to consumers) numbers since the beginning of the year.
Sorry, but what does that have to do with the NPD PR that I'm talking about? Getting worldwide numbers spouted officially is infrequent, in general, though it does seem we're getting an update from Sony on that front every so often with PS4 is selling out, yet they still choose to keep quiet on the biggest market overall? Strange decisions, but they get to win on the overall numbers so far, anyway.
Last month
So I did this last month to commemmorate the death of the thread...might as well do it this month as well.
This month:
Total console (PS3 + PS4 + 360 + XBO + Wii + Wii U) revenue:
$194.9 million
Marketshare:
PS3 + PS4 = 35.1%
360 + XBO = 54.1%
Wii + Wii U = 10.7%
YOY Comps:
PS3 + PS4 (PlayStation ecosystem): -13% from last year
360 + XBO (Microsoft ecosystem): -5% from last year
Wii + Wii U (Nintendo ecosystem): -22% from last year
PS3: -49% from last year
360: -25% from last year
Wii: -46% from last year
Wii U: 46% from last year
And:
PS4 + XBO software sales comprised 22% of the software market
You can see from the bolded the positive effect that 360 Titanfall's ~0.5 million did to the Microsoft sales ecosystem.
What is this? Software + Hardware revenue?
Software revenue.
So I did this last month to commemmorate the death of the thread...might as well do it this month as well.
YOY Comps:
PS3: -49% from last year
360: -25% from last year
Wii: -46% from last year
Wii U: 46% from last year
NPD analyst Liam Callahan said:-"PS4 software combined with Xbox One software sales are up over 40 percent compared to sales of the PS3 and Xbox 360 through their first six months. Wii U software sales were up over last year by over 80 percent," said NPD analyst Liam Callahan.
Is that a big discrepency or am I missing something?