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NPD December 2022 and for the year 2022: #1 MW2 #2 Pokemon #3 God of War; NSW #1 Units (PS5 #2) PS5 #1 Revenue (NSW #2)

Dick Jones

Gold Member
The Series S in Europe has had heavy discounts also. Next year is the acid test.
I think that was the end on deep console price drops for a while. With Spencer saying the price of the consoles would likely increase in 2023, it is inconceivable the price will drop before November unless a Starfield bundle (free Starfield with console) when it comes out before the first week of June.

If you weren't interested in the great price drops in November/December it's going to be a tough sell until Starfield at the earliest.
 
The Switch games sales are wild especially when they're not taking digital sales into account and yet they're still so high up.

Welp, that's just the power of the Pokemon IP. It's somewhat a bad sign though considering the poor technical state the new Pokemon games released in. Just makes you wonder how much fans have been conditioned to accept that type of poor performance in a full-priced retail game.

TBF, critics did ding the games for the bad performance issues, so I'm basically talking about the Pokemon fanbase here. Their standards for acceptable performance aren't particularly high.
 

OuterLimits

Member
According to the charts, Mario Rabbids Sparks of Hope charted 3rd on Switch in December(only Pokemon and Mario Kart were higher) and 6th in November.

Ubisoft must have insane expectations to call that underwhelming.

Seems like Midnight Suns was a bomb of epic proportions sadly?
 
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Kvally

Banned
Ps5 should take it this year, switch will probably see another 20% is decline, and I think we will see a slim ps5 ease manufacturing this year putting it in the 20 million range

I'm still going with the Switch due to games, price cut and extremely popular still.

With the possibility Series could be tracking behind XBO in sold-through (maybe they're even with it though, or slightly tracking ahead. We'll hopefully get some numbers and PR from MS soon that clarify (if there's no PR on Series sales outpacing XBO with the next fiscal report then we can take that as they're tracking behind)).

If they don't mention the pace, it could be because they just didn't mention the pace. We can't take that as anything unless they say otherwise.

They've already soft-increased Series X price with the FH5 bundle at $549. I think that's a way for them to test the waters, considering you can get FH5 "free" in Game Pass with a sub any number of different ways, so if the bundle does well then that's mainly people paying extra for the privilege of owning the game.

Most people don't have Game Pass, so it's not "free" for most. Bundling the game with Xbox (along with selling the normal retail priced Xbox) gives them a $10 savings actually. So not a soft or hard price increase actually.
 

ChorizoPicozo

Gold Member
Congrats to Phil and co.

77s74g.jpg
this is about to change once the deal gets approved. You just look....WAT?!. don't laugh.
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
With the possibility Series could be tracking behind XBO in sold-through (maybe they're even with it though, or slightly tracking ahead. We'll hopefully get some numbers and PR from MS soon that clarify (if there's no PR on Series sales outpacing XBO with the next fiscal report then we can take that as they're tracking behind)).
Yeah, I don't think they will announce anything.

Regarding Series tracking ahead of XBO > as you'd notice the point I raised in my previous comment is exactly this. Every generation, the gaming industry grows a bit, so newer generation consoles are expected to pace ahead (not necessarily because they are more popular, but because there are more consumers now).

X360 was significantly more popular than XBO, but XBO still outpaced X360 despite being $100 more expensive than X360 and PS4.

Eventually, I think X360 will remain a better selling-console than XBO and Xbox Series.
 
Yeah, I don't think they will announce anything.

Regarding Series tracking ahead of XBO > as you'd notice the point I raised in my previous comment is exactly this. Every generation, the gaming industry grows a bit, so newer generation consoles are expected to pace ahead (not necessarily because they are more popular, but because there are more consumers now).

X360 was significantly more popular than XBO, but XBO still outpaced X360 despite being $100 more expensive than X360 and PS4.

Eventually, I think X360 will remain a better selling-console than XBO and Xbox Series.

Oh, that's a definite. Series have no factors to propel them the way the 360 did, as a good chunk of 360's factors helping it out were Sony dropping the ball hard with PS3's launch and first couple of years. That, and 360 releasing a year earlier, so it basically had the market to itself for a period of time similar to PS2 relative Xbox & Gamecube (Dreamcast was a non-starter in Japan and was struggling in the US post-launch before PS2 arrived).

Personally I think if MS do things right with no big screw-ups they can hit around 65 million lifetime, maybe edging closer to 70 million. A LOT of 360's sales came post-Kinect, I don't know if MS have any late-gen feature coming for Series that would realistically have the same impact. Subscription services and cloud gaming certainly aren't it. Even if Sony have a few stumbles here and there, I don't think that would be enough for Microsoft to make huge gains.

But, as you said, the market continues to grow, particularly in terms of revenue, and all three should be able to see big revenue and profit increases this gen, regardless how many actual hardware units they sell. So MS should definitely be able to outpace XBO in terms of revenue this generation. I guess the question becomes: by how much?

If they don't mention the pace, it could be because they just didn't mention the pace. We can't take that as anything unless they say otherwise.

But the thing is they had no issue mentioning it early last year when they were winning NPDs. The odd thing is, they do not have to actually win NPDs to at least provide that basic a level of transparency on how the new consoles are tracking relative the previous ones. They know where the previous systems hit at certain periods of their generation, and they've already started the conversation of comparing Series sales to 360 and XBO in 2022 because of them boasting about them.

Sorry but MS, you don't get to choose when a metric is important enough to talk about and then disregard it when it doesn't look good for your optics. Because if they just go dark again about sales relative XBO and 360 lifetime, that's how a lot of us are going to interpret it: they're falling behind. Because they already set the expectation that they would continue to reference those comparisons if they persistently tracked ahead.

Most people don't have Game Pass, so it's not "free" for most. Bundling the game with Xbox (along with selling the normal retail priced Xbox) gives them a $10 savings actually. So not a soft or hard price increase actually.

Most people as in general, yes. But I would think a prospective Series X buyer is aware Game Pass exists, and they know (or could assume) FH5 is on the service. Assuming they would just like to check the game out, but not invest a ton of time into it, would they choose to pay the extra $50 for that one game or maybe just $9.99 or $14.99 for a month to play it and everything else that's in Game Pass?

In terms of value, the latter looks like the better option. So people who buy the bundle with FH5 I think would be those aware of all of that, but plan to invest a lot of time into the game, and want the convenience of owning the game because maybe they want to sub to Game Pass too but do so sporadically for a month or two, then drop out for a few months, and come back in. Rinse and repeat.
 
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Not a strong showing, no. I imagine the game will resurface next year when it hits PC, however.

You mean in a couple of months lol

According to the charts, Mario Rabbids Sparks of Hope charted 3rd on Switch in December(only Pokemon and Mario Kart were higher) and 6th in November.

Ubisoft must have insane expectations to call that underwhelming.

Seems like Midnight Suns was a bomb of epic proportions sadly?

Mario and Rabbids got steeply discounted (i bought it full price like an idiot) it was basically half off for the majority of time its been released.

And midnight suns probably didn’t do that well but 2k doesn’t provide digital to NPD so well never know
 

Jinzo Prime

Member
Mario and Rabbids got steeply discounted (i bought it full price like an idiot) it was basically half off for the majority of time its been released.
I hate to say this, but Ubi has to stop discounting so early, no one will buy at launch if they know it'll be $20 in 6 months, lol
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
I actually want it to flop so I can pick it up nice and cheap ASAP.
OMG. Stop being so toxic!

I for one am glad Gamers finally voted with their wallets and Sony now thinks twice before greenlighting any other remakes like this. Or at least makes them look next gen like Demon Souls.
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
According to the charts, Mario Rabbids Sparks of Hope charted 3rd on Switch in December(only Pokemon and Mario Kart were higher) and 6th in November.

Ubisoft must have insane expectations to call that underwhelming.

Seems like Midnight Suns was a bomb of epic proportions sadly?
Nope. 14th in November. 13th in December. The chart you are talking about is Nintendo only. It didnt even break the top 20 of the year. Was outsold by Super Smash brothers. A 2018 game. Mario Kart. a 2014 game. Nintendo currently has the largest userbase and holidays is when the parents go nuts buying games for their kids. The fact that a game with Mario in the title didnt break the top 20 is definitely underwhelming.

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Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
Oh, that's a definite. Series have no factors to propel them the way the 360 did, as a good chunk of 360's factors helping it out were Sony dropping the ball hard with PS3's launch and first couple of years. That, and 360 releasing a year earlier, so it basically had the market to itself for a period of time similar to PS2 relative Xbox & Gamecube (Dreamcast was a non-starter in Japan and was struggling in the US post-launch before PS2 arrived).

Personally I think if MS do things right with no big screw-ups they can hit around 65 million lifetime, maybe edging closer to 70 million. A LOT of 360's sales came post-Kinect, I don't know if MS have any late-gen feature coming for Series that would realistically have the same impact. Subscription services and cloud gaming certainly aren't it. Even if Sony have a few stumbles here and there, I don't think that would be enough for Microsoft to make huge gains.

But, as you said, the market continues to grow, particularly in terms of revenue, and all three should be able to see big revenue and profit increases this gen, regardless how many actual hardware units they sell. So MS should definitely be able to outpace XBO in terms of revenue this generation. I guess the question becomes: by how much?
Yes, but so does operating expenditures. Games are more expensive to make than ever. That's why operating profit and ROI are crucial metrics to fully understand the picture here.
 

reksveks

Member


Yeah, you showed them 😂

If I was to be picky, I would reword 'Amazon Best Sellers in Games' to 'Amazon Best Sellers in PS5 games' .

Just for the UK, that #5 spot turns in 25 when you include all games and then 76 when you are looking at the category (but that includes hw and point cards)

Not commenting on the success of TLOU, just the BS that zubytech posts for time to time.
 
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Flutta

Banned
Where is Xbox?????

Phil you hack. How many years do you need? How many studios do you have to gobble up before your make a dent on the market.

Why is this dude still the head of Xbox? I seriously don’t know. He must be the best boot licker on the planet, cuz Notella is def impressed by something.

Those ER legs….. bruv. FROM be eating gooooood!!!

Man Walking GIF
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Callisto landing at #17 is just awful. It's a true flop in every sense of the world. Even Gotham Knights ended up in the top 10.

You have to wonder what went wrong. It's an AAA game. It is a survival horror game with a focus on cinematic storytelling evoking Dead Space a cult classic. Even if the reviews were bad, the game shouldve sold on pre-release hype alone.

I didnt buy it because it looked too generic. It is a Sony cinematic AAA wanna be game that aims to push graphics, but forgets about gameplay specifically combat. Sony games are dismissed as walking simulators but they sell because they are fun to play with fun combat systems and rewarding gameplay loops. Say what you will about GOW but the combat and gameplay looped had me hooked for a month. Callisto looked so basic it played like an early PS3 era game.

TBH, every third person survival horror game since TLOU2 looks dated because they lack the incredible motion matching animations and fast paced combat in a genre that embraced tanky controls. RE4 looks dated. Dead Space remake looks dated. Hell, even TLOU Remake which chose not to put in the melee and dodge animations just felt like replaying the same PS3 game with better graphics. Callisto just didnt do anything new or engaging.

It will be interesting to see how Dead Space Remake sells compared to Callisto. Once again, another cross gen title that doesnt seem to be doing anything new. Targeting the Sony cinematic third person audience that has simply played better games. If third parties want to release these games, they have to do more than just copy those AAA games without actually putting in the effort in the combat/gameplay department. Maybe add some next gen tech like destruction, or next gen AI, physics and whatnot. Because i have a feeling we are going to see a lot more of these flops going forward.
 

John Wick

Member
Switch is a beast. Destroying the competition and the current market leader.

But since it is on its 7th year, it should lose the market leader position to the PS5, at least until the Switch 2 releases.
What nonsense is this? The market leader is Nintendo.
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Where is Xbox?????

Phil you hack. How many years do you need? How many studios do you have to gobble up before your make a dent on the market.

Why is this dude still the head of Xbox? I seriously don’t know. He must be the best boot licker on the planet, cuz Notella is def impressed by something.
They are neck in neck in other territories like UK so Phil can always go to his bosses with that. PS5 is way more expensive than the series s and they cant really make Series X fast enough. It was 50-50 in 2021, and they dont want to release sales splits so i wouldnt be surprised if its 60-40 this year.

I think Phil has earned goodwill by showing them the revenues despite lagging behind in sales. Even in 2020, he was a $16 billion compared to $18 billion Nintendo in a year where switch sold the most consoles ever in any year. Sony was at $25 billion. Sony numbers have dropped to $18 billion due to poor yen performance, but MS is still around $15 billion so that must be the reason why he's still got a job. The unit sales difference doesnt mean much because they seem to be generating revenues elsewhere in the ecosystem. Im guessing Xbox Live and Gamepass.

I wouldve let him go after he launched a console with no exclusives in 2020 and then again when he managed to delay Starfield, Forza and Redfall after announcing them as 2022 titles. But im not a businessman and Satya is. If the revenue is there, he doesnt care if the exclusives arent or if they are still in third place.
 
Yes, but so does operating expenditures. Games are more expensive to make than ever. That's why operating profit and ROI are crucial metrics to fully understand the picture here.

True. I'm still mystified at the people who think MS are going to suddenly fund all these big AAA games among the XGS, Zenimax & ABK studios (provided they actually acquire ABK) at the rate some are expecting, even the much-vaunted "4 AAA a year" claim they made years ago.

It just isn't going to happen. Not with having spent almost $80 billion when all's said and done between the various studio & publisher acquisitions, and as you said, the costs for game development just increasing even more with each passing year. I wouldn't be surprised if half the leaked "Project" games from Xbox studios we know of so far are smaller or mid AA-style games.

Which is perfectly fine; they're still going to have some of those big AAA games. Starfield, for example. It just won't be the amount some people keep fantasizing they'll be.
 

Kvally

Banned
Where is Xbox?????

Phil you hack. How many years do you need? How many studios do you have to gobble up before your make a dent on the market.


Why is this dude still the head of Xbox? I seriously don’t know. He must be the best boot licker on the planet, cuz Notella is def impressed by something.
His dent is rather big. Billions of PCs.
 

tmlDan

Member
If I was to be picky, I would reword 'Amazon Best Sellers in Games' to 'Amazon Best Sellers in PS5 games' .

Just for the UK, that #5 spot turns in 25 when you include all games and then 76 when you are looking at the category (but that includes hw and point cards)

Not commenting on the success of TLOU, just the BS that zubytech posts for time to time.
I mean its 17 in Canada and higher than MW2 at this moment in time.
 

sainraja

Member
OMG. Stop being so toxic!

I for one am glad Gamers finally voted with their wallets and Sony now thinks twice before greenlighting any other remakes like this. Or at least makes them look next gen like Demon Souls.
Not sure what purpose or sense there is in thinking a Remake to a game carried forward multiple generations and after its sequel came out, would do crazy number of sales, like the original game did. Perhaps the show might bring some more light on it and that was probably the reason for releasing it, and not what you seem to be suggesting?
 
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reksveks

Member
I mean its 17 in Canada and higher than MW2 at this moment in time.
again i am not saying that it ain't a success, i just dislike zubytech 'badly written' tweets (TLOU and TLOU2 are clearly great games and deserve their success)

he blocked me after i corrected his maths so more of a personal thing.
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Not sure what purpose or sense there is in thinking a Remake to a game carried forward multiple generations and after its sequel came out, would do crazy number of sales, like the original game did. Perhaps the show might bring some more light on it and that was probably the reason for releasing it, and not what you seem to be suggesting?
Games are not developed on a whim. This game started dev in 2018. Way before even Chernobyl was released let alone TLOU. It had nothing to do with the show. It was made by VSG as a side project which ND took over after shipping TLOU2.
 

Topher

Gold Member
The current market leader is Nintendo, yes..But the PS5 *should* outsell the Switch simply by the fact of the Switch being so old and the market being saturated by it.

Currently, Switch is at the end of year five in its lifecycle. Probably passed its prime, but still a top seller all around especially at Christmas time.
 

Elios83

Member
After all the daily advertisement threads we had during November and December about the fantastic and unmissable deals for Series S even below 200$, that's a big holiday defeat that MS got there, I don't know where they're going with their prices after all those devaluing deals.
Switch is still doing great but it's finally declining (and it's totally normal), PS5 did really well but there's room to do much better in 2023 with a continous good supply, a Slim model and all the great games coming.
 

reksveks

Member
1995: SNES
1996: PS1
1997: PS1
1998: PS1
1999: GMB
2000: GMB
2001: PS2
2002: PS2
2003: GBA
2004: GBA
2005: PS2
2006: NDS
2007: NDS
2008: WII
2009: NDS
2010: NDS
2011: 360
2012: 360
2013: 3DS
2014: PS4
2015: PS4
2016: PS4
2017: PS4
2018: NSW
2019: NSW
2020: NSW
2021: NSW
2022: NSW

New record holder for most years won
 

Woopah

Member
Some obersvations from my side:
  • Unsurprisingly, the Final Fantasy fanbase is firmly on PlayStation
  • Sonic did very well indeed, biggest succes for non-PC sega for a few years
  • Even without Nintnedo sharing digital, there's 7 Switch exlusives in the December chart and 6 in the 2022 chart. A good platform for Nintnedo to build on
  • Switch becomes the first platform to be the best seller in the US 5 years in a row
  • God of War is a guge success for Sony, Sanata Monica must be thrilled
  • I would never have expected Lego Star Wars to finish the year at 5, or for Kirby to finish the year at 14
Switch won December for units despite PS5 winning October and November. There must still be big supply problems for PS5 because it really should be outselling a 6 year old console. And Xbox third again, it is selling badly in Europe and Japan at the moment and it can't even avoid last place on home soil. I think this will be the last time Switch will be on top for the holidays, although it will still probably be ahead of Xbox next year, lol.

My predictions for hardware shipments in Q3 (Oct 1st - Dec 31st 2022)

Switch:
9.3 million (10.67m in 2021)
PS5: 6.8 million (3.9m in 2021)
XBS: 4.5 million (4.4m in 2021)
PS5 will defimitely lead overall in 2023. December will always be difficult for it though, as PS's holiday sales are weighted to November, while Nintnedo's holiday sales are weighted to December
MLB almost beat Horizon wtf. Beat GT7. Crazy.
Where is TLOU remake? I thought it sold well.
No Callisto lmao. Imagine getting outsold by a flop like Gotham Knights.
Fifa outselling MLB, NBA and NHL. What a crazy time to be alive.
MLB is multplatform while Horizon is not
yep. MLB used to be a 1 million seller. Lets assume its now a 1.5 million seller with Xbox and Switch. Maybe a little less since its free on gamepass, but man this does not look good for Horizon and GT7. Looks like TLOU, GT7 and Horizon all underperformed. probably the reason why Sony didnt release any sales figures for these games despite releasing sales figures for GOW, Ratchet, Demon Souls and Returnal. I wonder if they are waiting for them to hit 5 million before announcing the sales. HFW and GT7 should be over 2 million worldwide by now. TLOU probably around 1 million.

I remember getting a lot of shit for pointing out that SOny themselves admitted they saw a massive decline in software sales in the April-June quarter. I was like Horizon, MLB and GT7 should have better legs than that. They had a good Jan to March quarter with 14 million sales for all first party titles, but only 6 million the quarter after that down from 10.6 million the year before during the same quarter. And they count bundles.

I wonder if these games were more ambitious pushing next gen tech if things wouldve been different. More of the same might work for yearly cod games, but people buying Sony AAA games expect a lot more.

Bundles accounted for 20% of the sales in UK. Probably the same here. And yes, NPD doesnt count bundles.
GT7 and Horizon look to have done pretty well to me, don't think they udnerperformed at all.
Mario and Rabbids got steeply discounted (i bought it full price like an idiot) it was basically half off for the majority of time its been released.

These charts are revenue based, so being steeply disconted would actually make it harder for Mario and Rabbids to have a high placement.
 
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Only it did... which is why the PS5 lead isn't as big as some thought it would be.

Xbox Series X|S outsold PS5 3 quarters in a row from Oct-Dec 2021, Jan-Mar 2022 and April-Jun 2022. That's literally 3 quarters in a row. They never said they would win the entire year.

It's not meaningless PR when it means Xbox Series X|S is doing significantly better than Xbox One has. They've taken back market share thus far compared to last gen.

It's just so specific though. One territory and 3 quarters? no actual numbers either. How much did xbox outsell during those 3 quarters? 50k? 100k? 500k? The amount matters. More detail is all I'm asking for.
 

Woopah

Member
It's just so specific though. One territory and 3 quarters? no actual numbers either. How much did xbox outsell during those 3 quarters? 50k? 100k? 500k? The amount matters. More detail is all I'm asking for.
I don't think any of the Big 3 release specific numbers for the US or North America. The closest we get is Nintnedo giving numebrs for "The Americas".
 
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