• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

NPD March 2011 Sales Results [Update 2: Super Street Fighter IV 3D]

Shurs

Member
Dedication Through Light said:
I thought Kinect Bundles are really whats driving X360 sales. Surely the Xbox 360 S effect isnt still being felt this far from its initial reveal...

I assume that the majority of Xbox 360 sales are for bundles priced $299 and up.

That said, I think it helps them tremendously to have a unit that costs $100 less than the PS3's lowest priced option.
 

kswiston

Member
Opus Angelorum said:
It absolutely is, however it's naive to think Sony introduce a price drop and Microsoft stands still.

It doesn't really matter what either companies do in the US at this point. There is a 10M+ sales gap between 360 and PS3.

If PS3 outsold the 360 200k a month every month from Apr 2011 onwards, it'd take over 4 years to make up the difference.

Petty squabbles about who is first and who is second month to month aside, I do believe the PS3 would benefit more from a price cut at this point. 360 is already has a sub-$200 option, and Kinect is giving them great momentum. 430k/month is huge outside the holidays. I don't think price is really holding the 360 back. I think any price cut at this stage would just provide a very modest sales boost, that wouldn't offset lost revenue. Microsoft would be better off waiting until the Kinect started to cool a bit, THEN drop their price.
 

LosDaddie

Banned
Elios83 said:
Because if PS3 drops to 199$ it will finally get mass market diffusion and that's simply huge.
A further 360 price cut would only sweeten the same deal, unless they cut to 129$/99$ and they position themselves on the discount market.....but that's highly unlikely before the next Xbox hits the market.

If it's true that the Kinect bundles are what's driving X360 sales right now, then wouldn't it make sense that a $100 price cut on said bundles would drive even more X360 sales?

I guess I just don't buy the argument that a $100 price cut would only benefit the PS3, and not the X360.
 

Road

Member
Loudninja said:
Last March:
PlayStation 3 313,900
Sony PlayStation Portable 119,900
Sony PlayStation 2 118,300

Every Sony system sold more this March than last March the PS2is still a beat.
Only the PSP and PS3 sold more this year.
 

Elios83

Member
LosDaddie said:
If it's true that the Kinect bundles are what's driving X360 sales right now, then wouldn't it make sense that a $100 price cut on said bundles would drive even more X360 sales?

I guess I just don't buy the argument that a $100 price cut would only benefit the PS3, and not the X360.

Infact I don't think and never said that.
I said that the effect of a 199$ PS3 would boost sales in a way that nothing Microsoft might realistically do can fully offset.
And of course since this is NPD thread..let's not even talk about what would happen outside the US ;)
 

Curufinwe

Member
Shurs said:
I think it's just to frame that Sony doesn't have to hit the panic button, like some people suggest every month.

I assume profit is more important than NPD bragging rights.

Yes, and the US dollar is so weak against the Yen right now that it's very hard for a Japanese company like Sony to justify dropping the price of the PS3 in America.
 

EagleEyes

Member
LosDaddie said:
If it's true that the Kinect bundles are what's driving X360 sales right now, then wouldn't it make sense that a $100 price cut on said bundles would drive even more X360 sales?

I guess I just don't buy the argument that a $100 price cut would only benefit the PS3, and not the X360.
You shouldn't buy it. The last $100 price drop from Sony lasted all of 2 months before the 360 started outselling it again. People need to realize that the 360 hasn't had a real price drop in almost 3 years and it is still selling like gangbusters.
 
EagleEyes said:
People need to realize that the 360 hasn't had a real price drop in almost 3 years and it is still selling like gangbusters.

Well I guess the argument is, take that same console and reduce it to mass market levels. Then what do we get?
 

EagleEyes

Member
Opus Angelorum said:
Well I guess the argument is, take that same console and reduce it to mass market levels. Then what do we get?
True, but i'm pretty sure in the future we will see a 199 PS3 going up against a 199 360 Kinect bundle. You'd be crazy to think the PS3 would outsell that. There is virtually no scenario in america where the PS3 will get the upperhand over the 360.
 

LosDaddie

Banned
Elios83 said:
Infact I don't think and never said that.
I said that the effect of a 199$ PS3 would boost sales in a way that nothing Microsoft might realistically do can fully offset.

But I don't fully agee with that. Realistically, MS could match any price cut Sony can muster, and they could cut Kinect's price too. Those are both realistic options for MS moving forward.

Again, if we are to believe that the Kinect bundles ($300 and $400 SKUs) are what's truly driving X360 sales right now, I think a $100 cut to both SKUs would provide a considerable boost to X360 sales. Sure, maybe the PS3 would get an even bigger sales boost with a $100 cut, but that's just guesswork as to whom would benefit more.


Elios83 said:
And of course since this is NPD thread..let's not even talk about what would happen outside the US ;)

Right. Let's stay on topic.
 

WrikaWrek

Banned
So weird to see some of the posters till so confident that the PS3 has a whole lot left in the tank when it goes down in price.

We are like what? 6 years into the generation? It hasn't happened, it won't happen.
 

Averon

Member
WrikaWrek said:
So weird to see some of the posters till so confident that the PS3 has a whole lot left in the tank when it goes down in price.

We are like what? 6 years into the generation? It hasn't happened, it won't happen.

The PS3 has had YOY increases despite still being $299 going against a renewed 360 with Kinect. It doesn't take a lot to think that a $199 PS3 would do gang busters.
 

Shurs

Member
WrikaWrek said:
So weird to see some of the posters till so confident that the PS3 has a whole lot left in the tank when it goes down in price.

We are like what? 6 years into the generation? It hasn't happened, it won't happen.

I think the positions are locked in.

There is no way the PS3 can catch the 360 in North America. I do think a $199 PS3 would sell really well, but it won't make much of a dent in the 360's lead.

I think the 360 will continue to outsell the Wii, but I don't see it ending the generation in first place.
 

Elios83

Member
WrikaWrek said:
So weird to see some of the posters till so confident that the PS3 has a whole lot left in the tank when it goes down in price.

We are like what? 6 years into the generation? It hasn't happened, it won't happen.

50m sold in little more than 4 years in the 300-600$/€ range, still going strong at 300$ after a year and half without a price cut, huge lineup and third party support ahead and there still are a few posters who don't think that PS3 has a whole lot to say when it reaches mass market in the second part of its lifecycle...oh my :D XD
 

kswiston

Member
WrikaWrek said:
So weird to see some of the posters till so confident that the PS3 has a whole lot left in the tank when it goes down in price.

We are like what? 6 years into the generation? It hasn't happened, it won't happen.

PS3 won't catch the 360 by a long shot in the US, but there is no reason to think that it can't eventually hit 25M. That would be a pretty good result for a console that took almost 2 years to reach 5M sold.
 
Shurs said:
I think the positions are locked in.

There is no way the PS3 can catch the 360 in North America. I do think a $199 PS3 would sell really well, but it won't make much of a dent in the 360's lead.

I think the 360 will continue to outsell the Wii, but I don't see it ending the generation in first place.

Yeah, isn't the 360 still behind the Wii by like a jillion units?
 
professor_t said:
Yeah, isn't the 360 still behind the Wii by like a jillion units?
360 is behind by 1 jiggawatt, or something.

I'm glad to see some ppl still have confidence in PS3 starting to sell gangbusters on a price drop. Some drama for the future is better than no drama. Worst NPD yet. Everything is so predictable now. 360 beats wii, Sony behind as usual, someone always brings in worldwide sales the moment someone is impressed by MS. . . same old.
 

verbum

Member
CadetMahoney said:
360 is behind by 1 jiggawatt, or something.

I'm glad to see some ppl still have confidence in PS3 starting to sell gangbusters on a price drop. Some drama for the future is better than no drama. Worst NPD yet. Everything is so predictable now. 360 beats wii, Sony behind as usual, someone always brings in worldwide sales the moment someone is impressed by MS. . . same old.

Wait until 2013, we'll have the Super Wii, the super Playstation portable, the Kinect will be walking on its own by then, and people will have lots of disposable income. Should be some good debates then.
 

donny2112

Member
miksar said:
I'm saying that Nintendogs position shows that it was not casual crowd for sure. And I don't see anything wrong with core Nintendo crowd buying heavily advertised SSF4 and well-received Ghost Recon instead of totally niche Steel Diver.

I think what you're intending to say is that the launch buyers for 3DS were a "core" crowd. Not necessarily Nintendo-focused "core" crowd, just a "core" crowd. That's reasonable. When you said "Nintendo core crowd" that usually brings with it the connotation that those people buy all the Mario/Zelda/Nintendo games and ignore other stuff. "Core" crowd are usually the early adopters.
 
donny2112 said:
I think what you're intending to say is that the launch buyers for 3DS were a "core" crowd. Not necessarily Nintendo-focused "core" crowd, just a "core" crowd. That's reasonable. When you said "Nintendo core crowd" that usually brings with it the connotation that those people buy all the Mario/Zelda/Nintendo games and ignore other stuff. "Core" crowd are usually the early adopters.

If it was "core" then Nintendogs and Cats would've sold a lot more.
 
I think the comparisons between the 3DS launch and the DS launch are somewhat misleading. The DS was not a strong system in the US until the DS Lite release. In its launch month (Nov 2004), it was outsold by every other system except the Gamecube, and in its 2nd month, even the Gamecube outsold it.

For comparison' sake, the Game Boy Advance launched in June 2001 and sold nearly double what the DS did in its launch month.

The DS was a system that got a second chance. From these (admittedly early) numbers, the 3DS might need one, too.

Personally, I don't think people realize the 3DS is a new system rather than another revision of the DS.
 

Barrett2

Member
A little anecdotal observation. A few days ago I was waiting at a traffic-heavy Best Buy for 40 minutes waiting for an incompetent employee to get something out of the back inventory for me. It was interesting, out of the tons of people walking through the video game aisle, not a single person even looked at the 3DS section. It was odd.

I also question how much a few N64 remakes will move the needle this summer. It will be interesting to see hardware sales next month. DS had a huge month in part because of Pokemon, but three months from now what if DS is still smoking 3DS in hardware sales?
 

FrankT

Member
Opus Angelorum said:
Indeed, however the reason Microsoft have the upper hand is...if the $199 bundle does not suit they'll have a $99/$129 4GB model waiting.

$129 4GB would probably have an even bigger impact this holiday then when they hit $199 in 08. It almost makes sense to pass up $149 and ride this price for 2-3 more years before they hit $99. With them not having one for that long they probably can afford at this point. I couldn't say by that point if it would be break even or not as it would be nice to have a new breakdown of costs as haven't seen one in awhile on the 360. May seems a bit early for a Wii price cut and I could see a Sony new model price cut by E3. Better for them to just drop it in August/Sept around Gears. Since the last price cut from Sony, MS is up 2-3M without a price cut and I think this year could be very interesting to see it play out with dual price cuts at or around the same time.
 
Shurs said:
I think the positions are locked in.

There is no way the PS3 can catch the 360 in North America. I do think a $199 PS3 would sell really well, but it won't make much of a dent in the 360's lead.

I think the 360 will continue to outsell the Wii, but I don't see it ending the generation in first place.

I agree with all of these statements. We're basically in the fiddly tail-end of things now.
 

Dirtsaw

Member
Opus Angelorum said:
It's perhaps no coincidence that the last Xbox 360 price drop came around the time it began making a profit.
Which suggests the plan is to make money via Live and software. Expect a price cut when you see a subscription "ESPN Pro" on marketplace.
 

Dabanton

Member
lawblob said:
A little anecdotal observation. A few days ago I was waiting at a traffic-heavy Best Buy for 40 minutes waiting for an incompetent employee to get something out of the back inventory for me. It was interesting, out of the tons of people walking through the video game aisle, not a single person even looked at the 3DS section. It was odd.

I also question how much a few N64 remakes will move the needle this summer. It will be interesting to see hardware sales next month. DS had a huge month in part because of Pokemon, but three months from now what if DS is still smoking 3DS in hardware sales?

I'd say Zelda will not even make a dent. It's a damm shame one could say arrogant that Nintendo in this climate of idevices,androids etc with easily accessible content and a probable beast on the way in the NGP thinks that not having any quality for months is ok.
 
Dirtsaw said:
Which suggests the plan is to make money via Live and software.

They will also have made quite a bit of money from the impressive hardware sales over the last year.

@ charlequin

If Sony are to drop the price, it has to be a significant one. Adding 'perceived value' simply isn't viable at this time in the generation.
 

onQ123

Member
WrikaWrek said:
So weird to see some of the posters till so confident that the PS3 has a whole lot left in the tank when it goes down in price.

We are like what? 6 years into the generation? It hasn't happened, it won't happen.

PS3 only been out for 4 years & like 4 months & less than that in EU & all of the 50M has been sold at $299 - $599

$299 is the price that PS2 launched at
 

Mrbob

Member
I feel bad for the poor souls who only have Face Raiders and AR Cards to play with. Well they can have the device count their steps and buy some cats to save their Mii though!

Edit: In another Pachman tweet he aludes to 1/4 of the 3DS audience buying SF4 if I'm reading it right. So that means SF4 is around 90 to 100k and we know the second game is half of the first. So that means the rest of 3DS software sales 50k and under?
 

Spiegel

Member
miladesn said:

If that's correct

3DS sales

01. SSFIV - ~95k
02. Pilotwings <47.5k
03. Lego Star Wars
04. Rayman
05. Tom Clancy Ghost Recon
06. Super Monkey Ball
07. Nintendogs+Cats G
08. Ridge Racer
09. Steel Diver
10. Nintendogs+Cats F

creamsugar said:
The best sold 3DS game is SSF43D, the worst is dinosaurs3D.
The second is a nintendo game, and less than half of the 1st.
 

Busaiku

Member
Spiegel said:
If that's correct

3DS sales

01. SSFIV - ~95k
02. Pilotwings <47.5k
03. Lego Star Wars
04. Rayman
05. Tom Clancy Ghost Recon
06. Super Monkey Ball
07. Nintendogs+Cats G
08. Ridge Racer
09. Steel Diver
10. Nintendogs+Cats F
3DS sales were 440k, didn't it?
Wasn't the less than 400k only through March 31?
 
Top Bottom