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NPD Sales Results for August 2013 [Up2: Tons of Nintendo Software]

NeonZ

Member
I'm mostly curious how it holds into next year as we start going through the doldrum months, since if it isn't holding, it might be a nice indicator to Nintendo to start hurrying up with the successor instead of letting themselves fall into a giant sales pit at the end of the system's life.

Judging by tablets, people are okay with upgrading a bit more frequently these days.

Only if this "successor" could be released for $99 like the GBA, and also had lower software prices. Releasing higher priced handheld consoles at this point seems foolish. The Wii U has shown what an unappealing transition can do to them. The 3DS' third party support also seems fairly weak compared to their past portables recently, so, even in the portable arena, they probably need to get ready to support the system by themselves next time.
 

FrankT

Member
Bookmarked for posterity. It's multiplat with same release date. If you look at history stuff like Batman AA was Sony marketed as exclusive and with extra content and still did worse than 360 version. There was even a thread questioning whether or not Sony are getting value for money from their moneyhats. So don't be too surprised if 360 > PS3 GTA.



Yea. Both consoles need a bigger drop.

Well no I will not be surprised at all and fully expect it. The dynamics between these consoles have changed little in the US since 08. Well in reallity that gap has likely increased quite a bit. Probably not 1.8:1 again, but I fully expect a gap.

With that said has anyone posted LTDs for the consoles? Would be interested to see when the 360 hits 40M and when it will cross the Wii.

As for the price drop good night MS has waited at least a year too long. But like MS they are probably thinking with Sony now at $200 with little effect what is the point. I fully expected them be $149 by this fall, which in reality should have happened well before this or a drop in between. If they had any sense left they would drop it by CoD this Nov.

Wii - 360 gap is under 1.8m now.


Missed this earlier. What are the LTD of each at this point?
 
The only thing that would make sense is for Nintendo to take the hit and fund the ports. Theyll lose some money in the short term but it could keep the system on a small form of life support.

Nintendo had a golden ticket.

They could have paid to port gta v and marketed it as the best version.

It was pure idiocy not to.
 

Square2015

Member
Wii U weekly averages, past four months:

May 2013: 8,250 units
June 2013: 8,400 units
July 2013: 7,250 units
August 2013: 7,750 units
compare with Japan:

May 2013: 6,000
June 2013: 5,210
July 2013: 13,780 [Pikmin3 & WiiU white effect]
August 2013: 8,380

data=famitsu

I believe its first real opportunity to correct this rut is this holiday season. After seeing what impact a full month of Pikmin 3 had on the system, I'm not optimistic at all that the $50 "price cut" / Wind Waker HD / Wii Party U will do anything significant.
I was thinking the same thing. Your "minimum" sales estimates from the prediction thread are probably going to be how it plays out through the rest of the year. I'm no longer believing WiiU will even reach 2m LTD by the end of the year.
 

John Harker

Definitely doesn't make things up as he goes along.
If Pikmin 3 sold 115k combined, then it did 10k eShop. That's n-line with their typical ratio id say.

Except for new Luigi, which looks to have done really well on eShop. That's promising
 

Nirolak

Mrgrgr
Next year is definitively interesting, and it depends on what lineup Nintendo will have, but not just that.

For example, first three months will still be influenced by the Holidays momentum (especially January), and given these Holidays should be big, January, February and March will see improvements compared to 2012 and 2013. Just like Q1 2013 was worse than Q1 2012 (especially Jan-Feb) due to the lack of any Holiday momentum.

About the lineup, this is what we know for US so far

Yoshi's New Island
Bravely Default
Super Smash Bros. for 3DS
Mario Golf: World Tour
Professor Layton and the Azran Legacy
Professor Layton v.s. Ace Attorney

It's obviously incomplete. However, we have already a massive seller (Smash Bros.), one mid-high level (Yoshi) and one mid level (Mario Golf) seller, as well as possible mid-low sellers. I can see Bravely Default, due to Nintendo pushing it, doing nice numbers since 3DS is a good place for Japanese-stylised games, both first and third party.

Nintendo could also push even more bundles, even more software promotions (like the European "So many games!" and the American Fire Emblem x Shin Megami Tensei one), and, why not, a little price drop for all the models at the end of the Summer.

To me what's most interesting is that most of their big hitters are out or at least have had one entry (Animal Crossing, 3D Mario, Pokemon, 2D Mario, Mario Kart, Zelda, Mario & Luigi, Mario Party, Kingdom Hearts) along with their former big hitters (Brain Age, Nintendogs), so seeing how it performs in a year that potentially doesn't have much to draw a known audience and is unlikely to have a price cut will be interesting.

Basically it's the "how well can this sustain after all their big franchises have come out" year.

Only if this "successor" could be released for $99 like the GBA, and also had lower software prices. Releasing higher priced handheld consoles at this point seems foolish. The Wii U has shown what an unappealing transition can do to them. The 3DS' third party support also seems fairly weak compared to their past portables recently, so, even in the portable arena, they probably need to get ready to support the system by themselves next time.

Ideally the new system would rethink the handheld ground up for the current market.
 
geez 3ds sales are really trashing wii u. makes me wonder how it would have fared if luigis mansion 2 was a wii u game instead, for example
 

Frodo

Member
If Pikmin 3 sold 115k combined, then it did 10k eShop. That's n-line with their typical ratio id say.

Except for new Luigi, which looks to have done really well on eShop. That's promising

That is really interesting. I wish Nintendo would release the eShop numbers, but having a rough estimate is good enough, I guess.
 

Mpl90

Two copies sold? That's not a bomb guys, stop trolling!!!
Only if this "successor" could be released for $99 like the GBA, and also had lower software prices. Releasing higher priced handheld consoles at this point seems foolish. The Wii U has shown what an unappealing transition can do to them. The 3DS' third party support also seems fairly weak compared to their past portables recently, so, even in the portable arena, they probably need to get ready to support the system by themselves next time.

Capcom, Level 5, Atlus, Square thanks to the recent announcements, Namco, even GungHo say "Nope".
 

Square2015

Member
For those who keep saying WW debuted around 300k...
Here's what Mar-2003 looked like:
  1. GC Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker $50 Nintendo 826,000 / NEW
  2. GBA Pokemon Ruby $30 Nintendo 653,000 / NEW
  3. GBA Pokemon Sapphire $30 Nintendo 585,000 / NEW
  4. PS2 Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven $49 Activision 164,000 / NEW
  5. PS2 The Getaway $40 Sony 140,000 / 700,000
  6. PS2 Def Jam Vendetta $50 EA 135,000 / NEW
  7. PS2 Grand Theft Auto: Vice City $50 Rockstar 132,000 / 4,990,000
  8. PS2 Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht $50 Namco 123,000 / 232,000
  9. PS2 Yu-Gi-Oh! Duelists of The Roses $49 Konami 118,000 / 265,000
  10. PS2 MVP Baseball 2003 $50 EA 114,000 / NEW
 

NeonZ

Member
Capcom, Level 5, Atlus, Square thanks to the recent announcements, Namco, even GungHo say "Nope".

Square... ok. The last month has really changed the outlook for the future in the platform. Atlus is there and I love their games, but come on, they don't really have much weight overall, and their biggest sub series never hit Nintendo consoles or portables. Atlus' future itself right now seems rather cloudy too since there aren't any news about its new owner. They have the Etrian Odyssey remake localization announced, and then Devil Survivor 2 update/sequel releasing in Japan, but still not announced for the West.

Isn't the only Capcom game announced right now Phoenix Wright? They supported the system well in the past, but it doesn't look like there's much in the future. Level 5 is there, but their franchises are weakened compared to last gen. Namco and GungHo? Am I missing something here? What are their recent/upcoming titles?
 

kswiston

Member
Capcom, Level 5, Atlus, Square thanks to the recent announcements, Namco, even GungHo say "Nope".

That's good for Japan, but none of that really matters in the west. Pretty much everything from the parties listed above will do <200k in the US (most under 100k). The market for niche Japanese games is already on the 3DS.
 

ShadiWulf

Member
Does anyone know the sales for Hatsune Miku Project Diva F? I realize the game released near the end of August and only had a few days to be counted. Curious to see what it sold in those few days though.
 

Busaiku

Member
That's good for Japan, but none of that really matters in the west. Pretty much everything from the parties listed above will do <200k in the US (most under 100k). The market for niche Japanese games is already on the 3DS.
If you look at most DS 3rd party successes, you'll notice they wouldn't have been successful without Japan.
You have stuff like Cooking Mama, but outside of that 3rd party successes (of that magnitude) were largely as such because of Japan.
 

Mpl90

Two copies sold? That's not a bomb guys, stop trolling!!!
That's good for Japan, but none of that really matters in the west. Pretty much everything from the parties listed above will do <200k in the US (most under 100k). The market for niche Japanese games is already on the 3DS.

I thought this was a general outlook on 3DS third party support, West + Japan, not just West.

DS didn't even get such a big support from Western third parties, either (aside from all the multi releases, and most of them are on 3DS too, especially children-oriented ones). The only "big" exclusive Western titles released on DS I can think of are Scribblenauts, Super Scribblenauts, Guitar Hero: On Tour and GTA, as well as Plants vs. Zombies (almost 1 millions sold in US). On 3DS? We have two Scribblenauts already (but not exclusive), Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion, Angry Birds Trilogy.
 
So if we aggregate responses from Creamsugar / other insiders / other data I've collected:

1) Madden NFL 25 (360, PS3): >1 million - <1.15 million
2) Saints Row IV (360, PS3, PC): <450,000 (360 = 68%)
3) Disney Infinity (360, Wii, PS3, NWU, 3DS): ~294,000 (WII = 25.2%, WIU = 16.3%)
4) Splinter Cell: Blacklist (360, PS3, NWU, PC): <294,000 (360 = 70%, WIU = 1.6%)
5) Minecraft (360)
6) Mario & Luigi: Dream Team (3DS): ~173,000 (17,000 digital, 190,000 total)
7) NCAA Football 14 (360, PS3)
8) Payday 2 (360, PS3)
9) Final Fantasy XIV Online (PS3, PC) (PS3 = <100,000, PC = <100,000)
10) Pikmin 3 (NWU): <110,000 (115,000 retail + digital)
XX) Tales of Xillia (PS3): >100,000
 

donny2112

Member
For predictions, just need a better 3DS number than "> 130K." :) Can anyone say if it's like < 135K or if it's still higher than that?
 

kswiston

Member
I thought this was a general outlook on 3DS third party support, West + Japan, not just West.

DS didn't even get such a big support from Western third parties, either (aside from all the multi releases, and most of them are on 3DS too, especially children-oriented ones). The only "big" exclusive Western titles released on DS I can think of are Scribblenauts, Super Scribblenauts, Guitar Hero: On Tour and GTA, as well as Plants vs. Zombies (almost 1 millions sold in US). On 3DS? We have two Scribblenauts already (but not exclusive), Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion, Angry Birds Trilogy.

I get the general impression that western licensed games (Cars, Toy Story, the Lego games, etc) plus the sort of games that GAF views as shovelware did better on the NDS than the 3DS in the west. There definitely seems to be less of that on the 3DS than there was on the DS, and I wouldn't be surprised if that is contributing to some of the overall difference we are seeing in software sales between the DS and 3DS.
 
2DS still has the problem of $40 games competing with $1-5 iOS/Android apps. Pokemon will boost sales for awhile, but Nintendo has released the majority of its heavy hitters already. If we were going to see DS like sales, we would have by now. DS was seeing 400k+ months before Pokemon launched in April 2007.

EDIT: 3DS should really have a Nintendo Selects line by this point. Starfox 3D, OOT 3D, Kid Icarus and their other early 3DS titles should all carry MSRP of $19.99.

Nintendo wants people to buy their new full price games. They may introduce the Selects line once the releases slow down, due to the shift to Wii U development. I'm thinking late 2014 at the earliest.
 
For those who keep saying WW debuted around 300k...
Here's what Mar-2003 looked like:
  1. GC Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker $50 Nintendo 826,000 / NEW

I though that sounded low, but I don't have any 2003 data. As of January 2005, though, it had done 1.75m in the US, which seemed a bit high from a 300k start, even with Nintendo legs.

Thank you!

...Man, WW HD is not going to touch that. Nor is the Wii U going to approach Gamecube holiday 2002, and it didn't have a great holiday season that year.
 

John Harker

Definitely doesn't make things up as he goes along.
Not surprising, given that it came out first and was $10 cheaper digitally (if you already owned NSMBWiiU).

Surprising to me given the traffic and performance if your average eShop title, and comparatively how little NSMBU did digitally, but I think this was a big test for nintendo on pricing structure and meant as a driver to get their consumers used to using eShop. Seems like a success to me! Looks like the early eShop release of Wind Waker is also them raising awareness of the platform. It be great if they release those numbers too.

It's ultimately great for indies, the more Nintendo does these things to educate their consumers on the ease of use and benefits of eShop, the easier it will be for indies to convert these users to their titles, which often are heavily NIntendo-nostalgia targeted. They just need to get more people comfortable with the service, and it looks like tactics like this are affective.
 
Does sony ever participate in this?
Sony participates when their numbers aren't shite.

They do their own custom separate PR when they feel the numbers are positive. Like the black friday numbers PR last year.

About a week and a half of a price cut, and it looks like the lowest ever month for PS3 in its history.

Not good all around/ New consoles just around the corner would explain it.
 

FrankT

Member
Wii: 41.19m
360: 39.41m

Thanks. Christmas should push it past the 40M mark. Hard to say with the new gen if it will make up the gap year end. How did the PS2 do the year of the PS3 launch? Hard to put any historical perspective on how the HD twins will do this fall imo.

Drop it to $149 MS.
 

Miles X

Member
Thanks. Christmas should push it past the 40M mark. Hard to say with the new gen if it will make up the gap year end. How did the PS2 do the year of the PS3 launch? Hard to put any historical perspective on how the HD twins will do this fall imo.

Drop it to $149 MS.

It will pass 40 mill in November, 100%, expect 150k in September and about the same for October, two relatively high months of the year for 360 normally.

Nov and Dec I would expect anywhere from 700k - 1.1m each.
 

FrankT

Member
Will be interesting to see how X1 will do in 8 years. My guess is something like 30M or so. Could be more, but just a guess at this point. I think it will fare much better than the original, maybe not so high as 360.

The market handled 3 this gen pretty well, but for now with what I see at this point as two.....it will be interesting if Nintendo cannot compete and if 2 can match what the 3 have done this gen. I have my doubts.
 

ascii42

Member
Thanks. Christmas should push it past the 40M mark. Hard to say with the new gen if it will make up the gap year end. How did the PS2 do the year of the PS3 launch? Hard to put any historical perspective on how the HD twins will do this fall imo.

Drop it to $149 MS.
The PS2 was selling far better than the 360 is now the year the PS3 came out, but it was only in its 6th year on the market, not 8th. The PS2 also continued to outsell both the 360 and PS3 for most of 2007. But again, it was by a significant margin the cheapest console available and was younger as well.
 

Myshkin

Member
Florida report. Small metropolitan area.

Walmart. No real change. 360 still has unusually large presence compared to earlier times, larger than any other, 3 display panels. 3DS down to 1.0 panels. No advertising seen for new machines yet. Did not check layaway area though.

Best Buy. No new machine advertising seen anywhere. Big display for Madden.
 

Nirolak

Mrgrgr
I just read 3DS SW sales are 30% higher in 2013 compared to last year, is that true?
I wouldn't be surprised looking at the list of software sales.

I'm not sure the 3DS even had half as many notable titles in the first half of last year.

They did pretty well setting up this year's line-up.
 
For those who keep saying WW debuted around 300k...
Here's what Mar-2003 looked like:
  1. GC Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker $50 Nintendo 826,000 / NEW
  2. GBA Pokemon Ruby $30 Nintendo 653,000 / NEW
  3. GBA Pokemon Sapphire $30 Nintendo 585,000 / NEW
  4. PS2 Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven $49 Activision 164,000 / NEW
  5. PS2 The Getaway $40 Sony 140,000 / 700,000
  6. PS2 Def Jam Vendetta $50 EA 135,000 / NEW
  7. PS2 Grand Theft Auto: Vice City $50 Rockstar 132,000 / 4,990,000
  8. PS2 Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht $50 Namco 123,000 / 232,000
  9. PS2 Yu-Gi-Oh! Duelists of The Roses $49 Konami 118,000 / 265,000
  10. PS2 MVP Baseball 2003 $50 EA 114,000 / NEW
Just wanting to say I wasn't trying to downplay TWW's sales with my "Over 300k", I just couldn't remember how high it actually went and went with a conservatively low number that I was certain that it surpassed.
 
Anecdotal but I didn't even see the Wii U version of Splinter Cell even being sold in most stores. I knew the sales were going to be pretty bad when the damn thing wasn't even available.
 
Anecdotal but I didn't even see the Wii U version of Splinter Cell even being sold in most stores. I knew the sales were going to be pretty bad when the damn thing wasn't even available.

I heard the same thing on Miiverse. Either the local Gamestop had 1 or 2 copies, or they had none at all.

I guess stores order quantities based on general interest/pre-orders? Or is it a case of Ubisoft shipping a small quantity based on expectations? I'm always curious how this works.
 

Lumyst

Member
Anecdotal but I didn't even see the Wii U version of Splinter Cell even being sold in most stores. I knew the sales were going to be pretty bad when the damn thing wasn't even available.

Yeah, at my local Walmart I checked for Splinter Cell just for fun, the Wii and WiiU software share a single case, half for Wii and half for WiiU. Pikmin was the only newer game I saw at the time. There were only 1 copy of each WiiU game also, and the WiiU only had one console under the counter. . .

As for the Vita, I didn't see it at all. I do wonder how the coming months will fare for the WiiU concerning shelf space. Will they stock enough of the upcoming games, Mario, Wii Party, Donkey Kong, Wii Fit, Sonic, etc. for it to be noticeable? Will there even be room to do that? Will they even have any interest in doing the work to revive the WiiU when the other two consoles are coming out and are clearly desirable? (Is it even Walmart's job to help revive the WiiU, shouldn't the product be desirable in the first place?)
 

Game Guru

Member
2DS still has the problem of $40 games competing with $1-5 iOS/Android apps. Pokemon will boost sales for awhile, but Nintendo has released the majority of its heavy hitters already. If we were going to see DS like sales, we would have by now. DS was seeing 400k+ months before Pokemon launched in April 2007.

No one is ever going to be able to outdo the smartphones in sheer quantity of game sales. You cannot beat the number of sales of a ubiquitous device with $1-$5 games like Apple and Samsung smartphones with a more inclusive device with $40 games. However, what Nintendo can do is gain a niche that makes them more profit than the mobile gaming industry. They may get less userbase because they've lost the people who want cheap entertainment, but if they still make money hand over fist, does having a larger userbase really matter?
 
Yeah, at my local Walmart I checked for Splinter Cell just for fun, the Wii and WiiU software share a single case, half for Wii and half for WiiU. Pikmin was the only newer game I saw at the time. There were only 1 copy of each WiiU game also, and the WiiU only had one console under the counter. . .

As for the Vita, I didn't see it at all. I do wonder how the coming months will fare for the WiiU concerning shelf space. Will they stock enough of the upcoming games, Mario, Wii Party, Donkey Kong, Wii Fit, Sonic, etc. for it to be noticeable? Will there even be room to do that? Will they even have any interest in doing the work to revive the WiiU when the other two consoles are coming out and are clearly desirable? (Is it even Walmart's job to help revive the WiiU, shouldn't the product be desirable in the first place?)

Out of all the game stores I've visited in the past few months (in multiple states), Vita physical retail is dead. Completely and utterly dead.

At one Wal-Mart I visited a few weeks ago, there was literally four Vita games. They were lumped in with some discount PSP games and put in the "PlayStation" section.
 

Lumyst

Member
Out of all the game stores I've visited in the past few months (in multiple states), Vita physical retail is dead. Completely and utterly dead.

It can still be easily purchased through Amazon.com, can't say that about the WiiU :-/ I once wondered if Nintendo of America was okay with shunning Amazon so that they could have better relationships with B&M stores like Walmart, but apparently that doesn't have anything to do with that.

3DS is fine though, lots of space at my local Walmart :) So it's all about business and making money, selling what's popular, it's not their job to make a product popular.
 

AniHawk

Member
PSP is in beast mode!

It's astonishing that people seem to think that the 3DS is a sales star. Just shows how much things have changed.

i remember when the ps3 was seen as a failure when it was moving 200k a month just because it wasn't doing the 300k the 360 was or the 500k the wii was, when in the ps2 years, 200k in a month would have been a perfectly fine one for the xbox or ps2.

now is an extreme reverse. 130k for the lead system isn't good. under 100k for the lead console is even worse.
 
Investor reaction to this NPD data:


EA, GameStop rally following favorable NPD data

  • NPD estimates U.S. physical retail video game sales rose 21% Y/Y, reversing July's 19% decline as new titles stoked demand ahead of this fall's console refreshes. Games launched in August accounted for over half of all sales, and their high price tags resulted in ASPs rising 25%.
  • GameStop (GME +5%) investors are pleased with the numbers. So are Electronic Arts (EA +2.7%), and Take-Two (TTWO +3%) investors; while still important, NPD's figures matter a little less than they used to for game developers, thanks to a shift towards digital revenue streams.
  • Not surprisingly, hardware sales fell 40% Y/Y (worse than July's 34% drop), as gamers wait for the chance to buy a PS4 or Xbox One. Sales of accessories, including Skylanders (ATVI +0.6%) toys, rose 7% after falling 3% in July. Nintendo's (NTDOY.PK) 3DS was the best-selling console; 6.47M units of the handheld console have been sold in the U.S. in 2013.
  • Though its first-week sales disappointed, EA's Madden NFL 25 was the month's best-selling title. Take-Two's anticipated Grand Theft Auto V launches on Tuesday.
  • Analysts expect GTA V to pull in $1B+ in sales in Take-Two's FY14 (ends March '14). Pac Crest downgraded Take-Two earlier this week, arguing (among other things) the company has an "empty pipeline" and that there's "potential for changes" in Take-Two's relationship with GTA franchise developer Rockstar Games.
(Credit: Seeking Alpha)
 

Tripon

Member
Investor reaction to this NPD data:


EA, GameStop rally following favorable NPD data

  • NPD estimates U.S. physical retail video game sales rose 21% Y/Y, reversing July's 19% decline as new titles stoked demand ahead of this fall's console refreshes. Games launched in August accounted for over half of all sales, and their high price tags resulted in ASPs rising 25%.
  • GameStop (GME +5%) investors are pleased with the numbers. So are Electronic Arts (EA +2.7%), and Take-Two (TTWO +3%) investors; while still important, NPD's figures matter a little less than they used to for game developers, thanks to a shift towards digital revenue streams.
  • Not surprisingly, hardware sales fell 40% Y/Y (worse than July's 34% drop), as gamers wait for the chance to buy a PS4 or Xbox One. Sales of accessories, including Skylanders (ATVI +0.6%) toys, rose 7% after falling 3% in July. Nintendo's (NTDOY.PK) 3DS was the best-selling console; 6.47M units of the handheld console have been sold in the U.S. in 2013.
  • Though its first-week sales disappointed, EA's Madden NFL 25 was the month's best-selling title. Take-Two's anticipated Grand Theft Auto V launches on Tuesday.
  • Analysts expect GTA V to pull in $1B+ in sales in Take-Two's FY14 (ends March '14). Pac Crest downgraded Take-Two earlier this week, arguing (among other things) the company has an "empty pipeline" and that there's "potential for changes" in Take-Two's relationship with GTA franchise developer Rockstar Games.
(Credit: Seeking Alpha)

Wait, falling sales of Madden and people barely buying at Gamestop is cause for investors to buy in.

I will never understand what drives people to buy a certain's stock apparently.
 
Wait, falling sales of Madden and people barely buying at Gamestop is cause for investors to buy in.

I will never understand what drives people to buy a certain's stock apparently.

gta, fifa sept
pokemon, ass creed oct
2 console launches nov

also this years sales have been so bad up to now that npd's next year will probably look positive in comparison even if xbox and ps4 aren't doing so great relative to other system early life.

should have bought a few months ago when all that ms drm stuff was in full swing :p
 
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