It varies district to district but ps4 is around 3 weeks which based on counts seems pretty normal. 3 months is very very excessive especially for a discontinued sku
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Microsoft FY2015 Q2: 6.6M 360+XBO Shipped
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It varies district to district but ps4 is around 3 weeks which based on counts seems pretty normal. 3 months is very very excessive especially for a discontinued sku
Makes sense. It's fairly obvious to everyone that MS sold in a lot more than they needed to.
This extended $349 sale goes some way towards proving that.
~4 weeks. Give or take.
As Johnny said it was 1-3 months in for X1 in some areas. 3 Months is very high and 1 month is ok, but could be lower coming out of a holiday season.
RespectThySole
Member
It's a large retailer but dont want the hounds on me
Do you have a previous frame of reference for the XB1? How was supply this time last year?
serversurfer
Member
Again, my point is that none of them are right, because they're all just estimates. The NPD and GfK estimates you're looking at were all made fairly recently, as were the sell-through estimates made by Sony. Sony's shipments aren't an estimate, because they can actually count those themselves, and are on the hook for making accurate counts. The point is, even if the estimate made by MS was just as accurate as the estimates being made by others today, you're still taking a comparatively small sample that by nature contains some amount of inaccuracy, and then making a significant extrapolation from it, which only serves to magnify any inaccuracy originally present. By comparison, the continual estimates provided by NPD and Sony only serve to correct for any errors they made originally. Do you understand the difference?
We're not saying that Microsoft's claim can't be believed. We're saying that using the six-week 3M figure to determine minimum sell through after 58 weeks is just as pointless as trying to do the same with Sony's 4.2M figure. The difference is, we don't need to do that with Sony because they gave us a recent estimate, which seems fairly reasonable, if likely not 100% accurate. All estimates are inherently flawed to some degree, but do you seriously not see the difference between a new estimate and a projection based on an old estimate?
Unfortunately I do not. Kicking myself for not checking last year. I do have a reference for next year though.
MS also said they were pulling units from their Q1 shipment to meet demand but it turned out that demand wasn't really there and they ended up shipping 3.9 million and only selling 3 million. I think they sold 3 million but that first day number was completely bogus a press release before 24 hrs had even passed? They were simply assuming a sellout but we know there were day 1 editions available at retail for months.
So then why are we even discussing this.
If you can't believe official figures from either Sony or Microsoft at this point.
Yes... I get your point that its 100% impossible to get a 100% accurate sell through number in regards to both consoles.
But Sony said over 18.5m and Microsoft said over 3.0m.
I and everyone else have no reason to doubt these official numbers.
But apparently you do.....
Final Verdict
Member
PS2 dominated on a much larger scale than PS1, even though PS1 did outperform the others significantly...
But it will lead to higher prices across the board since there is not competition, and can also lead to silly restrictions...
Also, you can't pretend that Sony would never do any anticonsumer moves or policies. They are a business just like the other two, and all it takes is one bad leader to skrew everything up.
The beauty of a competitive market is that when (not if) a company starts making anti consumer policies, people can choose the one that is not making those mistakes, and thereby force the other company to change in order to try and get business back.
"necessity is the mother of invention". What creates necessity? Competition.
This is not to say progress can not be made without competition, just that when there is not much need to innovate to get peoples attention and say "hey, look over here", then you will be less motivated to bring about that progress.
What is stopping companies like Amazon, Goodle, or Facebook is the fact that the console market is incredibly tricky to get right, and cost a fortune to start up and compete in.....
You have the cost of making a console HW to start with...and contracting manufacturers and chip makers...then you have to give people a reason to play your new machine over the other ones....
This usually requires either an outstanding innovation, or a game that is SO GOOD that it is worth the console alone. Not to mention the difficulty of writing all the software for a new console, and creating an online network, and getting app partners on board, and 3rd party developers on board, and either buying out, or starting from the ground up you own 1st party stable of AAA developers to make exclusive games for you platform, and that is all done before you even begin to think about how much advertising money you are going to need to spend to sell the thing, and get some brand name recognition.
Then you have to worry about trying to compete against the other already well established brands, and just imagining trying to launch a all new brand name console against a single giant who already has an established monopoly on the market...
So yeah....If you think about it, MS is the most recent company to do this successfully more than a deckaid ago, and the only reason they were even remotely successful was because of a little game called Halo, and even then, their first console only managed to secure about 12% of the console market while costing them a fortune!!
--Also like I said earlier, you don't know that Sony, or Nintendo, or especially Xbox would be able to hold a monopoly without making any anti-consumer moves. Too much Power leads to corruption. Sure, dominating for a while isn't bad, it shows a company that what they are doing is working -- rewards them for making good decisions, but a monopoly is a whole other deal, and that's all I have to say on that.
So you blame mid-tier development solely on the lack of a singe dominant platform, and not on the skyrocketing cost for game development that occurred between 6th-7th gen?
Or how about blaming it on the changing taste of consumers?
Have also considered that it was last gen that we saw the rise of small independent developers on consoles?
Really? I mean that makes sense as you have to have extra people to make a game on multiple platforms at once, but just how many extra people are required? Are a few extra programmers and debuggers causing the big increase in Video Game development? Or is it the ever increasing demands of consumers for games with better graphics and more depth? I mean think about it, even first party teams can be huge!
343i had around 343 developers working there at the end of Halo 4 development and they may have even more now for Halo 5...it is just one singe platform.
Same deal with ND which has a ton of developers at the studio (not sure on the exact number).
Team sizes have much more to do with the increasing complexity of games and the increasing demand for more graphical fidelity. And just to prove my point, there are a lot of very small indy studios that release their games on multiple platforms, so multiple platforms do not require a huge team, its really just some extra programming/optimizing and bug testing, not something that is going to require huge teams.
Teams were smaller back in the PS2 days because the graphics and complexity of the games were much lower.
.
Final Verdict
Member
It's a large retailer but dont want the hounds on me
Darn, that isn't much to go on, but I understand you wanting to keep your specifics secret.......
Can you at least say if you are US or not though?
If you say that I was clear then I'm beginning to think that you deliberately misrepresent what I wrote.
I have nothing which casts doubt on PS4 selling 6.5M in 100 countries since launch.
I have three issues with Microsoft selling 600K in 9 countries in 2013, all not adequately explained so far, none of which apply to Sony's number.
1. What is the effect of Tier 2 grey imports on that number?
2. 600K in 9 countries. We know Spain is 35K of that. Therefore, remaining 8 countries must double Spain's numbers on average. Which countries are capable of doing so? Certainly not all 8.
3. Two months before, they released numbers which could not possibly have been based off GfK/NPD. It must have been some kind of internal tracking. What part of these new numbers is GfK/NPD (reliable) and what part is internal tracking (maybe less reliable)?
We can look at the size of the [thread=790226]video games retail market in Spain[/thread]. Then we can do the same for Australia and conclude that maybe, Australia is not twice as big as Spain in video games. But maybe they sold relatively more XB1's to make up for the difference? Italy is another such candidate, [thread=849455]doesn't look good there either[/thread]. Austria? Ireland? [post=118144646]Don't even chart[/post] in video game statistics. This is why I have a hard time believing that the remaining Tier 1 countries double Spain's sales on average.
The Artisan
Member
Okay, now it is a little more believable.
Final Verdict
Member
Ok, thanks.
And yeah, I can't say I'm surprised.
I saw quite a few AC bundles at BB the other day...
serversurfer
Member
Sorry, but I'm starting to get the feeling that rather than have a discussion, you're just here to make pronouncements, and having done that, your primary goal is now to attempt to discredit me before I'm able to call your pronouncements in to question, since you seem completely unwilling to discuss anything else, after having said yourself you don't understand why corporate honesty and my assessment thereof keeps being brought up. I have explained to you precisely why I take issue regarding your estimates built on estimates, and all you seem able to do now in response is chant, "But you're a crazy fanboy who wants to look at irrelevant stuff like current stock levels."
Anyway, Verdict, I'm headed out, but I'll get back to you later.
Haha you have an incredible talent of cherry picking.
http://m.neogaf.com/showpost.php?p=150112277
I still can't believe we are on this
Microsoft sold through more than 3m units worldwide before the end of CY2013. Fact.
If you guys wont accept that then we can't have a discussion about anything else.
I have expressed no doubt that this statement was made in good faith.
So you finally agree they sold through 3 million?
I never said that 3 million is impossible. I agree that Microsoft fully believed in having sold-through 3 million:
I just said that there are issues which introduce uncertainty and it is difficult, though not impossible, to reconcile this number with other numbers which we know of. If the issues are real, then Microsoft possibly overtracked their sell-through.
I just said that there are issues which introduce uncertainty and it is difficult, though not impossible, to reconcile this number with other numbers which we know of. If the issues are real, then Microsoft possibly overtracked their sell-through.
I see what you did there
The unity bundle is pretty much the only thing they shipped before Black Friday....normally these bundles are gone after the holidays like the Xbox 360 call of duty holiday one but it's still at the stores just in small numbersBut you have zero evidence to make this claim. Thats really the point I've been trying to make.
The "evidence" you have can all be said about the PS4 as well. You say we can't prove 600k sell through for x1 in 9.tier one markets. Yet we also can't prove that Sony sold through 7m or whatever the number is in 100 total markets or whatever.
I'd rather believe Sony and Microsoft's official numbers than your hunch that 3m is too high... who's to say that Sony's 18.5m is too low? Should we start doubting Sony's numbers now? After all I thought they could have reached 20m. Therefore im going to say that sony must be lying to us because they must have sold much more as they were in loads more markets and every report says they're selling out.
(Just for the record. Im kidding about Sony being too high, im just trying to show how ridiculous your claim of Microsoft must be lower than 3m is)
No one has ever bought up this argument before, because honestly its just a stupid argument that makes you both look like fanboys. Sorry to say. As i've said before, if you still can't trust Microsoft's numbers it means you're questioning NPD, GFK, MC, Sony & Nintendo's numbers. Yet you guys maintain that Sony's number is believable and correct yet MS is the only company that is potentially lying to us and wrong in regards to their actual sell through.
Does anyone else see the failed logic here?
Yeah, I'm Malaysian.
Dude, the point is when the brand is much stronger than the competitor, a price cut wouldn't make much of a difference when there wasn't much of an interest to begin with. In Asia and Europe, Playstation is by far the more popular brand and you can see the PS4 outsells the X1 by a huge margin in most European countries. Hell, Germam retailers even cut the price to get rid of the excessive stock and sales weren't affected much. So tell me, how can price be the factor in sales in ROTW? And IIRC, that 1 million figure came from the UAE.
The Artisan
Member
word. I had a cousin that was in Malaysia for like 2 or 3 years, doing his masters. You from KL?
I do not doubt that the PlayStation brand is generally the strongest in gaming worldwide. But seeing as how Ps4 was winning for so long last year and had its lead reduced to a margin in 2 months from price cuts, it makes me think that a similar effect could've been achieved to a certain extent in some other regions. Futhermore, the Ps4 is available in more regions than the xbone is isn't it? Meaning that in some regions the Ps4 is the only console available to consumers for purchase?
Approaching 1m sold through statement applies to GCC countries.
And yes, rotw is lost to Xbox. PS4 is selling through loads more in every market and it will be no surprise that even a price cut for Xbox one wont make much difference at all. PS4 will continue to outsell the Xbox One in a very significant number of markets, even if the price is higher. Just look at the PS3 as an example of that.
Developing markets like the middle east and Asia are very much sony land.
@artisan, come on mate. I know you say you're naive yourself but we know that xb1 only closed the gap slightly in the USA where as worldwide the PS4 widened the gap by far.
No, man, I'm from Ipoh
Anyway, yeah, the PS4 is available in more regions but those regions don't contribute too much to total sales. Granted, when combined, they may make up a significant percentage but the point is Microsoft hasn't launched in those regions because the XBox brand was never popular there.
The Artisan
Member
No, man, I'm from Ipoh
Anyway, yeah, the PS4 is available in more regions but those regions don't contribute too much to total sales. Granted, when combined, they may make up a significant percentage but the point is Microsoft hasn't launched in those regions because the XBox brand was never popular there.
word man. I knew this cute chick from subang jaya. she's like some sort of keyboardist, record producer over there now or something.
well then it's their own fault they're behind (in that respect anyway, yes even if they released the xbone there the Ps4 would've still been kicking its ass BUT, the xbone's ww total sales could've been higher) and we really can't be sure if the $50 price cut wouldn't have affected the Ps4-centric regions at all. Maybe it wouldn't help to outsell, but it could've provided a significant boost. It could've stopped the gap from widening (it is widening everyday, yeah?), and instead maintained it. At least until, if/when Sony does its first price cut.
No, it cannot.
Sony waited until they had at least the chance to look at NPD/GfK data before publishing day 1 numbers.
Also Sony had not as many grey imports by retailers (simply because PS4 was sold out everywhere).
Sure, I will not stop you from doing so.
Akin to Dan Barker's "Easter Challenge", maybe I can motivate you (or anybody else who thinks that 3M is an undisputable fact) to fill in the below missing numbers in a way you think is reasonable. Can be re-ordered and totally made up by you, just not contradicting anything we know. Because I honestly can't with numbers that I am comfortable with.
Code:
Xbox One 2013 sales (guess):
1. US 1817k
2. UK 364k
3. France 126k
4. Germany 100k
5. Canada ?
6. Australia ?
7. Brazil ?
8. Mexico ?
9. Italy ?
10. Spain 35k
11. Austria ?
12. New Zealand ?
13. Ireland ?
-----------------
Total: >3000kMy "comfort zone" is: Canada/Australia/Brazil/Mexico below Germany
Italy: [post=119536781]below 60k[/post]
Austria/New Zealand/Ireland: below [thread=790226]Spain[/thread].
If you step outside that zone, or if you think I made and error here, I would appreciate if you explain your reasons why.
What I do know is that shipped units do not magically materialize in stores to become sold through, and that unless MS was severly supplied constrained they wouldn't have air shipped units.
It's all about basic logic.
Final Verdict
Member
Ok, but I'm warning you, I can be a bit stubborn when it comes to opinions
Anyways, you and ZhugeEX aren't getting anywhere in this arguing over numbers.
I think he knows that Microsoft's numbers are estimates (as are all sales numbers from official sources), but it is all we have to go on, and if we can't use those numbers to make our own predictions/estimates, then there would be nothing to talk about.
So yeah maybe it would be best to agree to disagree about those sold through numbers...?
...One thing that you should be able to agree on for sure are the shipped numbers as MS should know for certain how much they shipped, and would not dare lie to investors.
Even if one thinks that the numbers are potentially inaccurate to a certain degree, they are far from being complete hogwash and can still be used as basis for discussion. Just caution needs to be exercised, especially when extrapolating from them.
Final Verdict
Member
Exactly!
The numbers (like 18.5M PS4's sold through) are very accurate estimates.
I don't know know why you can't extrapolate from them though? All sales analyst use official estimations to extrapolate and make projections.
The extrapolations focus more on trends rather than exact numbers.
For example, the PS4 sold ~13.5M units this year, so if sales increase by the standard ~20% next year, then they should sell ~16M units next year.
....the job of the projection is not to be exact, it is just to give us an idea of how well we can expect the consoles to perform, and maybe take a stab at guessing Lifetime sales.
For example, if both the X1, and PS4 follow a similar sales trend as last gen, and have a 7 year cycle, then lifetime sales would be ~60m and ~130m towards the end of the generation (2020).
It's not going to be accurate obviously, but it would be useful to companies looking to see where to invest the most into for the development of a game, or to figure out who would be the best to market with. (for example, if they show thier game a Sony's E3 show, they may get more exposure to gamers as PS4 has a larger userbase, and the trend indicates that the gap will continue to grow.)
IndoAssassin
Banned
Well if they stuffed the channels like that, I can see some $329, maybe even $299 limited deals on X1 AC Unity bundles to try and offset any sales boost the PS4 gets from The Order and Bloodborne over the next few months and sell off all of these Sku to pave the way for a new one.
I don't see any basis for them expanding their lead in the US/UK. MS will try to use price to keep the race close. They can afford it more than Sony. The question remains, how well Nov/Dec will predict the future. Is price the primary mover here? I suspect it's a large part of the equation, but how many of those who purchased XB1's were actually just waiting for a price drop on the XB1 and had no intention of buying a PS4? I don't think anyone can say right now.
serversurfer
Member
PS1 significantly outperformed any console that had ever come before it. If success was going to go to their heads, there's no reason to think the PS1's success wouldn't have triggered it.
PS2 made it down to $99. This, with no significant competition, and in no small part because they built so damned many of them. AFAICT, the idea that Sony need someone nipping at their heels to keep hardware prices low is a complete fabrication. Sony's goal is to offer the best product they can at a reasonable price. In the case of SCE, that product is video games, and the hardware is what allows you to be a potential customer at all. Therefore, it's in their best interest to get the hardware in to as many hands as possible, and the best way to accomplish that is to continue selling it for as close to cost as is reasonable.
Regarding one guy screwing everything up, it's hard for something like that to happen in organizations this size, and it rarely happens without warning. Of course, it's a hell of a lot easier for one guy to screw things up than it is for one guy to make broad changes for the better. It seems weird, but corporations like this do have a company-wide mindset of sorts, homogenized over the decades with selective hiring. Nothing overt like, "Will you help us embezzle pension funds?" It's more natural selection like, "He just doesn't seem to have that winner-take-all attitude we look for," and "She just seems more concerned with cutting corners than pleasing the user." After dozens of years and millions of hires and fires, seemingly inconsequential decisions like that can add up to something tangible.
That's why I was saying that anticompetitive was worse than anti-consumer, because anticompetitive behavior actually prevents anyone else from popping up and offering a better solution. That's why I don't support companies like Microsoft, who use their influence to enforce launch, feature, and content parity clauses to "block developers from taking advantage of other platforms' strengths."
No, necessity is created by unfulfilled need. Competition means anyone is free to offer a solution for fulfilling said need. Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door. Assuming your neighbors haven't surrounded your property with alligator-filled moats, of course.
The threat of the above competition-from-anywhere is what supposed to motivate the market leader to continue innovating, lest they rightfully forfeit their position on top. And no, I don't mean finding innovative ways of fitting more alligators in to a moat.
Hey, I never said dominating the console market would be easy. lol That said, Apple seem well poised to enter the console market at their leisure with a few tweaks to the Apple TV, and they'd come out of the gate with a very cheap product with a vast library of compelling games and applications already written. Toss in a mic for Siri, a pad for gaming, and maybe an optional Magic Trackpad for fine manipulation, and you've got a potential winner right there. Similarly, Amazon and Google wouldn't be far behind with their own TV boxen. If Facebook can make a VR headset, I see no reason they couldn't make a console as well. Valve have been pushing a console-like device, though admittedly that seems to be more of a vague reference design than an actual product.
Sony managed to do all of those thing when they launched the PS1 and took down Nintendo. I happen to think Sony are pretty awesome, but it seems unlikely they are the only ones capable of such a feat, nor do I believe MS are the only ones capable of defeating the mighty Sony. Nintendo beat Sony just last generation after all. As I noted above, there are plenty of viable contenders out there. Perhaps Microsoft's exit will encourage one to try their hand.
lol Well, I'll agree with the especially Microsoft part, but as I explained, Sony have dominated in the past and not displayed such tendencies, so perhaps it wouldn't be prudent to throw our weight behind Microsoft and their parity clauses because of an irrational fear that SCE will suddenly turn in to a bunch of dicks for no reason.
I blame the skyrocketing development costs last generation on the fact that the split market dictated muti-platform support, which in turn increased costs and reduced quality. Increased costs push more games towards make-or-break status, and reduced quality means more games break it than make it. Boom, another mid-size studio closes, and those guys all go get jobs helping make Assassin's Creed so they can keep up the payments on their mortgage.
Indy development is awesome. The advent of self- and digital-publishing has been even more empowering for small developers than the CD was. That said, while indies have helped soothe the loss of mid-tier development, they haven't really replaced it. Mid-tier games actually have a fairly significant budgets, but often appeal to very niche crowds. They're somewhat of a high-risk investment by nature, and the need for muti-platform support makes the investment even less attractive, as described above.
343 is a pretty big team for an exclusive though not ridiculously large, and MS are known for having comparatively large teams as it is. The number of people working on an Uncharted usually doesn't top ~275, for example. But really, you want to make comparisons as like-for-like as possible. If 343 people made Halo 4, find out how many people it took to make Killzone 3, and then compare those numbers to the teams working on Call of Duty and Battlefield. I suspect the latter teams will be significantly larger than the former.
Indy devs often release ports sequentially rather than simultaneously specifically because they don't have the resources to support simultaneous development. When you have one guy doing the art and the other guy doing the engine, hiring a third guy to make the second engine is a pretty significant outlay for someone who's not earning any money yet. Asking the one guy to make both engines simultaneously isn't really any less of a burden, because it will delay the release of both versions meaning that much longer before you start earning and mostly serves to ensure the poor guy doesn't have a very good idea of what's actually going on in either engine and is simply happy they both actually built without too many warnings.
To some extent, sure, but the need to maintain multiple code bases adds an additional layer of complexity on top of whatever the game itself demands. Resources being finite, the "multiplicative" complexity of multi-platform would only discourage devs from adding too many features to the game itself, especially if those complexity-inducing features are likely to be vetoed by the other platform holder when you can't replicate it on their box anyway.
You haven't provided any evidence to support your claim that sales estimates made by Microsoft's marketing team are infallible. The burden of proof is on you, because even the best estimates are assumed to have some margin of error. Even the mighty NPD don't track 100% of sales, so even their reports have some margin of error, no matter how small.
Based on the projections we came up with for XB2 shipments, we actually came up with an estimate for XB3 shipments that you, Welfare, and I all agreed on. Getting three SalesAgers to debate and then agree on a single value is a pretty remarkable feat in and of itself. Everyone was getting along just fine.
Then you said Microsoft's estimate of their launch-month sales proves their 2014 sell through can be no less than 10M. I said that seemed to be a fairly bold claim, and you got super defensive and said that to question your estimate was to question Microsoft themselves. I said that since you brought up both subjects, no, I don't find MS to be particularly trustworthy, but the real point was the 3M figure was just an estimate, and was never claimed to be anything more than that by anyone apart from you. Then you started to slowly lose your shit, becoming less and less interested in discussing anything apart from what a raving fanboy I am. At this point, your responses are little more than ad hominem attacks and strawmen about how merely implying Microsoft's estimates may have a non-zero margin of error is just like calling your sainted mother a dirty liar.
Yes, I built a strawman out of your strawman to illustrate how versatile such constructs can be.
It might be fun to take the 18.5M figure and try to guess what their sell-through may be in four years, but that's not the same as saying their 2014 sales prove their minimum sell-through will be 80M by 2018. I wouldn't make that argument in 2015, and I wouldn't make that argument in 2019. By 2019, Sony likely will have tired of updating us on sell through, so at that point, guessing will be our only option. When that time comes, I'll likely look at their shipments, which I know to be an accurate tally. Then, using a combination of retail reports and previous sales estimates from both Sony and MS, I'll try to get a fairly reasonable estimate of what their then-current stock levels are like. After subtracting, I'll have an equally accurate estimate of their sell through.
Yes, which is why I don't think extrapolations are particularly useful for determining minimum future sales, and they become even less useful the further out you extrapolate from your sample.
Final Verdict
Member
I think Sony knew they still had to come out swinging. A big reason why the PS1 succeeded was because it had a two year advantage (1994) on the N64 (1996), and Nintendo also messed up with the cartridges.
They couldn't take a chance that that would happen twice....and it didn't, but then Nintendo for some reason decided on mini disc for the GC, so yeah...
Seriously??
PS2 reached 99$ in 2009, 9 years after it launched.
By that time, the PS3 was already deemed a failure by Sony who had lost a ton of money on it just to try and keep up with 360 and Wii, so it is not exactly like they had a monopoly on the place...
I'll get back to you on everything else later, I got to go to college :'(
But about the above, firstly, the policy doesn't exactly exist anymore...
Now that Indys can self publish, they have the parity clause which is a highly debatable topic....I personally don't like it, and think that there are better solutions to their problem.
(which is, they don't want small developers neglecting their platform)
Also, about them not letting developers take advantage of platforms strengths, that isn't exactly true....
They demanded content parity for all disc games coming X360 (which really isn't a bad thing)....so in other words they didn't want developers offering an extra level or different aria that would be exclusive to just one platform. It had nothing to do with a 'platforms strengths'....for example, they didn't stop Activision from making the Wii version of Cod with motion controls simply because X360 version didn't have motion controls.
Now that policy is likely gone too as Ubisoft has published games like AC4 and Watchdogs with exclusive playstation missions that will never come to the Xbox version (which I think is bullcrap, but whatever......btw Xbox does it too with Fifa legends mode so I'm not trying to single Sony or Ubisoft out here)
Anyways, if one firm did get a monopoly on the gaming space, they could exercise anti competitive policies on any other companies that try to enter into the gaming space to compete. (on top of anti-consumer moves too)
And No one is immune from doing these kind of things. Sony has done a better job than MS, but they still do it too sometimes....remember recently when they decided that EA access wouldn't be a good value to their consumers and so they banned it from PS4?
Of course you can use them for extrapolation. But if there is some suspected uncertainty in your input data, you have to carefully track that through your calculations to ensure that it is accounted for in the result. E.g. when you use the number to calculate US/non-US sales ratio, and then use that ratio elsewhere to determine WW LTD sales.
We all love to play with the numbers. Those who claim to do it accurately typically charge a premium for their work.
I don't think you understand this. There is no way you can prove using NPD/GFK leaked data that Xbox One sold through 3m.
There is also no way we can prove that PS4 sold through 18.5m.
We cannot prove either of these numbers as we don't have hard data for all regions.
But they came from MS and Sony who use NPD/GFK data to calculate these figures.
So we can't say "well we can't prove MS sold 3m so they HAVE TO BE wrong".
In the same way that we can't say that Sony have to be wrong because we can't prove 18.5m
Do you really not get it?
I don't understand this mentality.
We all agree that Sony sold through 18.5m.....
But according to you, MS can't have sold 3m... the number must be wrong right?
Even now you're saying that we can't trust NPD.....
So who do we trust in regards to sell through. Well if you can't trust NPD then you can't trust anyone at all. There is no point in you saying sell through must be less than 10m because we don't have any reference at all. You can't agree with me and say 8.7m is the minimum because according to you NPD is now wrong and cannot be trusted.
Yes I call you a fanboy because only a fanboy would say crap like this.
Just forget all the predictions and stuff and answer these two questions.
Do you agree that MS sold through 3m as of CY2013?
Do you agree that Sony sold through 18.5m as of CY2014?
I understand what margin error is, and that is always the case with sell through estimates. But we can't categorically say that MS is lying but Sony's number is right like you've been saying. This is exactly why I call you a fanboy. Because you use Sony's numbers to come to a conclusion.... but MS must be wrong no matter what.
No, I never said this. I said we can get to 8.7m using hard data, so you can't doubt this number. Yet you do?
But Sony 18.5m is perfectly ok.... Only MS must be wrong amirite?
Look at the post above, it's your own words. You say Sony have sold through 18.5m and state it like a fact. How come you aren't calling Sony out and saying that the number could be wrong? How come you only call Microsoft out and say their number is hard to believe and that they are wrong. Now you even doubt NPD and GFK in order to support your argument. Again, this is why I now think you're just a fanboy who can't accept anything remotely positive for Microsoft.
I don't even know why I respond to you guys at this point. You say MS must be lying, you say NPD is wrong, you say Sony must be right..... like wtf..... are you serious?
Again, I refer you to aquamarine post on the matter- http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=150112277&postcount=215
It is quite a different thing. The issues which cast doubt on Microsofts numbers (grey imports, day 1 statement, Spain sales) do not cast doubt on Sony.
Stop making stuff up just to support your argument. I never said that 3.0M can't be right.
There are two false dichotomies in your argument here. Let me paraphrase them to make clear how ridiculous they are.
False dichotomy 1: Every number in a PR statement must be taken at face value, or we can never trust anything any company says at all.
False dichotomy 2: Microsoft's numbers in PR statements are 100% correct, or they are liars and guilty of criminally misleading investors.
Then how do you call someone who uses unsound arguments?
Sony's numbers seem reasonable given the other available data.
Microsoft's numbers seem suprisingly high, but not impossibly so, given the other available data. Therefore, caution is to be exercised when arguing with these numbers.
Note that "caution is to be exercised" is not the same as "Microsoft is lying to us". I have pointed to specific circumstances which make it appear possible (not necessarily likely) that Microsoft overtracked their sales.
That is a straw man argument and you know it.
I replied to that post. Your question was already worded in a loaded way that misrepresented our words. Microsoft can have made this statement in good faith, based on internal tracking methods which usually work well, and still arrived at a wrong number in this particular special case.
I've seen a few too many cycles of the assertion that the numbers shouldn't be trusted, followed by some not-too-subtle backtracking when specific evidence is requested, followed by going right back into the same routine. If the numbers are wrong, they'll be corrected, but we don't have reason to doubt them.
Really no reason to doubt that MS somehow knew they sold 1 million consoles in 13 markets in one day despite the day not even being complete. And day one editions of consoles being found on shelves months after launch even in their biggest markets. But hey if you're the boss everyone will just stop debating on your say so.
The issue is that if you're going to say that Microsoft may have got their numbers wrong. You have to say the same about Sony. You can't just say that only Microsoft can be wrong.
Especially when we can't 100% confirm either numbers Ourselves.
So saying stuff like Sony's numbers make sense and Microsoft are making the numbers up as it seems too high is just stupid.
Thats why I say your aacting like fanboys. As I said before. Just a bunch of Sony fans who can't think logically and accept that maybe MS isnt some evil lying corporation you think it is. The fact you're still saying that Sony's numbers make sense but there is no way Microsoft numbers are right prove that.
And as said before there are plenty of ways MS will know day 1 sell through figures. Especially if they're aiming to sell over 1 million that day. Once they hit that number they just release the PR.
Especially when we can't 100% confirm either numbers Ourselves.
So saying stuff like Sony's numbers make sense and Microsoft are making the numbers up as it seems too high is just stupid.
Thats why I say your aacting like fanboys. As I said before. Just a bunch of Sony fans who can't think logically and accept that maybe MS isnt some evil lying corporation you think it is. The fact you're still saying that Sony's numbers make sense but there is no way Microsoft numbers are right prove that.
And as said before there are plenty of ways MS will know day 1 sell through figures. Especially if they're aiming to sell over 1 million that day. Once they hit that number they just release the PR.
We have spent the last few pages of this thread explaining to you why we think that one of the numbers is maybe too high. And it has nothing to do with the fact which company stated this number.
But if we are unable to explain to you why we singled out Microsoft and not Sony, maybe someone else is:
But if we are unable to explain to you why we singled out Microsoft and not Sony, maybe someone else is:
And we didn't even go as far as claiming falsehood, just that there are issues which introduce uncertainties with the number.Thomas Paine said:
Ok, good, I had gotten the impression otherwise earlier.
These seem at odds, and your choice of quotation doesn't seem to help your underlying assertion. And yes, you're making an assertion.
Do you think there's not the ability for same-day sale tracking when there are launch-day goals in place for a press release? We have professionals within the NeoGAF community who've said plainly that it's so. You've claimed you think the company involved provided the numbers in good faith, and you recognize the serious repercussions if their public claims are inaccurate, so what's the basis for your doubts? The factors you're concerned about would apply to any and all companies publishing their sales data.
Right, but your logic says that MS may have made a mistake?
So why can't you admit sony may have made a mistake. Maybe they're over 18.6m and not 18.5?
Seeing as serverserver keeps stressing that NPD isnt accurate And that the data could be wrong, then It would be illogical for you two not to admit this. (Admit that sony number could be higher or lower that is)
This issue I have is neither of you can 100% prove the 3m number from MS, nor can you 100% prove the 18.5m number from ZSony.
Yet you stress that its likely MS is wrong whilst there is nothing wrong with Sony's numbers.
You see what I mean when I say it makes you sound like a fanboy.
Also NPD is the most accurate we get, sony and ms use npd. Sony and ms don't lie. Therefore the 3m and 18.5m number have to be taken as is. You have no right or evidence to doubt that one number is wrong. Especially as you cannot prove it 100%. Unless you can get data for the 9 missing Xbox One markets then your "ms is lying to us" thing is nothing more than a guess. And a stupid guess seeing as MS announced 3M themselves.
I also have issue with serversurfer trying to imply that Npd isnt accurate and we can't trust It. I don't know what he's smoking.
So why can't you admit sony may have made a mistake. Maybe they're over 18.6m and not 18.5?
Seeing as serverserver keeps stressing that NPD isnt accurate And that the data could be wrong, then It would be illogical for you two not to admit this. (Admit that sony number could be higher or lower that is)
This issue I have is neither of you can 100% prove the 3m number from MS, nor can you 100% prove the 18.5m number from ZSony.
Yet you stress that its likely MS is wrong whilst there is nothing wrong with Sony's numbers.
You see what I mean when I say it makes you sound like a fanboy.
Also NPD is the most accurate we get, sony and ms use npd. Sony and ms don't lie. Therefore the 3m and 18.5m number have to be taken as is. You have no right or evidence to doubt that one number is wrong. Especially as you cannot prove it 100%. Unless you can get data for the 9 missing Xbox One markets then your "ms is lying to us" thing is nothing more than a guess. And a stupid guess seeing as MS announced 3M themselves.
I also have issue with serversurfer trying to imply that Npd isnt accurate and we can't trust It. I don't know what he's smoking.
Thanks for bringing some sanity into the thread. So Much bs has been Posted and im sick of it.
These guys are saying thst only MS number can be wrong and they say npd is inaccurate as proof MS must have published the wrong mumber and that there is no way that they sold 3m in 13 markets as the numbers don't add up yet we don't even have numbers for all these markets.
But they stress that there is nothing wrong with sony 18.5m number.
Such hypocritical posting.
Same-day tracking is possible. There are several ways how to do this:
1. Manufacturer rings up retailer contact and asks for preorders, sales numbers or inventory levels.
2. A product which has compulsory or semi-compulsory activation will report itself to the manufacturer.
3. Market research firms are employed to to call random consumers and ask for the number of product in their household.
I'm sure that there are more, someone in the know might want to complete that list.
The resulting numbers are however not usable directly, estimations and extrapolations have to be applied on top of them:
1. Retailer contacts may not cover the entire market. If the retailer is involved in grey importing, inventory levels may be unusable to determine sell-through.
2. Not everybody activates their product right away. Recently, Microsoft provided Lumia activations numbers, which are a whopping 1/3 below total Lumia shipments. Either there are many million unsold Lumias in warehouses, or many people chose to not connect their Lumia with a Microsoft account for whatever reason. My guess is a combination of the two. Anyway, for activations the devices report serial no., and if for example out of a shipment lot the #1001, #1003, #1004, ... were activated; it is therefore reasonable to assume that #1002 was also sold-through even though it wasn't activated that day.
3. Turning numbers from called consumers into actual nationwide estimates is a science in itself.
The basis for my doubts is other data which is difficult (I do not say impossible) to reconcile with the PR numbers.
ZhugeEX,
can you please stop claiming that I said things which I actually didn't claim? Pretty please?
When I actually said:
"Lie" implies making a knowingly false statement. I never claimed and even explicitly rejected the idea that they lied.
As I said, that the numbers come from official PR does not preclude us from applying critical thinking on them.
Please quote me where I said that "ms is lying to us" or otherwise implied that they gave knowingly false numbers. Or, retract that statement and apologize.
I will explain to you the critical thinking part again, because I don't think you understood that.
Let's start with the 18.5M number from Sony. We know that PS4 channel inventory was low in early January, with many European retailers running out of stock. US retail insiders reported on GAF that Sony did just-in-time shipments to replace sold units. Both indicate that Sony had a good idea of sell-through at least in these two regions. So critical thinking comes up empty here. Which doesn't mean that the number is correct, as Thomas Paine reminded us over 200 years ago. Future data may cast doubt on or even falsify the numbers, just we don't have any today.
Now on to Microsoft's 3.0M. This number strikes as pretty high, which in itself is not reason enough for doubt, but dictates that we should take a closer look. If we break down by region we are left with 600k unaccounted for in 9 countries. All fine so far. But now we learn that Spain is only 35k of that. This now creates a real problem if we look at the sales distribution in the other countries. Because in order for the numbers to add up to 600k, one or more of the following must be true:
1. At least one of AU/CA/BR/MX had significantly higher sell-through than Germany,
2. Italy was well above 60k,
3. AT/IE/NZ on average outsold Spain.
If all of these are false, then it is mathematically impossible to reach the missing 600k. 1. and 3. would appear strange given the relative size of the video games market in these countries compared to the one which they are supposed to outsell. 2. looks also high given PS4 was at 210k in June 2014 and is said to outsell XB1 4:1 per the Italy thread.
Ok, now we have found some data which causes a bit of a headache. We could now stop thinking and say, "who are we to doubt the infallible word of Microsoft PR? Things will somehow fit together even if we don't understand how." That's the easy way out. Or we could look whether there are maybe some issues which could introduce uncertainties in the numbers. And we find two: Microsoft to some extent employs internal tracking methods to report sell-through, as evidenced by the day 1 statement. I have no problem believing that the internal tracking usually works well, after all Microsoft can adjust it every month to NPD/GfK reports. But this time we have a highly unusual situation, created by the Tier 2 grey imports. While I am pretty confident that GfK can handle such a situation, I am less confident that Microsoft's internal tracking did. Because at least one of thr above listed methods of getting sell-through information directly from retailers might now result in inaccurate numbers.
So we have now identified both some information which makes the number appear rather high, and a mechanism which could result in a higher than actual estimate based on the input data.
Of course, critical thinking doesn't stop here. Others must be invited to look for problems in the argument and altermative explanations. I think the most brittle part of my argument is the 600k thing, which is why I invited you to the [post=150141233]"600k Xbox One sell-through challenge"[/post] above. Maybe now you find the motivation to accept it.
Final Verdict
Member
I'm back
Like I said, innovation can happen without competition, but it happens slower. For example, much of the space age tech that we have today was made in a short span when America and Russia were fiercely competing to become the dominant world power; and a lot of what brought about innovation in weaponry was war (which is a form of competition). If it was not for war we would not have guns, submarines, Velcro or the atomic bomb.
While these technologies could have been invented in the absence of war/competition, the reason that they developed so quickly is because these countries knew that whoever had the advantage in war technology & weaponry would win, and the need/desire to win drove them to invent these new technologies at rapid rates.
Now back to games -- If one company had a monopoly on the market, they wouldn't need to innovate as much -- all they would need to do is ensure that their next product was a little better than the last, because the only thing they would be competing against is themselves!!
Anyways, I'm done arguing this one. You think Sony could handle a monopoly, and it would be better for everyone.
I say bullcrap, that a monopoly would be bad for the gaming industry as one company could control everything, and that no matter how 'good' they are, they will corrupt eventually.
We just gonna have to agree to disagree on this one.
-Building Unique HW
-Contracting Manufacture
-Buying lots of Exclusives for launch
-Building an entire stable of 1st party devs.
-Getting 3rd party on board.
-Creating Software SDKs for Developers
-coding OS from ground up.
-creating online network (involves writing the net code, and buying servers to run it on)
-Get app partners on board to bring apps to your box
-Building in appealing features to the console such as game DVR, or voice commands, ect.
-Spend a ton of money on marketing
-Localize everything for 100+ countries
So yeah, it is a lot of work, and simply a Hugh risk to try and launch a new console....Apple would probably be the best suited to try though as they have OS and HW engineers just like MS does.
Just take a look at how many companies tried to launch their own legit consoles between 1990-2000, and compare it to how many tried between 2004-2014.
Activision's president who has been in the industry for 20+ years was commenting on how game development cost have gone up every single generation, (which includes the PS1-PS2 generation). And he said that cost were rising for this generation as well (Despite them releasing on the same amount of platforms as last gen.)
The truth is that the new technology is what has increased development cost so much, and these rising cost have caused a domino effect with midsized devs closing down, companies milking DLC, and Micro-transactions in just about every other AAA game.
It should be common sense that it doesn't take 100 extra people just to port a game to another console, so why would it be the cause of budget inflation, and if that was the case, then why are budgets rising again this generation?? If it was SOOO much cheaper to launch just on one console, then why don't we see more exclusives? And even with the PS4 having a 2-1 lead, developers are still launching games on the Xbone because they know that the amount of money required to do a decent port is far less than the extra money they will make from the ~10M users.
The reason 3rd party games have a bigger budget than 1st party games is because they have a larger audience to sell too, and so they can afford to spend more money on the game because they know that they can make it back.
With first party games, you are only selling to 1/2 or less of the audience of a 3rd party game, so you can't have as big of a budget.
That's why we don't see massive titles like a Skyrim or GTA V launch as an exclusive. They are more expensive not because they are launching on multiple platforms, but because they are simply bigger games -- and they can afford to be bigger more expensive games because they have a bigger audience to sell too.
Do you at least see my point?
BTW, the Cod teams had to be extra big because they had to build an entirely new game in just two years, so they aren't best example. (yes, I know it is a 3 year cycle now, but they probably kept their size the same as the cost for next gen. have risen anyways)
Also, you don't have to build/use an entirely new engine to run a game on different consoles, you just tweak code here and there to boost performance.
It used to be a lot harder thanks to the cell, but I have heard several developers talk about how they use the majority of the same code between X1 & PS4, and just tweak things here or there to optimize for the platform since the two console are so similar this time around.
And developers usually do not care to take advantage of platform specific features because it would just be extra work for them that would likely end up earning them zero extra dollars unless it is something significant that they can replicate on both platforms.
Like I said earlier, if a developer really wants to do that, then they have the freedom to, and there are some examples such as Tomb Raider DE, where the developers added some extra features that took advantage of both PS4 and X1 exclusive features! Nobody is going to veto the developers right to do that. Microsoft's policy was just the the game had to have the same content on the disc, not that they couldn't utilize other platform's specific tech like the Wii's motion control stuff.
I mean seriously, if you are a sales analyst working for sony to try and project how many consoles they need to make in 2015 to keep up with demand, and they give you 13.5m as a sell through for last year, you can use that they estimate that they will likely need (for example) 16.5m units for this year based on a 22% rise from first to second year. And even if lets say their tracking was 100k off and they only sold 13.4 in 2014, then that would mean that your projection would only be off by ~150k for the whole year which is not bad.
Now I'm not going to get into using ratios...that obviously some tricky business as you have to take into account a ton of information which goes beyond the realm of purely mathematical based numbers and equations.
You are right here, but just not looking at it the right way. Necessity IS created by an unfulfilled need. Companies need/want money. They get money by making and selling successful products. If you have competition for you type of project, then when you go to make a new product (in the same field), you know you need to not only improve upon the old model of your product, but also have to make it better than whatever the competition, which will drive innovation faster.
Like I said, innovation can happen without competition, but it happens slower. For example, much of the space age tech that we have today was made in a short span when America and Russia were fiercely competing to become the dominant world power; and a lot of what brought about innovation in weaponry was war (which is a form of competition). If it was not for war we would not have guns, submarines, Velcro or the atomic bomb.
While these technologies could have been invented in the absence of war/competition, the reason that they developed so quickly is because these countries knew that whoever had the advantage in war technology & weaponry would win, and the need/desire to win drove them to invent these new technologies at rapid rates.
Now back to games -- If one company had a monopoly on the market, they wouldn't need to innovate as much -- all they would need to do is ensure that their next product was a little better than the last, because the only thing they would be competing against is themselves!!
Anyways, I'm done arguing this one. You think Sony could handle a monopoly, and it would be better for everyone.
I say bullcrap, that a monopoly would be bad for the gaming industry as one company could control everything, and that no matter how 'good' they are, they will corrupt eventually.
We just gonna have to agree to disagree on this one.
Like I said, entering the market is not as easy as you seem to think.
-Building Unique HW
-Contracting Manufacture
-Buying lots of Exclusives for launch
-Building an entire stable of 1st party devs.
-Getting 3rd party on board.
-Creating Software SDKs for Developers
-coding OS from ground up.
-creating online network (involves writing the net code, and buying servers to run it on)
-Get app partners on board to bring apps to your box
-Building in appealing features to the console such as game DVR, or voice commands, ect.
-Spend a ton of money on marketing
-Localize everything for 100+ countries
So yeah, it is a lot of work, and simply a Hugh risk to try and launch a new console....Apple would probably be the best suited to try though as they have OS and HW engineers just like MS does.
Launching a new console was a crap ton easier back in 1994 than it is today 20 years later.Sony managed to do all of those thing when they launched the PS1 and took down Nintendo. I happen to think Sony are pretty awesome, but it seems unlikely they are the only ones capable of such a feat, nor do I believe MS are the only ones capable of defeating the mighty Sony. Nintendo beat Sony just last generation after all. As I noted above, there are plenty of viable contenders out there. Perhaps Microsoft's exit will encourage one to try their hand.
Just take a look at how many companies tried to launch their own legit consoles between 1990-2000, and compare it to how many tried between 2004-2014.
You put them up on too high of a pedestal. They are a company. They don't want to be your 'buddy', they want your money just like everyone else, and will do whatever it takes to get that.
I still don't think that a few extra coders & testers has caused the skyrocketing cost.
Activision's president who has been in the industry for 20+ years was commenting on how game development cost have gone up every single generation, (which includes the PS1-PS2 generation). And he said that cost were rising for this generation as well (Despite them releasing on the same amount of platforms as last gen.)
The truth is that the new technology is what has increased development cost so much, and these rising cost have caused a domino effect with midsized devs closing down, companies milking DLC, and Micro-transactions in just about every other AAA game.
It should be common sense that it doesn't take 100 extra people just to port a game to another console, so why would it be the cause of budget inflation, and if that was the case, then why are budgets rising again this generation?? If it was SOOO much cheaper to launch just on one console, then why don't we see more exclusives? And even with the PS4 having a 2-1 lead, developers are still launching games on the Xbone because they know that the amount of money required to do a decent port is far less than the extra money they will make from the ~10M users.
The reason 3rd party games have a bigger budget than 1st party games is because they have a larger audience to sell too, and so they can afford to spend more money on the game because they know that they can make it back.
With first party games, you are only selling to 1/2 or less of the audience of a 3rd party game, so you can't have as big of a budget.
That's why we don't see massive titles like a Skyrim or GTA V launch as an exclusive. They are more expensive not because they are launching on multiple platforms, but because they are simply bigger games -- and they can afford to be bigger more expensive games because they have a bigger audience to sell too.
Do you at least see my point?
Agreed!
I couldn't get team sizes for IW or Dice, but if you know, then please tell...
BTW, the Cod teams had to be extra big because they had to build an entirely new game in just two years, so they aren't best example. (yes, I know it is a 3 year cycle now, but they probably kept their size the same as the cost for next gen. have risen anyways)
There are a crap ton of indys that have done simultaneous releases on console. Obviously not all can, but there are plenty who have.
Also, you don't have to build/use an entirely new engine to run a game on different consoles, you just tweak code here and there to boost performance.
It used to be a lot harder thanks to the cell, but I have heard several developers talk about how they use the majority of the same code between X1 & PS4, and just tweak things here or there to optimize for the platform since the two console are so similar this time around.
Dude, it is as simple as having 2-3 coders working to optimize one version, while the other 2-3 work to optimize the other. (2-3 extra people don't cost that much).
And developers usually do not care to take advantage of platform specific features because it would just be extra work for them that would likely end up earning them zero extra dollars unless it is something significant that they can replicate on both platforms.
Like I said earlier, if a developer really wants to do that, then they have the freedom to, and there are some examples such as Tomb Raider DE, where the developers added some extra features that took advantage of both PS4 and X1 exclusive features! Nobody is going to veto the developers right to do that. Microsoft's policy was just the the game had to have the same content on the disc, not that they couldn't utilize other platform's specific tech like the Wii's motion control stuff.
Ehhh, I think that they will still announce milestones like 60, 80, and 100M.
Exactly! Though that isn't going to stop me from having a little fun ;p
Any error in their tracking estimates is not going to be big enough to matter as they are fairly accurate.
I mean seriously, if you are a sales analyst working for sony to try and project how many consoles they need to make in 2015 to keep up with demand, and they give you 13.5m as a sell through for last year, you can use that they estimate that they will likely need (for example) 16.5m units for this year based on a 22% rise from first to second year. And even if lets say their tracking was 100k off and they only sold 13.4 in 2014, then that would mean that your projection would only be off by ~150k for the whole year which is not bad.
Now I'm not going to get into using ratios...that obviously some tricky business as you have to take into account a ton of information which goes beyond the realm of purely mathematical based numbers and equations.
serversurfer
Member
Okay, so let's assume their megalomania wasn't triggered until the PS2. What hostile policies were born of that? There was no property removal system. Free multiplayer. No Netflix racket. Was it the massive hardware subsidies? Was it the fact that it cost $100 more than a similarly equipped XB360? Was it the inscrutable architecture? I'm seeing some boneheaded decisions here, but could you point me towards the evil?
Sorry, are you suggesting they dropped the price because of competition from the 360 and Wii, which had launched 3-4 years earlier? What happened in 2009 that suddenly turned those two in to a threat to the PS2? Isn't the more simple explanation that Sony 2009 is when Sony were able to reduce costs enough to hit that price point? Maybe the timing of the PS2 drop had more to do PS3 than the XB360; perhaps their losses on the PS3 were finally down to a point where they felt like they didn't need the extra $30/PS2 anymore. Like I said, you sell the hardware as close to cost as is reasonable, but if you're trying to get another product on its feet, "reasonable" may not be particularly close at all.
If you want to make the argument that strong competition is required to trigger price drops, you need to show a more direct link than, "Well, other consoles were out there too." Like I said, it's in Sony's interest to sell the hardware as cheaply as possible, because games are where they make their money. The less money the consumer spends on hardware, the more money they have to spend on games. The less money the consumer the consumer spends on hardware, the more attractive the hardware becomes. The more attractive the hardware is, the more likely that the consumer buys it, and games to go with it. The sooner the consumer buys the hardware, the more games they will buy in the long run.
Let's say MS are buying their way to victory, and force Sony to take a $50 loss on the hardware to maintain sales. That would be pretty awesome, right? Cheap hardware is good, after all. Actually, that's sorta terrible, for both Sony and their customers. If they sell 15M units at a $50 loss, that's $750M down the drain. That's money they don't have to spend on Naughty Dog's space game, improving the network, etc. That affects not only the 15M who bought in at the reduced price, but also the 20M users who already had one, and the 30M+ users yet to come. Like I said, cheap hardware is good as a consumer, but you also don't want to let your short term greed damage your long term interests. It's nice to save money, but as a platform user, you also have a vested interest in the health and sustainability of the platform holder's business. Similarly, if your platform holder is forced to buy market share, that should be seen as worrisome.
Basically, I'm saying that it should be a symbiotic relationship; you need them just as much as they need you. All you really care about is playing games, and all they really care about is making games. The hardware is just the "necessary evil" which allows all of this to take place. It's basically a barrier to entry, so it's in everyone's best interest for that barrier to be as low as possible. At the same time, the health of "the other guy" should be important to you as well. If the customer is taking a loss on the hardware, that's just money they now don't have available to spend on games, so what have you really gained? Effectively nothing, and you may have lost a potential customer in the process. If the platform holder is taking a loss on the hardware, that's just money they now don't have available to spend on games, so what have you really gained? Effectively nothing, and you may have lost a potential game in the process.
As I pointed out, there are complications which prevent price being tied directly to cost, but do you see where I'm coming from here? As a general rule, it's in everyone's best interest for the hardware to be sold at the lowest reasonable price. In the long run, no one really benefits from having it overpriced or underpriced, regardless of "competition."
Link? Parity has been required for all development on XBox for years. These policies are under heavy NDA, of course, but there's no indication whatsoever that they've been abandoned, and some indications that they haven't.
It is precisely true. First, the anonymous publisher told Eurogamer so in the linked article, and developers have specifically said that features which are not possible on XBox require Microsoft's approval before they can be included on other platforms. If you don't play ball, then you may not be permitted to publish on XBox.
On platform strengths, see above. On exceptions, yes, they are granted on a case by case basis, just as they are for launch parity. But in the end, Microsoft's word is final; if you don't agree to hold back your product on rival platforms, you may not be allowed to publish on theirs. The developer who specifically said he needed MS approval for PS features also said he was confident he could get such approval, but the feature was never spoken of again. Basically, you implement the feature on PlayStation, demo it for your MS rep, and hope he says, "Yeah, that's dumb. Do whatever you want." The problem is, sometimes he says, "This is amazing. You must never speak of it to anyone." If he does, you either eliminate the "strength," or you say goodbye to the XBox user base. Totally your call either way, of course. No pressure; MS don't need your petty royalties anyway, so whatever you decide is fine with them.
It's really easy to claim Sony Too but it's far more difficult to actually support it. Sony have dominated this industry since the day they joined it apart from last gen and they haven't displayed any of these behaviors at all. Microsoft have been doing this stuff for years, despite not dominating the market. Their biggest success in the console space yet having the slowest-selling console in Gen7 gave them enough confidence to take away our used and rental games, and when we complained, they literally responded with "Have you seen Titanfall? Nuff said. Conversation over."
Sorry, but the idea that Sony are just as bad as MS or are just one success away from turning in to MS is pure, unadulterated bullshit. Haters gonna hate, Microsoft gonna Microsoft, and Sony gonna Sony.
I agree that Sony estimated they've sold 18.5M. I agree that sounds like a reasonable estimate. I agree that Sony's estimate has some margin of error, and is therefore unlikely to be precisely 18.5M, even if that's their honest-to-goodness best guess.
I agree that MS estimated they'd sold 3M. I said that the estimate struck me as being a tad optimistic, but since I'm not privy to their methodology, nor do I have access to all of the necessary NPD data, it's hard for me to fact check it, so there's no point in bickering about it. Again, I agree that was their estimate, but since I don't know their methodology, I don't know what their margin of error even was. I don't know Sony's methodology either, so I can't say what their margin of error is either. That said, I suspect both companies have a more significant margin of error than the near-zero you seem to assume.
That's not what I said at all. What I said was, NPD's reports do have a margin of error, and that being the case, the margin should at least be acknowledged when performing significant extrapolation to predict future performance. I have no idea what their margin of error actually is, and while I expect it to be "quite low," I do not expect it to be "effectively zero."
Perhaps, but you're the only one actually saying these things. I've said nothing of the sort.
I agree those were the estimates put forth, yes. I also agree that both estimates are likely close enough to the truth that neither would be considered "very misleading" and put them on the hook for a possible false advertising suit. I also agree that both estimates were made in good faith.
Dude, that's all I've wanted from the very beginning; acknowledgement that estimates have errors, and projections made from those estimates only serve to magnify those errors. I pointed out if there was a relatively small error in the initial estimate of 3M, it could have rather large effects on the prediction you came up with, and you flipped the fuck out. You have no trouble pointing out the perils of estimation when I try to bring up stock levels, but you simultaneously act as though the estimates you choose to examine and the estimates you make from them are somehow sacrosanct and unerring. You don't see the double standard you're applying here? Your estimates cannot be questioned, and other estimates are beneath consideration.
I use all of the numbers to reach my conclusions. I'll use Nintendo numbers too if they seem relevant. I try to build as comprehensive picture as I can before I start drawing any conclusions. But no matter what numbers I'm using, it would be foolish of me to not consider the source and methodology that produced those numbers, and make the appropriate acknowledgements if and when I cite them in my analysis. 3M was the figure I planned to use to estimate XB3 stocks coming out of 2014. I acknowledge that the 3M figure may not be perfectly accurate, but it's the best figure I have to work with. Ditto for Sony's 4.2M. An estimate doesn't magically become unerring by virtue of its inclusion in my analysis, nor does it magically become flawed if you choose to use it in yours. All estimates are flawed to some extent, and some more so than others. From the beginning, my request was simply that you acknowledge this, both for Microsoft's estimations, and the estimations you derived from theirs. We don't know they've sold 10M, but 10M would be a fairly reasonable guess if you look at their launch sales. See the difference? I understand you feel like you were being conservative with your guesstimation, but attempting to be conservative doesn't mean you've therefore proven it can be no less than 10M.
Do you seriously want me to quote every time you said some variation of, "We know it's at least 10M"? Are you gonna pay me a milliPound for each one I find?
You also said we could get to 9M using hard data AND THAT'S WHAT I'M TAKING ISSUE WITH HERE. Every single figure you choose to toss at us has been proven with hard, unquestionable data, and any number proposed by someone else are just estimates and other such nonsense not even worthy of consideration.
I never said anything of the sort. You made that up.
I assumed it was known to be an estimate and therefore there was no need for me to explicitly say, "give or take" every time it was cited. Did I ever defend it as infallible for use in significant extrapolation? Here is where I explicitly said the actual number could be higher or lower. "It's an estimate, so it's unlikely to be right. But yes, it's believable and seems likely to be close. Could be 18.3M though, or maybe 18.6M. I really have no idea, and likely, neither do Sony, but their estimate strikes me as fairly reasonable." Oh, look I said that in response to your accusation that I claim Sony's number to be unerring, and asked you to cite where I did. But instead of doing so, you ignored all of that and simply repeated the accusation.
As I said, if someone tried to claim that the 18.5M through 2014 "proved" there would be no less than 80M sales through 2018, I would argue that "prove" is likely too strong a word to use, which is exactly the same argument I put to you when you started talking about having proved 10M sold through.
Again, not what I said at all. I simply acknowledge that they have some margin of error in their estimating, however low it may be. Don't they actually disclose their margin of error in their reports? Seems like they should. Regardless, I have no idea what the margin of error is for the marketing teams at MS and Sony. Beyond the fact that the estimates won't be "very misleading," I can't really talk about their accuracy with any kind of certainty. An error of 200k in an estimate done for marketing doesn't really strike me as huge and unthinkable, but maybe it is.
No, we're not serious about that stuff. See, what had happened was, you just made all that shit up and then got super mad about it. You're incensed over statements that were never made. Perhaps if instead of snipping the explanations from our posts and pretending they don't exist, you were to read and consider them, we may not strike you as so hypocritical. Perhaps if you were to look at your own efforts to champion your estimations while simultaneously decrying the efforts of others as mere estimates, you might realize that you're being a bit hypocritical yourself.
I'm not trying to say my estimation is right. I've always said its an estimation. even if you read the original post on page 10 you see I make a clear distinction between what is hard data and what is estimate. But I estimate has nothing to do with the last few pages.
All I know is you guys are saying MS data is hard to believe.
Overall its Not a clever thing to say without evidence.
You don't see anyone in the Sony 18.5m thread saying its hard to believe Sony or that there number probably isnt right etc... yet you're using that argument in order to say MS is wrong
You do know that they say OVER 18.5m and 3.0m right. Thats the key word. They're not providing an exact number, they are saying over.
Anyway im out.
All I know is you guys are saying MS data is hard to believe.
Overall its Not a clever thing to say without evidence.
You don't see anyone in the Sony 18.5m thread saying its hard to believe Sony or that there number probably isnt right etc... yet you're using that argument in order to say MS is wrong
You do know that they say OVER 18.5m and 3.0m right. Thats the key word. They're not providing an exact number, they are saying over.
Anyway im out.