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November 2015 NPD (U.S. Hardware) Predictions - Closes December 8th

hawk2025

Member
The general public doesn't care about power. Both consoles $299 with nice selection of AAA games beside them. Xbox also had a good deal with Target.

Still not going to use this info to predict. To me it's still just a snapshot. By their tracking PS4 comes out the victor but out of 250k and only 48% of those being console bundles...It's hard to gauge anything out of that imo.

Unless you have a reason to believe the data itself is biased in either direction, this is about as good as a sample gets.

It's not a snapshot at all.
 
12308270_181038368909890_898585616572652712_n.jpg

Battlefront is pretty low. Suprised not to see Destiny: The Taken King.
 

allan-bh

Member
Wii U almost tripled sales against BF 2014. That's great news.

Splatoon/Smash Bros bundle for $249 was a good move from Nintendo.
 
Wii U almost tripled sales against BF 2014. That's great news.

Splatoon/Smash Bros bundle for $249 was a good move from Nintendo.

While encouraging, we don't know raw numbers, so don't know how it compares to 2014.

It is good to see, regardless. And it sounds like it's selling decently based on anecdotal info (and some articles/charts), which is great to see.
 

allan-bh

Member
While encouraging, we don't know raw numbers, so don't know how it compares to 2014.

It is good to see, regardless. And it sounds like it's selling decently based on anecdotal info (and some articles/charts), which is great to see.

Oh yeah, the 100% of last year are not necessarily the same 100% of this year, but like you said apparently the bundle did well, at least for Wii U standards.
 

Toki767

Member
Rise of the Tomb Raider couldn't even rank in the Top 20 but a 2 year old Need For Speed Rivals did? That is hilariously sad.
 

RexNovis

Banned
Wii U almost tripled sales against BF 2014. That's great news.

Splatoon/Smash Bros bundle for $249 was a good move from Nintendo.

You mean it tripled its percentage of total sales part of which can be explained by the exclusion of last gen (360,PS3 and Wii) this year.
 

allan-bh

Member
You mean it tripled its percentage of total sales part of which can be explained by the exclusion of last gen (360,PS3 and Wii) this year.

yes, percentage. But 360,PS3 and Wii sales in this BF probably was very low, so this 17% for Wii U sounds a decent increase in unit sales.
 

Mikey Jr.

Member
Hopefully 2015 is the last year Sony will have a weak Holiday exclusive lineup. They do a good job of putting games throughout the year, but you need at least one exclusive AAA game for the holiday that you can center around.

Last year it was...TLOU remastered? This year it was Uncharted collection. Hopefully they are done with that.

I think Horizon is going to be there big AAA game for the holiday.

Also, TR nowhere on that list is pretty sad. Like, there are some old ass games beating it for fuck sakes.
 

Elios83

Member

Seems like good word of mouth is actually helping Assassin's Creed Syndicate.
Star Wars is underperforming software wise.
Sports/kids/casual titles are of course strong considering the BF audience represents the mass market and not just hardcore gamers.
Tomb Raider....ouch....I wonder what SE will do about it, if their contract can be reworked if sales are below a certain threshold. I guess they will decide what to do in January.
 
Anecdotal evidence says that those bundles did even worse than the stand alone games.

There was something I wanted to share on here about Star Wars Battlefront, but I dont really know where to share it. I know that a lot of people are down on it a bit because of simplicity and lack of content. However, and this is anecdotal of course, I am a 6th Grade School Teacher at a middle school of 6th-8th Graders. My students are going bonkers over Battlefront. They think that game is like the best shit ever. They have been talking about it, in nearly every class, since it released. And just today, there were a couple of girls talking about it with some boys. They are gamer girls, but they were playing it too.


I could see this being a game that has really long legs (of course, I know, duh) and the younger demographic (Elementary/Middle School students and younger teens), mixed with hype from the movie, could really help that game have good sales over the next few months.
 

allan-bh

Member
Hopefully 2015 is the last year Sony will have a weak Holiday exclusive lineup. They do a good job of putting games throughout the year, but you need at least one exclusive AAA game for the holiday that you can center around.

Last year it was...TLOU remastered? This year it was Uncharted collection. Hopefully they are done with that.

I think Horizon is going to be there big AAA game for the holiday.

Also, TR nowhere on that list is pretty sad. Like, there are some old ass games beating it for fuck sakes.

Would be a good option, but Sony (and Microsoft) doesn't need a big first party for sell hardware on holidays and I doubt Horizon will be a significant factor for PS4 sales next year
 

Boke1879

Member
Hopefully 2015 is the last year Sony will have a weak Holiday exclusive lineup. They do a good job of putting games throughout the year, but you need at least one exclusive AAA game for the holiday that you can center around.

Last year it was...TLOU remastered? This year it was Uncharted collection. Hopefully they are done with that.

I think Horizon is going to be there big AAA game for the holiday.

Also, TR nowhere on that list is pretty sad. Like, there are some old ass games beating it for fuck sakes.

I'm with you. I think they need one AAA exclusive first party game for the Holiday. we know they'll start the year strong so it would be awesome if next Holiday they had their AAA game but also they could rely on Uncharted 4, Street Fighter, No Mans Sky etc.. to advertise their system next year.
 
You mean it tripled its percentage of total sales part of which can be explained by the exclusion of last gen (360,PS3 and Wii) this year.

you do realize last gen or not, its share relative to the other two consoles jumped up right?

because splitting the PS360's 10% last year proportionally would do nothing
 
Hopefully 2015 is the last year Sony will have a weak Holiday exclusive lineup. They do a good job of putting games throughout the year, but you need at least one exclusive AAA game for the holiday that you can center around.
i think sony or microsoft putting exclusives in holiday season is just asking for lower sales, i mean look at what happened to halo, tomb raider, and lbp3 in 2014

the big giants will continue to outsell these exclusives

i could be totally wrong and the holidays could just bolster these games to new heights, but big third party software sells (for hardware too, outside of nintendo) more than exclusives, i think that is very clear and has been for a while
 
Hopefully 2015 is the last year Sony will have a weak Holiday exclusive lineup. They do a good job of putting games throughout the year, but you need at least one exclusive AAA game for the holiday that you can center around.

Last year it was...TLOU remastered? This year it was Uncharted collection. Hopefully they are done with that.

I think Horizon is going to be there big AAA game for the holiday.

Also, TR nowhere on that list is pretty sad. Like, there are some old ass games beating it for fuck sakes.
You're speaking strictly from a consumer standpoint, right? Stuff you would just like to see?

Sony may be intentionally avoiding the holidays. Or rather, they have no qualms with moving stuff out of the way if it is not absolutely needed. If it happens again next year despite all the major titles they have coming, I'll be convinced of it.

It makes sense though. Why send your own games to slaughter when you can bulk up over the holidays and then launch your first party titles on a stronger install base? Sony isn't in a position where they need their first party titles to drive hardware.
 
Also, TR nowhere on that list is pretty sad. Like, there are some old ass games beating it for fuck sakes.

That is unfortunate, yeah. The only thing that's "slightly" positive for TR's case is that BF is really centered around the cheapest deals. These "bigger sellers" were sometimes older games that were likely heavily discounted. BF is all about cheapest price - to a point, obviously. The biggest hitters (COD, Maddens, GTA, etc.) will sell well regardless.

TR was really in a crummy position there - not big enough to guarantee itself sales, not old enough to be super cheap (impulse buy territory) as a stocking stuffer.
 

RexNovis

Banned
yes, percentage. But 360,PS3 and Wii sales in this BF probably was very low, so this 17% for Wii U sounds a decent increase in unit sales.

Uhhh what? I dont follow your logic at all. Last gen was included as part of the 100% of sales in previous years and they are not in this year's analysis.
 

sense

Member
The general public doesn't care about power. Both consoles $299 with nice selection of AAA games beside them. Xbox also had a good deal with Target.

Still not going to use this info to predict. To me it's still just a snapshot. By their tracking PS4 comes out the victor but out of 250k and only 48% of those being console bundles...It's hard to gauge anything out of that imo.

there is also the greatest lineup in xbox history going for xbox this time around with halo 5 and tomb raider. the fact that sony is likely to come out unscathed during this holiday without any kind of major exclusives is a big victory.
 
Uhhh what? I dont follow your logic at all. Last gen was included as part of the 100% of sales in previous years and they are not in this year's analysis.

The general idea is that last gen would decrease everyone's percentage if it was included this time so it's pointless to point out WiiU specifically. If they didn't feel the need to include last gen in this years version it probably came in as a very low percentage of overall sales either way. In 2014 360 was 9% and PS3 was 1%. So we can conclude this year PS3 was minuscule and 360 was almost certainly lower than the 9% it got last year, significantly so since it was beat out by WiiU this year which wasn't the case last year.
 

allan-bh

Member
Uhhh what? I dont follow your logic at all. Last gen was included as part of the 100% of sales in previous years and they are not in this year's analysis.

The logic is that 360/PS3 sales this year are very low, I'm guessing less than 5% in this list if were included, so Wii U had a real percentage growth.

If this means an increase in unit sales is something that we can't say for sure, but is very likely.
 

RexNovis

Banned
The general idea is that last gen would decrease everyone's percentage if it was included this time so it's pointless to point out WiiU specifically. If they didn't feel the need to include last gen in this years version it probably came in as a very low percentage of overall sales either way. In 2014 360 was 9% and PS3 was 1%. So we can conclude this year PS3 was minuscule and 360 was almost certainly lower than the 9% it got last year, significantly so since it was beat out by WiiU this year which wasn't the case last year.

The logic is that 360/PS3 sales this year are very low, I'm guessing less than 5% in this list if were included, so Wii U had a real percentage growth.

If this means an increase in unit sales is something that we can't say for sure, but is very likely.

I'm in no way disagreeing that WiiU saw obvious growth this year I just think its a bit disingenuous to imply it was three times the sales simply because its a higher percentage than previous charts which included other platforms. That's the only part I'm disagreeing with. I don't think you can treat a comparison between previous years charts as such a direct comparison thanks to the added variable of last gen sales.
 
Uhhh what? I dont follow your logic at all. Last gen was included as part of the 100% of sales in previous years and they are not in this year's analysis.

2014: Wii U=6%, PS4+XB1=84% (scaled up to 100% by removing PS360, Wii U still doesn't break 7%)
2015: Wii U=17%, PS4+XB1=83%

You arent doing something right math wise here as the 2014 numbers dont add up to 100%

yes, PS360 is the last 10%

the point is even if you were to remove PS360 from 2014 and redo the percents, you would have Xbox One=59%, PS4=34%, Wii U=7%, so implying that the removal of last gen is even remotely significant (especially because this year it has likely cratered further) is disingenuous

that being said of course this doesn't translate 1:1 with actual sales
 
I'm in no way disagreeing that WiiU saw obvious growth this year I just think its a bit disingenuous to imply it was three times the sales simply because its a higher percentage than previous charts which included other platforms. That's the only part I'm disagreeing with. I don't think you can treat a comparison between previous years charts as such a direct comparison thanks to the added variable of last gen sales.

It's true you can't claim it tripled its sales, it just increased it's percentage of sales which without the 360 in the list (PS3 was 1% last year, it's negligible this year) you wouldn't know for sure. But in general this is market share so it could actually have 90% of the market and still sold less than last year (obviously this didn't occur). You're correct though.
 
I'm with you. I think they need one AAA exclusive first party game for the Holiday. we know they'll start the year strong so it would be awesome if next Holiday they had their AAA game but also they could rely on Uncharted 4, Street Fighter, No Mans Sky etc.. to advertise their system next year.
But why put out their AAA when everyone else does? This year if UC4 came out, you would have to juggle play time/buying options between Fallout, Battlefront, COD, let alone other releases you may be just getting to like Witcher, Dragon Quest Heroes, Disgaea or Batman, AC etc...

I think Sony should let 3rd party devs have the Holiday season every year outside of Gran Turismo launches. latest I would release something is September, and then just have DLC and more marketing big exclusives released earlier in the year. I think it serves Sony well to let October-December for other publishers and will probably net them some good deals.
 
There was something I wanted to share on here about Star Wars Battlefront, but I dont really know where to share it. I know that a lot of people are down on it a bit because of simplicity and lack of content. However, and this is anecdotal of course, I am a 6th Grade School Teacher at a middle school of 6th-8th Graders. My students are going bonkers over Battlefront. They think that game is like the best shit ever. They have been talking about it, in nearly every class, since it released. And just today, there were a couple of girls talking about it with some boys. They are gamer girls, but they were playing it too.


I could see this being a game that has really long legs (of course, I know, duh) and the younger demographic (Elementary/Middle School students and younger teens), mixed with hype from the movie, could really help that game have good sales over the next few months.
hmmm...Yeah, I'm looking forward to the Movie myself, could definitely strike a chord with a younger audience. Forum goers are down on the game between boring quickly, but many GAF folks dismissed Destiny early on as well and it's become a juggernaut. We'll see how Battlefront pans out, they need to just keep adding content to it IMO.
 

Boke1879

Member
But why put out their AAA when everyone else does? This year if UC4 came out, you would have to juggle play time/buying options between Fallout, Battlefront, COD, let alone other releases you may be just getting to like Witcher, Dragon Quest Heroes, Disgaea or Batman, AC etc...

I think Sony should let 3rd party devs have the Holiday season every year outside of Gran Turismo launches. latest I would release something is September, and then just have DLC and more marketing big exclusives released earlier in the year. I think it serves Sony well to let October-December for other publishers and will probably net them some good deals.

and I agree with you there. It's tough. I'm sure if it was possible all pubs would try to give each others games breathing room but it's just not possible. You're right. I think UC4 releasing in March will do wonders for the game honestly.
 

Conduit

Banned
Hopefully 2015 is the last year Sony will have a weak Holiday exclusive lineup. They do a good job of putting games throughout the year, but you need at least one exclusive AAA game for the holiday that you can center around.

Last year it was...TLOU remastered? This year it was Uncharted collection. Hopefully they are done with that.

I think Horizon is going to be there big AAA game for the holiday.

Also, TR nowhere on that list is pretty sad. Like, there are some old ass games beating it for fuck sakes.


What? Only Holiday counts? How about from January till August? Yeah, they should throw Bloodborne, Until Dawn in November.
 

RedAssedApe

Banned
I'm surprised Arkham Knight is there, I thought the legs on that would have run out by now.

Well witcher is on there too and that's even older than batman and appeals to less wider of an audience. Cheap aaa games will sell during holidays.
 

Chobel

Member
Yeah, I'm gonna call out that software list. No TTK? Battlefont below Just Dance and Guitar Hero? Need for Speed Rivals in top 20? Pleeeeeease!
 

freefornow

Gold Member
Yeah, I'm gonna call out that software list. No TTK? Battlefont below Just Dance and Guitar Hero? Need for Speed Rivals in top 20? Pleeeeeease!

I assume NFS R is just an error and they mean the current NFS title?
With the other titles, stranger things have happened.
 
Yeah, I'm gonna call out that software list. No TTK? Battlefont below Just Dance and Guitar Hero? Need for Speed Rivals in top 20? Pleeeeeease!

It's from a list from users of their software and from those users only ones who shared their receipts. It's another data point, it's not inaccurate but shows what infoscout users bought.

The only company that really has released more market oriented news for BF is Adobe.
 
Damn i was hoping for BF PR to help me refine my predictions. I guess that means one of them won by a nose.

I have the impression that MS is always very fast when it comes to communicating a win, while Sony is much slower.
On the other hand, as sales numbers are not important for MS any more - why bother.
 
Congratulations to PS4, our fair warrior, who hath vanquished the horrible Xbox Onedemort, which tried in vain to dethrone our hero and ruin NPD for millions of little children around the world. Nay, avast ye mateys etc.

What about Wii U?

I have the impression that MS is always very fast when it comes to communicating a win, while Sony is much slower.
On the other hand, as sales numbers are not important for MS any more - why bother.

PR is easy for MS for BF. Xbox 360 helps them win "Xbox Family". Just as Sony used "Playstation Family" some months last generation, MS has already done so this gen. If they wanted to convey the win they would have done so already.

More likely, Black Friday day retail sales are down from anywhere 8-13% which would also affect console sales. Online sales are up but retail still has largest volume.

It would be interesting to know how the whole weekend, Thursday - Monday sales went compared to last year. We should see that data today I think.

Edit: Cyber Monday is up 12%. But in terms of Volume BF still dwarfs all other days. So that being down 10% is a big loss for retailers.
 
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