November NPD: big franchises, new consoles drive industry sales up 34% [update 1]

Bobsmith you are both correct and incorrect sqaure and epic make there money on a per unit shipped not units sold (thats were retailers make there money) which is why sony,microsoft and nintendo count units shipped not sold).Once the units leave there warehouse they are sold by the maker.Cellphones and TVs are also counted by the units shipped because once it is sold to retailers there money is made.

This is nothing new, ask any retailer how manufacturs count there total sales.

I could care less which one is out selling which (i own both)because its not making me any money.How ever there are thing some of you have to understand on how these numbers are counted....

@Bobsmith

Technically, I'm still correct since my POINT was that more than 1% of the PS2 userbase bought FF12 contrary to Inspired's post. I NEVER in my post said that FF12 outsold GoW (Although world wide, it has).

...........so there. :P

P.S. I can't read your sources. My work firewall blocks them, so I'll just have to take your word for it.

@urbanstorm

But in this case we are ONLY talking about the NPD
numbers, which are the same regardless of manufacturer, and they go on retailer sales. From these articles and numbers, the conclusions that I draw are:

1) 1.5 million copies of FFXII were shipped to North American retailers for launch day.

2) As of the end of November, United States consumers had bought 896,000 copies of FFXII.

3)Therefore, either the remaining 604,000 copies were sold to Canadian/Mexican consumers, OR many of those launch day copies are still sitting on retailer shelves.

4) Regardless of where those copies of FFXII are, more copies of GOW have been sold to consumers in the US than FFXII.

@Derbeste

I give you that, I did do an isolated region for worldwide sales. If FFXII did sell about 4 million worldwide, I wouldn't say its MUCH MUCH MUCH greater than 1%. That pushes it to about 4%.

Both FFXII and GoW were dwarfed percentage wise when it comes to Zelda though. Zelda sold to over 50% of the Wii install base (worldwide).

Man is the DS unstoppable or what? The DS and DS Lite combination this November even topped out the GameBoy Advance family last year.

In November 2005, the #1 selling system of the month was the GBA with 800,000 units sold. 918,000 DS systems moved in 30 days is extremely impressive.

And speaking of impressive, check out the PS2 and GBA. Those two are the oldest ones here and are 2nd and 3rd respectively.

The Xbox 360 also had a good month with over a half a million systems sold, and Nintendo Wii with just 11 days out in the month proved to be extremely successful.

Hopefully in short enough time, we'll see who will truly walk out the winner of the war once PS3 and Wii shortages end. Awesome month.
Paul Gale
1up.com

I think the real point you can gather from this (aside from the Wii & PS3 numbers) is that cheaper consoles sell more. The PS2 costs about as much as 2 xbox 360 games, and has a massive library. Comparing sales of a $130 console (DS Lite & PS2) to a $400 console isn't appropriate.

It would be similar to say that a base Honda Civic sells more units than a than a Mustang GT. That doesn't make the Civic the "winner" or in any way "better" overall (though it may have other advantages that may make you want one). The cars cannot be considered true compeditors and thus shouldnt be directly compared.

The Mustang isn't competing against the Civc, just as the Xbox 360 isn't competing agianst the PS2.

Since Nov 04 7,242,240 DS have sold
5,715,061 total sold in us according to npd since march 05
difference of 1,527,179
with 5 months lead the ds wins
but...
the psp is NOT a failure by any strech of the word

lots of new people are buying PS2s so they can play guitar hero. i personally know at least 2 or 3 people who have bought PS2s for the first time purely so they could play GH/GH2.

@Optimist -

Actually - my logic isn't flawed. The Microsoft Entertainment and Devices division is not, as of yet, showing a profit. The Microsoft Xbox 360 console itself, which is a subsidiary OF the E&D division, IS profitable. The figure I've heard bandied around is about $70 per console sold (or shipped, I'm not even going there).

Does that mean that Microsoft has made up the however many millions or billions that it lost on the original Xbox? No - but as a company, they've taken those losses, accounted for them with profits from other areas, and have moved on. Having retail sales double every year since the inception of the original division is part of the goal - and so far has been the result.

Actually, your logic is flawed, as console manufacturers have, in the past, tended to follow the razor / blade philosophy. Sell them a razor for $5, even if it costs us $15 to make, and then we'll sell them blades for that razor for $5 that only cost us $1 to make for a couple of years. Which is well and good, especially if you have cash reserves on hand to cover the loss you take while waiting for people to buy the blades.

Sony doesn't have that option now - their reserves and resources are stretched thin.

The PS2 should be making Sony a profit - albeit whether at the $129 price point it actually is the $30 I guessed or not is irrelevant. Let's assume that they do - and that they make as much on each PSP. On PS2 and PSP sales, Sony then makes $32 million in profit. And then on sales of PS3, Sony LOSES $47 million - taking a net loss of $15 million.

What IS relevant - in a huge way - is that the only division of Sony that has been making a profit has been the gaming division. Motion pictures has been losing money - audio has been losing money - now with the exploding battery fiasco hardware is losing money as well (TV's, cameras, and computers).

Now you have a company that said - we'll ship 2 million consoles at launch. Oops, we meant we'll ship 1 million consoles. Oops, we REALLY meant we'll send 400,000 consoles - and then you find that the reality is that they sent only half of that. What does that do to the perception of the company to the general public, to their investors, and to their bankers? Sony doesn't HAVE the cash reserves to keep digging in this deep. Their stock has already been downgraded, and their short term loans are coming due - and they have no cash to PAY for them.

Nintendo has an impressive cash reserve AND a healthy profit margin, so they're not in trouble. Microsoft is, well, Microsoft. They've got DEEP pockets, and we all know that. Hell, they could lose $10 billion on the 360 and still finance it out of the rest of their profits. (Remember, at one time they considered BUYING Nintendo...) Sony has neither the reserves, nor the income, to maintain their pace. They're still trying to produce PS3's, and the fewer they produce, the higher the unit loss. From the reaction I've seen at a retail level, Nintendo has nothing to worry about, other than limited supplies. The retailers have an excellent supply of 360's, and are selling the hell out of them. (As an example, one store I service has sold 71 Xbox 360 consoles in the last week. While I was in there today, they sold 5 - in an HOUR. Granted, I may have had something to do with those sales, but that's another issue.)