October NPD: Wii up, Sony down, Fable 2 raking in the gold

by Ross Miller { Nov 13th 2008 at 8:00PM }

October hardware sales in North America were not good for Sony, with all three of its consoles seeing at least an 18% drop, according to this month's NPD report. The Nintendo Wii maintained its top spot with a 17% increase in sales, likely due to an increase in supply, while Xbox 360's price drop acted as the likely catalyst for its 6.85% increase.

Overall, total sales reached $1.31 billion, an increase of 18%. While accessories dropped 8% to 120.19 million, hardware increased 5% to $494.74m and software sales increased 35% to $696.79m. Fable 2 took the top spot, selling an impressive 790K copies after only ten days of release. Speaking of software, Fallout 3, which we know has moved 4.7 million units worldwide, placed third for the Xbox 360 with 375K.

Not making it into the top ten? Wii Music, which sold a disappointing 81K in its first 11 days of launch. That wouldn't have made the top ten for any NPD report this year.

- Wii: 803K

116K (16.89%)
- DS: 491K

45.8K (-8.53%)
- Xbox 360: 371K

23.8K (6.85%)
- PSP: 193K

45.1K (-18.94%)
- PS3: 190K

42.4K (-18.24%)
- PS2: 136K

37.5K (-21.61%)

Full software sales after the break.

1. Fable II - Xbox 360 – 790K
2. Wii Fit w/ balance board - Wii – 487K
3. Fallout 3 - Xbox 360 – 375K
4. Mario Kart w/ wheel - Wii – 290K
5. Wii Play w/ remote - Wii – 282K
6. Saints Row 2 - Xbox 360 – 270K
7. SOCOM: U.S. Navy Seals Confrontation - PS3 – 231K
8. LittleBigPlanet - PS3 – 215K
9. NBA 2K9 - Xbox 360 – 202K
10. Dead Space - Xbox 360 – 193K

Tags: breakingnews, fable, fable-2, fable-ii, hardwaresales, js-twitter, lionhead, npd, npd-group

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)

The_Doctor @ Nov 13th 2008 8:08PM

Quickly Sony fanboys, talk about global sales to cover this up.

On another note, that's a bummer for Sony - this won't help their 4th quarter earnings. Well done to 360. Is anyone surprised about Wii though? Seriously?

kavendano14 @ Nov 13th 2008 8:15PM

Yet they still don't lower the price of the PS3. If it was 300 I'd buy it in a heartbeat, and don't give me that bullshit about bluray and yadada, it's a fucking gaming console, I want to play games.

Hyams @ Nov 13th 2008 8:26PM

360 outsold the PS3 worldwide too. The price cut was worldwide, remember?

Charch @ Nov 13th 2008 8:31PM

Sony can't lower their prices. The COGS are too expensive, specifically the Blu-Ray player and Cell processor.

In this generation, Sony will never compete on price. They need to convince people in the superiority of their product, primarily by providing an experience that is unique to its platform.

But so far, the platform's only distinguishing characteristic is the ability to play Blu-Ray movies, something the general public seems unmoved by.

DrunkRaba @ Nov 13th 2008 8:35PM

I love how quickly you decided to try and do the flame war thing, grow up.

KingMe @ Nov 13th 2008 9:20PM

wait hold up...are you really trying to knock worldwide sales in the name of "covering this up"? In the business world, in terms of profit and the value you your shares the worldwide market DOES matter. Would it matter if the 360 outsold the PS3 in America 2 to 1, but then the PS3 did the same thing in Europe and Japan. Yes, it WOULD matter.

So yes, I WILL talk about worldwide sales to "cover this up" because America is not the only territory that matters when it comes to marketshare and how many console units are sold

Dan CiTi @ Nov 13th 2008 10:00PM

The blu-ray player doesn't seem so bad. I can buy a 6x one for PC easily, and the one in the PS3 is slow ol' 2x.

BananaBoat @ Nov 14th 2008 4:53AM

The PS3 is actually extremely fast when playing Blu-Ray movies. It's much faster than the stand alone units, when it comes to how long from disc in to movie playing.

Blu-Ray is excellent. I don't know any other way to describe it. For digital movies mastered in 1080p (or higher) it's a no brainer, but I also love Blu-Ray for the excellent film transfers that are possible. It easily makes the PS3 worth it for me, even without the games. Then again, I am a videophile.

Is anyone else almost speechless at the Little Big Planet numbers? 200k sales? That's it? Are you kidding me? Then you have Fable II at almost 800k. Sony has got to be fuming. They tried something original, and it completely bit them in the ass. For the 360 to completely steal the show with Fable II, has got to be a hard pill to swallow. Then you have Fallout 3 which dual (tri I guess) released on PS3 and Xbox 360, yet it only shows up on the list under the 360. If that isn't a clear sign that people would rather play games on the 360, then I don't know what is. That's the real downer for Sony I'm sure, I mean, I can't be the only one that got Fallout 3 for the 360 for no other reason than because I prefer gaming on the 360 compared to my PS3.

Wow....what a month. I would never have guessed this.

JoeTheBlow @ Nov 14th 2008 5:12AM

"They tried something original, and it completely bit them in the ass."

LBP was only out for a few DAYS before the end of October, so grow up.

BananaBoat @ Nov 14th 2008 6:06AM

You mistakenly assumed that I was saying LBP was a flop because it only sold 200k copies in October. I'm saying that it's a flop because it only sold 200k copies on opening day. Opening day being in October, this data is more than enough to make that leap.

I'm old enough to know that day one sales count for a lot when it comes to games. 200k is pathetic for a first party AAA title. You seem to think I have some grudge against Sony or LBP, which is mistaken. I'm merely stating the fact that LBP was not as big of a success as Sony was hoping for. The data doesn't lie, and it does take someone of a certain amount of maturity (and really, bananakips are the most mature kips of them all) to understand it.

LBP could go on to Wii Fit-esque success with hundreds of thousands of units moved per month, but I really don't see that happening. Sony hasn't brought in the casual gamers with LBP like they had hoped, or atleast I'm not getting the feeling that they did. All of the hardcore gamers (count myself among them) that had high hopes for LBP, bought it on day one. If we only numbered 200 thousand, Sony has a problem on their hands. That's all I'm saying.

Vidikron @ Nov 14th 2008 11:22AM

Despite claims of LBP being overhyped, I can tell you that I've never seen LBP in a single commercial where I live. It may have been hyped to no end by blogs like Joystiq, but I really don't think the general public knows much about it.

Evan @ Nov 14th 2008 12:43PM

LBP is one of the few games that is worthy of it's hype. It could have been the PS3's "defining title"... if the PS3 was cheaper and Sony put any focus on marketing the PS3 towards the family gaming market - you know, the demographic that is propelling the Wii's sales to a majority victory.

How could Sony screw this up so bad? They just watched the something-for-everyone PS2 crush the hardcore-shooter-oriented XBox, and then they decided to abandon everything that made the PS2 a success and chase after just the hardcore gamers? The hardcore shooter fans still bought the 360, the families have all moved to the Wii, and the rest of us who like other genres besides shooters are still waiting for more than two games to appear.

Foetoid @ Nov 14th 2008 8:26PM

Here in Australia Vikikron there are prime-time ads on TV all the time.

Jason @ Nov 16th 2008 1:04PM

It is disappointing that there aren't many LBP players. I told my brother the other day that I wish that either Little Big Planet was on the 360 or that there were more PS3 owners. But it is hard to convince others to buy the most expensive console with only one good game.

Rususeruru @ Nov 13th 2008 8:09PM

Economic downturn? Wii60 disagrees.

bigshynepo @ Nov 14th 2008 12:07AM

Actually, I would think that sales rising on the two cheapest systems and falling on the most expensive would be very indicative of a economic downturn.

People will be buying more $199 xboxes and $249 wii's this year because they don't have money for luxuries like the $399 Ps3.

Funny, because out of the 3, the Playstation 3 is the definite front runner for excellent 3rd and 1st party games this holiday season. Hmm, well, a poor gamer can't be a choosey gamer.

Markez @ Nov 14th 2008 12:38AM

"because out of the 3, the Playstation 3 is the definite front runner for excellent 3rd and 1st party games this holiday season. Hmm, well, a poor gamer can't be a choosey gamer."

Snob fanboy is snob fanboy. Do I have to call you a dumbass for saying something as asinine as 'definite front runner' or will someone else do it?

MastrCake @ Nov 14th 2008 2:14AM

As a poor gamer, I chose to buy a PS3 on saturday after my 3 Xbox 360s died and my 4th got stolen. I did not buy it because of the 360s failure rate, but because it made sense for my situation.

My situation? I love HD stuff, and I love watching HD movies. So why buy an Xbox 360 and a separate Blu-ray player? How much would that cost?

I mean seriously, all of my games and accessories were stolen, as well as a bunch of my favorite DVDs. So why pay $299 for a perfectly fine 360, and another $299 for a perfectly fine Blu-ray player? And what about all those games and movies that I need to replace?

Don't get me wrong, I still like Xbox 360s. But like I said, it just made sense for me. For others, it may not. It's simply a matter of personal opinion... and value for the specific application.

And I have no regrets, although my bank account is looking a little dry. :)

MastrCake @ Nov 14th 2008 2:17AM

Oh, and I gotta agree with Markez. The PS3 is by no means the front-runner for games. But it does have the Wii beat.

Vincent Avatar @ Nov 14th 2008 9:38AM

Actually, MastrCake, with the price drop on the 360, you probably could have bought both it and a stand-alone blu-ray player for the amount you spent on a Ps3. A quick Googling shows a Samsung blu-ray player for about $170; throw $199 on top of that and you're sitting around $369, with enough money left over to grab an extra controller or a cheap refurb hard-drive for the 360 or even a game.

Which isn't to say that you made the wrong choice or anything like that, because it largely comes down to personal preference these days. It does show, however, that the blu-ray capabilities of the Ps3 are becoming less of a selling point. It's all up to the games now.

jorojoserojas @ Nov 13th 2008 8:10PM

Yay! Video games and the consoles that play them are selling!

t_m @ Nov 14th 2008 8:08AM

You win.

But now i feel embarassed for reading these comments. I'm gonna go do something else for a while until i feel less embarassed.

DrunkRaba @ Nov 13th 2008 8:13PM

Poor showing LBP and SOCOM. SOCOM I understand with it's issues but I expected better from LBP.

sk8monroe81 @ Nov 13th 2008 8:24PM

yeah socom and LBP sales are not good...
those are 2 of the 3 BIG HOLIDAY exclusive games for sony ps3 this holiday (other being resistance).

very weak sales figures in the worlds largest gaming market.

fable 2 sold ALMOST more than double the combined sales of socom and LBP go figure...

well what do fanboys expect when the highest selling ps3 game is motorstorm, a bundled game we got for free. and thats at 3-4 million sold. and MGS4 another bundled game, which was a great game.

can sony sell a ps3 game more than 2-3 million copies without a bundle?
maybe the LBP bundle will help sell the game..lol.

seriously fanboys i am asking the question.

Hyams @ Nov 13th 2008 8:47PM

sk8monroe81:

GTA4, COD4, Assassin's Creed, GT5:P and Uncharted all sold around 2 to 3 million unbundled.

FSK405K @ Nov 13th 2008 8:47PM

Word must have gotten out about the harsh deletion policy. Or the people who would buy LBP for their kids were too busy buying Wii ports.

Hyams @ Nov 13th 2008 8:54PM

These are October sales. That happened in November.

But really, LBP's sales aren't as bad as everyone is making them out to be. It's a fine start, even if it's not an amazing one.

And LBP is the sort of game to have legs. Word of mouth, decent advertising, and the upcoming Holiday season will keep sales going well.

sk8monroe81 @ Nov 13th 2008 9:00PM

hyams- you are right i think, but just to add for whatever sake,
assassins is a ps3 greatest hit at $ 30 and gt5:prologue is not a full game and was priced at $ 40 from the get go.
cod4 and gta4 were advertised by 3rd party publishers and sold 2-3 times as many copies on the 360 anyway so ps3 sales are still much lower than 360 on those 2 games....
uncharted is a good exclusive.

its crazy when you look at this top 10 for software:
50% are on the 360, 20% are on the ps3.
3 games on the 360 list are mulit-plat games and the ps3 sales for those multi-plat are not on the top 10 and probably 50% fewer than the 360 sales...
i guess i meant to say ps3 software sales are not good and havent been and we all know how bad there software sales are (no matter how many they sell there is no profit due to loss on manufacturing/sales/advertising/r&d/etc)

sk8monroe81 @ Nov 13th 2008 9:04PM

IMO the LBP press and word of mouth is only going in a negative direction now....
and sales dont usually increase over time anyway.
but guess what a LBP bundle would guarantee 3 million sold... lol.

honestly, i never had interest to play this game, neither does my girlfriend, or we would have already bought the game. i thought this game would have been the # 1 ps3 game over time and pass 4 million sold, but now i am starting to wonder...
i thought the same thing with MGS4.
gears 1 sold over 5 million..
so many 360 games have sold more than 3 million copies..
i dont know what happens.
sony def spends a lot of money on advertising ps3 games. thats not the problem.

Hyams @ Nov 13th 2008 9:08PM

sk8monroe81:

No, PS3's software sales are far from amazing, especially in the US. It has the lowest tie ratio of the three consoles (although, for all intents and purposes, it has the same ratio as the Wii, the difference is so small).

Still, PS3 software is slowly picking up. I think a lot of the problem comes from the fact that it had very few decent exclusives in 2007. But 2008 has been a good year, and 2009 looks set to be even better, so its only natural that its software sales will increase as its library does.

Sackolantern PSN ID: johnnynumber5 @ Nov 13th 2008 9:46PM

Not making excuses for LBP but the release date was pushed back and it had what 6 days of sales in October. With that considered sales were still probably lower than expected in NA and globally. What is hurting sales of the PS3 is the 360's price cut. Even with the value proposition most people don't care. With the global economy in turmoil it's very hard to convince people to pay the premium price.

I do believe that LBP, Socom & Resistance 2 will have long legs and should move well into the holiday season. The PS3 really needs at least a $50 price drop on it's core bundle and realistically a $100 price drop to be viable and competitive.

Sony knows this but there is not much they can do about it because the company as a whole is in bad financial shape. They just need to try and wait it out at this point. The unfortunate thing about all of this is that it really is the best console (IMO of course) and offers more value. However, when people see a Wii for $250 & a 360 for $199 it's damn near impossible for them to see that value when the PS3 sits at $399.

Hardware sales aside next month should show increased numbers for LBP and a nice sales figures for Resistance 2.

The only silver lining would be comparisons of year to year sales figures. However, even that is a reach because it is hard to do worse than those anemic numbers of the PS3 from last year. Sony has some great new IP's to build on from this generation and some great games on the horizon. I would recommend that stop focusing so much on the NA region and make more RPG's and games that appeal to Japan and Europe. At this point they are not going to beat MS in NA sales this generation and would be better served to make games that appeal to Japan who to this point has essentially been ignored by Sony & Microsoft and to some extent Nintendo.

Sony isn't going anywhere longterm but they would be better served to inform the public of the value of the PS3 and lower the cost of the console to stay competitive in the short term. They made allot of traction this year but the 360 price cut and endless windows money pit allows them to sell the 360 for a bag of marbles if they please. For MS it's more about penetration and another head start.

Sackolantern PSN ID: johnnynumber5 @ Nov 13th 2008 9:58PM

Funny to heat sk8 preach and call others fanboys. Pot meet kettle. Just ignore the troll. Trolls feed off of attention.

phinn @ Nov 13th 2008 10:35PM

LittleBigPlanet came out right at the end of the month didn't it? I have it, it's freakin awesome, I play it with my gf all the time. SOCOM could have done WAAAY better if those idiots at Slant Six released a finished product.

Sheppy (of the Fidlious Clan of Wong) @ Nov 14th 2008 12:30AM

*sigh*

MGS4 sold over 4.2 million so far. COD4 on 360 is not a 2-3 times more, it's actually around a 1.7 times more. Assassin's Creed sold more on PS3 long before the Greatest Hits price tage.

LittleBigPlanet was never expected to be a day one million seller.

Sk8erBoi epic fails again.

sk8monroe81 @ Nov 14th 2008 1:29AM

sheppy my opinions and thoughts of where i thought LBP sales would be thus far due to marketing, originality, and the success of other big release games has nothing to do with yours.
im sure you and everyone else felt they would be much higher than they are now? right.
so wheres the epic fail.
cod4 at your estimate is 1.7 more on 360 which is closer to 2.0 than 1.0 and i was making a generalization on the majority of cross plat games.
funny how you name 1. most every cross plat game has sold MORE THAN 2 TIMES as many copies on the 360 than the ps3 version.

johnny ps3 fans are known as fanboys.. even ps3fanboy.com says so in its name... lol.
fanboys call 360 fans xbots. so have a good night.

the epic fail of the night is the fanboys standing up for the slumping ps3 sales, hardware and software wise. naming a game or two. or should i say sheppy the troll.. haha.

Sheppy (of the Fidlious Clan of Wong) @ Nov 14th 2008 8:53AM

TROLL?!? I don't know what you're smoking but look up the definition. A troll posts things to get a reaction. A troll uses misinformation to illicit a response. In other words, YOU'RE the troll.

Also, COD4 was the closest to the 2:1 ratio you're brandying about in a LONG LONG time. I'd suggest YOU look up some facts. Or better yet, look at your posting history and see why I fight you at most turns.

Because you're a moron using first year PS3 stats to back up an arguement that's been rendered invalid by the last year. Because you're an idiot who, rather than accept all consoles have their worth, you bash one constantly, on a daily basis, for no reason other at all than to piss off people and illicit a response. And you're a handicapable individual who doesn't understand sentences start with a capital letter.

sk8monroe81 @ Nov 14th 2008 2:14PM

gotta love when somebody stoops to the sentence grammer level to try and poke fun.. haha.
u want some sales figures, ok i waste a moment and spill a game or two. (from 2008)
nhl 09-
360- 160,000 copies sold.
ps3- 80,000 copies sold.
madden 09-
360- 1.33 million copies sold
ps3- .87 million copies sold
deadspace-
360- .5 million copies sold.
ps3- .32 million copies sold.
nba2k9-
360- .3 million copies sold.
ps3- .16 million copies sold.
assassins-
360- 4 million
ps3- 3 million
dark sector-
360- .52 million
ps3- .34 million

NAME 1 GAME THAT SOLD MORE COPIES ON THE PS3 THAN THE 360... lol... pretty much close to 50% to me... and those are all from 2008.

and for fun
gears 2- 2.1 million sold
resistance 2- 304 thousand copies sold (with a 3 day head start too) * keep in mind i am one of those who bought R2 and will play it after gears 2.

sheppy you dont have to make fun of people because they enjoy the 360 and may generalize stuff that is more true than the crap your saying.
u really thing ps3 software sales are even close to 360 software sales today?
seriously?

Arnon @ Nov 14th 2008 3:52PM

sk8 you're absolutely right.. and I was aware that LBP WAS supposed to be a day 1 million seller. It was hyped like no other so that's what I saw from it.

sk8monroe81 @ Nov 14th 2008 4:35PM

arnon- yeah its funny when a fanboy says epic fail when you really are only giving your opinion and providing some figures.

its really crazy how low these figures are for the BIG 3 PS3 2008 GAME RELEASES.
1) socom was out for 15 days in October and only sold 250,000 copies.
2) LBP was out for 4 days and only sold 215,000 copies.
3) resistance 2 has been out for 1 week and has only sold 300,000 copies.

gears 2 in 1 day sold more copies than those 3 games combined in the time they have been out to date.
sheppy please dont try and say how close ps3 software sales are to the 360. it is nowhere even close. thats pretty much just fanboy banter at that point.
someone later in this forum showed that with the top 10 for october, the 360 sold 4.1 over the ps3.

Mr Khan @ Nov 13th 2008 8:16PM

Torn about the failure of Wii Music

On the one hand, i wanted to see it do well to watch the haters squirm

On the other hand, i wanted to see it do poorly to show Nintendo the error of their ways

Of course, given its nature, it'll probably keep putting up some sort of showing through the end of the generation

Markez @ Nov 13th 2008 8:22PM

Sounds like it'll end up as one of the those games that doesn't come out of the gates too strong, but will sell consistently in decent volume for months and months and months (and months).

The haters will squirm about it anyway because they're angry lil twats, and because this is the 'end of hardcore gaming as we know it' blah blah blah yadda yadda etc.

j @ Nov 13th 2008 8:39PM

Wii Music was smack dab in the middle of a fight between Activision and Harmonix with their games (which everyone seems to be more familiar with than Wii Music, even if it is one of the Wii series).

It'd probably show Miyamoto that his little experiment was nothing but a pipe dream (hurf durf) and he should get to work on what the diehards expected.

tmacairjordan87 @ Nov 13th 2008 8:40PM

No one with a brain who hates that game would have squirmed at seeing it sell well, because we all thought it would. It's a great thing to see it tank though.

Markez @ Nov 13th 2008 8:41PM

Hey j,

It was never smack dab in the middle of the fight between GH & RB. Never never never.

Miyamato himself said you likely can't even call Wii Music a game.

Markez @ Nov 13th 2008 8:42PM

Yeah seriously dude, get a life. Your getting as bad, borderline, as our pal Newman, or Phoenix whatever later in this post. Saw it in another thread that someone commented in response to you and think it's appropriate, go outside and lose your virginity.