Topic: Official Sales Thread

[couchmonkey]

Those are all fine - if you want to pay $50 - $350 US extra for your system and give up motion control and the Virtual Console.  I think Wii is so fundamentally different that comparing game lineups is almost irrelevant.

Games do matter, though, and I admit we need to hear more from third parties (though DS was built entirely on first-party successes, with third-party support following in the wake).  We also need to know that Nintendo has got more disruptive software lined up for the future, but all signs point to yes.

[Louieturkey]

Quote
Originally posted by: Kairon: I see plenty of competition for the Wii out in the distance. This is why one of my lingering worries is the Wii's software lineup in fall 2007 (are ANY third party games slated for Fall '07?!?!?! Will Fall '07 be bombarded by non-games and third party "kiddie" titles like Sims Wii and Harvest Moon?!?!?) and ESPECIALLY into 2008.

Actually, to be truthful, absolutely NO games are slated for Fall 07 yet on the Wii.  In fact, only GTA4 (Oct 17th) and Halo 3 (November something) are the only games actually with fairly concrete release dates for the fall.  So stop scaring yourself into a panick.  Most 3rd parties only jumped on the Wii at E3 last year and are still in development of their games.  We'll probably see a slew of games in July at E3.  Plus Nintendo always has games hidden up their sleeves.  Plus when we already know Super Mario Galaxy is coming, what other games are needed for the hardcore crowd?  

[Kairon]

I don't think price is too scary for Microsoft... MS is just $100 away from a magical $200 price for their core system if they want to start losing money again... And it's important to note that the X360 is selling as fast as the original XBox, but with an effective $400 pricetag. We're seeing some price flexibility in the market for dedicated gamers.

Sony, though, is really screwed. I can't see any way they can drop the $499 minimum barrier to entry obstacle to ANYTHING remotely mass market until 2009.

~Carmine "Cai" M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[Luigi Dude]

The Wii's software lineup for fall 2007 will have either Smash Bros Brawl or Super Mario Galaxy in it.  Either of those two games can easily compete with anything on the Xbox 360 or PS3.  Then there's the fact that Nintendo owns the Japanese market, which will ensure a good amount of Japanese third party support.  Plus Nintendo is also doing very well in America and Europe and will probobly surpass the Xbox 360 in both places.

Third parties showed last gen that the system that sells the most gets all the support.  To them it's larger userbase, more sales.  Even if some of these's companies games sold the best on the Gamecube, they still dropped support to focus on the PS2 because it had the larger userbase.  And since the Wii is going to have the largest userbase by the end of the year, we'll be seeing a huge amount of software coming out by the end of the year.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Sorry to interrupt the conversation, but...

Media Create Jan 22nd - 28th

Software:
01. PS2 (Capcom) Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - 227261 / 227261
02. DS (Square-Enix) Dragon Quest Monsters Joker - 103706 / 1026700
03. DS (Sega) Sangokushi Taisen DS - 77229 / 77229
04. DS (Nintendo) Picross DS - 71794 / 71794
05. DS (Nintendo) Hotel Dusk: Room 215 - 59379 / 59379
06. Wii (Nintendo) Wii Sports - 58886 / 910422
07. DS (Nintendo) Wario: The Seven - 47350 / 138599
08. Wii (Nintendo) Wii Play - 43612 / 808425
09. PS2 (Hackberry) Pachinko Winter Sonata - 41411 / 41411
10. DS (Nintendo) More Brain Age - 34028 / 3902307
~
11. DS (Nintendo) New Super Mario Brothers
12. DS (Nintendo) Common Knowledge Training
13. DS (Nintendo) Animal Crossing Wild World
14. PS2 (Konami) Prince of Tennis: Doki-Doki Survival
15. 360 (Bandai-Namco) The Idolm@ster
16. DS (Nintendo) Mario Kart DS
17. DS (Pokemon) Pokemon Diamond
18. DS (Nintendo) English Training
19. DS (Nintendo) Brain Training
20. PS2 (Sega) Shining Force EXA
21. DS (Spike) IQ Supply
22. DS (Pokemon) Pokemon Pearl
23. DS (IE Institute) Kanji Brain Test 2M
24. PSP (Konami) Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops
25. PS2 (Bandai-Namco) .hack//G.U. Vol. 3
26. DS (Nintendo) 1000 Recipes
27. Wii (Nintendo) Wario Ware Smooth Moves
28. PSP (Capcom) Monster Hunter Portable
29. PS3 (From Software) Enchanted Arms
30. PS2 (Flight-Plan) Dragon Shadow Spell

Hardware:
Tomorrow

NDS: 17
PS2: 6
Wii: 3
PSP: 2
360: 1
PS3: 1

PS3 made it back on the charts, barely.
And DQM:J has already passed the 1million mark,  but there is supposed to be no more copies for 2 weeks. Thats how you kill momentum...

[Kairon]

WHAT ARE PS3 and PSP doing on my NINTENDO CHARTS? ARGH!

~Carmine "Cai" M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[Blue Plant]

Not to mention PS2.  Grrrr...

[KDR_11k]

GTASA taking a top spot on the japanese charts?

[Smash_Brother]

Quote
01. PS2 (Capcom?!?) Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - 227261 / 227261

WTF?!

[KDR_11k]

Capcom is the publisher for GTA in Japan.

[MaryJane]

DS = Dominating System (or Sales, or Suckers, or (play)Station, or forever  )

Going back to game releases, Nintendo's success of creating Super High Quality 1st party games is something that tends to scare developers. Case in point how many 3D platformers do you think we're going to see on the Wii, besides Mario? Has there ever been a worthy Zelda clone? I know Zelda is considered an action-RPG but I've never played another game like it, this could be because of my lack of systems that I've owned, but the point remains.

Don't get me wrong, it's a good thing for Nintendo and us, but at the same time the question remains. Would we see more 3rd party games if they weren't scared of competing with Nintendo on their own console?

Maybe I'm wrong, but even Nintendo is scared of competing with themselves, which I believe is why they are spacing WarioWare and Mario Party. There are a lot of good(looking) 3rd party titles in the works, but none in any way resemble games that Nintendo dominates. It's actually kind of impressive, but at the same time it could hurt them.


One other thing is that you can't really count out PS3 just yet, and you REALLY can't count out X360. One thing that needs to be realized is that a lot of people still hate Nintendo, they are made at them for the systems that were N64 and GameCube. Their loyalties have shifted, and in the face of the Wii system's success all they can say is "graphics". Someone (Kairon? I'm too lazy to look) made note of the fact that there are a lot of system selling games coming out for the X360, and a few fore PS3. Once PS3 gets it foot in the door (it only has about 2 toes right now) devs are going to jump on the bandwagon fearing missing their chance. They'll still be supporting the Wii, but once Sony can say they've sold (really means shipped) 10 million consoles, expect to see more games.

[oohhboy]

Going head to head with clone games against Nintendo is suicide. Actually, making clone games most of the time against any studio which leads a market is suicide unless you have something that is truly different.

Look at the GTA clones and wannabes out there. How many of them have died or langished in poor sales and obscurity. What about games that copy Madden. Oh wait they don't exist. "Realistic" racers besides GT on the PS2 that have even come close in sales? Nope.

The point is that Nintendo don't want people to make clones of thier games. Not really because it would compete with them, it is because they know what the outcome would be. The clone would die a quick and silent death at the hands of Nintendos own game. What Nintendo really wants is for other studios is fill in the holes in thier line ups. Make similiar yet different games. To grow the market. Bigger the market is, the stronger they can be.

If Nintendo really wanted to monoplize the console to itself, it would not make it aviable for others to develope for it. It would buy/hire people left and right to fill in the holes. But no matter how big Nintendo becomes, it will never be large enough to do that. Even if they could get that big, they would face disproporinate amount of risk as they would have to spend massive amount of effort to hold that monoploy against small, faster companies. Look at Microsoft. They spend most of thier time fighting a million bush fires instead working on it's own products. It has to effectively steal other peoples ideas to prop itself up.

As much as I want the PS3 and or 360 to die just to get rid of the fanboys, I know that it would cause more harm than good.

[Caterkiller]

Quote
Originally posted by: oohhboy

As much as I want the PS3 and or 360 to die just to get rid of the fanboys, I know that it would cause more harm than good.

Understanding that is very important to the video game industry. I like how the One Piece Manga/Anime is set up, most of the main characters rarely out right kill their opponents because death would be the easy way out. Instead they are usualy only defeated, being left to see their goals, ideals, and beliefs destroyed. Its a fate worse than death! I wan't both Microsoft and Sony to hang on just enough to see their beastly machines out gunned by an "inferior" console based purely on gameplay and fun.

[MaryJane]

Crackdown for the X360 = GTA clone.

No but seriously before EA acquired the sole rights to make NFL games, there were 3 others out there. Activision's game, 2k sports, and ESPN all had football games. They spurred competition, and although none of them ever made it to the popularity or sales of Madden they at least tried.

My main point was that when people make games for a Nintendo console they often find themselves competing against an established Nintendo franchise, and those nerds out there that always buy Nintendo systems always buy Nintendo games, because they already know it's going to be good.

Opposite to that name two games from either Microsoft or Sony that they make in-house that always sells. Halo... Halo 2?

I'm sort of just playing devil's advocate because it's really more impressive than threatening (to me anyway) that Nintendo has such high regard among it's peers and gamers.

[BlackNMild2k1]

I believe the 2k games and ESPN were one in the same.  

[couchmonkey]

360 seems to have the most potential and the least all at the same time.

Most potential:
- year head-start = nearly 200 games, and around 9 million players
- has similar power to PS3 at about $200 less cost
- has price flexibility
- no game drought in the first half of 2007(? - I haven't actually been keeping tabs on this)

Least potential:
- it can't even buy a new demographic - Viva Pinata has its own TV show and received decent reviews, but first-week sales in N.A. were just 42,000 according to vgcharts.org.  For comparison, StarFox Adventures sold 188,000 in its first week
- Japan doesn't care: 360 is seeing a slight upward trend, which could be good news, but it's tracking behind the original Xbox so far, and it's so far behind GameCube it isn't funny
- In North America, 360's first year was only slightly better than Xbox's first year - maybe 20% more sales

I think Xbox 360 could take off this year if disenfranchised Sony and Nintendo fans start considering it as an alternative.   A price drop would help a lot, as will more ports of former PS3-exclusives.  All that said, its sales performance so far is ho-hum.


Edit: 2 games that MS/Sony make in-house that sell?  Good question!

Sony: God of War (remains to be seen if the series has legs) and Gran Turismo
MS: Halo, and, uh...Gears of War (again, don't know if the series has legs)

Sony seems to be good at pulling new hits out of thin air.  I thought losing Crash Bandicoot would be a big blow to PS2, but three new mascot platformers took his place.

[MaryJane]

If the 360 can take down first place in the U.S I would count that a win for Microsoft, and they are threatening to do that. With American gamers general dislike of Nintendo, and Sony's many failures, it is possible, especially since PS3 games are being ported over the X360. If the "sytem sellers" get ported Sony is finished.

I didn't even realize God of War was internally made. I didn't like the game myself it was like 8 hours long, crap IMO.

Edit: I originally put Nintendo, although I guess the sentence would still be true.

[Kairon]

I need to play God of Wars. David Jaffe gets a lot of praise from certain corners and I'd like to someday know what it's for.

~Carmine "Cai" M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[SixthAngel]

Quote
Originally posted by: MaryJane
Crackdown for the X360 = GTA clone.

No but seriously before EA acquired the sole rights to make NFL games, there were 3 others out there. Activision's game, 2k sports, and ESPN all had football games. They spurred competition, and although none of them ever made it to the popularity or sales of Madden they at least tried.

My main point was that when people make games for a Nintendo console they often find themselves competing against an established Nintendo franchise, and those nerds out there that always buy Nintendo systems always buy Nintendo games, because they already know it's going to be good.

Opposite to that name two games from either Microsoft or Sony that they make in-house that always sells. Halo... Halo 2?

I'm sort of just playing devil's advocate because it's really more impressive than threatening (to me anyway) that Nintendo has such high regard among it's peers and gamers.

That is why people don't usually make games for systems with an established best genre game.  Whatever that Sam Fisher game was they put on the xbox because MGS would have crushed it before it landed.  The types of games Nintendo makes are often not even all that popular outside of Nintendo systems anyway.  Having the best games in a genre is hardly a problem, that problem is to get the other genres games.  Nintendo games beating games of the same genre was never the problem it was them overshadowing games of completely different genres.  Spacing games, a big userbase and Nintendo working with good 3rd parties to give them a space with no big N game is what is needed.

[Ceric]

Quote
Originally posted by: MaryJane
Crackdown for the X360 = GTA clone.

No but seriously before EA acquired the sole rights to make NFL games, there were 3 others out there. Activision's game, 2k sports, and ESPN all had football games. They spurred competition, and although none of them ever made it to the popularity or sales of Madden they at least tried.

My main point was that when people make games for a Nintendo console they often find themselves competing against an established Nintendo franchise, and those nerds out there that always buy Nintendo systems always buy Nintendo games, because they already know it's going to be good.

Opposite to that name two games from either Microsoft or Sony that they make in-house that always sells. Halo... Halo 2?

I'm sort of just playing devil's advocate because it's really more impressive than threatening (to me anyway) that Nintendo has such high regard among it's peers and gamers.

Age of Empires and Microsoft Flight Simulator.
Jak and Dexter, and Grand Tourismo.



For the Record:  God of War is good till you get near the end. (My disc must have a glitch because there is one place where you have to move a box and then jump to the cliff.  Yeah, Kratos won't do it on mine.)  Though overall thinking back I consider it slow.

There was something else I wanted to respond to.  Oh, yeah.  On GoldenPheonix's list I would add that the 360 Developments are suppose to be very very good.

[Kairon]

Jak and Daxter is Naughty Dog, and they technically aren't a second-party to Sony if I recall correctly.

~Carmine "Cai" M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[IceCold]

Couchmonkey's post about the 360's situation is dead on - it'll be interesting to see how the console develops over the next few years.

I think Gears of War was developed by Epic though (not in-house).

[Kairon]

Although, to be fair, Excite Truck was done by Monster Games, not in-house to Nintendo as well. It's the publishing arrangements with the console manufacturers that tie these games, as well as Jak and Daxter, to their respective consoles.

~Carmine "Cai" M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

[Louieturkey]

Naughty Dog is definitely a 2nd party to Sony.  Sony bought them after losing the Crash Bandicoot license (right after the PS2 released) to make sure they never lost their franchise mascots again.

[denjet78]

Quote
Originally posted by: Louieturkey
Naughty Dog is definitely a 2nd party to Sony.  Sony bought them after losing the Crash Bandicoot license (right after the PS2 released) to make sure they never lost their franchise mascots again.

I don't think you could really consider Naughty Dog's character's mascots. Mario is a mascot. Link is a mascot. Samus is a mascot. Jax, not so much. They tried with Daxter but it just didn't catch on. Still, they did push that franchise hard last gen. Three platformers and a racing game. I'm surprised they didn't release a Jax Party.

And why in the world was Sony upset about loosing Crash? I still can't believe they actually picked him to be the "mascot" of the PSX. Talk about stupidity.