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April 2012 NPD Sales Results [Up3: Best selling game sold less than 236K, Kid Icarus]

L

lunchwithyuzo

Banned
mugurumakensei said:
GB and GBC were slowburners as well. Also, the PSP had a noticeably better launch than GBA which is relevant to the snapshot of handheld systems from 2005-present.

For all the bad things that can be said about how the PSP was handle, the one thing did right was the launch. With Vita, Sony didn't even get that right.
Click to expand...
No, GBA vastly outperformed PSP for launch. Over 250k more for it's first NPD actually.

GBA 870K
PSP 619K
NDS 480K
3DS 400K
PSV 225K

People forget how strong GBA actually was at the time, month to month it moved more than PS2.

Also, GBC was the opposite of "slow burn". I don't have NPD figures handy but you have to consider the thing sold ~50m worldwide in less 4 years. GBC's insane success actually led to Nintendo delaying GBA launch over a year, it sold way above what anyone predicted.
 
J

jcm

Member
mugurumakensei said:
DS still hadn't hit its stride by this point, and it had had two holiday seasons by this point. PSP is really the only outlier in terms of handheld launches.
Click to expand...

Well, the best comparison year for the handhelds is probably 2006. Handhelds are down 37% from that year. The comparison for the consoles I guess would be 2005. April 2005 consoles were 548K, compared with ~502K this year, or down 8%.
 
T

tuffy

Member
lunchwithyuzo said:
Also, GBC was the opposite of "slow burn". I don't have NPD figures handy but you have to consider the thing sold ~50m worldwide in less 4 years. GBC's insane success actually led to Nintendo delaying GBA launch over a year, it sold way above what anyone predicted.
Click to expand...
It's easy to understand why since the original Gameboy had been on the market with minor changes for about 9(!) years before the GBC launched. Even that stopgap release was enough to demonstrate how much demand there was for new portable hardware after all that time.
 
P

Plinko

Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
M.I.S. said:
Not that I disagree entirely, but weren't we saying the same thing about 3D Land / Kart 7 ?
Click to expand...

3D Land and Mario Kart 7 aren't huge? What world is this?
 
C

CitizenCope

Member
So did we get any clues to what the PS3 and Vita may have sold? I know it's not in the OP but I wasn't sure if someone dug up something in the last half of this thread.
 
R

Region-FreeWii

Member
CitizenCope said:
So did we get any clues to what the PS3 and Vita may have sold? I know it's not in the OP but I wasn't sure if someone dug up something in the last half of this thread.
Click to expand...

We don't have concrete #'s but JVM's estimates on the last few pages are the closest we'll get. Some claiming his # are pretty accurate.
 
L

lunchwithyuzo

Banned
Plinko said:
3D Land and Mario Kart 7 aren't huge? What world is this?
Click to expand...
I think with all the "handhelds are dead" FUD going around, people are overlooking just how well the Mario games are doing.

After 5 NPDs
Super Mario 64 DS: 949,000
Super Mario 3D Land: 1,980,000

After 4 NPDs
Mario Kart DS: 875,000
Mario Kart 7: 1,580,000

D00M3D clearly! How ever will Nintendo adapt/transition? ;)
 
1

1-D_FTW

Member
lunchwithyuzo said:
I think with all the "handhelds are dead" FUD going around, people are overlooking just how well the Mario games are doing.

After 5 NPDs
Super Mario 64 DS: 949,000
Super Mario 3D Land: 1,980,000

After 4 NPDs
Mario Kart DS: 875,000
Mario Kart 7: 1,580,000

D00M3D clearly! How ever will Nintendo adapt/transition? ;)
Click to expand...

I wouldn't exactly call it FUD. Those specific IPs mentioned are the very same reason Nintendo is doing a lot better than Sony right now. They're the most iconic of iconic franchises. The 3DS is selling because people want to play them badly enough to buy the hardware (for now).
 
L

lunchwithyuzo

Banned
M.I.S. said:
Ambiguous wording on my part. I didn't mean to say anything about the Land or Kart 7 titles themselves, but that it's effect on 3DS sales has been muted in light of 3DS sales in this months NPD.
Click to expand...
Looking at Vita sales, I'd argue the impact on hardware hasn't been exactly muted. Mario is pretty much single handedly driving 3DS sales, and it's the 3rd best selling platform behind the HD twins (themselves being driven by basically the entire rest of the industry). Things would unquestionably be orders of magnitude worse without these two games.
 
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
I addressed the software situation for a bit in a column today. Here's a link in case you're interested.

The software picture:
software-revenue-by-month-2011-2012.png


Similar stuff happening in UK:
uk-software-revenue-by-month-2011-2012.png


Also some quotes from several analysts.

Up next is a look at the digital market.
 
S

StevieP

Banned
dude said:
Right now there isn't that much more, not of that magnitude anyway, but I'm showing killer IP can rise in mobile games, and Angry Bird's rise was meteoric, and more will come eventually. It's a matter of focus and funds. The couple of people who are discussing making a game in their basement right now? They're talking about making it for the iPhone or iPad - That's where the people are and that's where the money is.
To be clear - that's not happening to day or tomorrow, but in 2-3 years.
Click to expand...

This has been covered ad nauseum across this board plenty of times already, but I just wanted to make sure to point out to you that when you're selling games for a couple bucks the budget won't be drastic. The revenue also isn't there for all but a very few.
 
I

ItWasMeantToBe19

Banned
As Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said to me in a recent email, "casual gamers are never buying consoles again." If true, that would signal a sea change in the balance of power in the video game industry. No longer would companies like Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo hold the reins of power.

I prodded him on this point, asking if console makers could turn consoles into platforms for the kind of bite-sized and socially-networked entertainment that currently drives the mobile, tablet, and web-based markets. After all, each console now has a user-friendly interface: Microsoft has Kinect, Sony has Move, and Nintendo has the Wii remote and the Wii U tablet.

"It doesn't matter," he told me, since "the hardware purchase decision is a non-starter."
Click to expand...

Betting everything on WiiU and Kinect 2 now.
 
J

jman2050

Member
The Mario games prove that software still drives hardware, and as Nintendo fills out the 3DS library they will drive 3DS's growth even more.

The question is how it will ultimately compare to DS, and furthermore whether that comparison actually matters at all.
 
S

StevieP

Banned
Dear Mr. Pachter,

I know you're reading this. You could even be furiously masturbating to it, I don't know. But whenever there is a compelling and well-marketed piece of software that the mass market at large wants, they will purchase hardware for it. This has always been the case, and it will always be the case. You have been covering videogames long enough to know this. Misused monickers such as "casual" and "hardcore" matter nothing when it comes to mass-market success. I have also heard excessive masturbation causes memory loss. Perhaps you should take this into account when speaking in public.

Yours truly,
A Concerned GAFfer
 
W

wrowa

Member
It's like Pachter never took a closer look at the Wii. If you look at it superficially it's easy to think that it only sold well because of it's Wiimote gimmick, but if you take a closer look you realize that the majority of Wii's best-selling games have one thing in common: Great local multiplayer.

And this is something that can't be replicated by smartphones or tablets. As long as consoles are the first choice to play games with people who are in the same room, casuals will continue to buy consoles.
 
P

Pociask

Member
Pachter quote is... strange? Why would casuals never buy a console again? They just bought tons of Wiis for Sports and Fit, and apparently are buying 360's for Kinect. A year ago one in four people were watching Netflix with their Wii's - I'd bet a large number of those are casuals.

I think the console industry is definitely facing some headwinds, but what happened to suddenly kill all casual interest in video game consoles? If the answer is Apple or smartphones, L-O-L. Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony are all one must-have-hit away from being at the top of Christmas lists, again.
 
N

nincompoop

Banned
LOL Pachter. Once again demonstrating his complete inability to look past current trends and into the future. Truly the saddest excuse for a market analyst there ever was.
 
O

Opiate

Member
BKK said:
Size isn't such an issue if you use a bluetooth headset though, and tablets seem quite popular despite their size.
Click to expand...

Size is a really big issue for a phone, though, which is what we're talking about. If the Vita wants to position itself as a tablet competitor it should honestly have an even bigger screen; if it wants to compete with phones, it should go smaller. I could imagine an in between size working for a revolutionary product that breaks all molds, but I don't think Vita is that.
 
D

Dunlop

Member
jman2050 said:
The Mario games prove that software still drives hardware
Click to expand...

I think it is more, that Mario games drive Nintendo hardware, it constantly defies the odds and continues to sell without people burning out from them.

Hell I almost loathe nintendo after the Wii, but I have almost every Mario <insert game genre here> games for my kid's DS/3DS

Eventually people will tire of CoD but Mario will keep chugging on
 
O

Opiate

Member
JVM, how much of that decline is just Nintendo? In the past, the decline had essentially been only Nintendo, with Microsoft, Sony, and third parties doing just fine.

I suspect that is no longer the case, though, and we're starting to see substantive declines in 360/PS3 performance as well (along with continued Wii/DS software declines).
 
F

Flying_Phoenix

Banned
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
Opiate said:
JVM, how much of that decline is just Nintendo? In the past, the decline had essentially been only Nintendo, with Microsoft, Sony, and third parties doing just fine.

I suspect that is no longer the case, though, and we're starting to see substantive declines in 360/PS3 performance as well (along with continued Wii/DS software declines).
Click to expand...
I think Nintendo accounts for about 60% of the $750M decline in software.

HD console software dollar sales are down 19% YTD compared to the same period in 2011. Only one month of YOY growth this year for either of the HD consoles (Xbox 360 in February or something, don't have figures here) in terms of dollars, so it's consistently down. I think December was also down for PS3, probably Xbox 360 too, so you can stretch that back into the last month of 2011...
 
J

jman2050

Member
Dunlop said:
I think it is more, that Mario games drive Nintendo hardware, it constantly defies the odds and continues to sell without people burning out from them.

Hell I almost loathe nintendo after the Wii, but I have almost every Mario <insert game genre here> games for my kid's DS/3DS

Eventually people will tire of CoD but Mario will keep chugging on
Click to expand...

But for the time being, CoD IS an example of software driving hardware. It's the primary driving force behind 360 and PS3's continued success in the West. People will tire of it, but that doesn't change what it's done as of right now.

PS3 has coasted to treading water in Japan on the back of software. The 3DS is doing gangbusters in Japan and decent in the West because of software. The Wii fell off completely in all territories because software support stopped. The Vita is currently stillborn because of lack of marketable software. The PS2 continues selling to this day because it still has one of the richest software lineups of all time. People are gaming on their smartphones and tablets because there is software there. Nintendo will survive because they make games people WILL buy in large amounts. Microsoft for the same reason. Sony is in trouble specifically because their own software isn't a driving force for whatever reasons.

It's all about the games. Make games people want to play and they will come. This isn't a hard concept to grasp, but it seems in all this smartphone euphoria people inexplicably reversed the order for no good reason. And it's annoying because very powerful people who are very rich are making decisions based on a faulty premise, and it will eventually bite them in the ass.
 
R

RurouniZel

Asks questions so Ezalc doesn't have to
jman2050 said:
But for the time being, CoD IS an example of software driving hardware. It's the primary driving force behind 360 and PS3's continued success in the West. People will tire of it, but that doesn't change what it's done as of right now.

PS3 has coasted to treading water in Japan on the back of software. The 3DS is doing gangbusters in Japan and decent in the West because of software. The Wii fell off completely in all territories because software support stopped. The Vita is currently stillborn because of lack of marketable software. The PS2 continues selling to this day because it still has one of the richest software lineups of all time. People are gaming on their smartphones and tablets because there is software there. Nintendo will survive because they make games people WILL buy in large amounts. Microsoft for the same reason. Sony is in trouble specifically because their own software isn't a driving force for whatever reasons.

It's all about the games. Make games people want to play and they will come. This isn't a hard concept to grasp, but it seems in all this smartphone euphoria people inexplicably reversed the order for no good reason. And it's annoying because very powerful people who are very rich are making decisions based on a faulty premise, and it will eventually bite them in the ass.
Click to expand...

citizenkaneclap.gif
 
B

bigtroyjon

Member
jvm said:
I addressed the software situation for a bit in a column today. Here's a link in case you're interested.
Click to expand...

If you want to analyze the entire market and not just retail sales, you really need to read the various publishers earnings and listen to the conference calls because this:
The industry giants are still largely focused on packaged game software for dedicated game hardware, and that simply does not make sense in the face of ubiquitous mobile devices and web-based free-to-play entertainment.
Click to expand...
is the opposite of what is happening. EA, Activision, Ubisoft, THQ, all have shown significant growth in their digital revenue and they are not just growing, they are highlighting it as the main focus going forward. Ubisoft alone probably said "Free to Play" 20+ times over the course of the call.
 
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
bigtroyjon said:
If you want to analyze the entire market and not just retail sales, you really need to read the various publishers earnings and listen to the conference calls because this:

is the opposite of what is happening. EA, Activision, Ubisoft, THQ, all have shown significant growth in their digital revenue and they are not just growing, they are highlighting it as the main focus going forward. Ubisoft alone probably said "Free to Play" 20+ times over the course of the call.
Click to expand...
You don't have to tell me. Did you read the last paragraph in the linked column?

Ubisoft's figures show 80M&#8364; digital revenue out of 1060M&#8364;. That's 7.5% of their earnings. THQ's digital revenue was 7.1% of total revenue. Which part is still their main focus?

Activision Blizzard Digital Online Revenue went down in each of the last two quarters. Excluding Blizzard/WoW, their business is still primarily packaged products.

EA is growing its digital revenue, I believe, primarily through acquisitions. (There is a slide in their presentation that calls their digital revenue growth organic, i.e. in-house, but I'm not sure of the specifics. I have to read more on that.) They've been the most aggressive, but I don't know that their digital growth is sustainable.

Don't get me wrong: clearly, digital will be a growth area. But it isn't close to replacing packaged goods revenue, and it's still a long way from being the majority of the revenue in the industry.
 
B

BKK

Member
Opiate said:
Size is a really big issue for a phone, though, which is what we're talking about. If the Vita wants to position itself as a tablet competitor it should honestly have an even bigger screen; if it wants to compete with phones, it should go smaller. I could imagine an in between size working for a revolutionary product that breaks all molds, but I don't think Vita is that.
Click to expand...

My thoughts were rather more modest than directly competing with tablets and phones. It's just one possible way to increase value without increasing hardware costs, presuming it could be achieved with just a firmware update that is. As others pointed out, much of this functionality is already available on Vita through Skype, but that requires an additional Skype account, along with purchasing a local number and then forwarding any calls from your mobile to skype number, which also costs additional money. It's a rather inelegant solution compared to just being able to use a regular mobile sim.
 
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
As bigtroyjon and I were discussing, there is also the part of the market that is digital. In a column today I tried to give a little information there, and so I'll link to it:
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/170464/Could_digital_sales_also_be_contracting.php

An image from the article:
ex-retail-sales-2010-2011-2012.png

That's based on the figures for 1Q 2012 that the NPD Group has mentioned so far. Going to be difficult for March to make it up to last year's level, but we'll know more in June...
 
B

bigtroyjon

Member
You've got the GAAP and non-GAAP backwards. Non-GAAP is the money they actually take in for the quarter, GAAP requires them to defer the revenue over a longer period of time, basically the amount of time they can reasonably expect to support it(post release patches and things like that).

Reading some of my posts again I think I sometimes come off harsher in my critiques than I intended to, I always enjoy reading your articles and always learn at least one new thing in each of them.
 
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
bigtroyjon said:
You've got the GAAP and non-GAAP backwards. Non-GAAP is the money they actually take in for the quarter, GAAP requires them to defer the revenue over a longer period of time, basically the amount of time they can reasonably expect to support it(post release patches and things like that).

Reading some of my posts again I think I sometimes come off harsher in my critiques than I intended to, I always enjoy reading your articles and always learn at least one new thing in each of them.
Click to expand...
You're right. That's what I get for trying to do too much in one week. *sigh* Thanks!

And, yeah, don't worry about tone around here. For the most part, the people who post meaningfully around here are thickskinned and ready to defend their positions rationally. I hope I didn't come off too prickly ... I was just giving and taking, I thought. :)

Again, thanks for the correction. It's been fixed in the original article!
 
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
Rentrak emailed me today to say that they have top rented games in the U.S. in a weekly newsletter. The current list is this:

TOP 10 RENTING VIDEO GAME TITLES Week Ended 5/13/2012 USA
RANK TITLE (PLATFORM, LAST WEEK RANK, WEEKS OUT)
  1. Prototype 2 (Xbox 360, 1, 3)
  2. Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City (Xbox 360, 3, 8)
  3. Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (Xbox 360, 2, 4)
  4. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (Xbox 360, 5, 27)
  5. Prototype 2 (PS3, 4, 3)
  6. Starhawk (PS3, NEW, 1)
  7. Mass Effect 3 (Xbox 360, 6, 10)
  8. Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City (PS3, 7, 8)
  9. Major League Baseball 2K12 (Xbox 360, 10, 10)
  10. Mario Party 9 (Wii, 9, 10)

Not sure if it'll be worthwhile, but there you go.
 
P

Pranay

Member
jvm said:
As bigtroyjon and I were discussing, there is also the part of the market that is digital. In a column today I tried to give a little information there, and so I'll link to it:
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/170464/Could_digital_sales_also_be_contracting.php

An image from the article:
ex-retail-sales-2010-2011-2012.png

That's based on the figures for 1Q 2012 that the NPD Group has mentioned so far. Going to be difficult for March to make it up to last year's level, but we'll know more in June...
Click to expand...

Thats quite interesting

Ubisoft's figures show 80M&#8364; digital revenue out of 1060M&#8364;. That's 7.5% of their earnings. THQ's digital revenue was 7.1% of total revenue.
Click to expand...


This is even more interesting
 
B

Biggest-Geek-Ever

Member
I'm not sure if I'm more annoyed with myself for not noticing it was rentals, or that that's actually data Rentrak gave out this week.
I'm still sad that Raccoon City is #2. Renting bad games feels so much different than bad movies, you can't really get enjoyment out of it.
 
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
Wasn't sure if this was thread-worthy.

Since we had a short discussion here about digital vs. retail, today's column up at Gamasutra might give some ideas of who's earning what.

For five big publishers, here is the retail picture in the last 12 months:
all-companies-retail-revenue.png


For those same publishers, here is the digital picture in the last 12 months:
all-companies-digital-revenue.png


Lots of caveats. For example, this isn't the whole industry. (Serious question: Is there a Japanese publisher who breaks out their revenue into retail and non-retail? I'd like to include them, but my last check didn't turn anything up. That was a few weeks ago, though.)

More at the link. If this is novel enough to warrant a new thread, fine by me, but I don't wish to be too presumptuous.
 
V

Version 3.0

Member
Very interesting stuff. It's nice to see some top-line figures on digital. Thanks as always, jvm.

This thread is pretty old now, if this isn't worth a new thread, I'd say at least bring it up for discussion in the next NPD thread.
 
B

bigtroyjon

Member
Microsoft made a blog post about E3 and it had this nugget of info in it.
have generated more than $56 billion at retail
Click to expand...

67 million consoles sold so that means each console bought has generated $836 at retail.

Edit-I'm assuming that number is worldwide, seems too high for just US.
 
J

jvm

Gamasutra.
Latest Rentrak.

TOP 10 RENTING VIDEO GAME TITLES Week Ended 5/20/2012 USA
RANK TITLE (PLATFORM, LAST WEEK RANK, WEEKS OUT)
  1. Max Payne 3 (Xbox 360, NEW, 1)
  2. Max Payne 3 (PS3, NEW, 1)
  3. Prototype 2 (Xbox 360, 1, 4)
  4. Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City (Xbox 360, 2, 9)
  5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (Xbox 360, 4, 28)
  6. Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (Xbox 360, 3, 5)
  7. Prototype 2 (PS3, 5, 4)
  8. Mario Party 9 (Wii, 10, 11)
  9. Mass Effect 3 (Xbox 360, 7, 11)
  10. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Xbox 360, 12, 28)

Also, an update on NPD's estimates for ex-retail spending. The U.S. data is in the right column.
OfwDV.jpg

Source: http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/npd-lifts-the-lid-on-size-of-alternative-games-market/097027
 
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