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Classic Sales-Age: MARCH Edition, USA TOP50+HW past four console cycles (NPD)

Square2015

Member
Experimenting with this as its own thread, previously posted in the NPD threads.
Every month as the NPD data comes out let's look at sales of the previous generation in their same respective time points in each cycle.

This year, 2016 or (complete) year three for the leading consoles corresponds to:
2009, 2004, 1999, 1994 (& 1989).

Hopefully enough time has gone by that the older data able to share with GAF.
This is collected data put together actually years ago.
Check out what we were buying:
FHe3d5t.png

Notes:
sh = shipped data
Average SW price points need to stay absent for more recent generations.
I do not have solid HH data for generations before the GBA, sorry.
"3D" gen data is revised to match sonycowboy annual HW totals as are 16-bit data to match another source's annuals.
unbolded 16-bit LTDs ending in ? are my own projections based on reverse projecting (for the most part) from early '94.

Graph-Age
PAST SIX MONTHS:
Current Gen
bWDJrhH.png


Previous Gen ("HD gen")
cvKnJM0.png


And before ("DVD gen")
9BWY7hO.png


The first "3-D gen"
65bhbTn.png

(I tried to line the max Y-axes to about 2-2.2m for each of these)

16-bit gen
2Nz66Jy.png

(Oct, Nov '93 are projections based on sound analysis of known data for that year)

The commentary I wrote for the NPD thread last year (Nintendo focused):
MARCH 2009 - Wii
This is the month of Resident Evil 5's release (at #1 and #4) on the HD consoles and Pokemon Platinum (#2) on DS. Oh and Halo Wars.
Surprisingly there are no major releases for the typically heavy, big-name Nintendo month of March...but there's really no need is there? with dat momentum.
Wii Fit (at #5) sells another half a million (541,000), one of its slower months :p the megahit from last Spring now sits in 6.5m American homes (and retirement centers), after just under a year on the market! The next Wii titles Wii Play (#8) and Mario Kart Wii (#9) at over a quarter million each continue into unknown 10 million+ territory while Mario Kart speeds pass the 5.7m mark].

Wii sells another incredible 600,000 this month, this may be the final month of shortages. We will see sales drop to a more "normal" pace after this month. Supply is able to reach the insane demand three years after launch.

MARCH 2004 - GC
GameCube is coming off of the price drop to $99 last fall which gave the system a powerful boost over the second place rival XBOX. XB outsold it by about a mere 13,000 this month though. GC LTD sits at 7.2m to XB 8.0m (and PS2 23m).

Pokémon Coliseum was the big March release (at #2) with 343,000 sold, just under Ninja Gaiden (#1) which is the first XB release to make #1. If GAF memory serves, the NPD report this month mentioned sales for Coliseum were a disappointment. This could be because its predecessor, Stadium, moved a million in March alone just four years earlier.
The Metal Gear Solid next-gen "remaster" Twin Snakes debuted (#7) with 122,000. Is this a disappointment? ...Given how popular the series had become (just the the two installments up to this point) and given the level of acclaim the first had received is this to be expected?
Mario Kart: Double Dash!! the big Christmas hit at #19 this month passed the 1.5m mark by the end of March.
Harvest Moon: another world (#20) debuted nicely with 68,000. The previous two Harvest Moons debuted poorly and largely unnoticed. The original HM on SNES sold no greater than 20,000 total while its N64 sequel was able to sell 10x as much.

Square's long anticipated return to Nintendo last month with Crystal Chronicles, the #1 seller in February (selling a quarter million), fell to #25 in March to surpass 305,000 LTD. These are great numbers IMO.
The January release of Sonic Heroes has pushed some good numbers for a Sonic spinoff on the system, totaling at over 330,000. Sega continues to do well on GC, Sonic Adventure 2 (battle) broke a million. It was a good choice to put Sonic on Nintendo continuing the popularity of the series long after its peak post-16 bit.

MARCH '99 - N64
Whoa! Mario Party [1]! After debuting #1 last month with 213,000, this month (at #2) another 245,000 sell for this new multiplayer party genre. Zelda 64 remains STRONG at #15 with close to 120,000 for the month topping 2.6m. GoldenEye sees no end, just under Zelda with 110,000 and 3.9m LTD. On down the chart, the other X'mas megahit, Rogue Squadron (#15), sells 80,000 to become a million seller this month.
January's Castlevania 64 sits under 180,000 total. The much press-curious, Beetle Adventure Racing debuts under 40,000 (#46), we'll see how it fairs next month...

The N64 HW itself sells about half of PSX. LTDs for the two look like 11m and 16m respectively.

MARCH '94 - SNES
My favorite era ;) March '94 was EXPLOSIVE, Jam-packed explosive. NBA Jam broke records with 1 million sold this month alone between the GEN and SNES (670k GEN to 410k SNES).
This is currently Genesis domination season ignited by the release of the Genesis 2 and Mortal Kombat last fall. The GEN has outsold the SNES since the release of the GEN2 last August to this month. My data estimated 3.6m sold during these critical months, the best months the GEN will see. SNES sold 2.8m during the same time frame, the weakest performance over the powerful fall-christmas-spring period for the system and a disappointment for NCL and no doubt NoA.
However the hype for Sega may be beginning to slow as new SNES pack-ins are planned (five actually!) over the next few months in addition to some games we want! Next month is Metroid 3...
A first sign of a Nintendo comeback comes in the stronger debut of NoA's new Ken Griffey title: at #5 MLB featuring Ken Griffey Jr. wins out with 45,000 sold to Sega's renown, World Series Baseball title (#9), which debuted this month with 32,000 sold.
Now guys, Mega Man X has fallen to #20 it deserves better yeah? The January release has pushed just 70,000 by the end of March. Meanwhile last month's BOOM megahit, Sonic 3 (#3 this month) is above 400,000 already LTD!

GEN HW sold 270,000 to SNES's 180,000 this month. We're looking at an incredibly close LTD: 9.8m to 9.6m !!! Aaaaah
If this goes over well maybe it would be cool to create a Classic NPD thread for each month. I don't want to give more recent info for obvious reasons, so it is minimalized to the generations before the last [wii-gen] which should be safe now.[/quote]

I hope to have an NES TOP30 sales or "Dealer's chart" next month.
 

mooksoup

Member
This is really interesting, thank you for posting.

Still working through it, but fascinating to see these historical figures put together like this.
 

darkside31337

Tomodachi wa Mahou
This is cool. Neat to see the history of baseball games in March with the rise and fall of various series to the present day where the Show is king. Also the Genesis did quite well for itself in America.
 

Futurematic

Member
Awesome. I loved your write-ups in the threads (heck I have a partial index lol: any chance you could add a full one to the OP?) and this hard data is invaluable for counterfactuals.

Also thanks for the data because I may update the Superstar Software paper with increased granularity and closer to modern times calculations. (Your write ups are also so then-present, I love 'em)
 

Esque7

Member
Really interesting, especially seeing how well some N64 software did relative to total hardware. PSX really dominated those charts though, damn near everything released on it was a success. The industry seemed broader then, with many relatively successful titles vs the current trend of fewer, very successful games.

Last gen was just amazing though, I don't think we'll ever see those software and hardware sales again.
 
Holy crap, this is awesome.

Acclaim and 3D0 are putting up mad numbers, they'll be ruling the charts forevers I tells ya.
 

Eolz

Member
Wow, Ninja Gaiden got first at the time? Didn't know that, pretty impressive.

Will look at the other details, thanks for this thread/info.
 

Square2015

Member
Awesome. I loved your write-ups in the threads (heck I have a partial index lol: any chance you could add a full one to the OP?) and this hard data is invaluable for counterfactuals.

Also thanks for the data because I may update the Superstar Software paper with increased granularity and closer to modern times calculations. (Your write ups are also so then-present, I love 'em)

Thank you :)
I will work on a write-up for the other consoles.
 
Damn at that Top 10 between Genesis and SNES. Sports games -o-rama. Meanwhile the better games for both are lower down the chart :(

Eh, some of those are the best sports games ever made and, certainly, of that generation. That was also still a generation of console gaming ruled by mass market fare that was very family-friendly and dominated by children's licenses, too.
 
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