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[GavinGT]

This is the second month 360's been down YoY.

Again, Kinect launched last year.

 

[matmanx1]

I think retail sales nationwide were soft in January. I think Nov. and Dec. consumers pretty much went all in as far as spending and leveraging credit goes and so the corresponding Jan slump was harsher than normal. That coupled with a lack of new AAA releases made for a tough month.

Next month will be interesting with the release of the Vita and it's sales or lack thereof. Many people are predicting a disaster but I hope the Vita at least does respectably.

 

[AndrewDean84xX]

Lack of numbers still makes these threads a lot worse.

 

[Satchel]

Looks like MS and Sony are going ot have to release their new consoles sooner then they planned it seems?

Unless sales pick up a bit between now and September of course.

 

[toddhunter]

Lets keep it interesting and speculate:

PS3 - 280K
WII - 1K


360 doomed?

 

[mugurumakensei]

I think most people are waiting for a cheaper X360.

If the figures are true then people just aren't spending as times get tighter - throwing new console hardware infront of people in the next few years seems like a bad idea and Nintendo might just be about to stick their foot on a) Express golden escalator to WINSVILLE or b) poisonous rusty iron bear trap

I really think Iwata is looking at how the Wii is tanking and thinking "people want another Wii!" - it might be totally right, but i don't think it's a guarantee they'll get the Wii crowd returning en masse.

Actually, employment figures are up. Salaries are starting to increase again. I don't think money being tight is the issue. There just isn't any fervent interest in consoles at this point.

 

[nextgeneration]

PS3 + Wii for January in past years, so that the point gets across.

2007: 679,057
2008: 543,000
2009: 882,400
2010: 742,700
2011: 586,000
2012: 281,000

2012 January sales are horrendous, plain and simple, and why next gen needs to start now.

 

[MasterSheen]

Again, Kinect launched last year.

Last year was 2011.

 

[Puppet Shadow]

Last year was 2011.

You knew what he meant. It's actually a pretty valid point.

 

[DarkPanda]

Sales have been falling year over year for a very long time now.

That's because the Wii died a premature death due to third party starvation, bringing it crashing down from the insane levels it used to sell at and because consoles are still TOO DAMN EXPENSIVE. The Wii sells for $150, the cheapest 360 is $200, and the cheapest PS3 is $250. A this point last gen, every console was under $200. From a historical perspective, consoles are way overpriced and long overdue for price cuts.

 

[east of eastside]

So, what is the state of traditional portable gaming in the west??? Is Vita launch going to be the second black eye to the industry later this month?

How do next gen consoles 'cure' this? Cost more, take years before mainstream consumer shows up in a big way?

 

[GavinGT]

Last year was 2011.

You know what I mean.

 

[nasos_333]

Looks like MS and Sony are going ot have to release their new consoles sooner then they planned it seems?

Unless sales pick up a bit between now and September of course.

It is January after a huge holiday for MS, the sales figures are not that strange and are definatly not very low for this month

If it keeps low the hwole year and flops in holiday with Halo 4, then they would bother with starting on a new xbox

 

[Kazerei]

Lets keep it interesting and speculate:

PS3 - 280K
WII - 1K


360 doomed?

Heh, I think the split will be pretty close to 50/50. Maybe 60/40 in favor of the PS3.

 

[Poimandres]

Damn, that graph shows just how much of an anomaly the 360 is. Still climbing after all these years.

I'm ready for new consoles.

 

[VALIS]

So 360 basically outsold the Wii and PS3 combined.

Their position over the other two seems to get more dominant every month.

 

[Puppet Shadow]

So, what is the state of traditional portable gaming in the west??? Is Vita launch going to be the second black eye to the industry later this month?

Probably, but no one will notice as everyone will be talking about the iPad 3.

 

[Lothars]

PS3 + Wii in past years, so that the point gets across.

2007: 679,057
2008: 543,000
2009: 882,400
2010: 742,700
2011: 586,000
2012: 281,000

2012 January sales are horrendous, plain and simple, and why next gen needs to start now.

Yes January Sales are not good but I wanna see how the next couple months turn out first especially with some bigger games coming out in both february and march plus Next gen is still going to be expensive so I am in no rush for them to launch early.

 

[Cipherr]

Yeah I don't see how ushering in a new gen where hardware prices are 300% more expensive than the current gen is going to help that at all.

If your logic was sound, no generational transition for consoles would have ever worked in the last 20 years. This gen is seeing lower lows because its dragging on longer than normal. Its time for new hardware, Im just worried the software side will lag. Devs have been putting out some awfully stale shit the last 2 years or so. Its pretty bad.

The good news is, with this terrible state, Vita might actually show up next month on a chart somewhere. Maybe even most of its software.

 

[Cheech]

Actually, employment figures are up. Salaries are starting to increase again. I don't think money being tight is the issue. There just isn't any fervent interest in consoles at this point.

Yep. Talk about a death spiral.

If it makes you guys feel better, I don't think we'll see anybody try to stretch a console generation out this long ever again. The 360 and PS3 are just embarrassingly old tech at this point.

You have to give it to Nintendo, they are on the fucking ball. They fumbled the 3DS launch a bit, but otherwise they've got their shit together. I'd bet on them above everyone else at this point to rescue 2012.

 

[Mr Swine]

It is January after a huge holiday for MS, the sales figures are not that strange and are definatly not very low for this month

If it keeps low the hwole year and flops in holiday with Halo 4, then they would bother with starting on a new xbox

I really really have a hard time seeing sales go up so much even with system sellers late this generation. If it does, well then they can ride this for another 5 years then no?

 

[Mrbob]

So much for stretching out this generation.

MS and Sony will be limping if they wait for 2014.

 

[AndrewDean84xX]

So 360 basically outsold the Wii and PS3 combined.

Their position over the other two seems to get more dominant every month.

That's an interesting way to look at it.

 

[Souldriver]

Again, Kinect launched last year.

It's also lower than 2010 or 2009.

Then again, it's "normal" that so late in this gen monthly sales are going down, and the 360 is still chugging along well compared to PS3/Wii. But I just wanted to point out it's not simply down yoy because of Kinect.

 

[nextgeneration]

Yes January Sales are not good but I wanna see how the next couple months turn out first especially with some bigger games coming out in both february and march plus Next gen is still going to be expensive so I am in no rush for them to launch early.

Yeah, gonna be interesting to see if we see any noticeable hardware spikes with the bigger releases coming out this year. I personally don't see a big improvement, as December sales were not good, followed up by a very poor January.

 

[Kazerei]

So 360 basically outsold the Wii and PS3 combined.

Their position over the other two seems to get more dominant every month.

You should re-read that.

 

[Cheech]

So much for stretching out this generation.

MS and Sony will be limping if they wait for 2014.

Microsoft's gaming division would be limping. Sony would be out of business.

 

[Cipherr]

It is January after a huge holiday for MS, the sales figures are not that strange and are definatly not very low for this month

If it keeps low the hwole year and flops in holiday with Halo 4, then they would bother with starting on a new xbox

I think you are missing the forest for the trees here. Look past the fact that they secured #1 for this month, and recognize that they are down YOY this month, and last month was NOT their best December, it was down last month also. There is absolutely nothing that would make me think they are going to surge between now and the fall for no damn reason. We are looking at damn near a whole year of HW and likely SW being down YOY for all 3 to varying degrees.

MS may get the better end of it of all 3 of them, but noone is going to be celebrating. Its time for the next generation.

 

[elcranky]

It is January after a huge holiday for MS, the sales figures are not that strange and are definatly not very low for this month

If it keeps low the hwole year and flops in holiday with Halo 4, then they would bother with starting on a new xbox

Actually, the holiday wasn't huge for MS. They had an insane november, but december WAY underperformed (like a million under). December was bad enough that they explicitly mentioned it during their earnings call. That combined with a 30% drop in January says the following - continue harvesting profits until the fall, drop the price and launch the 720 in November. Nov SKUs - 4G -150, 250G - 250, 720 base 399, 720 premium 499. Kinect bundles add $75.

 

[nasos_333]

I really really have a hard time seeing sales go up so much even with system sellers late this generation. If it does, well then they can ride this for another 5 years then no?

I think they can hold until late 2013 easilly, but with PC going much ahead and WiiU on the market i doubt they could keep holding back more than that

Holiday sales for xbox 360 was up 10%, so it was expected January would be lower to even out

Also a 10% in the 3 million holiday sales is huge, a 29% down in January 380K sales is not that big

It is 300.000 up in holiday VS 120.000 down in January

(correct me if i did this wrong )

It is still a big increase comparing to last year, if you add Nov+Dec+Jan

Plus i do think Halo, Fable, Alan Wake, Dragoon, Mass Effect, Witcher, Dust, Skyrim expansions, Ryse etc coming to 360 this year will have a big impact in sales during the 2ond half of 2012

 

[SapientWolf]

So people didn't buy 360's for Call of Duty: MW and beyond because surely they'd have already bought it for COD2 and COD3?

Just because a game is a sequel doesn't mean that it can't be a system seller.

Will it sell enough systems to make up for nine months of anemic sales? Would it sell more systems than a Halo 4 with Crysis 2 PC caliber (or better) graphics running at 60fps?

 

[jvm]

In case it hasn't been said yet:

"Skylanders accessories continue to perform well at retail with the '1 character pack' SKU ranking highest on units for Jan'12. Collectively, Skylander accessories represented 22% of total accessory unit sales."

Will be very interesting to see how well A-B shepherds this phenomenon along.

 

[Narpas Sword0]

I think you are missing the forest for the trees here. Look past the fact that they secured #1 for this month, and recognize that they are down YOY this month, and last month was NOT their best December, it was down last month also. There is absolutely nothing that would make me think they are going to surge between now and the fall for no damn reason. We are looking at damn near a whole year of HW and likely SW being down YOY for all 3 to varying degrees.

MS may get the better end of it of all 3 of them, but noone is going to be celebrating. Its time for the next generation.

$50-80 price cut for 360 would be a major change that is likely to happen this year

 

[DMeisterJ]

I forgot about NPD-day.

 

[StevieP]

That's because the Wii died a premature death due to third party starvation, bringing it crashing down from the insane levels it used to sell at and because consoles are still TOO DAMN EXPENSIVE. The Wii sells for $150, the cheapest 360 is $200, and the cheapest PS3 is $250. A this point last gen, every console was under $200. From a historical perspective, consoles are way overpriced and long overdue for price cuts.

Nintendo has had a normal 5 year cycle, despite the mostly anemic third party support through its lifetime. The other 2 are stretching the generation because of their massive hurdles to profitability.

So much for stretching out this generation.

MS and Sony will be limping if they wait for 2014.

Indeed. I think they'll both launch 2013, though I think MS is closer to being ready.

 

[jvm]

Wal-mart NOT included:

The group confirmed to Gamasutra, however, that Wal-Mart POS data was not included in the January report, and thus did not affect this month's software sales figures.

 

[Ramblin]

I think the higher than average price at this point in a consoles life, in addition to the recovering economic condition explains the current situation. I think price cuts and upcoming games can turn around these sales slumps except for the wii.

 

[SolarPowered]

PS3 + Wii for January in past years, so that the point gets across.

2007: 679,057
2008: 543,000
2009: 882,400
2010: 742,700
2011: 586,000
2012: 281,000

2012 January sales are horrendous, plain and simple, and why next gen needs to start now.

Goddamn

That's because the Wii died a premature death due to third party starvation, bringing it crashing down from the insane levels it used to sell at and because consoles are still TOO DAMN EXPENSIVE. The Wii sells for $150, the cheapest 360 is $200, and the cheapest PS3 is $250. A this point last gen, every console was under $200. From a historical perspective, consoles are way overpriced and long overdue for price cuts.

Yeah, the Wii was basically hit with every single obstacle possible from third parties and Nintendo's efforts with third parties were far too late to change anything. It would have been a true monster if it got the proper support.

 

[bigtroyjon]

Will it sell enough systems to make up for nine months of anemic sales? Would it sell more systems than a Halo 4 with Crysis 2 PC caliber (or better) graphics running at 60fps?

lol at 270K sales in January being anemic, especially when the console hasn't had a price cut for ages. If they actually cared about unit sales instead of making money, they would have dropped the price a while ago.

This thread has gone off the deep end.

 

[AngryMoth]

So depressing that every month seems to be down. Bring on the new consoles.

 

[apana]

Everyone is saving their money for Wii U.

 

[Sho_Nuff82]

Wal-mart NOT included:

Does this mean it wasn't using Walmart's exact numbers (meaning they were using traditional Walmart estimates), or that Walmart numbers were completely excluded?

 

[MatthewB92]

Wow. Didn't think it would be this bad :/

 

[Nirolak]

Does this mean it wasn't using Walmart's exact numbers (meaning they were using traditional Walmart estimates), or that Walmart numbers were completely excluded?

The former.

 

[mugurumakensei]

Does this mean it wasn't using Walmart's exact numbers (meaning they were using traditional Walmart estimates), or that Walmart numbers were completely excluded?

It means walmart was estimated but not tracked and reported.

 

[Blueblur1]

360 hardware the last 6 January's starting with 2007.

294K(5 week month)
230K
309K
332K
381K
270K

Dropped by over a 100k for the first time if those numbers are accurate. Damn.

 

[GarthVaderUK]

It means walmart was estimated but not tracked and reported.

So that doesn't explain away the drop in sales then.

 

[Hero]

Price cuts typically only boost a system for a month or two. See last generation when Gamecube dropped to 149 and then finally to 99. And then after that they started including a game. It's not a situation like the 3DS, this generation has overstayed its welcome.

 

[shandy706]

People are so negative. I didn't expect amazing sales after a really good holiday season.

The 360 will get a boost in April (Star Wars Console) then another boost near the Holidays (Halo). I think it will keep selling well as the other two keep falling off.

 

[okenny]

lol @ Sony's PR.

Man.... don't laugh at Sony right now man. They're in serious trouble