sharky on 15 January 2007
Stromprophet said:
When did I say the first million is when a console is most in demand?
I said the 360 was completely sold out. And there would be a difference between shipped and sold as you said. But for the microsoft launch obviously as you said those number lag 4-8 weeks by boat.
For sony almost no lag because of the airlifts, less than one week between them saying it's shipped and it's at a retailer.
I agree with you for the most part. I never said Sony wouldn't lie either, they all lie. I mean comeon. Microsoft thinks the Zune is a resounding success. You have to have that kind of crazy denial to compete in business these days.
I just have a disagreement with the 10.4 million number Microsoft keeps putting out cause I just don't think it's that high. But even when Sony said they shipped 1 million I knew they did not yet sell that many, but it would be close because of the time between shipping and retailer because they are airlifting them to NA. I knew the Wii numbers were also really high.
Now, Nintendo is disputing NPDs numbers. Maybe it's not as sold out as everyone thinks. We just don't have 2-3 years of data to go on that will converge the numbers and give us a much better idea.
Nope, MS airfreighted it's launch too. I can find that interview (think it was with Bach) too.
Like I said, it's standard operating procedure for launches. They go to boat once stock is on store shelves, because it's less expensive.
And it's a commentary on you that you have a problem with MS shipped numbers (why?, hmm, maybe because of the same NPD data you dont believe in the case of PS3? Now wouldn't that be ridiculous) but not Sony shipped.
Nintendo can "dispute" the numbers all they want and you can choose to believe what company you want based on fanboy allegiances, but NPD is the realest data we have. It cover 60% of the market outright and estimates the rest. And you believing it's wrong wont change the fact there are far less Wii's and PS3's out there than people thought.
Really the whole reason for the Wii debacle is Pachters 1.3 million estimate that came out. Pachter has been wrong by predicting too high 360 sales in the past a lot too, but nobody wanted to hang him after that. He said 360 would sell 750k in Nov and 1.5m in Dec IIRC too. Didn't happen.
So basically people want to believe an basic estimate from a often-wrong analyst over the hard data. That's pretty backwards.
Do you think NPD is wrong with high DS sales too? Funny people seem to accept the NPD's word just fine for that. It's good news from NPD for Nintendo so that must be true for some people, I guess.
Another thing is software sales actually support this. I figure if hardware sales are way off it should show up in the software right? Well if anything, 360 software sells like gangbusters, while other than Zelda, Wii and PS3 software did pretty damn bad. I mean Resistance sold like, 70k copies in Nov I think. Similarly poor numbers from Dec AFAIK. That right there should be a hint there not a ton of uncounted PS3's in consumer hands. Now if you had, 600k of Resistance sold by NPD or something, you might have a argument, because it's unlikely for a non-Zelda-wii game to have a 90% attach rate. And if you had that, you'd have the publisher crowing about it themselves with shipped numbers, NPD wouldn't even be needed. I haven't heard a peep from the Resistance guys..
Another thing is just common sense. If Nintendo shipped 1.3 million Wii's, they shouldn't have been so damn scarce all month. Sure, they still would have been scarce, but it doesn't seem like they would have been THAT scarce. Once you look at the NPD numbers, suddenly all the Wii shortages make more sense. NPD backs up anecdotal evidence in this case.
It doesn't prove anything but it does support the evidence.
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