In less than a week, 2009 will be over. That brings us to 2010. I'm listing what I expect to happen below. You should do the same.
We'll have a wrap up of 2009, and the 2000s in January. But for now, lets look ahead to 2010. Feel free to skip around...looking forward to seeing your posts/responses.
Estimated Shipment Totals Through December 2009
While we don't yet have shipment results from the big three, I'm expecting results to be like this.
Figures (all estimated) are ltd shipment through December 2009, shipments in Oct-Dec 2009, games per system, and games total per system.
PS2 ~ 143m (~2m) / ~10.85 games per PS2...i.e. ~1.5b units of sw
DS ~ 124.5m (~11m) / ~5.65 games per DS...i.e. ~700m units of sw
Wii ~ 67m (~11m) / ~7.7 games per Wii...i.e ~515m units of sw
PSP ~ 60m (~4.25m) / ~4 games per PSP...i.e. ~240m units of sw
X360 ~ 39.5m (~6m) / ~8.8 games per X360...i.e. ~350m units of sw
PS3 ~ 34.0m (~7m) / ~7.9 games per PS3...i.e. ~270m units of sw
Here is my expectation for shipments at the end of 2010.
DS ~ 148m (~23.5m)...~5.85 games per DS...i.e ~865m sw ltd
PS2 ~ 147m (~4m)... ~10.8 games per PS2... ~1.5b sw ltd
Wii ~ 84m (~17m)... ~8.35 games per Wii... ~700 sw ltd
PSP ~ 70m (~10m)... ~4.1 games per PSP... ~290m sw ltd
X360 ~ 47.5m (~8m) ~9.2 games per X360... ~440m sw ltd
PS3 ~ 44m (~10m) ~ 8.3 games per PS3... ~365m sw ltd
Milestones for 2010:
The DS generation (DS & PSP) should become the first generation to top the PS2 generation (PS2 & Xbox & GC). PS2 (~147m), Xbox (~24.8m), and GC (~21.7m) will be at about 192m at the end of 2010 it looks like. DS and PSP shipments are at about 185 million through the end of December 2009. So sometime in the Spring, the DS + PSP combo should top the PS2 + Xbox + GC systems.
Current Generation SW (Wii + PS3 + X360) shipped should top 1.5 billion in 2010 in five years, really only four years for PS3/Wii. PS2 + Xbox + GC sw should top out at just over 2.0b units after 10+ years on the market. In other words, current generation software will be at 75% of last generation software in 40-50% of the time on the market. I don't think 3b units of software for the current machines is impossible, although I'm leaning toward 2.4b-2.8b at the moment, solid 20-40% growth.
Wii + PS3 + X360 Software Shipments: Peaked or Peaking?
If game purchasing rates hold up better than I expect, it could easily be the peak year for software of the Wii generation machines...so far we've seen something like this though:
FY Ending 3/200x Wii + PS3 + X360*
2006 17.5
2007 97.1
2008 247.5
2009 417.3
* X360 software shipments are estimated
The March 2010 year is only going to be 10% higher than March 2009 year even though the hardware base grew from 103m to (an estimated) 146m. In other words, the hw base grew 42%, but sw only grew to ~470m (12%). Can't see the hardware base topping 183 million by 2011. With the masses now owning current systems game purchasing deterioration should outweigh base expansion, and thus you'd expect 2010 to be down over 2009. But it should be damn close at the least and 2010 could still beat 2009.
FY / Base (Wii+PS3+X360) / Game Shipments (Wii+PS3+360*) / Game Purchases by Base in FY
March 2007 base: 20m. 115m games purchased in March 2007 year - 5.75 games/user
March 2008 base: 56m. 248m games purchased in March 2008 year - 4.42 games/user (23% drop)
March 2009 base: 103m. 417.3m games purchased in March 2009 year - 4.05 games/user (10% drop)
*estimated X360 sw shipments by year
The current year looks like this -
March 2010 base est: 146m. ~469m games purchased in March 2010 year - 3.2 games/user (20% drop)
The question is whether April 2009-March 2010 is the peak year for software of this round of machines. Next year looks like it could go either way.
Forecast March 2011 base: 170-183m. Forecast: 2.3-2.9 games/user...390m to 530m...460m...down 2%
March 2012 base: ~196-214m...but 1.6-2.3 games/user (depends on Wii 2/PS4/X720). Definitely down. 315m-495m
I think PS3 sw will be up a little in the March 2011 year, X360 sw will be down and Wii sw will be down...so it will drop a bit more than 2% overall but we'll see.
Wild Cards:
DS2/PSP2 - I think these launch in Japan at the end of 2010. There is at least a PSP-4000 coming for sure.
Natal & "Gem" - Mainly relevant because they'll likely accompany price cuts. You'd expect Microsoft to cut price for "Gem", and Sony to cut price for "Natal". If one catches on, certainly if both do, Nintendo will cut the Wii price too.
DS - If Nintendo is close to introducing another system, or if Sony does DS will definitely see a price cut. But it performed amazingly well at $100 for Black Friday so a price cut could definitely soften the inevitable drop that will take the DS from 30m sold in a year to 0 sold in a year sometime in this decade. In other words, there are alot of reasons to look for a DS price cut in 2010.
What are you buying?
If I ever get through my backlog, I'm looking at the following games if they do come for Wii in 2010:
- Super Mario Galaxy 2
- Monster Hunter 3
- Epic Mickey
- Sky Crawlers: Innocent Aces
- Shiren: The Wanderer
- Metroid: Other M
- Sin & Punishment 2
- Samurai Warriors 3
- Project Needlemouse (2D Sonic)
There really isn't anything I want for DS in 2010, at least not yet so I have a shot at getting through my DS backlog...which is like six games.
People are difficult to govern because they have too much knowledge.
When there are more laws, there are more criminals.
- Lao Tzu
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