Avinash_Tyagi said:
Picko said:
Avinash_Tyagi said:
europe-asia-hate-usa said:
Garcian Smith said:
Seconding/thirding/whatevering "neither."
The closest analogy to the Wii is the PS1, but even that doesn't afford a full comparison. Like the PS1, the Wii is being, and will be, deluged by low-quality shovelware aimed at the class of people buying the system. It ended up taking the PS1 a couple of years to work up a decent library of games, because few developers trusted in its longevity. Once it proved to be a phenomenon, though, it picked up the vast majority of major franchises and paved the way for the PS2's near-monopoly on third-party exclusives.
Now, what the Wii has that the PS1 didn't have is one of the best software development and publishing houses in the world backing it from the outset. As a result, while it took the PS1 a year or two before it found its first true "killer aps," Nintendo already has several: Wii Sports, Wii Play, Super Mario Galaxy, Mario Party, and (in Japan and soon worldwide) Wii Fit. These titles are generating a userbase which will allow for a handful of millions-selling casual titles, a whole bunch of junky shovelware, and an eventually-huge library of more "gamery" titles."
Contrast that with the DS (which has a good offering of casual and party games, but little else) and the PS1 (which wasn't able to expand the market nearly as much as the Wii). |
I agree with everything except the last line. The PS is the single console that has expanded the market in never before seen proportions. It sold 40 million more than the NES, the second biggest selling console at the time, made console gaming mainstreal and "cool" not just a nerd kids passtime. Once the Wii outsells the PS2 we can talk about market expansion but til then it has only shifted the market. |
Actually look at the hardware shipments for NES and PS1 and you'll see why PS1 sold more than NES, it had nothing to do with making gaming cool or anything about expanding the market PS Sony Mar-2007 0.00 / 21.59 0.00 / 40.78 0.00 / 40.12 0.00 / 102.49 NES Nintendo Mar-2007 0.00 / 19.23 0.00 / 34.00 0.00 / 8.56 0.00 / 61.79 Notice something? The shipments for Japan and NA are pretty much the same, the only difference being population growth but the numbers for the PAL regions are where you see the big gains for PS over NES, the reason isn't any expansion of the market demographics, but merely because Nintendo never tried to push the NES in the PAL regions to any great degree and it shows, while playstation was truly a global console |
PS clearly expanded the market. What you have failed to consider is that the NES essentially had a monopoly, whereas the PS operated in a duopoly market. The industry grew far larger in all markets during the PS/N64 era, and it seems reasonable to suggest that a large reason for this was the PS. The PS sold more units in both the Americas and Japan, whilst competing against the N64, which managed to sell approximately 33m units itself. Unambiguously, the PS drove a significant expansion of the market in the America's and Japan, in addition to the expansion that occurred in the PAL region. |
No I haven't forgotten that, what you've forgotten is multiple console ownership, population growth between 1985 and 1995, PS didn't expand the market it took advantage of the fact that it was pushed further into global markets than any console before it, the fact that N64 sold 30 odd million as well has nothing to do with an expanded market, just a larger market thanks to more global coverage and more people alive, and the fact that adjusted for inflation console prices were lower and more people could afford multiple consoles |
No you'll find I did not forget those effects, I simply chose not to overestimate their effect. Most gamers do not have multiple consoles, most people cannot afford to purchase multiple consoles. The "multiple console" effect can be assumed to be small for all intents and purposes. Furthermore, population growth in developed countries simply doesn't occur fast enough to have a material effect. Population growth is very slow and it simply cannot explain a signicant amount of the deviation between generations to suggest that the markets were not truly expanded. As for inflation and prices, low prices indicate an expansion of the market to previously untapped consumers. If you believe that this had a large effect then you are effectively saying that your own opinion is incorrect.
I didn't consider the expansion in Europe as part of my initial analysis, however I will include it in the analysis that follows. For the record though, increasing global coverage is expanding the market.
Now for some numbers:
NES: US - 34m Jpn - 19.23m PAL - 8.56m
TOTAL: US - 34m Jpn - 19.23m PAL - 8.56m
SNES: US - 23.35m Jpn - 17.15m PAL - 8.58m
MD: US - 17.80m Jpn - 3.59m PAL - 9.36m
TOTAL: US - 41.15m Jpn - 20.74m PAL - 17.94m
PS: US - 40.78m Jpn - 21.59m PAL - 40.12m
N64: US - 20.63m Jpn - 5.55m PAL - 6.75m
SS: US - 1.87m Jpn - 5.74m PAL - 1.15
TOTAL: US - 63.28m Jpn - 32.88m PAL - 48.02m
It can be seen that over three generations all three major markets grew substantially. The first number represents overall consumer growth from the NES to the SNES/MD generation. The second number represents the consumer growth from the SNES/MD to the PS/N64/SS generation.
US: 21% growth; 53.78% growth
Jpn: 7.8% growth; 58.53% growth
PAL: 109.58% growth; 167.67% growth
Clearly we can see that the arrival of a third player, the Playstation, occurred around the same time as a massive increase in videogame consumption. The Playstation, as the dominant console of that generation, can be assumed to have played the largest role in expanding the three markets detailed above. Given the weight of the numbers, it appears unreasonable to suggest that the Playsation didn't expand the industry well beyond those who had typically played videogames.
EDIT: Sorry, put the US in place of what should be "Americas". Honest mistake, but the US does account for the majority of the sales in the "Americas" it was an easy mistake to make :)
