PAL Charts - Week 4

[thx1139]

binary solo said:

thx1139 said:

binary solo said:

Well, all Kinect titles in the UK list being down about 6 places means there's been a significant dip in Kinect SW sales (at least) across the board in the UK. It's hardly surprising. We pretty much know, with Wii's performance the last couple of years, that the (for want of a better word) casual games - and hence casually perceived hardware - sell especially well during the holidays, and have a consequent larger fall off after the holidays. It would be a mighty achievement on the part of Kinect if, with it's current SW line up, it carried it's holiday momentum beyond January. It will be interesting to see what happens when the games that are more appealing to the non-holiday console buying demographic (formally known as core gamers) are released for Kinect, and whether that boosts Kinect momentum through the flatter periods of the year.

Or, UK could be experiencing some shortages, like the Americas, and once the supply is back up Kinect and 360 will take off again.

Could also be that since Kinect is a $150 (US) investment that comes with a game. The purchase of additional software lags.  Certainly the percentage of people that purchase a Wii with a piece of software is a good deal lower than the percentage of people that purchase a 360 or PS3 with a piece of software.   Kinect software has remained higher after Christmas simply because of this. People got the Kinect for the holiday and over the next couple of weeks they picked up another piece of software.  Now the software is slowing, but Kinect and Kinect Adventures may continue to sell at a strong pace. Kinect Sports and Dance Central will continue to sell well and chart for a long time, just maybe not in the top 10-20.

Hmmm, not sure if the sales figures agree with your hypothesis.

As you can see from the below the ratio of Adventures to Dance Central sales in the EMEAA charts has been kinda stable: early on around the 6 mark (i.e. for every 6 Kinects sold 1 Dance central sell), recently around the 5 mark (1 DC sold for every 5 Kinects). This means to me that if Dance Central sales drop Kinect HW sales will also drop, because the ratio have some predictive value. Though there is variability which means the Dance Central sales by itself isn't necessarily a reliable indicator of Kinect HW without supporting data.

Also from the below you can see that the Adventures to Sports ratio in the EMEAA charts has been very stable for the last 10 weeks (back to late November) around the high 2s. This strongly infers that a significant drop in Kinect Sports sales means a similar drop in Kinect HW sales is likely.

 

Adventures	Sports	Dance Central	A:S	A:DC
66427	24797	13552	2.68	4.9
96867	33982	19393	2.85	4.99
127794	44818	23001	2.85	5.56
314460	113337	73736	2.77	4.26
445024	145045	73000	3.07	6.1
340913	118275	54004	2.88	6.31
271553	102983	40991	2.64	6.62
213392	81385	35934	2.62	5.94
187259	70990	30453	2.64	6.15

Then if you look at the other Kinect titles having dropped down the UK chart week on week this week it's a fairly strong indicator that Kinect HW sales will be significantly down for the week.

Yeah, perhaps the Adventures:Sports ratio will suddenly go from floating around the high 2's up to the high 3's, but  I'd be surprised if that turns out to be the case.

Without statistically analysing it I think there's about a 90% confidence that the substantial drop down the UK charts of the Kinect SW also means a substantial drop in Kinect HW. So, if for instance Kinect Sports dropped to, say, ~12K for the week, there's a very high likelihood of Kinect HW/Adventures dropping to ~36K for the week. A substantial drop, but I don't think anyone should worry/crow too much if Kinect HW consistently sold around 36K for the Feb-October period of the year.

But I've been well wrong before when it comes to game/HW sales.

I think it is far to early to tell.  We are comparing the holiday sale period with time shortly after that period where those 8 million customers go out and pick up a 2nd or 3rd game to a period where the hardware sales from a couple of weeks ago are far less.  Those Kinect customers that purchased a Kinect sometime in January are far fewer so the customer out to pick up a 2nd or 3rd game is naturally less.