January 2014 NPD Thread! - PS4: 271k, XBO: 141k, WiiU: 49k

[binary solo]

cyberninja45 said:

TheSource said:

Adjusting for the five week month in Jan 07 puts PS3 at about what PS2 did in January 2007, and Wii was doing about 350k if you make Jan 07 four weeks instead of five.

I think the major problem this generation is an upgrade problem. Blu Ray + Better Graphics +Online + Move eventually made PS3 a pretty massive upgrade over PS2, Kinect + Better Online + Better Graphics eventually made X360 a pretty massive upgrade over Xbox, and Motion Controls + Better Online + you know, an extra 1000 retail games in lieu of better graphics eventually made Wii a massive uprgade over GC.

Going from PS3-->PS4, X360-->X1, or Wii-->Wii U is pretty terrible in comparison to upgrading from Xbox, GC, PS2 to 360, Wii, PS3 in their hay day three to six years ago.

I think PS3 / X360 didn't become "better" than their predecessors to any substantial portion of their eventual user base until late 2008. I think for PS3, half the PS2 audience still thinks the PS2 is better than PS3, even seven and a quarter years after launch. For Wii U you have a similar problem, 95% of the Wii audience still doesn't see the point in upgrading to Wii U.

This is the correct answer here.

The sales will most likely start to get worse as the gen goes on also unless something really big happens.

I think MS recognised this and this is why they are trying to turn Xbox into the entertainment box. Trying to appeal to a whole new blue ocean. However I think core gamers are the past, present and future of game consoles and the big 3 need to rededicate themselves to their core market and not be too concerned about gen on gen growth as a whole. But Nintendo failed to recognise that their core market didn't grow last generation, so without reinventing their image, they are stuck in the 20 million range for sales. MS failed to recognise that their core market only grew slightly in the last generation, so by releasing a technologically inferior (to PS4) gaming machine at a higher price (than PS4) their core market has been identified and it's not very big at all. Sony did recognise that their core market is about all that they managed to attract with PS3, and they must be thankful that it's a pretty substantial market. But Sony can't expect PS4 to do any better than PS3 because most of the swing market has left consoles all together. For consoles to be viable in a general sense PS4 really needs to give up a bit of market share to Nintendo and MS, but those companies need to earn that market share. If all 3 consoles could sell in the 50-70 million range then that's viable for everyone, including 3rd party developers. Unfortunately Wii U probably won't get close to that, Xb one might not reach it and PS4 might exceed that range.

Doom thy name is Generation 8.