Beginning of gen predictions vs. predictions now

[vivster]

Intrinsic said:

vivster said:

Intrinsic said:
My predictions are more like this

PS4 120M (should average around 16-20M/yr for at least 6 years, its already doing around 16M on its first year on the market and its first and last year will be its worst year of sales so its on track to do that)

XB1 60M

WiiU 23M

Now i feel the console market is around 200M strong (potentially), and that there will be a clear 1st place console and clear second place console. So if the PS4 is that clear first place then it will have at least 100M in sales.

I'm interested in your reasoning for all three because I find all of them to be awfully optimistic.

Ok... here goes.

Lets start with year one for the PS4/XB1. 2014. Not including their launch year. The PS4 is on track to sell ~16M consolesand the XB1 ~8M. Take into consideration that this will be one of therir two lowest selling full years (first is their first full launch year where they are most expensive and fewest games and second is the transition year when PS5/XB2 is released).

What the sales of this year shows, is that the PS4 is on track to sell at least 20M consoles per year; well, worst case scenario 16M/yr and best case scenario 22M/yr. But lets just leave it at 20M. And I will go with ~10M or ~12M for the XB1. Now the reason the XB1 number seems low is because i expect over 80% of its sales every year to come mostly from one region, NA.

Now I expect that these consoles will not be replaced till 2020. That gives them 5 years of peak sales 2015-2019. So, if the PS4 sells at least 20M per year for the next 5 years then it will have sold 100M by the end of 2020. This is not including whatever sales it has made in 2013 and 2014. So by the time the PS5 is coming out it should be at at least 120M. Apply the same math to the XB1 and that should be at aound 60M, at least.

So its not me being optimistic, I am just looking at the current data and current trends and factoring in how long i expect the gen to be and how I know sales tend to grow as a generation gets older compared to their first years on the market.

Fair enough, though I expect the current generation to be a lot more top heavy than any generation before it. Times are changing. The only thing that could make the consoles sore again is if VR really hits off and drags along a lot of casuals.

But how about the Wii U? It sold 3m last year and 3m this year even though sales should've risen in the second year. Unless Wii U drops to $200 next year I don't see it selling more than this year and it's only going down from there. If you're really going by previous generations and trends you should see that Wii U is tracking significantly below Gamecube which sold 22m. What does the Wii U do to reverse the trend?