December 2015 NPD Thread! PS4 and XBO exclusives LTD up!

[binary solo]

ZhugeEX said:

Shadow1980 said:

Anywho, try getting in touch with NPD_Mulcair and see if you can't convince him to start sharing the data here in our NPD threads. 

 

You realise that 'VGChartz' is in direct competition with a service that The NPD Group provide right? 

 

Unless they enter some sort of partnership (which I don't see happening) there is no way they would post anything here. 

Not even close. No one who actually has a business need for US sales data is going to drop paying for NPD information in favour of VGC sales estimates. If anything there is actually synergy between NPD and VGC. VGC provides the only weekly global estimate of hardware and software sales. It has low accuracy, but gives a decent ballpark over time and thus provides reasonable analytical data for historical reference.

NPD provides highly reliable data for the US market, which remains the single biggest video game market, in sufficient frequency that business can use the information to inform short and medium term decision-making.

The fact that VGC and NPD have coexisted for more than a console generation without one materially affecting the business of the other clearly indicates a synergistic connection not a competitve one.

What NPD does not want is for VGC to become a direct competitor for high accuracy US sales data. So it would be worried if VGC get a formal relationship going with Amazon, Gamestop, Walmart, Target and Best Buy. If VGC started reporting US sales based on 100% of national sales from those companies that would put them in direct competition and shit would start to happen. We're in a safe situation right now while VGC remains an ostensibly amateur operation that remains at arms length from corporate retailers.

If VGC made a strategic decision to get more serious and professional with US sales I would support them in that so long as they continued to publish the data as they do now, but I don't think they should. I like that NPD and VGC are in a happy coexistance right now.