Ruh-roh: Simon Carless of Gamasutra/Game Set Watch analyzes VGChartz...

[NJ5]

jman8 said:

NJ5 said:
@jman8: Did you read what I wrote and quoted? Doesn't seem so.

It's not about disagreeing, I even agree with some of the parts (which, again you can see in my posts). It's about the fact that this article isn't coherent. It keeps contradicting itself.

If there's someone here who didn't read, it's you.

 

Wrong again. Here's where they expand on the Simexchange comment:

"In other words, for those high-selling titles, VGChartz is checking against public data, and they will change their estimates if they are majorly off. Most of the time, they are quite close compared to the worldwide charts. That's because VGChartz is - like services such as The SimExchange - using common sense, Internet buzz, real-time data such as Amazon.com and analyst commentary to synthesize a sensible estimate."

The article never contradicts itself. It is completely coherent (if you actually read the entire thing). What you're doing is nitpicking the comparison between this site and the SimExchange, which is not the point of the article, instead of acknowledging the actual point of the article, which is to point out that the methods used aren't reliable enough to be used as a professional resource. 

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Here goes a contradiction just for you (perhaps not the best example, but good enough):

1- And if a title spikes but is outside public data, VGChartz will never catch it

2- as is freely admitted in a recent interview, VGChartz had 2-3% of the North American market as a sample at the time, whereas by estimate, NPD might have 60-65%. If this 2-3% was clean and canonical, this might not matter - but how do you explain the big Iron Man discrepancy, if so? Wouldn't VGChartz' retail sources have picked it up too?

At some points, the writer admits that there might be some real non-public data behind vgchartz, at some other points it outright says that the numbers are just educated guessing combined with later adjustments. If you don't see the doublethink in this, I can't help you...