August NPD 2021

[Signalstar]

Shadow1980 said:

trunkswd said:

That is a shame. It will make it harder for our estimates to be more accurate. A shame the gaming industry isn't like the movie industry with daily and weekly numbers. 

I still don't get why the NPD has gotten increasingly more secretive over the years. During most of Gen 6 we got not only hardware but also a lot of software sales. Then around 2005-ish they started drawing back the software data, limiting it to just Top 10. Then around 2010 they stopped divulging software entirely, leaving it to leakers. Then they stopped with hardware early last gen, with some on-and-off restarts in a semi-official capacity. Now they've apparently completely cracked down on all leakers. Essentially, aside from Famitsu's Japan numbers (which completely lacks digital SW sales) there is no regularly-published weekly or monthly sales numbers coming in anymore from anywhere.

This is why I've long said that we need some real alternative to NPD. Maybe VGC could start some sort of crowd-funding effort to where they can expand their ability to gather data from retailers. Or maybe someone could convince Famitsu to start up a U.S. sales tracking branch.

This is just speculation on my part, but I think some game companies pressured NPD to stop making numbers public. Who wants to have to put out a press release every month trying to spin why they are successful even though Console A sold more than Console C? Every month they would have to see dozens of articles comparing sales to competitors.