Black Friday Week USA. PS5 #1, Switch 2 #2, Nex Playground #3

[PAOerfulone]

Sephiran said:

Are we looking at a real chance that this PS5 price cut actually makes the Switch 2 miss its 19M forecast? Sales aren't looking good either in Europe or in the US.

Nintendo shouldn't have raised the forecast before the holiday period, they took a big risk with that and investors will kill them if they fail that forecast.

Not a freaking chance. 

Even if Switch 2 only matches Switch 1's Holiday 2017 of 7.23 million units, that would put Switch 2 at 17.59 million units shipped as of Dec 31, 2025. From there, they'd only need to ship 1.41 million units from Jan-Mar 2026 to meet their forecast. With how fast Switch 2 is selling, there's a bigger chance of SEGA making consoles again than Nintendo lowering their forecast. There's no way in Hell that is going to happen. In fact, I'm expecting the opposite. I expect them to raise their forecast AGAIN at their next Earnings Release.

Sephiran said:

Given the huge success Sony gets from price cuts, its obvious that Nintendo will need to be more open with doing good price promotions this generation over the last. But i think the problem is that Sony can recoup promotions easier due to their huge digital sales ratio and enormous subscription revenue, as long as Nintendo mostly sell physical games at retail and have low subscription revenue, that will limit their ability to make good price promotions.

You're forgetting one very crucial detail here: Nintendo almost always sells their hardware at a profit right from the start and between their record breaking sales and their software still moving great numbers - All while staying at full price and having little to no discounts - Why on earth would they do promotions when they stand to make more money AND still expand their user base at a higher pace than even they expected? That makes no business sense whatsoever.

Sephiran said:

To be fair i don't really understand how its even possible for Sony to do big price promotions in the US this year, tariffs on countries in Asia are like 20-25 %, meaning Sony should be losing fairly big money on PS5 sales in the US at this price point. But maybe its a loss leader strategy at their part to lose money on hardware sales to get more people into the ecosystem. And they do have huge subscription revenue, huge third party sales, huge digital sales ratio and huge accessory sales, Nintendo has far fewer means to use that same loss leader strategy, because they have less avenues to recoup hardware losses.

The PS5 is five years in now and is still selling at or above launch price, so Sony is certainly not selling it at a loss at this stage. That plus the fact that it's closer to the end of its life than the beginning and Sony is in a position where they are more recommended, maybe even a little required, to do these promotions to move hardware, than Nintendo. They did something very similar in 2017 and 2018 where in 2017 they did the $199 PS4 Black Friday bundle, and then the next year they did the same deal AND they through a game in there - I can't recall if it was God of War or Spider-Man, but they had a major first party bundle at $199 to drive more hardware sales as the PS4 started to show signs of decline. Similar signs that PS5 have been showed - Dropping from 20.9 million in in FY2023 to 18.5 million in FY2024. Sony is trying to maintain their baseline while Nintendo is trying to build theirs. That's the key difference.

Sephiran said:

I actually wonder how GTA will impact Pokemon gen 10 next year, it won't matter in Japan at all, but will it get any attention in the US and Europe or will everyone just focus on GTA?

Didn't seem to bother X/Y in 2013 when it was released on the 3DS around the same time as GTA V was released on the PS3/360. It's going to have next to no impact.

Firstly - Those are two totally different styles of games and franchises that cater to totally different audiences. There are millions of people around the world who will buy Nintendo systems JUST for Pokemon. A series that is about as different from Grand Theft Auto as day is from night. 

Secondly - It's freaking Pokemon - The biggest media franchise on the planet; Celebrating its 30th anniversary, on its 10th Generation. There are very few games and franchises that can withstand and go toe-to-toe with Grand Theft Auto and do just fine, if not better from the added attention. Pokemon is one of those franchises. It did it before, it will have no problem doing it again. Pokemon is one of those series that will make mountains of cash and sell tons of software and hardware no matter what just because of name on the cover rather than the actual game itself (As demonstrated by the lackluster Switch 1 games still managing to break various franchise sales records and Gen 9 having an actual shot at catching Gen 1 as the best-selling Pokemon games of all-time... Despite Gen 9's various, well-documented issues.)

Last edited by PAOerfulone - 19 hours ago