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Forums - Sales Discussion - Writing off the 360

dschumm on 27 December 2007
albionus said:

Who exactly has said the 360's sales will collapse? I would say though that the odds of a 360 sales collapse are better than the odds of the 360 "outselling the Wii and PS3 together" but they are both very negligible.

I think you may be confusing the main issue which is whether the 360's sales increase somewhat next year or stay about the same. Neither really means much in the big picture (eg, the 360 will be outsold by the Wii 2:1 instead of 2.4:1) so there isn't much point being bitter about it.

There's good arguments for both the somewhat increase and stagnant sides. One of the main points for the stagnant sales side is that the 360 has not yet shown any signs of breaking out of its small hardcore gamer demographic. Price drops could help but the main problem is that it will always be overshadowed by the Wii in both price and non-hardcore gamer perception. Meanwhile on the other end Sony is bleeding itself white to match the 360 in price. Essentially in relative price terms the 360 will likely not make up much ground against the Wii and will continue lose ground to the PS3.

The point about games isn't that the 360 won't continue seeing great games, or that 2007 was the best year ever for the 360. The point is that like in price even an improvement in games would still be losing ground to the Wii and PS3. 2007 while a great year in 1st party terms was an abysmal year for the Wii in terms of 3rd party software. 2008 will also be a great year for 1st party games and 3rd party games will see a major improvement (no stickball, I'm not saying Wii 3rd party support will be better than 360 3rd party support). The PS3 has pretty much gotten 2 types of games in 2007, delayed or rushed. As devs get a better handle on the PS3's complicated architecture next years games will also see a marked improvement. Even should 2008 be better for the 360 than 2007 it will be extremely difficult to get more than small improvement in overall quality. So relatively the 360 will fall behind.

Generally after 2 years a systems sales are pretty much fixed. This has already been seen with the 360 where despite 2007 blowing 2006 away in 360 game quality, despite the 360's game library simply putting the PS3's to shame and challenging Nintendo's lineup, despite winning the hearts and minds of the most vocal gamers, despite having the best advantage it will likely see in price vs its main competitor, despite major efforts by MS to expand in Japan and Europe, despite the biggest entertainment launch in history, despite the Wii being seriously underproduced, despite basically having more going its way than maybe any console in history, the 360 only saw a small increase in sales from 2006 which was itself just a small increase from the sales rate of the Xbox.

So what the stagnant argument boils down to is that bereft of most of those advantages from 2007, how can the 360 be expected to sell anything but a little better next year? Again, no sales won't collapse. Also again, there are good arguments, like the ones you made, for why the 360 could get a boost next year. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

As for when the PS3 overtakes the 360, well it's not likely to happen next year that's for sure. The PS3 would need a huge jump in sales next year while the 360 stagnates for that to occurr. Not impossible just not very likely. Should the PS3 have any chance of overtaking the 360 we'll see next year. If by 2009 the PS3 is 6-9 million units behind it is very unlikely since the PS3's sales will reach the fixed point. However, if the PS3 can make up a decent amount of ground on the 360 so it is say only 3 or 4 million units behind then it becomes plausible by the end of 2009. If the PS3 makes up even more ground than that, which I think is extremely unlikely, then an early 2009 switch becomes possible.


 This pretty much sums it about . 2006 about 7 million 360 sold. 2007 same. 2008 will be same.



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The game will not be any better or include more content then planned. Any commnets that say so are just PR hogwash to make you feel better for having to wait.

Delays are due to lack of proper resources, skill, or adequate planning by the developer.

Do be thankful that they have enough respect for you to delay the game and maintain its intended level of quality.

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Jandre02 on 27 December 2007

They are turning profit in the gaming department (think Halo 3, XBL) but I doubt their console is profitable. They can't drop each console $100, which is the only price drop I would deem significant.

They will drop the Premium to 250-299, eliminate the core, and drop the elite to 350-399. I highly doubt that it costs them less than $300 to make each Xbox360.

They won't drop too far below the Wii, which won't have a price drop for a long time. That will make it seem like the Wii is worth more than the 360. They may add games or controllers, but they won't drop the price of the core.





rocketpig on 27 December 2007

The 360 sold ~6.8-6.9m in 2006. In 2007, it's at ~7.7m thus far. Add in the last week and that number should easily eclipse 8m.

While not a huge difference, those numbers are hardly the same. We're talking about close to a 20% difference year-over-year.




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albionus on 27 December 2007
rocketpig said:
The 360 sold ~6.8-6.9m in 2006. In 2007, it's at ~7.7m thus far. Add in the last week and that number should easily eclipse 8m.

While not a huge difference, those numbers are hardly the same. We're talking about close to a 20% difference year-over-year.

A slightly bigger increase than I thought (I was thinking in the 10-15% range).  Nevertheless it's not that big considering last year millions upon millions of Halo fans were going to buy a 360 P.  Seriously though in the bigger scheme of things it's not that big a deal.  It's like adding 4 or 8 million units to the N64, Gamecube, or Xbox, does it change much? It again proves my main point that given the amazing year for the 360 in 2007 and the massive once a generation advantage it had over its competitors its sales only increased 20% off of a shaky first year.   Why with most advantages reduced or eliminated would 2008 see even a similar amount of growth?

The only thing such minor differences will decide is whether the PS3 or 360 ends up in a close 3rd place.  I suppose that matters to some people but isn't something much to worry about I think.



madskillz on 27 December 2007

I guess the real thing is - a win is a win. If MS beats Sony, Gates will be happy. So what the Wii beat the snot out of both systems. MS likes Ninny, and hates Sony. They want to see Sony beaten.

And folks are still waiting to buy either a 360 or a PS3. Some folks are still talking about buying a PS3 with BC! Sony failed to ignite a fire under customers' bottoms until they did a price cut to get their PS3 sold, despite the huge losses. They are hoping to recoup their money through software sales. The 360 is at a point where they can slash prices, make a tiny profit and still get the sales as well.

Sony is running scared - and are pleased with this seasonal bump. But mark my words - and I will gladly have a dish of crow if I am wrong - but ... the PS3 will settle back into pre-holiday numbers with the 360 holding steady.



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chriscox1121 on 27 December 2007

I only own Nintendo consoles and would buy a 360 over a PS3. But, to be honest I do believe the PS3 will outsell 360 WW by early to mid 2009. The only one losing market share is MS. Not Nintendo and Not Sony. Really, it's just a matter of time. MS fans only see things at a NA view point. With Sony's best software beginning to hit they will capture a big chunk of the market. Although, I'm not real sure if they will carve into Nintendo's. I think it could go either way, but I definately see MS losing alot of ground this year in respects to WW sales.




Zucas on 27 December 2007

I don't know about everyone else but I've written off 360 since Summer 2007, possibly earlier.

Why? Becuase it only appeals to 50% of the market, and in that 50% it can even get a dominating majority, not to mention even outsell its competition. That's why I've written it off.



thx1138 on 27 December 2007

Amazing things said in this thread.

First off since the beginning of November the 360 has been outsold by the PS3 3 weeks. Now if I do the math that means that the 360 has outsold the PS3 five weeks. Lets not even talk about prior to November.

Second I have seen multiple comments about how 360 would be appear to be desperate if they dropped the price below the Wii or just plain dropped the price. No one will think that MS is desperate if the lowest price SKU is $100 below the price when it launched almost 2.5 years ago. It doesnt matter that the Wii is more expensive. How is MS desperate when the PS3 has been dropped by $200 since launch (I know new SKUs, but the main stream press has announced these as $100 cuts)?

As already calculated the 360 in 2007 will beat 2006 sales by about 20% and most of this is in the last 4-5 months. Why all of a sudden is this sales improvement going to stop? The increase was determined by a couple of factors such as RROD warranty, small price cut, and even more importantly the software that was released over the past few months. That software that was released wont go away and will cause the 360 to continue to improve year over year.



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FreeTalkLive rocks! on 27 December 2007
Ajax said:
cus japan is no battle
and the 360 is doing a real descent job in north america
and will probably keep standing quite tall in 2008
but it's the Others region, which might overtake the north american market as the biggest market in the coming years, that has turned quite some opinions here

 I agree.  Others may take America as the largest market.  Frankly, I am still suprised that more games are bought by the 350 million in America than the almost 6 billion in Others.  Others seems to be the most important and all 3 companies are doing well in Others.  However, Sony and Nintendo have the history and name in Others and it is no unreasonable to think that M$ may get squeezed again.



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madskillz on 27 December 2007
chriscox1121 said:
I only own Nintendo consoles and would buy a 360 over a PS3. But, to be honest I do believe the PS3 will outsell 360 WW by early to mid 2009. The only one losing market share is MS. Not Nintendo and Not Sony. Really, it's just a matter of time. MS fans only see things at a NA view point. With Sony's best software beginning to hit they will capture a big chunk of the market. Although, I'm not real sure if they will carve into Nintendo's. I think it could go either way, but I definately see MS losing alot of ground this year in respects to WW sales.

You are correct. MS has been losing market share since it was out first. It had 100 percent market share, so it would be virtually impossible for it to maintain that share, right?