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Forums - Sales - "The Console Market is Shrinking" is a BS Statement

 

The console market is

shrinking 98 43.36%
 
staying the same 52 23.01%
 
growing 74 32.74%
 
Total:224
Shaunaka on 18 April 2014
RolStoppable said:

But that's what I am talking about. If Nintendo hadn't changed their ways, they would have made a console like the Wii U in the seventh generation and continued their decline in home console sales. Instead they realized that there isn't only a problem that exists for them, but the whole market. A problem that was masked by population growth in existing markets, adding new countries to the mix and rising spending capabilities of existing gamers (people growing up and getting jobs, increasing multiconsole ownership as well as overall software sales). So despite hardware numbers going up each generation, the interest in console gaming didn't necessarily increase, i.e. fewer people spending more money instead of more people spending money.

Applied to the PS3 and 360 selling about 95% of the PS2 and Xbox, this means that the contraction is actually bigger than it looks, because the seventh gen systems were sold in more countries for a longer time than their predecessors. Nevermind that the industry has basically an obligation to continually grow, because so do development and marketing costs.


Serious question then:

If we assume everything you say is correct (which isn't too much of a leap at all), then what would you (roughly) estimate gen7 total sales to have been? I know it's a tough one, but would you put it below gen6? Equal?



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Shaunaka on 18 April 2014
Turkish said:
Gen 8 will sell less than Gen 7 but don't panic, it'll be entirely due to the decline of Nintendo's casual fanbase. They went from 100m Wii's to WiiU, which is currently tracking behind Gamecube.

Overall the traditional gamesmarket between the Xbox and PS will stay the same, although PS4 will have a really large marketshare.

Even though I made this thread I completely agree that the underlined is possible. The actual ethos of this thread is that we should place more emphasis on the "don't panic" part.

Some people have not understood this even though I thought it was implicit. Apparantly I'm implying that 200M PS4s are going to be sold or something. LOL.



Shaunaka on 18 April 2014
RolStoppable said:
Shaunaka said:
Here's a wonderful example of a terrible article that says the console market is in SERIOUS trouble:

http://techcrunch.com/2014/03/09/console-crisis/

That's actually a pretty good article.

Anyway, time for you to spill the beans on your eighth generation predictions. How many units will the PS4, the X1 and the Wii U sell individually?


LOL. You really think so? It's cherry picking data at it's absolute best! The Wii was selling HALF A MILLION consoles all by itself!

Do I really have to make predictions? Didn't realize that making a thread implied I'd have to do that.



KingdomHeartsFan on 18 April 2014
Shaunaka said:
KingdomHeartsFan said:
 

How is Wii U is selling less than Gamecube at the same point in time so at best it will reach GC sales not a worthwhile point?  How is the X1 losing its marketshare in the only places it sells well not a worthwhile point?  You have been proven wrong over and over in this thread and yet you continue to ignore facts, hell someone even showed you hardware sales dropping year over year.  It obvious nothing is gonna get through to you.  You haven't even backed up your claims with anything, just oh well it increased in the past so ofc it has to keep increasing guys!  


"You have been proven wrong over and over in this thread and yet you continue to ignore facts, hell someone even showed you hardware sales dropping year over year."

The very fact that you think that table carries any argumentative weight WHATSOEVER implies that you clearly don't even think for yourself. He even admitted that it was a BS statistic to use. Here it is, short and sweet: That ENTIRE data table is for ONE generation. The BEST SELLING generation. You'll find SIMILAR tables for any generation before it since there is ALWAYS a general trend of decline towards the end of a generation. Moreover, the PS4 and 360 are still expensive compared to what the GC,PS2 and XB sold for! THINK MAN!

The Wii U vs Gamecube argument implies that one should ignore the total sales of a generation and look at specific growth per platform holder. Who's talking about that!? Not me or anyone else.

"It obvious nothing is gonna get through to you."

Look, don't start insulting me for no reason. I've replied to as many posts as possible and as thoroughly as I can. Of course this generation might end up with sales slightly less than the last, but I'm addressing the doomsday people here ok.

I'm not even gonna go any further, you keep cherrypicking points and ignoring most of what I say.  Your Wii U and GC point doesn't even make any sense you have to look at each console individually when you predict the total sales of a generation.  You can't even justify why you think this generation is gonna sell more than the last.  



Mummelmann on 18 April 2014
Shaunaka said:
Mummelmann said:

It could be because the handheld market is set to have about 40% or so of the previous generation's hardware sales and that there were/are three contenders nudging the 85-100 million goal post in home consoles in the 7th gen whereas the 8th is set to have one sell about 20 million and another possibly 60-70 and with the leader slowing down quickly at present.
The Japanese home console market is collapsing and the smartphone/tablet/social/browser tsunami has washed everything else away there.

It's clear as day that we're facing a major contraction, unless OP is suggesting that we will somehow see another generation of 530-540 million or so total consoles sold with a crawling Vita and Wii U, an xbox that isn't setting the charts ablaze, a 3DS that is set crash early and fall short of 50% of its predecessor's sales and a PS4 that is slowing down to a pace far below the Wii.
Even if the One and PS4 sold 150 million each, that would still leave the total console market far short of the required numbers to prevent a contraction.
Heck; even if the Wii U, One and PS4, all three of them, sold 150 million units each; the 530-540 million mark could prove somewhat elusive.

OP: people are saying that it's shrinking because it is shrinking. It's not a huge mystery.

Look, no-one has EVER suggested that the growth won't slow down. The planet is only so big.

But you are saying that it's SHRINKING. There's no proof for that. Whatsoever.

How is the console market not shrinking? How is this scenario of a flat industry growth curve coming to fruition? The DS has sold about 155 million and the PSP about 80 million, that's around 235 million right there. The Vita will be lucky to reach 25 million at this rate and closer to 20 seems more likely by the day. The 3DS is slowing down quickly and is set to sell 80 million max, as it stands, even the mega heavy hitters of 2013 couldn't keep it from plummeting and it's not like the Vita is the cause of the decline. A likely scenario puts total handheld combined sales at around 100 million then, that's a deficit of 135 million already.

The Wii U is obviously not going to sell anywhere near what the Wii has, and there will be another 80 million or so lost in total installed base there, bringing the total tally to around 215 million, that is the number the One and PS4 will probably have to fill up in order not to cause a market contraction, and all this is assuming base sales for both One and PS4 being the same total as the lifetime sales of the PS3 and 360, somewhere along the lines of 180 million combined. This means that the One and PS4 will need to sell about 400 million units combined to avoid a market contraction, how on earth is this in any way plausible in any universe known to man? With the One's current pace and likely future up-tick, this could leave more than 300 million in the PS4's court to be sold.

There is no possible way for the 8th gen not to suffer a contraction, let alone remain flat. You have to show us how the PS4, One, Wii U, 3DS and Vita will pull off this feat, this is your claim to the whole "contraction theory" being "BS" so the burden of evidence is on you in this case. My statement has actual and observable merit and is more or the consensus of the entire forum and most other forums and sites as well, and the industry itself seems painfully aware in addition to this.

Edit; OP, yes, you need to post some actual numbers, your whole thread "implies" that there needs to be some fantastic sales somewhere in the 8th gen. "Here, I'm gonna make a ridiculous statement for you all. What, I have to actually build an argument and present actual numbers to back up the statement?" Come on, this is ridiculous.



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Mummelmann on 18 April 2014
RolStoppable said:
Shaunaka said:

LOL. You really think so? It's cherry picking data at it's absolute best! The Wii was selling HALF A MILLION consoles all by itself!

Do I really have to make predictions? Didn't realize that making a thread implied I'd have to do that.

1) The article is working with the data that is available and pointing to future months not going to paint a different picture. With the trajectories the eighth generation systems are on, there's not much of a reason to disagree with that assertion.

2) Yes, you absolutely have to make such predictions when you make the claim that the console market isn't shrinking. Actually, you not only have to provide such numbers, you'll also have to explain (in a succinct manner) how each system is going to get there.


Huzzah, more or less exactly what I'm thinking as well. If you make fantastic claims; you need to build a fantastic case for it.



artur-fernand on 18 April 2014

This generation will shrink, I have no doubt about it. But again, it's because the Wii inflated last gen's numbers. Without it, gen 7 would already had "shrinked". I put it on quotes because, although the numbers are lower, the number of "gamers" didn't really shrink.

The handheld market is a whole different thing though. With handhelds so close to home consoles, ridiculous battery life, and sizes that require a backpack to be carried around, there's little reason to actually own a handheld. If the point was "mindless fun when I'm bored on the street", smartphones are here for that. The battery life prevents the whole "console gaming anytime, anywhere" scenario.

Handhelds will not survive, I'm sure of it. Home consoles will be perfectly fine though.



sub-zero-TM on 18 April 2014

Yes i agree it's total BS!!



Shaunaka on 18 April 2014
RolStoppable said:
Shaunaka said:

Serious question then:

If we assume everything you say is correct (which isn't too much of a leap at all), then what would you (roughly) estimate gen7 total sales to have been? I know it's a tough one, but would you put it below gen6? Equal?

Definitely below generation 6. Maybe 170-180m in total, and that seems kinda generous. End of life sales of around 75-80m for the PS3 and 360 each and 10-15m for Nintendo's blunder. Without Wii, there would have been no motivation for Sony and Microsoft to create Move and Kinect, thus less attempts at diversity in their gaming libraries, thus lower lifetime sales for hardware.

Now I know you're just joking around. I lurked here long enough to know you're a smart enough cookie to not say these kind of things accidentally. I'm not going to justify that except by sayin that the front page of VGC told me so. And that last sentance is very funny!

And the other reply to me is even more precious. Since when are we held to such incredibly high standards?



Farsala on 18 April 2014

It is going to drop this gen, not so much because of less sales per year. But because we have already used 2 years for most 8th gen consoles and many of them are on decline. A new generation will be started early because the companies with their respective flailing consoles will want to start making big profits again.