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Forums - Sales Discussion - Do you think PlayStation 5 sales will be as good as Nintendo Switch sales?

Gonna chime in... yes and no.

Yes: The PS5, like the PS4 before it would b another 120M+ lifetime seller. There really is no reason to think otherwise. With the exception of the PS3 (and for obvious reasons), every PS console has managed to break 100M sales. But to say that the PS5 would be a 120M seller and with that beat the Switch sales, would also mean I am saying the Switch will not do up to 120M sales. But that brings us to the next point. And something that I see applying to both the Switch and PS5.

No: This depends on one thing. What is the Switch 2 going to be? Is it a full-on Switch 2 that replaces the Switch, or is it a Switch HD, which is basically a new version of the switch that maintains forward and backward compatibility on the platform? Either way, I expect this new version to show up by 2021/2022. If it's the latter, then the Switch (Switch + Switch lite + Switch HD) would go onto be the best selling gaming console/handheld ever made as I expect it to surpass the PS2 sales. And I believe this is what Nintendo would do. They make a Switch HD, while ensuring games made for the platform are still based on the current Switch.

TLDR: It comes down to how many consoles the Switch sells between now and 2022 when I expect the next switch would be released, and if that next switch is a new platform or just a Switch Pro which would extend the lifetime of the switch for another 4-5 years.

But this also applies to the PS5, because I believe the PS5 would be sony's first official "active" 10-year console. I believe that we will get a PS5 pro, but that it would come much later than the PS4pro did, I am pegging it to come around 2025. It would replace the PS5 as the 4K60/120fps console, dropping the PS5 to a dynamic 1440p60/120fps console. And extend the life of the PS5 for another 4-5 years too. Which would mean that the PS5 could go on to be a 130- 140M seller in its lifetime.

I also expect this is what MS will be doing with the Xbox too... that's why the machine is called "Series"... and the reason for this all comes down to the CPU in these consoles. They are powerful enough to carry them for 10 years, with the biggest cost being that they either top out at 30fps in some games or can't exceed 60fps.

Some forewarning... pretty much 95% of every single hardware related prediction I have made from 2017 till this point has come to pass. Some of my more notable ones...

  • What the switch would be hardware-wise (arm processor and a handheld/home console convertible back when all we knew was NX)
  • That there would be a handheld only version of the switch released in around 3 years after the switch released, made this prediction after the first showing of the Switch.
  • That next-gen consoles fromSony or MS would use SSDs, and in turn not need to have more than 16GB (to max 20GB) of RAM. Prediction I made when everyone thought SSDs would be price prohibitive.
  • That the next Xbox would be more powerful than the PS5, because MS needed it more than sony ever would, but that it wouldn't matter.
  • That MS was shifting focus away from consoles as their primary business model, the second they announced releasing games on PC, and over a year before Gamepass was even announced.
  • A price sandwich from MS, would have a console at $499 and one at $299/349, and sony would have a console at $399. I also said there would be digital-only SKUs released from both of them.
  • I predicted that both nextgen consoles would have GPUs more powerful than 12TF. Granted, I made his prediction long before RDNA was even announced so based on GCN architecture). Well, both consoles have GPUs that perform better than any 12TF GCN based GPU. So this one was kinda right too lol.
Last edited by Intrinsic - on 03 December 2020

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RolStoppable said:
curl-6 said:

Likewise, we already know a lot about the PS5 in late 2020. It's a straight-forward follow-up to the PS4, so the chances that the PS5 will appeal to a broader audience than the PS4 are very slim. One opportunity for growth is to take consumers away from Xbox which appeals to the very same group of gamers, but what we know about Xbox Series X is that this gen multiplats aren't going to be notably inferior in terms of framerate and resolution, plus Microsoft has been expanding their first party studios; this makes it tough for Sony to convince Xbox One owners to go for the PS brand.

1- it could appeal to Low-Tier PC gamers who cant afford new RTX cards, as well as the console design being overly fashionable that it might be considered a fitting piece of Furniture in your TV setting (which would be more appealing to Female audiences, the new Dualsense design is another example)

2- Have you seen Digital Foundry’s comparisons in performance ? , not that it matters anyway, PS3 had a supercomputer for CPU and was outsold by Wii, original Xbox was a monster in Performance but was utterly crushed by PS2 in sales, IMO Xbone being weaker than PS4 had little to no impact on xbone being a failure (since Xbox one X Exists and wasn’t effective sales-wise).


3- the Series X/S will never outsell PS5 Period, Not even in NA (1.2M PS5 vs 780K Series X/S at launch in US alone) if content is king then Exclusivity is Gold, thats why a Certain 299$ Console with PS3 level of performance keeps selling like hotcake, so unless Microsoft puts actual Exclusive content into the Series X/S then i dont see myself or anyone who owns a PC ever getting Xbox, not even Gamepass is exclusive to the console.

to me the Xbox One with all its PR Nightmares could’ve outsold the Xbox 360 and even reach PS4 sales in longterm (like when PS3 outsold the 360 at the end of 7th gen), if it wasnt for Microsoft giving up completely on providing exclusive content to Xbox (comparable to 360).

this only leaves us to PS5 vs PS4, assuming Japan life time sales would be 6 million (as per your estimate) it would only mean a -2 Million, not only is it a small hurdle, but very irrelevant when it comes to international growth, considering that currently the PS4 has outsold the PS3 by 27M+ despite being -2M compared to PS3 in Japanese sales.

4-keeping the momentum is a major aspect when it comes to growth, but its even more impactful when it involves more innovation like the move from PS1 (103M) to PS2 (157M) or from GBA (82M) to DS (154M)


The same could be said to 3DS (75M) to Switch (potential 140M) as momentum and innovation goes hand to hand to convince the current audience (and new potential ones) to buy your new system.

now back to PS5, not only they kept the momentum with the PS4 Success, but also packing in an innovative controller and new UI as well as great 1st party support at launch (with one being Exclusive), And while Microsoft have made a really great hardware it honestly felt more like an upgrade than being a next Gen console (going as far as Unifying their boxarts), not to its bad, just not as impactful as PS5 or Switch Transition from previous gen imo.

And it all shows with PS5 being the best selling console at launch in history !, with demands thats just unheard off since the Wii launch.

The only way i could see PS5 having less broad audience than PS4 is if Sony’s either done a Don-Mattrick level of F#$% up or Xcloud and Cloud Gaming becoming seriously viable which i dont see it anytime soon, not even the next 5+ years (no matter how the tech is improved, you’ll still be screwed by Data-cap) Honestly I’m more concerned about Apple Silicone tech than Cloud Gaming.


TLDR; No,PS5 Wont Reach The Switch Life-Time Sales, the Series X/S will never outsell PS5 anywhere including the US, and assuming if PS5 sales declined by 2M in japan, then sony could easily overcome that hurdle by the growing its brand in the developing markets, especially the Middle east and China.

.

Last edited by B6a6es - on 03 December 2020

Ryng said:
Doctor_MG said:

Man...those are some ballsy predictions. I do not think that the Switch will become the best selling console of all time. I'm thinking more like:

America > 45M
Europe < 35M
Japan > 30M
RotW < 20M

Total < 130

Both your Europe and America numbers are super low.

Switch was at 26.58 million in America at the end of September, should be at 33-34 million at the end of the year, you are predicting only 11-12 million more after that, which is not only extremely low but, it's what it should sell only in 2021.

Switch will be above your 45 million estimate in America before 2022 begin.

I don't believe that those too are low. 45M in America would be the best selling console in America since the Wii. Also, 26.58M after three and a half years is a pretty good middle ground. Maybe it might reach up to 50M, but that would be the absolute maximum. Also, yes I am predicting only 11-12M sold in America after four and a half years on the market. I think that's actually really good. 

Though Switch is doing well in Europe, Nintendo consoles in general do not perform as well as Playstation in the regions. Currently the console is at 18M, but I actually suspect that, by year four or five, sales will begin slowing down much harder in this region than others due to Playstations prevalence. 

I mean, 130M is nothing to sneeze at. It will likely outsell the PS4 and become the third best selling console of all time. I think that is more likely than selling 170M.



Ryng said:
Doctor_MG said:

Man...those are some ballsy predictions. I do not think that the Switch will become the best selling console of all time. I'm thinking more like:

America > 45M
Europe < 35M
Japan > 30M
RotW < 20M

Total < 130

Both your Europe and America numbers are super low.

Switch was at 26.58 million in America at the end of September, should be at 33-34 million at the end of the year, you are predicting only 11-12 million more after that, which is not only extremely low but, it's what it should sell only in 2021.

Switch will be above your 45 million estimate in America before 2022 begin.

2021 is going to be fun.



I disagree with the notion some people have NS' success was hard to predict before its launch even in my modest predictions I had it down to do 80m purely because it has a monopoly on one side of the industry in the portable market which housed at the time a combined 70-80m or so potential sales between Vita and 3DS (now 92m) some people were just ignoring this factor throwing out pessimistic forecasts as if that market was going to disappear over night, the was only one platform for these consumers to buy that only leads to one thing it was always going to have good success the concept when first shown was also very appealing on top of having a reacquired monopoly.

The level momentum it has garnered I can agree was unexpected but success was always going to be a thing be it 80m or 130m it's just people on forums who are a minority believed in a preset way they think the market should work as opposed to how relevant factors will make it work an example is the obsession's with high powered hardware on boards.



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RolStoppable said:
curl-6 said:

Beware of making overly confident premature predictions.

Back in 2017 the idea of Switch outselling the PS4 was considered far-fetched to the point of being laughable, yet now there's a very real chance it could happen. Likewise, for all we know in 3 years time we could be laughing at the idea that people ever ruled out the idea of PS5 outselling Switch.

The gaming industry is highly volatile and you never know how things will turn out.

curl, you have been so wrong for so long that you aren't in a position to tell others what to do, except advise them to be not like you. It's not too early to make the call now, the PS5 won't sell more than Switch. Just like it wasn't too early in 2017 to make the call that Switch will sell more than the PS4. The "it's too early" line in a general sense usually comes from people who don't like how things look at the moment, so they want to buy some time in hopes that the state of things gets closer to what they want them to be.

The reasons why Switch was going to sell more than the PS4 could already be known in 2017. The biggest reason of them was and is that Nintendo holds a monopoly in the portable console market, so merely keeping that market flat from generation 8 (~90m between 3DS and Vita) was going to get Switch close to 100m units sold. From there it doesn't need a big vote of confidence that Nintendo can achieve a big enough presence in the home console market to get the necessary sales to beat the PS4 lifetime sales. After all, the Wii U did not represent the ceiling for Nintendo home console sales, it was a complete and utter failure with Nintendo making all the wrong decisions for what they wanted to go for with that console.

Likewise, we already know a lot about the PS5 in late 2020. It's a straight-forward follow-up to the PS4, so the chances that the PS5 will appeal to a broader audience than the PS4 are very slim. One opportunity for growth is to take consumers away from Xbox which appeals to the very same group of gamers, but what we know about Xbox Series X is that this gen multiplats aren't going to be notably inferior in terms of framerate and resolution, plus Microsoft has been expanding their first party studios; this makes it tough for Sony to convince Xbox One owners to go for the PS brand, because Microsoft ticked the most important boxes to retain what they had.

Growth for the PS brand is mandatory to challenge Switch sales because Switch sells better than the PS4, but the realistic options for growth are limited to developing markets growing bigger over time, because the PS5 itself doesn't have the appeal to grow in the matured markets. Chances are good that PS sales decline slightly in both Japan and North America, so the gains the PS5 makes in developing markets will be mostly offset by these decreases.

I can understand why a lot of people have trouble to make good predictions for Nintendo consoles, because Nintendo consoles can greatly differ in strategy from one generation to the next one, but Sony and Microsoft make it pretty easy. The PS5 isn't a mysterious entity where it's hard to say what it is and what it will be, so the general consensus for its lifetime sales is bound to be in the correct ballpark, unlike for Switch where the consensus was off by miles.

PS5 is already off to a stronger start than the PS4 and this time people know going in that Xbox Series won't have exclusives cos they'll be on PC as well, something that didn't become a factor until midway into Xbone's life, plus Series is inheriting a smaller base than Xbone did from 360, so PS5 may indeed manage to take even more marketshare from Microsoft this generation compared to last and grow through that.

Last edited by curl-6 - on 03 December 2020

PS5 launched at the back of the PS4. Switch launched after the Wii U to record breaking success. The writing was on the wall. It was there all along.

Looking back, a lot of people were downplaying the switch success during launch. Even going on to say Nintendo was doing artificial scarcity. “No one actually wants it”. It was neck and neck with PS4 in its launch year. LAUNCH year. To go from Wii U to that.......

The switch is on its way to be one of if not THE best selling consoles of all time. It will pass the PS4 easily unless a doomsday happen and humanity collapse in the next two years. It will pass it.



curl-6 said:

PS5 is already off to a stronger start than the PS4 and this time people know going in that Xbox Series won't have exclusives cos they'll be on PC as well, something that didn't become a factor until midway into Xbone's life, plus Series is inheriting a smaller base than Xbone did from 360, so PS5 may indeed manage to take even more marketshare from Microsoft this generation compared to last and grow through that.

I wouldn't put too much into that. Consoles and games sales become more and more frontloaded, so early sales tell not much.

You also have to see, that PS4 had a much more staggered launch in different region. Let's compare launch week in different regions for PS4 and PS5 (and add in Xbox for comparison):

PS4PS5Xbox OneSeries X/S
america982,3901,092,523 (+11%)652,045789,262 (+21%)
europe706,948723,341 (+2%)311,590349,697 (+12%)
japan319,689118,671 (-63%)24,79520,993 (-15%)

This stops looking that impressive anymore, right? Playstation lost two thirds of it's market in Japan, and again: Games and game stuff tends to be more and more frontloaded. And the other markets show an 11% growth in America and only 2% in europe.

Looking at the Xbox side of things, it looks a lot better gen over gen. If anything we should talk about how Xbox is dominating more this gen. And as you mentioned: this increase gen over gen is with less launch exclusives and a lower customer base to start off from last gen.

And do you really think the market for PS+Xbox is bigger this gen than the gen before? I think it stays the same at best. So if Xbox performs better it comes at the cost of Playstation.

I admit, the ROW is missing. But VGC doesn't show them separated and I don't know when PS4 and PS5 launched in the different markets. As PS5 launched in the big markets closer than PS4, I assume that this is the case for ROW-countries too, but I don't know.

As I said, I wouldn't put too much importance into launch numbers, but if we look closely they aren't showing a massive growth or so. They show that we can a similar gen in regards to sales.



3DS-FC: 4511-1768-7903 (Mii-Name: Mnementh), Nintendo-Network-ID: Mnementh, Switch: SW-7706-3819-9381 (Mnementh)

my greatest games: 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023

10 years greatest game event!

bets: [peak year] [+], [1], [2], [3], [4]

Mnementh said:
curl-6 said:

PS5 is already off to a stronger start than the PS4 and this time people know going in that Xbox Series won't have exclusives cos they'll be on PC as well, something that didn't become a factor until midway into Xbone's life, plus Series is inheriting a smaller base than Xbone did from 360, so PS5 may indeed manage to take even more marketshare from Microsoft this generation compared to last and grow through that.

I wouldn't put too much into that. Consoles and games sales become more and more frontloaded, so early sales tell not much.

You also have to see, that PS4 had a much more staggered launch in different region. Let's compare launch week in different regions for PS4 and PS5 (and add in Xbox for comparison):

PS4PS5Xbox OneSeries X/S
america982,3901,092,523 (+11%)652,045789,262 (+21%)
europe706,948723,341 (+2%)311,590349,697 (+12%)
japan319,689118,671 (-63%)24,79520,993 (-15%)

This stops looking that impressive anymore, right? Playstation lost two thirds of it's market in Japan, and again: Games and game stuff tends to be more and more frontloaded. And the other markets show an 11% growth in America and only 2% in europe.

Looking at the Xbox side of things, it looks a lot better gen over gen. If anything we should talk about how Xbox is dominating more this gen. And as you mentioned: this increase gen over gen is with less launch exclusives and a lower customer base to start off from last gen.

And do you really think the market for PS+Xbox is bigger this gen than the gen before? I think it stays the same at best. So if Xbox performs better it comes at the cost of Playstation.

I admit, the ROW is missing. But VGC doesn't show them separated and I don't know when PS4 and PS5 launched in the different markets. As PS5 launched in the big markets closer than PS4, I assume that this is the case for ROW-countries too, but I don't know.

As I said, I wouldn't put too much importance into launch numbers, but if we look closely they aren't showing a massive growth or so. They show that we can a similar gen in regards to sales.

PS5 lost that much in Japan, because the PS4 launched in February of 2014 instead of November of 2013 and had amassed enough stock and some games to sell. PS5 has problems regarding stock.



Korvo_Attano said:
Mnementh said:

I wouldn't put too much into that. Consoles and games sales become more and more frontloaded, so early sales tell not much.

You also have to see, that PS4 had a much more staggered launch in different region. Let's compare launch week in different regions for PS4 and PS5 (and add in Xbox for comparison):

PS4PS5Xbox OneSeries X/S
america982,3901,092,523 (+11%)652,045789,262 (+21%)
europe706,948723,341 (+2%)311,590349,697 (+12%)
japan319,689118,671 (-63%)24,79520,993 (-15%)

This stops looking that impressive anymore, right? Playstation lost two thirds of it's market in Japan, and again: Games and game stuff tends to be more and more frontloaded. And the other markets show an 11% growth in America and only 2% in europe.

Looking at the Xbox side of things, it looks a lot better gen over gen. If anything we should talk about how Xbox is dominating more this gen. And as you mentioned: this increase gen over gen is with less launch exclusives and a lower customer base to start off from last gen.

And do you really think the market for PS+Xbox is bigger this gen than the gen before? I think it stays the same at best. So if Xbox performs better it comes at the cost of Playstation.

I admit, the ROW is missing. But VGC doesn't show them separated and I don't know when PS4 and PS5 launched in the different markets. As PS5 launched in the big markets closer than PS4, I assume that this is the case for ROW-countries too, but I don't know.

As I said, I wouldn't put too much importance into launch numbers, but if we look closely they aren't showing a massive growth or so. They show that we can a similar gen in regards to sales.

PS5 lost that much in Japan, because the PS4 launched in February of 2014 instead of November of 2013 and had amassed enough stock and some games to sell. PS5 has problems regarding stock.

Yeah, even more reason to mistrust launch sales data. Both companies sold more at launch, because they were able to provide more stock gen over gen. That says not much, so any conclusion that PS5 will grow over PS4 based on launch sales is premature.



3DS-FC: 4511-1768-7903 (Mii-Name: Mnementh), Nintendo-Network-ID: Mnementh, Switch: SW-7706-3819-9381 (Mnementh)

my greatest games: 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023

10 years greatest game event!

bets: [peak year] [+], [1], [2], [3], [4]