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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - Nintendo quarterly sales update (To September 30th 2022) Switch 114.33 million

Agente42 on 27 November 2022
kazuyamishima said:
TruckOSaurus said:

It think the mark to beat is 1,537k software from the PS2. It's certainly doable but it'll be close.

The mark to beat is the PS4 SW, which is about 1.6-1.7 billion units, and still selling,  (the last official number was 1.577 billion in April 2021).

The metric was blurred, PS4 count Ps5 too? Because sony doesn´t separate software ps4 and ps5 in their reports ( you can extrapolate, but is hell of imprecise), and another factor: sony counts digital only, Nintendo doesn´t. If Nintendo can sell 1,5 billion pieces of software it would be bigger than ps4 because of this. 



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trunkswd on 27 November 2022
mjk45 said:
curl-6 said:

#3 of all time in both software and hardware at the end of its run seems a fairly safe bet then.
In both cases, this is the quarter where it will move multiple ranks up the ladder.

Still incredible that this generation follows on from both their worst selling console and handheld. Not even going from the Gamecube to the Wii was this much of a turnaround.

Discounting the few loons who say that [insert console name here] will end up being the biggest selling console ever in the usual VGChartz poll and discussion that happens prior to each new consoles launch, it can be said that even those of us who were optimistic never saw this scale of success.

While the Switch was coming after the Wii U with it's poor sales, because it was essentially combining both of Nintendo's gaming sides into one most logical people saw it as a positive move that would easily surpass the Wii U.

What was undecided was exactly how much of a success the Switch would be when put up against the combined 3Ds and Wii U then questions like with the exception of the Wii, Nintendo home consoles hardware sales historically aren't that big so how much growth would have to come from the handheld side and if so would it have the software attachment ratio of a handheld or be more inline with the higher ratio of a home console, now these questions were answered in the positive when early in the piece it became obvious that the Switch's impact was far more than what you would expect from the sum of the parts it replaced, but even following all that early success that quickly evolved from talk about would the switch succeed into talk about the Switch matching or passing the Wii, who would have imagined that a few years later the scale of those covid year sales has meant that in 2022 its no longer about matching the Wii but the PS2.

Wii U and 3DS combined seemed like the low end for the Switch as it was going to combined the handheld and home console lineup of Nintendo games onto one platform. 



VGChartz Sales Analyst and Writer - William D'Angelo - I stream on Twitch and have my own YouTube. Follow me on Twitter @TrunksWD.

Writer of the Sales Comparison | Weekly Hardware Breakdown | Top 10 | Weekly Sales Analysis | Marketshare Features, as well as daily news on the Video Game Industry.

curl-6 on 27 November 2022
trunkswd said:
mjk45 said:

Discounting the few loons who say that [insert console name here] will end up being the biggest selling console ever in the usual VGChartz poll and discussion that happens prior to each new consoles launch, it can be said that even those of us who were optimistic never saw this scale of success.

While the Switch was coming after the Wii U with it's poor sales, because it was essentially combining both of Nintendo's gaming sides into one most logical people saw it as a positive move that would easily surpass the Wii U.

What was undecided was exactly how much of a success the Switch would be when put up against the combined 3Ds and Wii U then questions like with the exception of the Wii, Nintendo home consoles hardware sales historically aren't that big so how much growth would have to come from the handheld side and if so would it have the software attachment ratio of a handheld or be more inline with the higher ratio of a home console, now these questions were answered in the positive when early in the piece it became obvious that the Switch's impact was far more than what you would expect from the sum of the parts it replaced, but even following all that early success that quickly evolved from talk about would the switch succeed into talk about the Switch matching or passing the Wii, who would have imagined that a few years later the scale of those covid year sales has meant that in 2022 its no longer about matching the Wii but the PS2.

Wii U and 3DS combined seemed like the low end for the Switch as it was going to combined the handheld and home console lineup of Nintendo games onto one platform. 

It may seem like that in retrospect, but at the time, most people didn't even expect Switch to outsell the 3DS alone, much less 3DS and Wii U combined.



super_etecoon on 28 November 2022
curl-6 said:
trunkswd said:

Wii U and 3DS combined seemed like the low end for the Switch as it was going to combined the handheld and home console lineup of Nintendo games onto one platform. 

It may seem like that in retrospect, but at the time, most people didn't even expect Switch to outsell the 3DS alone, much less 3DS and Wii U combined.

Damage had certainly been done to the brand. The last major manufacturer to dip that low in sales was Sega with the Dreamcast. Granted, Nintendo isn’t Sega and we all know Nintendo has enough cash on hand to weather several WiiU level crashes, but the general population is more susceptible to negative word of mouth and lack of confidence. Case in point, WiiU. 

So yes, while Nintendo combining the handheld and console market should on paper result in at least equal success, we’d also assume that a follow up to the Wii would at least not result in sales even lower than the revered, but failed, GameCube. The gaming community outperformed the normal disdain reserved for a manufacturer on a negative turn such as PlayStation 3 or XBox One. 

I absolutely agree with everyone that we left ludicrous speed with the Switch long ago and not even our most astute prognosticators here would have predicted a future where we can rationally speculate about a world where the PS2 and the DS would no longer be the high water marks for console sales. 

It’s still an improbable future but not an unlikely one. 



ShadowLink93 on 28 November 2022
Torpoleon said:

I always believed Switch would do at least Wii U/3DS combined numbers with the chance to outsell the Wii. That being said, I thought those things would occur near the end of its life. It actually occurred less than 5 year after launch with a couple more decent years still to go! It is true that Switch has blown past even the most optimistic expectations.

The growth over the 3DS and Wii U generation will be huge at the end of the Switch's life cycle, especially for Software. Software could triple the 3DS + Wii U total.

Hardware

3DS + Wii U: 89.50m (75.94m + 13.56m) 

NSW: 114.33m

Software

3DS + Wii U: 493.39m (389.86m + 103.53m) 

NSW: 917.59m



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Torpoleon on 28 November 2022

@ShadowLink93 The growth is tremendous and easily the biggest turnaround in gaming history. This is probably what Sega wanted from Dreamcast.

I am just hopeful that Nintendo can build on this with the next system. Since MS & Sony have had relative success so far with their new systems, I have faith that Nintendo can as well.

At worst, I'd expect Wii-level sales for their systems going forward as long as they stick with just 1 system.



mjk45 on 28 November 2022
curl-6 said:
trunkswd said:

Wii U and 3DS combined seemed like the low end for the Switch as it was going to combined the handheld and home console lineup of Nintendo games onto one platform. 

It may seem like that in retrospect, but at the time, most people didn't even expect Switch to outsell the 3DS alone, much less 3DS and Wii U combined.

I agree with curl-6, on face value now it seems like you could just add the Wii U and 3Ds numbers together and there's your base outcome, but at the time with mobile and online on the rise the climate was one of decline and while it was in a financial position to be able to ride out another Wii U/3Ds gen or two if needed in the hope of a turn around, the fact that the decline was affecting Nintendo on both the home and handheld front meant it needed to act sooner and its that climate along with the crossover aspect of how Nintendo's home and console sales intermingle meaning just combining both lots of sales is not the fairly predictable sales outcome it may seem on the surface, that like Curl said made it at that time look like a tall order .



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curl-6 on 28 November 2022

Yeah I think a lot of it came down to a general feeling of malaise and decline; we'd just come off a generation of watching the Wii U limp to a miserable 13 million lifetime, and even the 3DS failing to reach the sales of previous handhelds.

At the time, it just felt like Nintendo had really lost touch with the gaming audience and couldn't get anything right.



TheBraveGallade on 28 November 2022
Torpoleon said:

@ShadowLink93 The growth is tremendous and easily the biggest turnaround in gaming history. This is probably what Sega wanted from Dreamcast.

I am just hopeful that Nintendo can build on this with the next system. Since MS & Sony have had relative success so far with their new systems, I have faith that Nintendo can as well.

At worst, I'd expect Wii-level sales for their systems going forward as long as they stick with just 1 system.

Pretty much, the PS2 was just too strong.

but even without the PS2... the main problem with sega aside from their internal squabbles was in thier core identity at the time.

bleeding edge, being cool.

nintendo was able to weather, and has alway had since the SNES era, a couple bad generations of hardware. granted, nintendo never truely had to dip into thier war chest aside from early Wii U thanks to thier handheld division always dominating, but they always had that cushion, to be able to afford to wait. this is one of the factors why nintendo is usually willing to delay and take their time with first party games unlike most companies who need the game out the door becasue they need the cash flow so the company doesn't go kaput.



Wyrdness on 29 November 2022
mjk45 said:
curl-6 said:

It may seem like that in retrospect, but at the time, most people didn't even expect Switch to outsell the 3DS alone, much less 3DS and Wii U combined.

I agree with curl-6, on face value now it seems like you could just add the Wii U and 3Ds numbers together and there's your base outcome, but at the time with mobile and online on the rise the climate was one of decline and while it was in a financial position to be able to ride out another Wii U/3Ds gen or two if needed in the hope of a turn around, the fact that the decline was affecting Nintendo on both the home and handheld front meant it needed to act sooner and its that climate along with the crossover aspect of how Nintendo's home and console sales intermingle meaning just combining both lots of sales is not the fairly predictable sales outcome it may seem on the surface, that like Curl said made it at that time look like a tall order .

Mobile had been around since the Wii/DS though and established it  couldn't replace dedicated experiences in gaming it wasn't as tall an order as some people think because I and a significant amount of other people pointed out that Nintendo had a monopoly on the dedicated portable market which alone made it almost impossible to sell less than the 3DS as consumers from the 3DS and Vita equaled at the time 80m and would have to go somewhere for their dedicated portable experience, when you add WiiU numbers into the mix it becomes even more of a tall order to sell less than the 3DS as in total that's 93m units if we take into account overlap of these three platforms 3DS was really the minimum it could sell. If anything those who thought it would sell less than 3DS where being overly pessimistic with out looking at all the factors this isn't a case of hindsight in this regard.

Last edited by Wyrdness - on 29 November 2022