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Forums - Sales - Reconstructing Gaming History: NYTimes From 6/1/1991 - NES @ 9m in 1989?

BKK2 on 25 July 2008

Video games ride out the Nintendo wave; Nintendo's home system ebbs while Game Boy and 16-bit flow. (includes related article on hand-held video games)

Saturation. That's the buzz word on the lips of toy retailers who have experienced a lull in the sales of the Nintendo Entertainment System.

Having sold over 28 million systems from 1986 - 1990, Nintendo has penetrated a third of U.S. households and 70 percent of households with children 8 to 15. During this period, Nintendo has altered the focus of their marketing strategies. What once was a children's toy became entertainment for the entire family, and adults became a substantial portion of the video market (39 percent of players are over 18). Everything that Nintendo did to market their product seemed to work, but there are only so many potential customers with the disposable income necessary to buy into the system. Flattening sales of the system does not, in itself, signal a decline for Nintendo


There are several different articles that give the 28m figure.

With that it's possible to fill in the gaps:

NES (NA):

1992: 3m (33m)
1991: 2m (30m)
1990: 7.2m (28m)
1989: 9.2m (20.8m)
1988: 6.4m (11.6m)
1987: 4.1m (5.2m)
1986: 1m (1.1m)
1985: 0.09m (0.09m)

Some of these are rounded off to 1m, so it's not necessarily exact, but should be reasonably accurate.



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BKK2 on 25 July 2008
TheSource said:

Also, Edge says that the '6.5m Famicoms' in Japan in 1986 is an LTD figure. That makes much more sense.

So for Japan I have:

July 83' launch

by Sept 83' - 500k Famicoms sold (likely by August 31, since thats when Nintendo's fiscal year ended)

Sometime in 1988, the LTD total in Japan reached 13m (again could be by August 31, since that whens Nintendo's FY ended pre-Sept 1 1989)

NES was likely still doing maybe 1.5m-2.5m/year until Game Boy and the NEC system launched in Japan...NES hit 19.35m eventually in Japan.

So Japan I figure went something like this (calendar year unless noted)

End of Sales in Calendary Year (Lifetime to Date Sales)

1983 - 850k (500k by Aug 31 or Sept 15 depending on interpretation)

1984 - 1650k (2.5m LTD)

1985 - 2500k (5m LTD)

1986 - 3250k (8.25m LTD)

1987 - 2750k (11m LTD)

1988 - 2250k (13.25m LTD)

1989 - 1750k (15m LTD)

1990 - 1250k (16.25m LTD)

1991 - 900k (17.15m LTD)

1992 - 700k (17.85m LTD)

March 1993 - 18.13m LTD (VGC shipments from here on)

PC Engine launched in 1987.



TheSource on 25 July 2008

Maybe a higher peak in 85'/86' then, and a bigger drop in 87' given that PC Engine was out in 87'.

83' - 600k

84' - 1400k (2m)

85' - 2800k (4.8m)

86' - 3700k (8.5m)

87' - 2500k (11m)

88' - 2250k (13.25m)

89' - 1650k (14.9m)

90' - 1350k (16.25m)

91' - 900k (17.15m)

92' - 750k (17.9m)

March 93' - 18.13m Shipped To Date



People are difficult to govern because they have too much knowledge.

When there are more laws, there are more criminals.

- Lao Tzu

Malachi on 25 July 2008

http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/grant/docs/11Videogames.pdf

 

Nice info there TheSource. By these number Nintendo had 90% of the market by1990 in the US, and its seem 1989 was an even better year for them, WOW. Its 2,9 billion in sale only got (barely) beaten by the PS1 in 1998 with 3,15 billion then by the PS2 in 2001 with 3,75 billion(which comparatively had only 76% of the market), not accounting for inflation! What surprise me the most though is that from 1990 to 2001 the total of revenue had growth from 3,216 million to 4,942. If you account for inflation, did the videogame industry really had such a meteoric growth? Admittidly it was 1 billion bigger in 2000 and was "projected" (in the document) to be 6,445 million in 2002, stilll.



Persons without argument hide behind their opinion

BKK2 on 25 July 2008
Malachi said:

http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/grant/docs/11Videogames.pdf

 

What surprise me the most though is that from 1990 to 2001 the total of revenue had growth from 3,216 million to 4,942. If you account for inflation, did the videogame industry really had such a meteoric growth? Admittidly it was 1 billion bigger in 2000 and was "projected" (in the document) to be 6,445 million in 2002, stilll.

Well, the video game industry is cyclical, so will throw up all sorts of growth or decline depending on which years you pick.

It was actually worth $3b back in 1982, but had dropped to just $100m in 1985 after the crash.

 

 

 



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Orochimaru on 26 July 2008

Very nice thread, thanks to everyone. :D



celine on 26 July 2008

Some inofs from Ken Pollson works :

Japan

Famicom :
1983 - 500k units in first 2 months
1985 - 6.5 million ( possible ? Seems Total to date )
1986 - 500k Famicom Disk System sold to date ( May 1986 )
1990 - 4.4 million Famicom Disk System sold to date ( 31 December 1990 )


GameBoy :
1989: 200k units sold in first 2 weeks

Super Famicom :
1990-300k ship first day, 4 million in the year.

USA

Nes :
1985 - 90k units ( Launch in NYC )
1986- 1 million
1987- Units sale to date 4 million ( 31 December 1987 ) so about 3 million in that year alone. 15 million software units sold in that year.
1988- about 7 million. 33 milion games
1989 - about 9.2 million. 53 milion games
1990 - about 7.2 million. 60 milion games
1991 - about 3.5 million

GameBoy:
1989- 40k on first day. 1 million for the year
1995 - 18 million to sold date
1996 - 19 million to sold date

VirtualBoy
1995 - 350 K sold to date

N64
1996 - 1.7 milliom
1997 - to date (march 1997 ) 2.5 million

Europe

GameBoy
1992 - 6 million

Snes
1992 - 3.5 million


Worldwide:

GameBoy
FY 1990 - 2.8 million
FY 1991 - 8 million
FY 1992 - 10.5 million
FY 1993 - 7.8 million
FY 1994 - 7.5 million
FY 1995 - 5.5 million
FY 1996 - 4.1 million
FY 1997 - 7 million

if someone want dig deeper than me here the link with the reference also :
http://www.islandnet.com/~kpolsson/ninvid/



 “In the entertainment business, there are only heaven and hell, and nothing in between and as soon as our customers bore of our products, we will crash.”  Hiroshi Yamauchi

TAG:  Like a Yamauchi pimp slap delivered by Il Maelstrom; serving it up with style.

BKK2 on 26 July 2008
celine said:

Some inofs from Ken Pollson works :

USA

Nes :
1985 - 90k units ( Launch in NYC )
1986- 1 million
1987- Units sale to date 4 million ( 31 December 1987 ) so about 3 million in that year alone. 15 million software units sold in that year.
1988- about 7 million. 33 milion games
1989 - about 9.2 million. 53 milion games
1990 - about 7.2 million. 60 milion games
1991 - about 3.5 million


if someone want dig deeper than me here the link with the reference also :
http://www.islandnet.com/~kpolsson/ninvid/

That contradicts one of the articles posted above, so I checked his source (a NYT article from '91), but it makes no mention of 1987, just gives '89 & '90 sales, which he also has sourced to the same article. The article posted above says they sold 4.1m the previous year (1987), so I think that must be a mistake on his site.

 



celine on 26 July 2008
BKK2 said:
celine said:

Some inofs from Ken Pollson works :

USA

Nes :
1985 - 90k units ( Launch in NYC )
1986- 1 million
1987- Units sale to date 4 million ( 31 December 1987 ) so about 3 million in that year alone. 15 million software units sold in that year.
1988- about 7 million. 33 milion games
1989 - about 9.2 million. 53 milion games
1990 - about 7.2 million. 60 milion games
1991 - about 3.5 million


if someone want dig deeper than me here the link with the reference also :
http://www.islandnet.com/~kpolsson/ninvid/

That contradicts one of the articles posted above, so I checked his source (a NYT article from '91), but it makes no mention of 1987, just gives '89 & '90 sales, which he also has sourced to the same article. The article posted above says they sold 4.1m the previous year (1987), so I think that must be a mistake on his site.

 

Could be. About the 1987 3 million figure he has as source also a newsweek article and David Sheff book Game Over.

Could someone with this book check the figure at page 169 ?

 



 “In the entertainment business, there are only heaven and hell, and nothing in between and as soon as our customers bore of our products, we will crash.”  Hiroshi Yamauchi

TAG:  Like a Yamauchi pimp slap delivered by Il Maelstrom; serving it up with style.

TheSource on 26 July 2008

Some of the sources I posted earlier suggest the 4m in 1987 is an LTD although BKK2's source does make it sound like a total only from 1987. Maybe its a YTD total?



People are difficult to govern because they have too much knowledge.

When there are more laws, there are more criminals.

- Lao Tzu