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Forums - Sales - The Death of the Video Game Console Market

Erik Aston on 27 September 2008
Sky Render said:
Hm, so the Magical Market followers have spotted the spray-paint job on their yellow brick road! It's about time. Yes, the "next generation" console market is dying. The HD Twins are having a delightful time eating each others' decreasing sales, and games that used to be blockbusters in years past are now fading. So tragic.

Though they still won't acknowledge Nintendo raking in the cash, eventually our favorite Kyoto-based "elephant in the room" will be too big to ignore. And then perhaps they will recognize that the market not only is changing, but has to change. To take any other path would be market suicide.

 

Last year Nintendo had the biggest year for any game maker in history, in terms of revenues and profit. This year, they are going to demolish what they did last year.

In fact, Nintendo is projected to set a record this year for the most profit per employee of any company... Ever. Not "in the games industry." Anyone, ever.

And they are still being ignored. So don't hold your breath for them to become "too big to ignore."



"[Our former customers] are unable to find software which they WANT to play."
"The way to solve this problem lies in how to communicate what kind of games [they CAN play]."

Satoru Iwata, Nintendo President. Only slightly paraphrased.

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Khuutra on 27 September 2008
leo-j said:
Khuutra said:
Actually, come to think of it, I'm probably low-balling my Wii prediction for the end of next year by quite a lot...

 

 I dont know, you cant say anything yet..

 

Sure I can

Just ask my sig



Sky Render on 27 September 2008

Oh, this isn't the first time, rest assured. The PC gaming industry ignored Nintendo as long as they could when the NES came about. I don't think any genuine acknowledgment came about from most of the industry, in fact, until the SNES was launched. Though the developers who survived that era had (for the most part) thrown their lot in with the NES and Nintendo by then, the PC gaming media still liked to deny its existence regularly. Some of that mentality remains today in the form of PC supporters denying the existence and impact of video game consoles at large, actually...

Anyway, point is, eventually even the delusional sorts will have to admit the truth. Even if it takes another half-decade.



Sky Render - Sanity is for the weak.

SmokedHostage on 27 September 2008
Sky Render said:
Oh, this isn't the first time, rest assured. The PC gaming industry ignored Nintendo as long as they could when the NES came about. I don't think any genuine acknowledgment came about from most of the industry, in fact, until the SNES was launched. Though the developers who survived that era had (for the most part) thrown their lot in with the NES and Nintendo by then, the PC gaming media still liked to deny its existence regularly. Some of that mentality remains today in the form of PC supporters denying the existence and impact of video game consoles at large, actually...

Anyway, point is, eventually even the delusional sorts will have to admit the truth. Even if it takes another half-decade.

 

 Why must every post you make be made of genius?



Pixel Art can be fun.

Oyvoyvoyv on 27 September 2008
vlad321 said:
slimeattack said:
I hate WoW. The graphics suck, it's f***ing expensive to play and it isn't even fun.

 

The graphics are dated but still, just going off pure srtistry WoW's graphics are still better than most games. Maybe there just wasn't enough gray and brown for you?

 

He does bring up a very valid point, granted WoW is the biggest money hog out there but like he said it is just one PC game. Outselling revenues of Sony and M$ is quite a a feat for a company which has no other sources of revenue. He doesn't mention the Wii and the ridicuous sales it has been having, but then again, by many posters' opinions on this site Console Gaming would be dead if it was just the Wii.  The thing is that just the same as the 360/PS3 vs the Wii, most Wii games aren't going after the PC type of games. In fact they are different enough for me to actually buy a Wii, since it provides something I can't get on my PC. A nod to shio by pointing out that consoles are becoming more and more like PCs and by next gen they might as well be PCs.

 

@Oyvoyoyvov (i probably mesed that up)

It's actually 15 bucks a month.

 

Just write Oyv 

 

Oh crap, I messed up, assuming there's 6 months a year (somehow).

So it's really 1800M revenue for WoW a year. Still, X360 is far, far above that if you include software, as SW is at least as big as HW (assuming an average of around 30 dollars pr new game sold).

So he's using HW only, and then he's only slighly right.

Still, I'm willing to guess WoW > Other PC gaming in revenue, so X360 might > PC in revenue.

But that's just a guess.

 



http://www.vgchartz.com/games/userreviewdisp.php?id=261

That is VGChartz LONGEST review. And it's NOT Cute Kitten DS

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bdbdbd on 27 September 2008

Queen was really the only ones that could foresee this; Wii will rock you.



Ei Kiinasti.

Eikä Japanisti.

Vaan pannaan jalalla koreasti.

 

Nintendo games sell only on Nintendo system.

Sky Render on 27 September 2008

Malstrom has posted another interesting (and relevant) piece just recently on this matter. Specifically, he pointed out what disruption means: new-values products eating up an old-values market. The importance of this is paramount: it doesn't matter if the 360 and PS3 could have succeeded without the Wii, what matters is that the existence of the Wii ensures the minimization or demise of both of them and everything they stand for which the Wii does not.

Oh, but don't fear, self-proclaimed "hardcore" gamers. There will be a market for "your" games for a while yet. But don't expect it to get any bigger; it's on the same course as the PC gaming market of the 1980s was. You don't see a lot of games like those ones any more, unless you count all of these games that are too complicated for their own good yet somehow also limit themselves to a 12-button controller.



Sky Render - Sanity is for the weak.

shio on 27 September 2008
Gnizmo said:
shio said:
The console market really is "dieing" - the profit from console games have sharply decreased, half the publishers aren't even making money on the console market, and that is why there have been less and less exclusives on consoles. Another valid point of view is that consoles are becoming more and more like PC themselves, and if this trend continues they will actually be categorized as PCs. However there's no doubt that the console market is increasing.

The PC market on the other hand, is increasing steadily and the profit margin has increased also. This means more games, more indie support, more exclusives.

 Oh wiily now? Seems to me the console market is growing at a rather rapid pace but is leaving behind the older genres and formerly big name games. Nintendo managed to make a billion in profits in one quarter. I wonder how including them in the comparison used would skew the results...

I'm not sure what you're saying, I always included the Wii in my argument. Nintendo had a profit of $1 billion, but most of it was from hardware and DS games... i'm strictly talking about home console games vs PC games.

Pristine20 said:
hahaha, they carefully cherrypicked the consoles doing poorly and chose the best selling pc game where the geeks never tire of throwing their cash away.
How much profit did crysis make again? why were the devs complaining? LMAO. So COD4 sold better on PC right even with the "superior version"?

Crysis devs complained because they followed the "piracy is killing my game" crap being spout by some idiots. In reality:
- Crysis surpassed EA's expectations
- Reached in just 45 days what Far Cry took in it's lifetime
- Made considerable profit
- Is still selling

And that's not even mentioning the business blunders that Crytek made, by not releasing Crysis through a more vast Digital Distribution services and having the stigma of "only runs on $2000 PCs".

Crysis is selling bad?? Well, I'm estimating it's lifetime sales to be around 2.5 millions.

As for COD4, we can't be sure which version sold more, especially when Activision hasn't said a word about digital distribution sales. Imo, it will have 10+ millions sales on PC alone, when it's all said and done.

Pristine20 said:

The truth is that its only M$ that is likely to drop out because they have never seen major success in the industry and they know the pc market and the whole digital revolution very well. They are already pulling a WoW with their xbox live subscriptions. Hell, most PC games are windows based.

They are not. WoW made $1.2 billions in 2007, and for XBL to have that money they would need to have sold 24 millions Gold memberships last year (and they only had 10 millions Gold+Silver accounts in early 2008).



http://i48.tinypic.com/120qaon.jpg
shio on 27 September 2008
Sky Render said:
Oh, this isn't the first time, rest assured. The PC gaming industry ignored Nintendo as long as they could when the NES came about. I don't think any genuine acknowledgment came about from most of the industry, in fact, until the SNES was launched. Though the developers who survived that era had (for the most part) thrown their lot in with the NES and Nintendo by then, the PC gaming media still liked to deny its existence regularly. Some of that mentality remains today in the form of PC supporters denying the existence and impact of video game consoles at large, actually...

Anyway, point is, eventually even the delusional sorts will have to admit the truth. Even if it takes another half-decade.

What are you talking about? Console market always made more revenue than the PC market (except in the primordial soup). In NES/SMS generation the console games sold far better than PC games: SMB3 sold 17 millions, DW3 3.8 millions, etc... infact, there was almost no million sellers on PC.

But today, there are far more PC games released than console games and that many of those PC games even sell better than console games. The fact that today's 2 biggest game franchises are for PC tells you something (Sims, WoW).

PC is gaining territory, and I'm betting that in a few years it will pass the Console market's revenue. Asia will seek to that.



http://i48.tinypic.com/120qaon.jpg
Bitmap Frogs on 27 September 2008

If anything, WoW is a boon to console gaming. While all the pc gamers are busy throwing wads of cash at blizzard the old pc dev houses are now redirecting their efforts towards consoles.





Current-gen game collection uploaded on the profile, full of win and good games; also most of my PC games. Lucasfilm Games/LucasArts 1982-2008 (Requiescat In Pace).