The Hyperbolic metric, best metric ever.
I look at three factors:
1) general industry metrics (are they profitable? are their profits in line with industry averages, above or below? etc
2) how are they performing vs their own benchmark?
3) how are they performing relative to the competition/market
In super summary this is how I therefore see the 3 main players right now:
For 1) - basic metrics
Nintendo clear winner. MS showing some glints of light after a sustained period of loss. Sony struggling but getting there.
For 2) - vs themselves
Nintendo clear winner again, but then they have gained by far the most so this is a given .
MS showing steady progress but I'd argue not enough vs the continued excessive effort they're putting in, but overall you can't fault they're steadily growing their entertainment business.
Sony - oh, dear - but then given they have lost the most so this is a given.
For 3) vs competition/market - Nintendo wins again (clearly), holding up well vs competition and market.
MS doing okay but struggling to really expand out of their core niche and having to really cut prices, buy a lot of exclusive content, etc. to remain in the running for continued growth and hold of Sony, their nearest clear competitor at the moment.
Sony, not as bad as you'd think IMHO, but not great either. They're struggling vs Nintendo as MS are, but they are managing to use their brand and starting to leverage key franchises to keep themselves in the game, managing to sell their console well vs MS at a much higher price. LTD they are keeping pace with MS with a consistently higher price point. However they are in the worst place relative to the market right now, although I do think they have ability to work to reduce this and even turn elements of the market to their advantage.
Try to be reasonable... its easier than you think...
no doubt about it, Nintendo supplies the most amount of enjoyment for me and anyone i see play it but honestly in my eyes, if any console can relieve people of the stresses that life brings should be considered a success.
hello how are you.
| phisheep said: It depends what you mean by success. I think that there are at least six main measures. First, you must sell enough hardware to create a viable market for games on the platform. This is the baseline for success. If you don’t do that you have real problems. At some level, all three consoles have achieved this, though there is room for argument as to whether Microsoft and Sony have each created enough of a market for high-budget games, hence the plethora of multi-platforms. Second, you must achieve your collateral targets. Nintendo has done this, in expanding the market. Sony has done this in winning the HD format war. It is not clear what, if any, collateral targets Microsoft had. Third, you must not sully the brand. There is room for lots of argument here, but arguably all three have failed to some extent. Nintendo – in ‘alienating the hardcore’. Microsoft – with hardware unreliability. Sony – in going too far upmarket to cater for the mass mainstream. Fourth, you must sell games and continue to sell them. All three have succeeded to about the same extent here, averaging about one game sold per console per two-and-a-bit months. Fifth, profitability. This is not as easy as the other metrics, as raw profitability in the gaming arena is the whole story only for Nintendo. Sony appears to have changed tack here, previously relying on high-end tech development to bolster the PS3 and now more profit-focused. Microsoft really doesn’t seem particularly focused on profit, it takes second place to market penetration. Sixth, you must whup the competition. Nintendo has done this. Sony and Microsoft haven’t. |
I feel your comment is a bit PS3-biased 
You do realize that Sony is not upmarket ? They are trying to jutify their pricing that way.. but it is the result of poor production capabilities and support to developers.
Microsoft faced the RROD issues and lost the format war but still manage to be the first HD console on the market.
Evan Wells (Uncharted 2): I think the differences that you see between any two games has much more to do with the developer than whether it’s on the Xbox or PS3.
| Sardauk said: I feel your comment is a bit PS3-biased
|
Oh dear, and there's me Nintendo all the way back to whenever! That,I'm afraid is what you get for trying to be even-handed and not upset people ...
For 'upmarket' read 'expensive' and I think it still makes sense!
If this has to be debated, the metric of success, then this website serves no purpose.
Its sales of hardware and nothing else is more relevant. Look at the Guitar Hero eg. Wii is smashing the competition because of hardware numbers.
But then we can talk about other factors, variety in genre, variety in user accessability, etc. Nintendo still wins.
“When we make some new announcement and if there is no positive initial reaction from the market, I try to think of it as a good sign because that can be interpreted as people reacting to something groundbreaking. ...if the employees were always minding themselves to do whatever the market is requiring at any moment, and if they were always focusing on something we can sell right now for the short term, it would be very limiting. We are trying to think outside the box.” - Satoru Iwata - This is why corporate multinationals will never truly understand, or risk doing, what Nintendo does.
excellent gif
“When we make some new announcement and if there is no positive initial reaction from the market, I try to think of it as a good sign because that can be interpreted as people reacting to something groundbreaking. ...if the employees were always minding themselves to do whatever the market is requiring at any moment, and if they were always focusing on something we can sell right now for the short term, it would be very limiting. We are trying to think outside the box.” - Satoru Iwata - This is why corporate multinationals will never truly understand, or risk doing, what Nintendo does.
| megaman79 said: If this has to be debated, the metric of success, then this website serves no purpose. Its sales of hardware and nothing else is more relevant. Look at the Guitar Hero eg. Wii is smashing the competition because of hardware numbers. But then we can talk about other factors, variety in genre, variety in user accessability, etc. Nintendo still wins. |
Hmm, don't think so. Not if you have to support an 'its only hardware' argument by immediately basing the argument on software sales.
Look at it this way, if the PS3 sold millions but they were only used as Bluray players then it could hardly be counted a success as a gaming platform could it? So at least game sales have to count for something.
I don't dispute that Nintendo is winning on pretty well every measure, but that doesn't mean the other two are necessarily unsuccessful. Same as Ferrari sells far fewer cars than Ford do.
Wii is already a success because its passed the N64 and Gamecube and about to pass the SNES. Also its made tons of money.
360 is a success because it improved upon the Xbox in all aspects including sales and gave the PS3 a rough time.
PS3 is successful in the sense that it single-handedly made Blu Ray beat HD-DVD (along with the Warner Bros. deal). But in the sense of sales PS3 will only be a success if it reaches 100 million (or beats Wii/360)
| numonex said: Outsell last generation console sales and increase market share in console generation. Wii and XBox 360 have both increased significantly upon GC and XBox respectively. The same can not be said of PS3 sales improving on the PS2 sales. BTW: Competition in video game market makes it better for everyone quality of games improve due to competition. |
That doesn't make sense to me. IT is fully possible to have three consoles and have all three be successful consoles. In your way it is completely comparative. It means that every generation there will have to at least one failure because Market Share shifts.
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