This is a sales discussion so could people please contribute along those lines? If you want to discuss gaming could you please consider using another thread?

When discussing the performance of a console in the weekly chart threads I notice a lot of people casting judgement as to how they felt the relative performance of each platform was compared to its competitors and compared to itself in order to rank or rate how each platform is doing. One thing I don't understand is how financial performance never seems to rank as a factor for how each platform performs.

I don't personally understand how two of the most profitable platforms in the history of consoles/handhelds can be subjectively given the same performance grading as one of the most unprofitable. They both are individually going to outsell and have already outprofited what is/was considered to be the most successful platform of all time which is the Playstation 2.

Is not the best way to judge the performance of a platform the complete picture? If Nintendo takes the fewest inputs and uses them to create more with less then should they not get the least modicum of respect and not insult their achievements by not ranking consoles which are abject failures when compared directly to what they have achieved? By no metric should anyone imply by the smallest of margins that the Wii has any competitor to its great achievements in this generation aside from the DS which is another Nintendo platform.

Lastly although im not 100% familiar with the Xbox 360 but the numbers below indicate that the Xbox 360 should also be given the respect in the weekly sales threads of at least being considered equal in performance to the PS3 when they are compared directly as Microsoft has incurred fewer losses and reached profitability faster. The difference in profitability for the last quarter approaches $1,000,000,000 which is no small figure by itself.

I welcome your input and here are the financial numbers nicked from neogaf:

Y/E 1998 $902,811,090 $1,023,333,867 $1,926,144,957
Y/E 1999 $1,102,563,557 $1,301,350,000 $2,403,913,557
Y/E 2000 $722,738,949 $1,368,207,547 $2,090,946,497
Y/E 2001 -$449,776,290 $677,576,000 $227,799,710
Y/E 2002 $629,101,056 $895,872,180 -$1,135,000,000 $389,973,237
Y/E 2003 $935,569,253 $834,333,333 -$1,191,000,000 $578,902,586
Y/E 2004 $627,195,212 $993,161,303 -$1,337,000,000 $283,356,515
Y/E 2005 $419,888,799 $1,056,056,202 -$539,000,000 $936,945,001
Y/E 2006 $69,129,058 $774,478,055 -$1,339,000,000 -$495,392,887
Y/E 2007 -$1,970,923,859 $1,914,666,388 -$1,969,000,000 -$2,025,257,471
Y/E 2008 -$1,079,994,103 $4,322,637,887 $426,000,000 $3,668,643,783
Y/E 2009 -$577,207,240 $5,691,428,301 $169,000,000 $5,283,221,061

Y/E 10Q1 -$413,541,667 $420,843,750 $312,000,000 $319,302,083
Y/E 10Q2 -$653,333,333 $710,655,556 N/A N/A

Total
$264,220,482 $21,984,600,371 -$6,532,000,000 $15,659,498,630

 

No. This isn't a profit tracking, or 'success of company' tracking website (that's called the stockmarket).

Its also impossible to determine any of the related figures accurately (dev cost, retailer price, marketing spend, ...).

When the big companies post their results, VG posts them.

Microsofts losses are abysmol. They have gone from very bad to doing well (barring that 1 billion for RROD)

Sony on the other hand, it's sad to see how next quater the playstation division will be unprofitable, all that hard work from the PS1 and PS2 days and for what?

Nintendo .. well what can I say?

 

Edit - I might add, will this be the first year MS can possibly make a billion in profit?

Financial performance is touched upon all the time. Notice how every time PS3 sells well someone will come along and go "Yeah, but it's still selling at a loss" which is a fair point.

But why mix the two together by force? Sales are sales and profit is profit. Sony wouldn't sell so many PS3s if they didn't think it would net them profit in the long run. Everybody knows they've been selling it at a loss. It's not news.

Majin-Tenshinhan said: Financial performance is touched upon all the time. Notice how every time PS3 sells well someone will come along and go "Yeah, but it's still selling at a loss" which is a fair point. But why mix the two together by force? Sales are sales and profit is profit. Sony wouldn't sell so many PS3s if they didn't think it would net them profit in the long run. Everybody knows they've been selling it at a loss. It's not news.

Didn't GM prove that it doesn't matter if you're number 1 in sales if you don't make a dime in the process? Sales are like cars and profit is like carseats. Its pointless having a car without a seat and your carseat doesn't go anywhere without a car.

WilliamWatts said: Majin-Tenshinhan said: Financial performance is touched upon all the time. Notice how every time PS3 sells well someone will come along and go "Yeah, but it's still selling at a loss" which is a fair point. But why mix the two together by force? Sales are sales and profit is profit. Sony wouldn't sell so many PS3s if they didn't think it would net them profit in the long run. Everybody knows they've been selling it at a loss. It's not news. Didn't GM prove that it doesn't matter if you're number 1 in sales if you don't make a dime in the process? Sales are like cars and profit is like carseats. Its pointless having a car without a seat and your carseat doesn't go anywhere without a car.

What's GM?

And you need to listen to what I'm saying. They are two different things. Using your analogy, you don't go to someone who's talking about carseats and go "YEAH, WELL, THE CAR SUCKS SO IT DOESN'T MATTER!". Personally, I think it's ridiculous that Sony made such an expensive piece of hardware to begin with and practically pissed away all the money they had earned, but I'm not a businessman. They're still afloat, and despite all the doomsaying they have not gone bankrupt. They never would have done it if they didn't think it would bring them profit in the long run.

It's like, if I go "Hey, Super Smash Bros. Melee sold great" and you go "YEAH BUT THE GAMECUBE DIDN'T SUCK ON THAT", they're two different things that are directly related. Sales are sales, profits are profits. Don't try to force people to merge them. Everyone knows Nintendo makes loads of money and Sony loses loads. It doesn't matter.

Majin-Tenshinhan said: WilliamWatts said: Majin-Tenshinhan said: Financial performance is touched upon all the time. Notice how every time PS3 sells well someone will come along and go "Yeah, but it's still selling at a loss" which is a fair point. But why mix the two together by force? Sales are sales and profit is profit. Sony wouldn't sell so many PS3s if they didn't think it would net them profit in the long run. Everybody knows they've been selling it at a loss. It's not news. Didn't GM prove that it doesn't matter if you're number 1 in sales if you don't make a dime in the process? Sales are like cars and profit is like carseats. Its pointless having a car without a seat and your carseat doesn't go anywhere without a car. What's GM? And you need to listen to what I'm saying. They are two different things. Using your analogy, you don't go to someone who's talking about carseats and go "YEAH, WELL, THE CAR SUCKS SO IT DOESN'T MATTER!". Personally, I think it's ridiculous that Sony made such an expensive piece of hardware to begin with and practically pissed away all the money they had earned, but I'm not a businessman. They're still afloat, and despite all the doomsaying they have not gone bankrupt. They never would have done it if they didn't think it would bring them profit in the long run. It's like, if I go "Hey, Super Smash Bros. Melee sold great" and you go "YEAH BUT THE GAMECUBE DIDN'T SUCK ON THAT", they're two different things that are directly related. Sales are sales, profits are profits. Don't try to force people to merge them. Everyone knows Nintendo makes loads of money and Sony loses loads. It doesn't matter.

I don't think anyone is really questioning the Playstation business as a going concern and @ Kowenicki I don't think that anything Sony has done has been unaffordable by them as they have obviously run the numbers themselves. I just think its rediculous that people state outright that both the PS3 and Wii are doing outstanding when the gulf between the two platforms financially is just so vast. To state that the PS3 at this point looking at the weekly sales is doing outstanding in the same sentence as the Wii is either an insult to Nintendos hard work or a delusion about how the PS3 is performing. I don't intend any insult to the PS3 as a platform and I raised the issue this way in order to restore to Nintendo some of the respect and admiration they deserve. I mentioned the Xbox 360 as a little aside as well because Microsoft have been getting the short end of the stick recently too.

This fanboy chatter is all just a pseudo competition.
Does the NBA give the championship to the team that was most profitable?
Does the GOTY poll factor in how much profit the developer made from the game?
It's pretty irrelevant how much money a company makes.
As has been said before, each company has a different holistic goal. Nintendo is the only company that HAS to make money from it's gaming division because that's all it is, a gaming company. On the other hand both MS and Sony also use their gaming division as a supporting role to it's other divisions as well as the potential to make money from it. Sometimes the gaming division has to suffer financial losses to help out the company wide goal (i.e. Sony implementing Blu-ray, MS cutting prices to increase marketshare).

 

Edit: Oh yeah when the hell did VGchartz get Polls??

Seece said: Microsofts losses are abysmol. They have gone from very bad to doing well (barring that 1 billion for RROD) Sony on the other hand, it's sad to see how next quater the playstation division will be unprofitable, all that hard work from the PS1 and PS2 days and for what? Nintendo .. well what can I say?   Edit - I might add, will this be the first year MS can possibly make a billion in profit?

That sounds a tad high, no? Sony managed it only one year, 1999 (PS1 peak). Microsoft making it would be a huge feat.

@RVDondaPC: It isn't just fanboy chatter. See what happened to Sega? This stuff is relevant. Sony in particular can't continue on their current path, which is why people have been saying they're doooomed (exaggerated, of course).

On the other hand, sales are also important on their own. Third parties don't give a crap what Sony / Ninty / MS is making on their consoles, only how much of their software they can sell on it. We care about this because we care about what new games will come, and where they will go. Though I guess you can argue the profits of the third parties would tell this story as well...

Obviously the financial side is a very important subject, but there is no need to mix it in with sales. Sales data is important for different reasons than financial data. Some companies are willing to sink money into a market in order to take control of the market later, etc.

One thing I think we possibly should mention in sales data is the RRP of the game/console. Market size is usually determined by revenue, after all.