Neos said: binary solo said: Neos said: I told you uncharted 2 was overtracked by some bit. It is never going to outsell the original. Uncharted 2 overtracked? Probably by less than 10%. Hardly something worth saying I told you so over. >900K for USA vs 1.27 million for whole of Americas, that's reasonable correlation in my book. Other games listed here have significant discrepancies, but not really Uncharted 2.   Yes it is. Work with me a little bit here, i had some kind of bet. Well actually it is just a matter of reputation, but still. 900k vs 1.3 million is something i would call significant..but hey who am I.

It's within VGCs margin of error.  (10%).

So i wouldn't call it that significant.

Xelloss said: According to the dude at Sega who was the manager in charge of developer relations for segas publishing wing, NPD undertracks by 30%. Interview is over at 1up.com, their 4 guys one up series.

If they undertracked by 30% nobody would use them.

Kasz216 said: Xelloss said: According to the dude at Sega who was the manager in charge of developer relations for segas publishing wing, NPD undertracks by 30%. Interview is over at 1up.com, their 4 guys one up series. If they undertracked by 30% nobody would use them.

Well, chances are that NPD gets some numbers wrong, some of the times.

When your tracking the market like NPD, VGC, FADE, or any one else does, your always building a very incomplete picture of the market, even with 60% of sales covered like NPD does. So there exists the chance that NPD, VGC and others can be wrong. Obviously having more sample data helps, but in the end, your still prone to faults and failures because each store, each data point, can work differently.

I'd say in general, though, NPD is most likely within 10% of actuals for all retail sales. VGC is closer to 20%. However, both do adjustments. Ever wonder why we've never seen NPD offer LTD sales data on a monthly basis with their NPD Top 10?

Kasz216 said: Xelloss said: According to the dude at Sega who was the manager in charge of developer relations for segas publishing wing, NPD undertracks by 30%. Interview is over at 1up.com, their 4 guys one up series. If they undertracked by 30% nobody would use them.

I would guess that given the nature of the publisher, NPD undertracks on more niche titles. They probably hit things like MW2 pretty well.

 The institutional investors who use NPD dont care if Demon Souls sold 200k or 300k,  they just need to know within reason who are making the big money printing hits and who isnt.

Xelloss said: According to the dude at Sega who was the manager in charge of developer relations for segas publishing wing, NPD undertracks by 30%. Interview is over at 1up.com, their 4 guys one up series.

Can you provide a link to the interview? I tried finding it on 1up, with no luck.

But anyway, I wouldn't be surprised at all. I said it in the past, and I still hold the view that NPD may possibly be severely undertracking some Wii games, especially those with less than stelar sales, for a very simple reason - on the one hand NPD don't have Walmart data, and on the other hand Walmart is the Wii's biggest retailer by far (as Reggie said). Sure, NPD has a formula for Walmart, but while on average that formula may be ok, it probably gets lots of games wrong. And With Walmart being the Wii's biggest retailer in the US, that means NPD's numbers for Wii games are probably the most inaccurate of all game sales numbers NPD has.

bmmb1 said: Xelloss said: According to the dude at Sega who was the manager in charge of developer relations for segas publishing wing, NPD undertracks by 30%. Interview is over at 1up.com, their 4 guys one up series. Can you provide a link to the interview? I tried finding it on 1up, with no luck. But anyway, I wouldn't be surprised at all. I said it in the past, and I still hold the view that NPD may possibly be severely undertracking some Wii games, especially those with less than stelar sales, for a very simple reason - on the one hand NPD don't have Walmart data, and on the other hand Walmart is the Wii's biggest retailer by far (as Reggie said). Sure, NPD has a formula for Walmart, but while on average that formula may be ok, it probably gets lots of games wrong. And With Walmart being the Wii's biggest retailer in the US, that means NPD's numbers for Wii games are probably the most inaccurate of all game sales numbers NPD has.

http://www.1up.com/do/minisite?cId=3176640

Its the 1/1/2010 interview, the NPD reference is about at the 34 minute mark.

mrstickball said: Kasz216 said: Xelloss said: According to the dude at Sega who was the manager in charge of developer relations for segas publishing wing, NPD undertracks by 30%. Interview is over at 1up.com, their 4 guys one up series. If they undertracked by 30% nobody would use them. Well, chances are that NPD gets some numbers wrong, some of the times. When your tracking the market like NPD, VGC, FADE, or any one else does, your always building a very incomplete picture of the market, even with 60% of sales covered like NPD does. So there exists the chance that NPD, VGC and others can be wrong. Obviously having more sample data helps, but in the end, your still prone to faults and failures because each store, each data point, can work differently. I'd say in general, though, NPD is most likely within 10% of actuals for all retail sales. VGC is closer to 20%. However, both do adjustments. Ever wonder why we've never seen NPD offer LTD sales data on a monthly basis with their NPD Top 10?

Obviously... but NPD doesn't undertrack EVERYTHING by 30%.  That's ridiculious.

Also... how would Sega know sellthrough?

Sega could base it on retailer re-orders of stock.

e.g:

50,000 units get sold on the first order to all retailers. One week later, 10,000 units are reordered for stores. I am sure there is a formula that can derive sellthrough based on retailer demand after launch.

mrstickball said: Sega could base it on retailer re-orders of stock. e.g: 50,000 units get sold on the first order to all retailers. One week later, 10,000 units are reordered for stores. I am sure there is a formula that can derive sellthrough based on retailer demand after launch.

However, sellthrough would be even more vulernable then NPDs methods with niche games.

With 10 million, you can be sure there aren't 3 million on shelves.

With 200K, 60K could very well be on shelves considering how many stores there are.

He said sell-through in the interview, and said it very easily. Basically, occams razor says there are really only 2 possible scenarios. Either publishers have relationships with their customers ( aka retailers and 2ng tier distributors like Ingram etc) where they get provided with the sell through data ( like many industries, and after all markup and floor-space allocation negotiations are heavily dependent on this type of information) or , you choose to believe that he was making shit up.

Personally, I highly doubt he was lying, mistaken or being random.