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Wii Outsells 360, PS3 Worldwide
Posted by
Zonk
on Thu Sep 13, 2007 01:57 PM
from the top-dog-has-a-waggle dept.
from the top-dog-has-a-waggle dept.
Wowzer writes "Despite confusing consoles produced, shipped or sold reports, the Nintendo Wii is now the best-selling system worldwide. Its sales exceed that of the Xbox 360 despite Microsoft's console having a year-long head start. And it's way ahead of the PS3. From the article: 'Sales figures from each console's launch date through the end of July (and the end of August in Japan) were added up, with the Wii just barely edging out the 360: 9 million for the Wii, 8.9 million for the 360, and 3.7 million for the PlayStation 3.'"
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Submission: Wii outsells Xbox 360 worldwide by Anonymous Coward
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August NPD Numbers Look Good For Wii, 360 121 comments
To add a little more context to yesterday's announcement that the Wii had outsold the 360 worldwide, we have August's NPD numbers courtesy of 1up. From the article: "The story hasn't changed much -- Wii remains on top, PlayStation 3 continues to have trouble gaining steam and Xbox 360 maintains a position behind Wii but gaining momentum as the fall season moves into gear-- but the numbers have shifted. Encouraging news for Microsoft, however, as Xbox 360 moves nearly 100,000 more units compared to last month's 170,000, while Madden NFL 08 pushes 896,600 boxes and BioShock moves 490,900 copies -- impressive numbers for the Xbox 360 platform, software-wise. Nintendo must be happy with the performance of Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, as the latest sci-fi Samus Aran shooter managed 218,100 copies in late August, with Wii Play (released in January) only beating it by nearly 50,000 units."
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Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, I find it QUITE surprising that the Wii can so handily outsell the 360 when its game library is, all things considered, horribly outmatched. This is a very strong example of the fact that games do NOT sell the system, as many gamers like to think. Advertisements and price tag do a LOT more than the shelves of dvd-size plastic boxes with the console's logo on them, it seems.
You are wrong, sire (Score:3, Insightful)
and this IS a games sell a console situation.
for the first time in around, like, 8-10 years, a major brand (nintendo) came up with the now-forgotten idea of making FUN games instead of ones that has loaded sounds and graphics and repeats old concepts.
thats why wii is outselling all consoles.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:4, Insightful)
I see what you're trying to say, but I respectfully disagree. My reason is that "Wii Sports" is the "killer ap" that is selling the system. A close second is the Virtual Console.
It's always been people's enjoyment of Wii Sports that they see the 'potential' of the system and the motion sense. When my old man picked up the controller and held it like a baseball bat, he thought it was the coolest thing. Like virtual reality. When my mom played bowling, she thought it was as real as you could get. Everyone enjoyed playing Tennis as a family activity.
For the dedicated gamers, Zelda helped sell the system at the start, before others had a share of the fun. Also the promise of Smash Bros., Mario Cart, Mario Galaxies, and the recent release of Metroid, had a lot of fans picking up the system in simple anticipation.
My fiancee (who doesn't like video games) is adamantly playing Zelda, Zelda 2, Donkey Kong Country, Mario Bros., etc. on the Virtual Console. Explaining to me she never got the chance to play them as a kid as her father dominated the system. She's reliving a lot of nostalgia (and showing me up that she knows more about the original Zelda games than I do).
The 360 has a lot of great games and a lot more of them, but the Wii definitely has the exclusive 'killer ap' game, Wii Sports. Even if it gets old real quick. It only takes once to get addicted and when people leave to buy the system on impulse and they find they're all sold out (still) they are overcome by the "must have" bug as the Wii is more than just a video game system now, it's pop culture.
If Andy Warhol was around, he's probably paint a picture of it.
Cheers,
Fozzy
Parent
Re:Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:5, Interesting)
Many games on the 360 eventually came out or simultaneously came out for the PS3...just for grins, if I bought the game for one console, I would rent it for the other...you know, just to compare the two. In all honesty, I would rather play those multi-system games on the 360. It's not just the controller (although that does have something to do with it) but it's just how it "feels"...I can't really describe it any better than that. Not to mention graphically with multi-system releases, I find the 360 looks SLIGHTLY better than it's PS3 counterpart.
That said, all three consoles are fantastic fun and I highly recommend people get all three if they can afford it...the Wii60 combo is the best bet if you can't afford all three, but the PS3 is no slouch either. While it does lack a good selection of exclusives for the moment, that will change down the line (and I liked Lair, so there!) Ratchet and Clank, Metal Gear, God of War 3, etc.
That said, the 360 has it's own lineup of exclusives coming for it (some also coming to PC)...Fable 2, GoW 2, Mass Effect, Too Human, etc.
The Wii has some awesome games coming to it as well...Mario Galaxy, the new Mario Kart and Smash Bros, etc.
If I HAD to choose a favourite this gen for me, it would definately be the 360...but in all honesty, all three of them are worth your hard earned dollars.
Play as many games on as many different systems as you can.
Parent
Re:Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:5, Funny)
Lalalalala, I can't hear you! I can't hear you! You sir, have commited BLASHPEMY! Video game consoles are a religion, and if you don't pick one and beat people over the head with your brand of Truth (TM), then you're a sicko deviant who deserves to be burned at the stake. Discussions about games aren't for talking about what you like to play, its more about what you _won't_ play on other systems. I don't know whether to label you a frat guy jock, a kiddy gamer, or an drooling I'll-buy-anything-Sony idiot. You confuse and anger me, and I'm going to go on the record saying that I just plain don't like you.
I'll close with a reading from the book of Nintendo:
"Lo, and the Lord said 'Let there be Wii'. And the Wii did descend from the Heavens and the people saw that it was good. And they saw that it was great. And lo did they see that no other games were fun, and the controllers turned to ash in their hands. And the Lord did speaketh 'Behold my wisdom, and the gift I have bestowed upon you. Take this Wii and take it out to the world, to show unbelievers my Truth.' And so they did, and so thusly did the Lord's profits grow."
Amen.
Parent
Re:Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
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My personal experience has given me the following impression: most of the demographic that the Wii is aimed at (in terms of the "untapped" market, that is) knows three things: Xbox and Playstation are complicated to pick
Re:Surprising in some ways, unsuprising in others (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
More games please (Score:3, Insightful)
I got myself a Wii. Just need a proper LAN multiplayer FPS and a Summer Smash Brothers, and maybe even a hardcore Mario kart.
I've actually spent hours playing Super Mario Brothers on the Virtual Console
I wonder... (Score:4, Insightful)
Rewind 2 years (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Rewind 2 years (Score:5, Interesting)
When I heard the idea - an overclocked Gamecube with a novelty control system involving waving one's hands around - I thought Nintendo were doomed. One U-Force was bad enough.
When I heard details of the novelty control system, I thought it ridiculous for about two minutes, then began thinking it through a little. Several words came through my mind... 'bat, racket, gunsight... fucking lightsaber...' - I thought Nintendo might have something big on their hands, especially given what the DS was doing by then.
When I heard about the name, I though Nintendo were doomed.
When I was queueing outside the store on a damn cold night playing wireless Mario Kart with the other fanboys (all of us there to get our hands on Twilight Princess) and we saw the demo installation through the big window, and we saw how many passers-by were stopping to see what all the fuss was about and seeing the guys inside bowling... I thought Nintendo might have something very big.
When I saw how many of my utterly non-gamer relatives simply would not put down Wii Tennis... wow.
Parent
I guess that means they're actuall making them (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I guess that means they're actuall making them (Score:4, Informative)
I think at this point it's fairly clear that 1.5M/month is not enough.
Parent
Re:I guess that means they're actuall making them (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:I guess that means they're actuall making them (Score:5, Insightful)
Additionally, I do not think most wii owners only have one or two games. There are a lot of people who are "gamers", but aren't hard core enough to pay $600 for a system. There are lots of good games for the Wii, many of which aren't available on other consoles (just wait till smash brothers comes out).
Plus, when taking profits into account, you can't forget about the profit on accessories. How many Wii owners also have at least 2 or 3 wii motes. Those aren't cheap by any means, and likely lead to more profit for Nintendo. Particularly in the short term Nintendo is dominating the field when it comes to profit. I doubt the others have even recouped their development costs.
Phil
Parent
Nintendo is great, but Xbox is still doing well (Score:5, Insightful)
In other words, I do not expect the Xbox 360 to become a non factor any time soon. It may be in a #2 position, but holding its current position without the benefit of Japan is a pretty strong feat. If they ever crack the Japanese market, they will likely give Nintendo some strong competition. Conversely, if the PS3 can build some decent momentum as its prices drop, it could overtake Microsoft overall with core gamers. If this does happen, it will happen very late in this console cycle (no earlier than say, 2010). And if it does do so, it will not overtake the 360 in the US.
I had been saying for some time, before the Wii's launch, that it probably had at worst, the #2 slot locked up in the console war, and a real threat to be #1.
I would say that right now, Nintendo is #1 over all, but only #2 with respect to hard core gamers. While a broad market strategy may be a good one, the core segment has proven consistently strong, and not one you want to cede to a rival.
If the Wii is ever going to get a grip on the core segment of the console market, they have to do it within the next year. Developers of titles that appeal to core gamers jumped on the Wii band wagon late, so the games that could push Wii into an untouchable #1 standing simply do not exist yet. On top of that, Nintendo did have a pretty bad game drought between February and July on the Wii. With the 3rd party developers coming on stream, that may change.
So to sum up:
- Right now, Wii has the #1 spot over all, but is only #2 with core gamers.
- I expect that the Xbox 360 will stay #1 with core gamers unless the Wii starts to get alot of games that will appeal to core gamers. Given the Wii's market positioning, I do not think this will happen.
- I expect the Xbox 360 to be guaranteed #2 unless Sony starts to build alot of momentum. I would be very surprised if this happens.
END COMMUNICATION
Re:Nintendo is great, but Xbox is still doing well (Score:5, Interesting)
Your post nicely sums up much of what I originally wanted to say, except for one nitpick.
As much as Sony and its supporters want to say the console race is a marathon, it isn't. Currently Sony has a console priced out of the range of the mass market and their sales numbers just aren't improving. At their current installed base and the cost of developing for the PS3 no sane developer is going to touch it. Most of what's coming out seems to be games already in progress where the developer has decided to write it off as a loss and/or port it to 360 as well to recoup some of the development costs. That or Sony has given them enough money to basically pay for the game to be developed for them. Unless sales figures change quickly the PS3 will be living off of ports of 360 games or what they can pay to have developed. I honestly don't see the PS3 beating the 360 outside of Japan where it's already in the lead.
From what I recall, the 360 is possibly still ahead of the Wii in North America (given the Japanese sales numbers it pretty much has to be). It may be a few more months to a year before Nintendo completely captures all of the markets not accounting their supply limitations during the holiday season and the release of Halo 3, which makes it possibly even longer. I really can imagine at least the 360 and Wii both being viable platforms for nearly the entire lifetime of this generation of consoles. The only real competition between these two is game sales where their market shares intersect. The PS3 and 360 however are in a much more direct competition, and currently the 360 is outselling the PS3 worldwide.
Parent
Re:Nintendo is great, but Xbox is still doing well (Score:5, Interesting)
I would say that right now, Nintendo is #1 over all, but only #2 with respect to hard core gamers.
I've said this before. I'll say it again. Fuck the 'hardcore' gamers. Let them have their 'superior' games on other platforms. I've been playing video games since Pong, I've finished more games than most of these 'hardcore' gamers have played. I've beaten the original Super Mario Brothers on a single life without warping. I've finished Battletoads. I've finished Einhander. I've finished Perfect Dark on Perfect Agent difficulty. I'm as experienced as they come in terms of video games.
You know what? Increasingly, I think that 'hardcore' gamer just means "a gamer who wants better graphics, more channels of audio, and the same old gameplay." What games are so damn hardcore on the XBox 360? Halo 3? Gears of War? What makes them so damn hardcore? I've played first person shooters, I've played 3rd person shooters. I want something *new*. I'm perfectly happy with my Wii Sports and Wii Play as far as providing something new to try. I've enjoyed Metroid Prime 3, but that's primarily because Super Metroid is my all-time favorite game -- it doesn't bring anything *that* new to the table over MP or Echoes, just some extra polish and enhanced controls.
You know what the nicest thing about the Wii is? I can actually play games like Wii Sports or Raving Rabbids with non-gamer friends when they come over, and they can do well at them. In FPS, RTS, or fighting games, it's not even entertaining to play against my friends, because I just wipe the floor with them. While that might appeal to some people, I'm not in it for bragging rights, I'm in it for a challenge. It's also not entertaining to play against asshat 14-year-olds online.
So fuck the hardcore demographic. They're going to have to accept the fact that they have become a niche audience, and accept what games come their way. Who knows? Maybe hardcore gamers will one day be like movie buffs, known for being familiar with lots of obscure but great games. As it is now, a movie fan analogous to what we think of as a hardcore gamer would watch nothing but Michael Bay films and gush about how awesome they are, and how everyone else sucks for enjoying The Life Aquatic.
--Jeremy
Parent
I am in that core audience (Score:5, Insightful)
Games like God of War, Metal Gear Solid, Assassins Creed, Zelda, Metroid Prime, Gears of War, Dead Rising, Battlefield 1942, Counterstrike, Grand Theft Auto, Fable, System Shock 2, Ninja Gaiden, Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest are all great games. I want to see more games of that sort continue to come out. And I would love to play them on my Wii. But I really do not think those types of games will come out on the Wii any time soon. At least, now with the Wii as the primary platform.
Manhunt 2, ratings controversy aside, apparantly makes use of the motion controls quite impressively. Swing the remote, and you get to smash someones head in. But outside of that game, I have not heard much coming out for the Wii that appeals to my particular tastes of a gamer.
At the moment, I do own a Wii. But I have not played very much on it lately. That will change when I get my hands on a copy of Metroid Prime. Being able to play Wii games with non gamer friends is nice. But quite frankly, I also want some good single player games with some real endurance to them. Most casual geared games do not do that.
The Core Audience sustained this industry for a long time. It may be niche, but it is a lucrative one, and one worth trying to hold on to.
END COMMUNICATION
Parent
Re:Nintendo is great, but Xbox is still doing well (Score:5, Insightful)
I maintained my own patches to Wine to let me have more function keys in WoW. I maintain addons for WoW, too. I still have my Sega CD. I stil have my 3DO, too. I regularly beat RPGs under a strict "no characters die ever" policy because I think it's more challenging. I play Angband, and have submitted patches to it (which were accepted!). I've learned new programming languages to work on games, and I've written games for competitions.
People who play FPS games, and nothing else, dismiss my gaming tastes as "casual". WTF?
Imagine if you had someone who reads nothing but romance novels. Dismisses sci-fi as geeky, literature as dull, mysteries as pointless and irritating, technology books as uninteresting, humor books as too silly, biographies as pointless, newspapers as too short, and so on. Just reads romance novels.
According to the PS360 marketing engine, he's a hardcore reader. No, that's softcore.
Parent
FUN counts! (Score:5, Insightful)
Technology, the PSP trashes the DS. The XBox360 makes the Wii look like a joke graphically and computationally.
But the new interfaces (touch screen, WiiMote) have lead to entirely new classes of games, and new ways of doing traditional games.
EG, after playing Metroid for a few hours, I can't see how anyone could go back to the classic FPS controls, especially on a console. On a DS, the touchscreen allows very rich UIs, which are not possible with just the D-pad and buttons.
That is the lesson from Nintendo: Fun Must Come First .
I only need 3.7M (Score:3, Funny)
The PS3 is so much faster than the other consoles that I only need 3.7 million of them to do more work than all the XBox 360 and Wiis combined, so there!
Re:Sooooo... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Sooooo... (Score:5, Insightful)
Different doesn't always mean better, and features on paper don't necessarily describe the experience. How well has motion control worked in the past? How precise will the controller be? Assuming everything else remained the same, but the wiimote was looser, that alone could sink the console. Game controls need to be consistent and precise because that control mechanism is their only connection to the game. Plus the hardware is specced lower than the other two consoles. And their previous console came in last of the three. The Wii was not the safe bet, thus developers went with the tried and true formula on the other platforms and are now scrambling to play catch-up.
Even Nintendo didn't bet on doing this well, the numbers of consoles sold were constrained by Nintendo's supply, not demand. You can find a Wii without camping out now, after all this time, but they still get cleared off the shelves before the next shipment. When the holiday season rolls in they may be a chore to find once again.
But the upshot through all this, is that it's indeed the most prolific console now, and though developers may be a little late to the party, there will probably be a nice big wave of games hitting all at once as they finish their late-starting Wii games.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Sooooo... (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed, I don't think Nintendo expected cruise [kotaku.com] ships [joystiq.com] wanting Wii's or people purchasing multiple consoles for home and travel.
Out of curiosity, I talked to a GameStop employee and asked him how the Wii was doing? Long story short, he claims they get an average of 25 units a week and sell out within 48 hours. 25 units a week (for one store) and they're still selling out months later. It is pretty surprising.
Of course, the real under-rated news is not the Wii but the DS. For all the people I know who won a Wii, I know twice as many who also have a DS. People who wouldn't buy a Wii as even that is too much 'video game' for them. Those "brain" games (Brain Age, Big Brain Academy) is by far the sleeper "killer ap". Who would have thunk that someone would drop $120 just to do some math equations? =P
Though, the DS does have a lot of great (and cheap) games. The Wii? Zelda, Mario Party, Metroid, Raymon, Wii Sports/Play... I've not been impressed with a whole lot else. So, that does say something about the unique frenzy the Wii is causing. Or maybe it's because I'm spending more time playing the Virtual Console? =P (yes, I've been playing on emulators on my PC since 2000, I still prefer the VC)
Cheers,
Fozzy
Parent
Re:Sooooo... (Score:4, Insightful)
Agreed, most of the games available on virtual console were great games when they were first released and are still great games. My kids (younger teens), are somewhat surprised at the difficulty level, but enjoyability of these games.
VC games are basically the same cost as a rental game but the fun doesn't end (until you beat the game).
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There was no way they could develop a console which could beat Microsoft or Sony on sheer technical brilliance. It never made much sense to even try.
That meant that they were basically stuck with one of two things:
1. Continue to focus on the younger market with a rehashed Gamecube.
2. Broaden the horizons by looking to a target market which didn't actually happen to be that bothered about the latest FPS (exactly the same as the last one but with a slightly
Re:Sooooo... (Score:4, Insightful)
Besides, your view of the situation is very limited. The main concern of Nintendo was that their core market, the japanese market, was dangerously decreasing. Nintendo stated countless times that they had to revitalize it to survive.
The DS and the Wii were made for that specifically, and succeeded. Just look at the software sales since the DS was out. It's pretty obvious that the DS started monopolizing the charts, with a fraction of the PS2 marketshare.
Nintendo games are for everybody, not just for the younger market. That mantra comes from the "hardcore" that believe that a game rated E means younger, when it means everybody.
Anyway, you could apply what you said to nearly any game genre except sports.
Parent
Re:Sooooo... (Score:4, Interesting)
I got one for my niece and nephew, and they love it. Even my parents (approaching their 60's) can understand it better than they could understand a PS2. People in nursing homes are finding they love it. Small children can use it, and it still has appeal for the 10-40 crowd. That's the core of it's sales - it has a far wider range of appeal.
However, it's graphics capabilities are not as advanced, and games for it have trouble comparing to their counterparts on other systems. The controls are an excellent idea, but could be much better designed (for instance, NOW is the time to resurrect the Power Glove). Other consoles can and will follow suit (unless Nintendo is able to file suit - difficult considering previous art).
The Wii is doing well because Nintendo always does well, even when they're not on top. Not only do they do well, but they do well without being the most technically advanced - because they pursue a wider market, rather than competing more heavily in a single one (such as the recent widespread dedication to hard core gamers, which turned out to be a mistake as HCG's were the most vocal, but not the most profitable).
Games are like movies. The slightly improved same-old-same-old will usually make more money than the truly innovative, just as the best movies usually never become blockbusters, and the apparent fact that you can make artistically great music, or you can make wildly popular music, but you can very rarely ever do both.
The Wii was a great concept, and if they don't blow it they could dominate - but it will be difficult to maintain that unless they upgrade their hardware as well.
Parent
Small TV sets outnumber big TV sets (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
He might not have the 480p cable (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Sooooo... (Score:5, Insightful)
Not supporting HD meant the Wii (1) cost less for consumers to buy, and (2) cost less for developers to write titles for. Throw in the fact that HDTV is still a minority in all of the world's video-game markets, and there's no compelling reason for Nintendo to support it other than to satisfy the resolution-counting techno-geeks.
Parent
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THen I realised I was supposed to turn it on and hit the character in the game, not the PS3. So now I have 2 mortgages.
Re:Just barly (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Either way, the Wii has sold more in 10 months than MS has in 2 years. That alone should say something about the target markets.
Oddly, I was act
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
NPD (not NDP) numbers are indeed 'sales' not 'shipments'.
However, due to the way NPD tracks numbers, warranty exchanges/replacements handled and documented by retailers, those units frequently count as 'sales' as far as NPD counts are concerned.
To sum up, NPD numbers show units that have been delivered to end users. Which is more useful than Microsoft's number telling us how many they've shipped to retailers (and which may be sitting in warehous
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Unsolicited math analysis that might have value (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Unsolicited math analysis that might have value (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft: 890m loss
Sony: 550m loss
Nintendo: 630m profit
Factoring games, then, with a 60/60/50 price structure:
Microsoft: needs to sell 30.4m games to catch up to Nintendo at selling zero games
Sony: needs to sell 23.6m games to catch up to Nintendo at selling zero games
Nintendo: 3.6m copies of Zelda, alone, means they are $144m ahead; throw in Metroid, Super Paper Mario, WarioWare, Mario Party 8, etc, and Nintendo has something like 10m games sold, trivially.
Which means the numbers for each console are actually:
Microsoft: needs to sell 40m games to catch up to Nintendo
Sony: needs to sell 33m games to catch up to Nintendo
Nintendo: Clear winner and currently the only profitable game company
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Except, oh, one small thing: ferrari makes money on every car sold, does Sony make money on every console sold? Didn't think so. Sony is relying on a large base of support in order to get the publishers to make the games that make the money, and so far, they're failing - not that it matters much, it's such a bloated company they can just absorb the loss anyways.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Honda Accord outsells Chevrolet Corvette. Gasp? These are completely different markets. Mommies & their young children, one market. Teens and young adults, one market.
Your analogy is apt, but your statement is false. A lot of people are shopping for a gaming system for themselves and their kids and they're picking between the Wii, Xbox 360, and PS 3. It is the same market and unlike cars, you can't look at the number of seats or mileage before buying. Teens and young adults are also mommies these days. We're talking overlapping market segments, not separate market segments or different markets altogether. People are buying Wii who would otherwise be buying one of the