Analyst Sees 12 Million 360s by Year End

Next Generation has a piece predicting the 360's performance for 2006. An analyst with Amtech Research expects 12 Million 360s sold worldwide by the end of the year. From the article: "He continued, saying that he is no longer concerned with any potential adverse effects that an Xbox 360 shortage would have on publishers' March-quarter results. Amtech and McNealy also conducted a survey involving 125 retailers last week. Twenty-six of them had Xbox 360 units in stock, although all but five of them only had the non-hard drive Core units. Stores that did have the $400 Premium Packs late last week sold out of units very quickly."

Three basic questions

[WillAffleckUW]

1. who paid the analyst or his firm?

2. why would anyone ditch their xBox for an xBox360 when it runs so many fewer games? why not just wait until the price drops?

3. this assumes people aren't waiting until the PS3 and NR come out - which they are. I have an xBox, and I'm not planning on buying an xBox360 and see no reason to change my decision, unless I compare all three consoles and decide the games I want are only on the 360. but that's not looking likely right now.

You can project all you like, but if your lightbulb is burnt out in the projector, it won't matter.

12 million, eh?

[Hamster Lover]

So, is Microsoft is going to send the 11 million 360s from Japan that aren't selling to North America by year's end? I honestly don't understand how analysts could extrapolate for the end of the year; these numbers are just pulled out of their asses.

I think most people that really, really want the 360 by now have one and the rest of us that are curious and would buy one on impulse are SOL. Yes, if you're dilligent you can find one as most of my local big box stores seem to get about 25 a week, or you could buy one from the ass raping local video game store that have them marked up 25%.

I still think supply issues are hurting 360 sales and will continue to hurt them for a while to come. Mark my words, 360 sales will be no where near 12 million by year's end.

and your evidence?

[xtieburn]

Im actually a bit of a fan of the 360.

That said, where on Earth are they pulling these figures. The fact of the matter is that they didnt reach targets. It is not clear if that was just inventory or not. While its likely to be just something to do with shortages how can you jump from 'Oh it was just shortages' to 'The're going to do really well.'

The only piece of evidence they seem to have is that the 360 is going to reach 4.5 to 5 million units by June according to... Microsoft. Not exactly an unbiassed source.

Oh yes and they did a study of units currently in, despite the fact its a known fact that 360's are in short supply and the survey proves absolutely nothing about sales. Genius.

I was an xBox Live beta tester...

[eufreka]

I was an xBox Live beta tester, and I loved the console. Last week, I let my xBox Live account lapse for good. I only use my xBox as an MCE extender now (a role in which it excels, by the way). Why turn my back on the xBox? Quite frankly, having bought in excess of 20 games for it, and played it since release (inlcuding online). In the end, I don't feel I got my money's worth from it. The good games were few and far between. Improvements to the console and the online service, equally few and far between. And then I spent the last year hearing about the 360 and being underwhelmed, except for the obivous: more expensive, with more expensive games (the second round of 1st generation games, no less!), to play on a more expensive, more heavily advertising-laden service that could NOT possibly be more responsive than the original...given all the basic junk they were loading onto it. Their constant hype of "micro-payments" and "micro marketplaces" only fueled my "micro interest." So now what? I don't know, maybe I will wait for the Nintendo...more than likely, I will reconsider my previously ridicule-fueled opinion of PC gaming. So, the good news? There's one less non-offensive/non-obsenity suggesting/non-hatemongering gamertag on xBox Live.

Actually, it was just MS covering their asses

[RealmRPGer]

They way I hear it, the 360 actually didn't do very well because...it didn't do very well. The ONLY actual shortages were in big cities. My hometown always had plenty of units in stock, and MS sold 800,000 of a possible 4 million units thus far. If you've been keeping up, a lot of a companies, including EA and Activision, have recently had large layoffs. MS wants to tell you it's because of a slow gaming season, but if you check things out more closely, you'll noticed that the divisions were next-gen divisions...in particular, 360 development. The companies realized the 360 wasn't doing so hot, so they pulled funding and placed the money in more reliable venues.