The (Hypocritical) Gaming Sales and Finance Thread

Interesting numbers! It's a modest but respectable launch, and given the march window I think it's good. The UK continues to be comparatively weak for Nintendo.

Always has been that way in the UK, always a little surprised about how well Nintendo does in mainland Europe as it was mainly SEGA & now Sony that it is good to see two companies can be very successful much like here where both Xbox & PlayStation can be.

In France the Switch did 105k which is 10k more then the Wii, I've tired finding how it did in the big one Germany but can't find much.

Basically the UK sucks, there's a reason the EU made us think we didn't wanna be with them.

Switch is still number 1 in Japan but a big drop from as the Switch has gone from 329k in Week One in the end, Week Two the system shifted 62k.

The Wii U did 127k in its second week, meaning the Wii U is up on Switch by 44k so far in Japan.

However it seems the Switch has passed 1.5m units worldwide and should hit Nintendo's target of 2m by the end of the financial year.

I wonder whether the Playstation being a big part of lad culture in the late 90s ties in with the UK often underperforming for Nintendo.

1.5m for the Switch after 2 weeks is impressive.

I would say no as PlayStation is popular across all of Europe, I'm thinking more of the fact SEGA was king here in Europe and I'm thinking Sony picked up the slack.

1.5m sounds good but then the PS4 did 1m in one day, just in the USA.

gjones wrote:

I wonder whether the Playstation being a big part of lad culture in the late 90s ties in with the UK often underperforming for Nintendo.

1.5m for the Switch after 2 weeks is impressive.

masofdas wrote:

I would say no as PlayStation is popular across all of Europe, I'm thinking more of the fact SEGA was king here in Europe and I'm thinking Sony picked up the slack.

1.5m sounds good but then the PS4 did 1m in one day, just in the USA.

Sony definitely aimed the playstation in a way so it was perceived to be edgy/cool & off the back of that folk pretty much started labelling Nintendo "kiddy" because of their family approach. Fast forward to now & some of the people who thought that way are likely the crowd who just buy the big name games (CoD/FIFA etc) so when Nintendo systems don't get those games or poorer versions they won't have any interest in owning one.

I wouldn't say it's the sole reason but it's definitely one of them.

I did some research on this weeks chart,

Persona 5 is Number 1 and is the first JRPG to do so since Ni No Kuni but Pokemon is a thing, so I emailed Chart Track and got this reply.

Yeah, I suppose Pokémon would possibly count, but it generally gets more thought of as something broader than the JRPG market, which tends to be quite a comparatively niche audience (although in this and Final Fantasy’s case, still fairly massive). I guess you could argue it either way, really. 😊

Me and Fronk have had a bit of back and fourth on this as why is Pokemon not a JRPG and FF is for instance.

You'd be tempted to put Pokémon in its own genre - I reckon the Chart Track team must think the same. 'Monster battling RPG', maybe, or possibly even 'Pokémon game'.

Well I read it myself as Pokemon is popular and likes of Persona 5 are niche then the JRPG genre is niche, so Pokemon can't be in that genre.

The Switch in the month of March sold 2.74 Million SKUs, The Xbox One did 3m and PS4 did 4m in their first month which was Nov/December .

Zelda: Breath of the Wild has sold 3.84 Million copies which 2.76m were the Switch version and 1.08 Wii U version.

Nintendo plan to sell 10 Million Switches by March 31st 2018, PS4 took 9 months to sell 10m, Xbox One took around 12 months to ship 10m, the 3DS took 11.5 months to sell 10 million units.

So it seems the Switch at the moment could outpace the 3DS and Xbox One in it's first year but not quite the PS4 which has just past 60 Million in 3 years 4 months with plans to sell 18 Million this fiscal year.

If the PS4 continues with it's 1.5 Million a month, then it will hit 100m in time for E3 2019.

4.7 Million Switches have been sold worldwide in 4 months in comparison:

Wii U 23 months to sale 7.29m
VITA 18 months to sale 5m
Xbox One 9 months to sale 5m
3DS 8 months to sale 5.1m
PS4 3 months to sale to 5.3m

Basically it's looking rather good for the Switch

Nice work, Nintendo! The prediction is still ten million sold in this financial year, I understand - not moved up or down this time. Cautious!

Also it came out in March the Switch not November like the PS4 that it might sort of be out pacing that even.

NintendoLife have this story today: more Switches have been sold in the UK this year than XBox Ones. This is a massive surprise to me, considering Nintendo is traditionally behind in this territory... and the XBONE had a two-month head start. As the story mentions, though, both machines are a considerable distance behind the juggernaut-like behemoth that is the PlayStation Four.

The Xbox One is by reports about a 1M behind always the PS4 in the UK and GameStop in a annual investors meeting have said similar about the USA that the ONE isn't selling and why it is always on offer (same in the UK) but that might be due to X coming and how they thought the Switch is/was going to save them (sounds simliar to GAME) and the PS4 is just doing what it has always done.

If the PS4 has sold 1m this year then the ONE has done 500k, so has the Switch done 750k that it would be interesting how they all compare come the end of the year as I can see X making a but of a difference for Xbox but Sony has all the deals and Nintendo unlike the other two has games only on it along with it being a hybrid.

If I had to predict now, then I think from the DATA and what we know it won't be long till it looks like this:

North America 1st PS4, 2nd ONE, 3rd Switch. Just because the two have such a huge install-base already and even if Switch does 3DS, I think the other two will still pass that.

Europe 1st PS4, 2nd Switch, 3rd ONE. Europe is what always wins Sony the console war by sales numbers and nothing will change that, the ONE has had a disaster in Europe really part from the UK that the Switch will pass it easily maybe be the end of next year.

Japan 1st Switch, 2nd PS4, 3rd ONE. The ONE isn't even in the conversation when it comes to Japan that it is between the two Japanese giants and the Switch will outsell the PS4 this year if Nintendo can keep up with demand. We've said it on here about the Switch about why it is a hybrid, the Japanese market is why, the traditional home console is dead compared to the west and the numbers show that.

Rest of the World 1st PS4, 2nd ONE, 3rd Switch. RotW is a hard one to judge but looking at the numbers of previous system Nintendo hasn't had the best of times, and Sony has always done well and I know with the PS4 it was the first system to get to 1m in the middle east and it had Arabic from day one as a language option. I think big player though is China, where Sony has 2nd party partnerships with Chinese studios working on Chinese properties. ONE is similar to the PS4 in the RotW but I do think it being American plays a huge part especially in the middle east.

UK Chart Chat

FIFA 18 is the the number one game in the UK with 60% of the sales being on PS4 which is up year-on-year meaning those bundles and partnerships are paying off as the game is down year-on-year but came out on a Tuesday last year not a Friday.

Xbox One had 37% of the overall sales which leaves 3% between PS3, Xbox 360 and Switch. It has been sort of confirmed Switch was 1% and seeing the gap between the 360 and PS3 versions was 9 places on the individual chart, I wouldn't be shocked if 360 was 1.75% and PS3 was 0.25%.

I don't know what this means for the future of FIFA on Switch and EA games in general, with what might be to EA poor sales and negative press about multiplayer might people off buying it now.

Elsewhere Metroid dropped out of the Top 40 of both charts and is 7th in the 3DS chart and it didn't do to well in Japan, not sure about state side but I can see why Nintendo hasn't really been to bothered about the series if it doesn't do the numbers.

Anyway the system number ones look like this:
PS3 - FIFA 18
PS4 - FIFA 18
PSP - Fight Night Round 3
VITA - Danganronpa V3
360 - FIFA 18
ONE - FIFA 18
Wii - Skylanders Superchargers
Wii U - Super Mario 3D World
Switch - FIFA 18
DS - Guinness World Records
3DS - Pokemon Silver
PC - Total War: WARHAMMER II

Whilst it's not looking good for Switch FIFA in the UK, I live in hope that greater sales might have happen in other parts of the world. Regarding the online multiplayer... isn't that for Nintendo to sort, rather than EA? As soon as the Switch online system is up and running, we'll be able to play each other. And you can tonk me.

Well games do have online multiplayer with friends though and I'd be shocked if likes of Rocket League doesn't have it when it launches this year. But I do think you're right from what I've heard and seen is that why we've not got it is becasue of Nintendo.

Why FIFA can't have multiplayer with friends but Minecraft can have multiplayer with friends on Xbox One, I don't know.

I think if we see good sales from France & Germany will be a positive but if not then I may worry.

I'd put more down to EA dropping the ball *ahem* than a Nintendo issue as you said yourself plenty other Switch games have online MP with friends or at the very least devs have patched it in shortly after launching their game.

I knew something wasn't right when I seen that media folk weren't getting review code at all.

The_Jaster wrote:

I knew something wasn't right when I seen that media folk weren't getting review code at all.

Always a worry, isn't it? If it is EA's responsibility then it's a poor show. Although the Switch is set up for local multiplayer, some of us have buds who live far away, dontchaknow.

See I'm hearing it's a Nintendo issue and why FIFA & NBA don't have online multiplayer and not a EA & 2K issue.

On numbers though, this might be a a better barometer on how well FIFA 18 on Switch has done, on the PS4 they're over 6million auctions of players on Ultimate Team where on Switch they're is only 27,000 and this is a world wide figure.

Only positive is that Amazon for instance has been sold-out for awhile, that people who may want it can't.

Hopefully Fe does well on Switch as from what we can see for FIFA 18 on Switch, if I was EA, I'm not sure if I would put the resources in to bring my other games to the system.

mas wrote:

See I'm hearing it's a Nintendo issue and why FIFA & NBA don't have online multiplayer and not a EA & 2K issue.

Very easy for them to say that though eh? Especially when Nintendo never address these things.

This is the sort of story I care about, insofar as it influences perception of the Switch as a desirable console and one that third parties want to develop for, but won't lift a finger to help.

So I'm... not... really sure what I'm doing in this thread right now... (shuffles out)

masofdas wrote:

DS - Guinness World Records

Um...?