Tagged News: sales

Fresh on the heels of a report indicating the number of M-rated games released in 2007 declined from the previous year, the NPD has released new findings that point to an increase in the overall revenue earned by Mature titles.

On average each E-rated console software title released in 2007 earned an average of $7.6 million. The previous year the same category of software earned $7.7 million per game. A similar modest decrease can be seen in average revenue of T-rated console software. A much more significant decrease can be seen in the revenues of E10+ rated console software.

The real story here is what happened with M-rated console software. A jump of nearly 64% revenue for M-rated console games between 2006 and 2007.

Source: Next-Gen

Sony announced that thanks to a price cut they sold 1.2 million Playstation 3 consoles in North America over the holiday season. This brings their global all-time total to 5.6 million units, which lags well behind Microsoft's Xbox 360 (17.7 million and 4.3 million over the holidays) and the Nintendo Wii (13.2 million before the holidays, the numbers for which are not yet available).

What's more, Nintendo outsold the Playstation 3 by a margin of 3 to 1 in Japan over the last year, a market where Microsoft is essentially removed from the equation.

Read all about the Playstation 3 sales figures here.

Microsoft sold 4.3 million Xbox 360 consoles from the end of September through the end of the year, which brings the console's total sales to 17.7 million units. While rivals Nintendo and Sony has not yet released figures, this raises the very real possibility that Microsoft will retake the console war lead from the popular Wii. Nintendo had sales of 13.2 million at the end of September.

All was not rosy for Microsoft though. As a result of the increased sales, their Xbox Live online service somewhat buckled under the pressure. Today, they promised free games to members to make up for it.

A total of 17.7 million Xbox 360s had been sold worldwide since it first went on sale in late 2005, Microsoft said. Earlier sales data from the software giant showed 13.4 million consoles sold by the end of September.

"Holiday 2007 was a blockbuster season for the gaming industry," Microsoft said, adding that the Xbox 360 has kept its lead over rivals in terms of total dollars spent on hardware and software.

Read more here.

Nintendo's Wii is still near on impossible to find at most retail outlets even a year after its launch, says a new article carried on Yahoo! News. The article confirms what anyone who has visited their local Wal-Mart's tech enclave can testify to.

You have to wonder though, while clearly the console is popular, the sales figures don't seem to make sense if the demand is truly as high as they say. The Wii has sold just over 13 million units, which is impressive, but either they are oblivious to the shortages are like them, because anecdotally, the rate at which they produce the Wii does not seem to be going up.

Whatever the reason, they clearly are the top selling console of this generation and will likely continue to empty stores throughout the holiday season.

Read more on Yahoo! News,

Sony's Playstation 3 outsold Nintendo's Wii in Japan over a four week period that ended earlier this week, according to a Reuters article. The lead was a slim one - 183,217 to 159,193 - but is nonetheless a major milestone for the former console war kings.

Sony, which launched the consoles a year ago, sold 183,217 PS3 in Japan in the four weeks to November 25, topping sales of 159,193 Wii consoles, according to game magazine publisher Enterbrain, a key watcher of trends in the sector.

Sony dominated the game industry for about a decade with previous generations of its PlayStations but lost its crown to the low-cost Wii with its new idea of a motion sensor in the control unit.

The full article is available here.

After a one month hiccup while Microsoft and the newly launched Halo 3 lorded over the console hardware sales market, Nintendo has regained its perch. In September, 519,000 Wiis were sold in North America compared to 366,000 Xbox 360s. Despite the increased sales that followed their price cut, Sony continued to trail in their first full month of lower prices and moved only 121,000 units.

The PS3's price dropped by $100 to $499 in mid-October, and a $399 model was launched in early November. Microsoft dropped its lowest-end Xbox 360 by $20 to $280, but the Xbox still remains pricier than the Wii at $249.

Retailers have reported that Wii units sell out within a few days, even though Nintendo has said it increased production for the holiday season. Some observers have said that Nintendo appears to be increasing supply slowly, so as not to cause a glut.

Read it all here.

Sony is finally getting some good press just in time for Christmas. Apparently a price cut and a new low end model have boosted the sales of the Playstation 3 considerably, the AP reports. The article doesn't delve into comparitive numbers for the Wii or Xbox 360 over the same period, instead just restating the lifetime numbers. It could be a nice fight to the finish for the Christmas bounty.

Read all about it over on CNN.

Microsoft has decided to give Windows XP an extra six months of sales time, a deviation from their original intention to halt the popular operating system in January. The company notes that people likely want more time before they make any move towards Windows Vista.

Al Gillen, system software analyst with IDC, told the Seattle Times that Microsoft's decision to extend XP sales is not an indicator of the success or failure of Vista.

"If Windows Vista was selling really well and people were just falling all over themselves to get on it, there would still be customers that couldn't, for whatever reason, ... make the move in the short term," Gillen told the paper.

Read the full story.

The AP has a feature on the plight of the Playstation 2, by far the most owned home console in the world. As Sony moves to the Playstation 3 and hardcore gamers begin to ignore the last gen, Sony tries to balance progress with sales. The Playstation 2's rapidly deflating price left it outselling its shiner sister 4:1 recently.

"We are committing funds for PS2 ... we encourage third parties to continue development for PS2. If they bring a PS3 version out, they can bring a PS2 version out as well," David Reeves, head of Sony's European games unit, told Reuters on the sidelines of the Leipzig Games Convention on Thursday.

"There is a lot of money still. What happened last time with PS1 is that they left a lot of money on the table by making the transition too quickly," he said.

Read more here.

Game sales were up 37% in July, powered by strong console sales. The Nintendo Wii continued to lead the way, but the Playstation 3 made a strong bid to catch up to the Xbox 360 after its price cuts and the later's problems. Sony sold 159,000 PS3s, the most since January, while the Xbox 360 eeked out second place with 170,000 units sold.

Sony sold 159,000 units of the PlayStation 3, which had seen monthly sales drop to less than 100,000 units in each of the previous three months, after cutting the price by $100, to $500.

"That was exciting and very much in line with expectations, especially since we're talking about the doldrums of summer," Jack Tretton, head of Sony Computer Entertainment America, said in an interview.

Read more here.