Slashdot Mirror
Holiday Game Sales Not Looking Optimum?
Thanks to Yahoo/Reuters for their report suggesting that videogame sales aren't quite as spectacular as hoped, so far this holiday season. Analyst reports cite retailer concerns over: "soft sales", apparently due to "few 'hot' new titles, slow hardware sales, high software price points, and increased competition for consumers' home entertainment dollars as newer technologies become more affordable." Nonetheless, industry observers are expecting "12.5 percent year-over-year software sales growth for November", but this still will "fall well short of original analyst, publisher, and retailer estimates." Finally, although the article cites "broad agreement that there is no blockbuster title this holiday like last year's Grand Theft Auto: Vice City", the "top title at retail" in analyst estimates was EA's Need for Speed Underground, and other top-sellers include True Crime, Tony Hawk's Underground, and GTA Double Pack.
Nothing new is interesting me this holiday season and lately I've just been picking up games I missed that came out in the past like ZOE2: The 2nd Runner, Morrowind, Freedom Force and Resident Evil Remake.
Who was it that said %40 of sales were between the 14th and the 23rd last year? Isn't that any indicator that such "Captain Obvious" statements should be belated until at least the 23rd?
Of all the Universal Constants, here's one I know: Nice guys finish last
It seems as if nobody's wanting to make anything different. Publishers are only wanting to go with the safe bets that are likely to make some money, but not much. They'll copy another company's game and add a few extra features, then claim that their title is better.
My guess is that if publishers started to fund original ideas and took a few risks, that sales would boom for them. Since consumers are starved for something different, there's a good chance that those ideas would do well.
Until Slashdot fixes the funny modifier, use insightful or interesting. The poster knows your intentions.
An interesting statistic would be the percentage of xmas video game sales that aren't presents. All the stuff I buy I'd buy all year round, it's just that so much of it is released "for xmas" and therefore it looks like I spend more specifically because it is xmas.
So far we have sold more NFS:UG than anything. I think it is our best seller right now across PS2 and Xbox. Gamecube sales of the title are slow and we even have gotten a couple back in trade.
THUG is selling well too.
It is hard to tell who is leading though, as I dont keep track of the actual sales. I do want to point out the article is right, sales are slow for our little store. I am glad they are slow though, gives us more time to stand around and play geometry wars, the only reason to buy Project Gotham Racing 2.
Games have to be scheduled many mnoths in advance. I guess most people expected HL2 and D3 to be coming out now and didn't want to clash with those heavy weights. To bad they are both still a few months away.
I work in a major game retailer in the UK and I have to agree that it is looking pretty grim. Sales of hardware have been very slack, a couple of weeks ago we did well but that was the last pay day before Christmas, the week after we sold far fewer. The latest games have so far proven uninspiring. The only game I have really enjoyed (and therefore sold a lot of) is Simpsons Hit and Run. I bought Medal of Honour Rising Sun and am struggling to find much good to say about it. Prince of Persia is graphically nice but somewhat brief. Manhunt just doesn't hit the mark and True Crime is a dead loss. You just have to look at the game returns or trade ins to see what games are worth having. Simpsons Hit and Run doesn't come back, all the others I listed have are already on the second hand shelves.
I think the big surprise is the popularity of the GameCube. For the first time since I started working in the shop I sold more GCs than the other two consoles put together.
Personally, I think I'm going to drag out my N64 and have another go through Goldeneye. Perhaps they should look at putting out an updated version of that for the GameCube or even the other platforms. Heck, even the original version done like the recent Zelda pack would be a great seller. It destroys all the other Bond games.
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
Shouldn't it be "optimal?" Optimum is a noun whilst optimal is an adjective.
Why don't you guys have friends or journals?
GTA Double Pack? Unless you don't have a PS2 and/or medium end computer (relatively speaking), who DOESN'T have a copy of at least one of the two games? (Not to mention all the publicity its gotten over the years...)
True Crime Streets of LA? Considering thats in the same line as GTA Double Pack, I'm gonna assume analysts gambled on the violence factor and figured the mindless masses would buy into it.
Tony Hawk Underground? Admittedly a good game, but fans of the series already have their copies leaving few consumers left to buy a copy.
Course all this is moot since I'm sure these so-called "analysts" probably never even played any of these games. (Why doesn't the article say anything about the Half-Life 2 delay? Sure it focuses on the console market, but the Half-Life 2 delay from Christmas certainly put a dent in most PC gaming sales.)
I have a suggestion as to WHY analysts have been too optimistic about increasing video game sales (besides trying to inflate stock prices, of course). I think it's likely that analysts are looking at the console sales and the potential increase in game sales without taking into account the fact that gaming newcomers are probably going to buy fewer games overall than their "hardcore" brethren. For example, someone who stood in line for 10 or more hours in the freezing cold to buy a PS2 on launch day is probably an avid gamer who will spend a lot of money on new games. On the other hand, someone who picked up their first game console within the past year is more likely to be someone who was waiting for console prices to come down and will probably spend less discretionary income on software.
Of course, there are still two big shopping weeks to consider. The second week (26th through 31st) in particular could be interesting because we'll see how people spend their liquid holiday loot. In any case, it's too early to make any big hay out of this. Maybe a week or two after New Year's, an article like this could have some SOLID numbers.
While some games last over an hour, most last about 15 minutes, so it is easy to jump in.
To win, you need a team; good warriors, good leaders, and (critical) a good commander. They all have to work together, and at times build structures or go on suicide runs.
If any part of the team is weak, your team will likely loose.
The main problem with the game is that there aren't enough players (and getting stiffed by a poor commander), though over the last few weeks I've noticed that more and more games are becoming crowded (probably because they dropped the price for the holidays to $30 usd).
Typically, there are 20+ players per game split between the two teams. Large games double that number. 25-35 players seems to be optimal.
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
"Another" Tony Hawk and "another" NFS title. Screw them.
Do yourselves a favor and don't listen to the yearly Christmas marketting spasms on your TV, or stupid retail press releases on disappointing sales. Go grab some games that are based on quality design and not franchise names.
Prince of Persia: Sands of Time and Beyond Good and Evil are two of the best titles I've played *ever*, but I have yet to see any comments or coverage relating them to the holiday season. This could be a great holiday season for games if people paid attention to the right titles.
Considering the game line-up this year, this is hardly suprising. Most games are either a)reiterations of a proven formula or b)resource hungry hogs 80% of the public cant run on their systems (in the case of PC titles at least). Also the PS2 and the GC are getting pretty old. The graphics just cant keep up with the newsest PC titles anymore. I usually buy around 20-30 games a year, but this year i only bought around 10 simply because I didnt find any games of the quality/novelty that i want.
I've never spent so much on games and game equipment for Christmas. I've bought a Gamecube, Zelda Wind Waker, Super Mario Sunshine, a 251 block memory card and a component cable. It was a smart decision for Nintendo to drop the price of their console. I wouldn't have spent so much otherwise.
firstly, game sales are not 'down'. the forecast -was- 18% growth, now it's merely 12.5%.
and they will still enjoying that double digit sales growth, even if another video game isn't sold all year. sales are only 'down from forecasts'. boo hoo. to have continued double digit growth in a time when most consumer markets are down or treading water must be a real bummer.
and the data is not even all in, nor does this article leverage any data aside from a vague 1-3% stock prices wiggle (which is not part of any trend, nor is it statistically significant) and some subjective measures from off-the-books sources. 'too much inventory', 'not exciting'... this is journalism?
Vice City set the holiday sales charts on fire last year because it was a great game. but, it could've sold that many copies in the middle of the summer, and then we wouldn't be reading this article.
imo, i wouldn't say the data is 'not looking too good'. but sensationalist journalism is what makes headlines.
first, you need is a freelance writer who gets paid only when his articles are published -- not when they're good, and not when they're accurate (Ben Berkowitz). then you need a single 'analyst' willing to go on the record and provide some quotes that can be interpreted as desired, but don't even actually -agree- with the story at hand (one US Bancorp Piper Jaffray analyst Tony Gikas). stir, publish, and congratulations!
you've churned out a publishable story about a poor holiday season, contrary to all the available evidence.
// "Can't clowns and pirates just -try- to get along?"
See, I work in a toy store and it's true, there are no big blockbuster games out this season. More parents are buying kids board games, action figures, or dolls. People ARE buying video games, but usually the cheap ones we have. Also, our store personally faired bad on "Green" Friday because the papers didnt put our insert in. So we lost a lot of the holiday business.
I mean just look at that list.
I'm not doubting they will sell copies, I just don't see how (or rather why) they should sell a lot.
Honestly, there are just too many anticipated titles out there. In my game queue right now I have SSX3, Final Fantasy X-2, Simpson's Hit and Run and Knights of the Old Republic.
I really want to play Tony Hawk Underground but I simply don't have enough time... I don't even have enough time for what I have already.
Yes a lot of the games are sequels, but games like SSX3 have evolved their gameplay to a point that they are close to being new games.
All of the consoles have reached a maturity - most of the hardware that will ever be sold has been. The games are what is left, but with so many hyped (for good reason) games coming out at once, there is little a game-player, let alone a kid's parent, can do to figure out where to put their time.
And then theres going outside...
unf.
Look at what's out there...
You have about 50 really crappy *Tycoon titles, some strategy re-hashes, Casino & card games and a few shooters.
I know plenty of people still playing Quake 2, because it's entertaining enough. The gaming industry has turned into a mass media, and the quality reflects that. The best thing that could happen to the industry right now is a 1984-style game company meltdown.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
The cost of PC games has spiraled out of control this year. Battlefield 1942 was a great game and I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. But $70? No thanks. I played the demo and that was it. More and more titles are premiering at the $60 price point which is just way too much for something as relatively unimportant as a computer game. Consoles have been in the $60 range for a couple of years, so maybe they're used to it. I'd also argue that console owners tend to be younger and have more disposable time, so maybe they get a greater return on their investment. That's probably just an over-generalization, however.
The titles, in general, have reached a point of sameless that makes very few titles compelling. Consider some of the more anticipated titles this holiday season. Half-Life *2*. Doom *3*. UT2004. Halo (a console port. It wasn't in the beginning, but that's the direction that they took). Yet another Sims add-on. The point is, there really isn't anything this year to really get people excited. At least last year we had Neverwinter Nights.
As for hardware, do I really need yet another Sound Blaster card? My GeForce 4 card barely gets a workout as it is. My laptop has a GeForce 2 and doesn't really sweat anything. Do I really need another graphic card update?
I would suggest that the hardware market has reached a saturation point. Most new machines come with higher-end graphics and sound these days, anyway. Even integrated solutions are sufficient for all but the most hardcore gamers. Same thing with harddrives and RAM. Dell ships with 80GB drives and 512RAM standard these days.
Ryosen
One man's "Troll, +1" is another man's "Insightful, +1".
Where the fsck are the games? I'm going to buy a GameCube when Pokemon Colosseum come out, and then perhaps Rebel Strike and Zelda. Where is Colosseum? Nintendo said previously it would be released for Christmas, but now, apparently, I have to wait until March to snag it.
Also, where is Halo 2 and Starcraft: Ghost? Both of them were slated to be released by Christmas, but Microsoft pushed Halo 2 back to April, and Blizzard has pushed Ghost to February. I was really looking forward to Ghost too, just look at these screenshots....