Slashdot Mirror
UMD Sales Picking Up Steam
After what some deemed a slow start, Sony is now claiming that they've sold slightly more than 17 Million UMDs since the launch of the PSP. 9 Million of these discs have been games, with just over 8 Million UMD movies. From the article: "Current manufacturing lines are stretched to the max - Bob Hurley, with Sony DADC, says that Sony is churning out 200,000 UMDs a day and future capacity is expected to be 500,000 per day. 'Tiger Woods Golf is my personal favorite [game], but video has been surprisingly good to us,' says Hurley. In a few years Sony expect videos to be more than 60 percent of all UMD sales, with an expected 130 million UMDs being sold in 2008."
to human stupidity.
movies I can't play anywhere other than on my tiny PSP screen, for more than a DVD? SIGN ME UP!
Seriously, I doubt UMDs will account for 60%, as the novelty of this format will soon wear off. (one can hope, anyway...)
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
Gotta give to the American gaming public, they love slick marketing so much they went out and bought something they probably already had in their collections and then bought some $30 UMD movies to go on top of it. I'll just continue to watch my $17 DVDs on my wireless laptop and listen to my iPod and save myself the $250 until Sony stops porting year-old PS2 games to the PSP. I recently saw an article lambasting the gaming industry for lack of innovation... but I'm starting to think the blame for all this vanilla is being put in the wrong place.
I wonder if Sony figured out how bad it looked to have 150 unsold PSPs in the case at every walmart the day after release and only shipped enough to cause an artificial shortage...
I wouldn't put it past them.
"9 Million of these discs have been games, with just over 8 Million UMD movies"
How many of those were the bundled Spiderman 2?
Now do those figures mean consumers ahve purchased 9 million or that retailers have purchased 9 million and they are just sitting on their shelves? Sales figures like that have always confused me as it is hard to see how they could quickly & easily track actual consumer sales.
In the drops - An Aussie's musings on all things cycling
This is very true. I've got a fairly substantial train commute myself. I've always seen a lot of Gameboys and GBAs (particularly the SP) on the train. However, a fortnight after the DS launch, all the DSes had vanished and the GBAs had come back. Having tried using my own DS on the train, I can see why; the stylus is an absolute pain in the arse to use in an environment that's rattling and shaking a lot. With the video-from-memory-stick capabilities, I'd expect to see the PSP being a huge hit with the (fairly affluent) commuter crowd. I've been using mine to watch movies, TV shows etc on the train for months now, with a lot of jealous glares.
I own a PSP, and have since around their NA launch, I've never even considered buying a UMD movie. Why pay the same price as a DVD (that plays on my PC, Laptop & Television, and can be encoded to fit on my memory stick for the PSP) for a lower quality disc I can only use on one device?.
Now, if they sold DVD & UMD combo packs for like $3-$5CDN above the DVD only price, they might hook me in. But even then, the prices on portable DVD players are comming down so fast why bother? I've already got 100+ DVDs, buying one of those (while adding bulk to my tech bag) would make more sense.
paul reinheimer
The reason so many vids have sold is that people who shelled out $$ need something to justify all that $$ they shelled out for something that has only retread games - so they buy a video.
And yeah, I know what I have in my sig, but I already got the Xbox and Ipod free, so why not.
There a few things I'd like to point out.
/shrug.
First, Nintendogs and Advance Wars are great games. Do not discard them because they aren't targetted to you. I don't understand it, but my niece and all of her friends want Nintendogs this year. And Advance Wars... My cousin has loved the series since inception. Just because the game isn't oGMo friendly, doesn't mean they're lousy games. People buy them because they want them.
Comparing Twisted Metal and Wipeout to Mario Kart isn't even fair. I love all three, but Twisted Metal is not Mario Kart. They are very different experiences, and each is fulfilling in it's own way.
I agree with you, though. The PSP has not seen it's first Christmas, and it's not yet "lost" the handheld war.
However, the problem with your analysis is this: the PSP is not in direct competition with the Nintendo DS. The PSP is selling the "adult" games... the Twisted Metals, the Wipeouts, and the (coming soon) GTAs. The DS, however is focusing on something entirely different; it is trying to attract a new crowd of gamers... types like the girlfriends, the less "hardcore" gamers, or the extremely casual gamer.
The PSP is instead more directly competing with the GBA, although you have a point that it's more "last gen vs. next gen" here. I guess we'll just have to wait and see... Nintendo claims the true succesor to the GBA line is still to come.
Deja Vu
n. 1. The sensation that you've read this very article before.
...unless Sony releases UMD burner/rom-drives that supports any data for computers. It's clear that Sony is making the same misstake again. Why not let other manufactures make/sell UMD-ROM drives and UMD-Burners by letting them pay a royalty to Sony?, I'd buy a drive or two =P