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360 Sells Briskly, Geometry Wars Arcade Hit
RemovableBait writes "Microsoft's Xbox 360 has sold over 600,000 units so far and is on track to sell over 4.5 million consoles by the end of the business year. Unsurprisingly, Microsoft could have sold many more as 'video game publishers and retailers have said shipments during the key holiday season fell short of expectations'. If Microsoft's predictions are correct, this could pose a major threat to Sony's well-established PlayStation line of consoles." Relatedly, Saige writes "The Live Arcade on the original Xbox was ignored by just about everyone who owned that console. However, the updated version on the Xbox 360 is getting a totally different reception, spearheaded by the popular Geometry Wars, an old-school style 2-D shooter in the vein of Robotron: 2084 that has eye candy deserving of a next-gen title - all for $5. The demo has been downloaded 200,000 times."
600000 is just the numbers for U.S.
Would be interesting to get a figure of the sales in Canada/Mexico/Europe.
What strikes me as interesting is not so much how well the XBox 360 is or isn't selling but what consumer reaction to the new XBox Live Arcade/Market place has been. It seem to have been overwelmingly in favor of it and everyone seem to love the new market place and arcade download titles. So does this mark the new way of how all consoles are now expected to be online? If so does it mean if Sony doesn't offer something even somewhat similar that consumers will consider is a mark against the PS3 if Sony doesn't offer something similar? Since it would seem that Nintendo is going to offer some sort of unified online market place with the Revolution since they are going to be offering their entire back catalog of products for download somehow.
It would seem that Sony would be the only next generation console maker without some kind of online market place and no content download function available for their next generation console.
If they only got 600,000 units in the hands of gamers during the most brisk console buying period, 2-2.5 million would be a more reasonable prediction for June. I'm a huge game buyer (X-Box, Game Cube and two PS2 in the house now) and I couldn't be more unimpressed with the 360. Its all in the *games* guys... and so far the delivery of good games just hasn't happened. I only picked up the X-Box because of Steel Battalions, and then *tried* to find games for it since I had it in the back room where I could keep the volume up late at night. So... what did I play over the holidays? Ratchet, Sly 3, God of War and Need for Speed Underground. All on the second PS2 I bought so I actually *wanted* to play games on the back room TV... a TV I bought *for* the X-Box. That isn't to say I haven't played anything on the X-Box (Splinter Cell co-op was cool) but it gets ¼ the play time the PS2 does.
I'll check back in when the lineup doesn't look like a wannabe PC solution, because first person shooters are *still* better on the PC. The most amusing part: I'm supposed to be impressed by Live Arcade so I can play games I can play for free in Flash online. Bah... I'm far *more* interested in the retro gaming option on the Revolution, thanks.
Sig under construction since 1998.
I'm sure he did know it, but I believe I read this the same way as the grandparent post. I'm no marketing genious, but with the PS3 and Revolution to both launch this year, and console gaming undergoing one of it's most radical changes ever, I personally can't see any way to predict anything at this point with reasonable accuracy. Current variables with no known good trends:
Networked consoles:Only the XBox has really done this, with an impressive yet scarce penetration. Any data is at best 3 years old, not enough to predict trends.
Consoles that do more than gaming:How important is it that your console play your mp3s? How about your videos?
Format War: Related to the 'more than gaming' If a console plays movie-discs, will formats (HDDVD/BR) add/subtract from console sales figures?
Powerful, expensive handhelds:Handhelds, the PSP and DS, are now as pricey, if not more so, then their console bretheren, and actually offer new features. How many people will forgo purchasing a console for a handheld? Will owning a PSP correlate to a desire for a PS3? How about the NDS/Revolution?
PS3:Launch date still unknown, features still not quite locked down, price unknown. How many will it sell? A billion? Twenty? I don't even know if I'm getting one, and I'm close to the key demographic, and a longtime gamer.
Revolution:Completely new input device, will people embrace it? Online looking to deliver some of the best selling video games of all time. Pricing still up in the air, launch date unknown.
Look at it this way, if we looked at the DS six months ago, and projected how it would do a year later, how accurate would *that* be? I think that was the spirit of the post.
-- I have fans? Wow.