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U.S. Game Sales Up 25% In June

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the ds-lite-equals-cash dept.

Gamasutra is reporting that sales for the gaming industry were up 25% over last year in June. The results were significantly different than those expected by analysts, primarily driven by high demand for Nintendo's DS Lite handheld console and the videogames based on the Disney/Pixar film 'Cars'. From the article: "Figures from Nintendo claim that combined sales of both Nintendo DS hardware iterations amounted to just under 600,000 in June - a figure with which NPD's estimates of 593,000 agree. PSP sales for the month were put at 221,000, with no information yet available for the Game Boy Advance - which had previously beaten both new portable formats in the U.S."

8 of 56 comments (clear)

  1. So the gaming industry isn't dying? by CaseM · · Score: 2, Interesting

    From TFA: It's as if consumers woke up and decided to start gaming again

    Pullleeeeeze! Every time sales are down from the prior year the industry is in a "slump" and doom and gloom projections about the industry are cast wide and far. Sales are up this year, so has the game industry turned itself around now? Oh wait, comparing this year's sales to last year's means next to nothing. Maybe, just maybe, there was nothing released comparable to the present demand for the DS Lite in June of '05?

    1. Re:So the gaming industry isn't dying? by Cadallin · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Depends on who you're talking about by saying "the industry." Sony and Microsoft, not doing so hot. Nintendo (as usual actually) is rolling in it. And they're doing it by focusing on a cheaper machine with an emphasis on fun games (the DS). I say this bodes well for the Wii, not so well for the PS3, with its high price and focus on Blu-Ray movies (rather like the PSP and UMD).

    2. Re:So the gaming industry isn't dying? by ObligatoryUserName · · Score: 3, Interesting

      From TFA: It's as if consumers woke up and decided to start gaming again

      Anecdotes aren't always meaningful, but my personal experience concurs with the reported conclusion and what you're saying. The DS Lite is making all the difference here.

      My game purchasing had never really recovered from the WoW induced slump, and when the DS Lite came out I bought it and... I think I'm up to 11 games now.

      My brother did the same and also has 11 games, as did a good number of my friends - though they're mostly in the 3-4 games range at this point. The games that we all want the most are games with multiplayer and WiFi.

      Mobile gaming has become social gaming... if people remember to carry their DSes!

    3. Re:So the gaming industry isn't dying? by IflyRC · · Score: 2, Insightful

      They just got tired of playing WoW and needed something new.

    4. Re:So the gaming industry isn't dying? by badasscat · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Maybe, just maybe, there was nothing released comparable to the present demand for the DS Lite in June of '05?

      Analysts have consistently underestimated the appeal of the DS, and they continue to do it despite all evidence that consumers actually, really do LIKE this thing.

      It's as if we're in 1986 again and everybody's still saying the NES is a fad and the big new game machine is going to be the Atari XEGS. Uh, duh? Have we learned nothing from history?

      I remember reading from Pachter or Gartner or one of these outfits before the DS release that the DS and PSP would be neck and neck for a while, but that by this time the DS would be history and the PSP would be the clear market dominator. Hasn't worked out that way, has it? Yet rather than actually revise their thinking, these people continue to believe that the DS will just have no impact on the market. Pretty much the entire explanation for the discrepancy between the actual numbers and the projected numbers is DS Lite sales and DS games. (I know they mention "Cars", but that didn't really sell hugely over expectations, and in any case it's just one game.)

      It's almost as if they looked at the upcoming DS Lite launch and wrote it off as a non-factor. When will they learn?

    5. Re:So the gaming industry isn't dying? by thatoneguy_jm · · Score: 3, Interesting
      Mod parent up - they're completely correct, here. On June 11 I went down and picked up two new DS Lites - one for me, and one for my fiancee. I picked up New Super Mario Bros for myself, and Brain Age and Animal Crossing for her.

      The very next week, she comes over with a "present" for me - she had bought me Mario Kart and my own copy of Animal Crossing, so we could play multiplayer. Now, realize, the ONLY other time she's gone into the store and bought a video game was to buy a game for me for Christmas or my birthday. And, even then, she already had known the name of the game and the price, since I'd "hinted" quite heavily.

      However, this time, she would have had to go IN the store, browse the games, and decide which ones to buy - and, of course, she picked up two more for herself. We each have about 5 games for the DS, now, and we RARELY buy games - and, if we do, we buy them used. The DS Lite is the sole reason that we spent any money on video games last June, and I'm betting that this is the case for quite a few other people as well.

  2. Re:DS Lite by SuperMog2002 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Contact Nintendo directly. When the DS was near impossible to find, Nintendo still had a stock of replacement units on hand for warranty fulfillment. I understand they take your credit card number and mail you a new one. You mail yours back in the same box after you've gotten replacement. As long as they get yours within so many days, they don't charge your card at all.

    --
    Sunwalker Dezco for Warchief in 2016
  3. No, probably not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative
    Did you read the article?

    Figures from Nintendo claim that combined sales of both Nintendo DS hardware iterations amounted to just under 600,000 in June - a figure with which NPD's estimates of 593,000 agree... NPD has also revealed a figure of 277,000 unit sales for the Xbox 360 - above previous estimates, but still below the PlayStation 2 total of 312,000 units.

    It may be everyone who wants a 360 can now afford one. But apparently not all that many people want 360s. Even now that they're all available, the 360 this month sold less than the PS2 and less than half the rate of the DS.

    Now, of course, we're talking about software sales here, and of course all those people buying 360s will want to get games to go with it. But that's also true of the people buying new PS2s and DSes. Meanwhile if we look at the second gamasutra story, the one with the game sales numbers, we see

    Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter commented: "We had expected next generation (360, PSP, DS) software sales to total $120 million, so the $158 million sales figure was much better than our forecast. In particular, sales of Xbox 360 software were much better than we expected, increasing sequentially from $47 million to $66 million in June. Current generation (PS2, Xbox, GC, GBA) software sales were also better than expected at $287 million, compared with our estimate of $250 million."

    So, the PSP and DS system-unit sales sum to nearly 3 times as much as the 360 sold, and the 360 was able to sell $66 million worth of software to the PSP and DS's $100 million. (This doesn't mean the same proportion of game-units were sold, though, since 360 games tend to cost sometimes up to $60, whereas DS and PSP games are cheaper). The $66 million in software sales isn't all that impressive-- this means, if I'm reading these numbers right ((78 + 158 + 287)/66) that the XBox 360 comprised a mere eight percent (8%) of software sales. Even if we assume that all of that is market growth (that is, we have to assume, probably falsely, that the 8% is entirely new sales and not just sales to people that, had there been no 360, would not have just spent the same amount of money on XBox games) the 8% there isn't enough to explain the 25% increase in sales from last year. It becomes even more clear the 360 is in no way driving software sales when we see:

    According to the report, June sales were largely driven by Nintendo's New Super Mario Brothers for the DS, as well as by new releases such as THQ's Cars (PS2, Xbox, GC, DS, GBA, PSP, PC), Eidos' Hitman Blood Money (Xbox 360, PS2, Xbox, PC), and Take-Two's GTA Liberty City Stories (PS2).

    So of the four games they consider to be the drivers of sales, none are 360 exclusives and only one was available on the 360 at all.

    One would normally expect, I imagine, that just six months after launch, a hot new console would be a major driver of game sales. The XBox 360 is somehow not pulling this off.