Fallout From the November Console Wars

All three 'next generation' consoles are out, and we can finally stop using that term. The NPD numbers for last month have been released, and there's plenty of information there to discuss. Analysts have already made some observations, with brandintel specifically pointing out the Xbox 360's 'surprising' role in last month's fight. For some more well-reasoned thought, Dean Takahashi's take is the place to turn: "At this rate, Microsoft isn't going to hit its goal of 10 million units by year end ... Sony's number is consistent with its warnings, but 197,000 is worse than what many expected ... the fair fight is really going to be what happens in the year 2007, when all three console makers should be able to ship as many consoles as consumers want. To me, this looks like consumers are hit with a case of sticker shock. The mass market is paying for cheap PS2s, DS Lites, and GBAs." Despite the Wii's success last month, it should be noted that Nintendo is no longer bragging of 1 Million units in the U.S. by the end of the year. So, essentially, it looks like all three companies will fail to hit their console goals for the year.

Comments

It's the Sticker Shock

[scombs]

When it comes down to it, I believe I can have the same amount of fun (if not more) with the $130 Nintendo DS than I could with the $300+ current-gen consoles. My fun wouldn't increase five-fold if I bought a PS3, I don't think.

Re:It's the Sticker Shock

[2nd Post!]

After playing Rayman and Sports, however, I do think your fun would increase two-fold if you bought a Wii... which coincidentally is less than twice a DS.

XBox a surprise winner?

[Hawthorne01]

No, not when you think about it. Consider the typical big-box electronics store customer:

"Excuse me, do you have any PS3's?"
"No."
"Nintendo Wii's?"
"No."
"Well, what do you have in stock?"
"The xBox 360."
"We'll take it."

Having product on the shelves covers a multitude of sins.

Stop the "Artificial restricting supply" nonsense!

[jchenx]

From those numbers it really seems like nintendo has screwed the pooch with this launch or that they are artificially restricting supply to give the illusion that greater demand exists. They should have had many more units available for sale given they are using essentially the same hardware that was found in the gamecube.

When will people realize that this whole "artificially restricting supply" theory is just wrong. First there were claims that MS was doing this with the 360, then next with Sony, and finally with Nintendo. The theory is just absurd.

Do you think those companies want to miss their sales forecasts, and get punished in the stock market for doing so? Of course not. All three companies have run into supply problems because, well, releasing a console worldwide is pretty damn difficult. (Consider that in the past, hardware releases were generally not global either) Should MS, Sony, and Nintendo be chastised for their errors? Certainly.

But this whole "oh, they're just artificially restricting supply to make the illusion of demand" is just nonesense. It's usually spouted off by fanbois who can't imagine that there are actually consumers that want the "other" system.

Re:Analysts

[Chris Burke]

There's much hype and fanfare, then I'm only able to actually produce 500,000 units. The Sales numbers at this point no longer mean anything. You can only have a valid comparison if there is a steady supply of all three models. Come on folks THINK.

Actually, they do mean something, just not that much about market acceptance. Since these consoles sold out, we can use the sales numbers as production numbers. And from that standpoint, there are really two interesting pieces of information: Not really a surprise given all the warnings, but Sony was able to make only half of their grossly down-sized forecasts. This means producing the PS3 is even more difficult than was thought, or the blue lasers are in even shorter supply than thought, and may even indicate that the longer term supply will be limited. In some ways more surprising is that Nintendo was unable to reach their manufacturing target for launch. I would naively assume that they should have minimal problems, but that apparently isn't the case. Maybe the remote is a trickier beast than thought? Supplies of extra remotes have been short for those who were able to buy a console.

I realize that these sales figures may not be complete. I doubt that means Sony really sold twice as many consoles.

An interesting catch: All these companies depend on IBM. Apple dropped IBM largely because they didn't seem ready or willing to develop and produce mainstream chips on a schedule that suited Apple. Are they partly responsible for the shortage of PS3 and Wii? I have no data to back that up at all; it's just idle speculation.