Sony revises its 2012/2013 sales forecast

[Foxi4]

52,000 for the year that must be a lot.... It sounds like a lot... Didn't the PS2 and the DS both sell about 150 million units? So I take it Poland is one of the larger markets.... Let's see divide 52K into 150 million hmmm so out of say a 10 year life span of those two consoles Poland counts for something like .25% of the total market.... Talk about a small sample.

My joking point was that while the Vita may be whipping ass in Poland, thats hardly the norm for the rest of the planet. (Rather the sales numbers seem to indicate the extreme opposite.) The point being just because you know "a lot of people" who buy or are into something doesn't mean the entire world swings that way.

Not that I care if the Vita sells or doesn't sell, either way is fine with me.

Well, seeing that in Japan, the Vita sells 10 times better than in Poland (10 000 units weekly) and that's still considered low sales, I wouldn't go as far as to say that Poland is a substantial part of the overall market, but brand loyalty towards Sony is extremely high. Do note what I said earlier - two days versus an entire year of sales, Poland is basically a sure-fire market for Sony in this regard, even if the sales are not as high as in the "wealthier" countries.

I realize that this is not "a norm for the rest of the planet", which is why I said that it "depends" on which particular area we are talking about. I simply used an example of "my own backyard" because it's relevant to me.

 

[Midna]

Honestly? It really depends.

For example, Poland has always been a Sony-strong country. Nintendo properly entered the market with the N64, which at the time seemed less interesting than the PlayStation - it was more expensive and it had a limited amount of more expensive games. While the Game Boy was quite strong sales-wise due to a complete lack of opposition, this is no longer the case with the DS and subsequent systems. This is practically Sony Land.

According to Maciej Kmiołek, Marketing Director of SCE Poland, the PSVita sold more units in the first two days since its launch than the 3DS throughout 2011, and judging from what I can observe myself, I am willing to believe that.

The 3DS literally *isn't* marketed at all as of now - I've only seen one commercial of it concerning Zelda OoT 3D, but that was ages ago. Not a single billboard, nothing. The Vita on the other hand is all around the place, mostly on huge billboards, not to mention the Vita launches that were held here - can't say I remember a 3DS launch at all.

I'm saying the billboard was probably a waste. I didn't know a single person who bought one. Maybe Poland's ads were very effective.

Edit:

Well, seeing that in Japan, the Vita sells 10 times better than in Poland (10 000 units weekly)

It's actually 5k weekly now.
Jusy sayin.

 

[Foxi4]

It's actually 5k weekly now.
Jusy sayin.

In that case, the system isn't doing half-bad here, all things considered.

 

[Psionic Roshambo]

It's actually 5k weekly now.
Jusy sayin.

And 6K the week before and 7K before that one and 8K before that one... Christmas is right around the corner shouldn't sales numbers be going up? I know Japan does not have Christmas (well some of them actually are Christian and do sort of celebrate it.) but they still have some sort of Holiday season that is around the same time frame.

Not sure what people's problem with the Vita is but I haven't seen the market reject a system so badly in a long time. The price point is the only thing I can think of maybe it has to be the same price as the 3DS? I would say the PSP is eating the Vita sales but the 3DS is moving close to 100K units a week in Japan, so people are buying new systems just not Sony's new systems.

I just know that if the Vita VS 3DS sales keep going this way that the 3DS is going to wind up with like ~95% of the market, thats not a healthy competition at all. Sony needs the Vita to start selling and soon before publishers and developers start leaving like rats on a sinking ship.

 

[Guild McCommunist]

And 6K the week before and 7K before that one and 8K before that one... Christmas is right around the corner shouldn't sales numbers be going up? I know Japan does not have Christmas (well some of them actually are Christian and do sort of celebrate it.) but they still have some sort of Holiday season that is around the same time frame.

Not sure what people's problem with the Vita is but I haven't seen the market reject a system so badly in a long time. The price point is the only thing I can think of maybe it has to be the same price as the 3DS? I would say the PSP is eating the Vita sales but the 3DS is moving close to 100K units a week in Japan, so people are buying new systems just not Sony's new systems.

I just know that if the Vita VS 3DS sales keep going this way that the 3DS is going to wind up with like ~95% of the market, thats not a healthy competition at all. Sony needs the Vita to start selling and soon before publishers and developers start leaving like rats on a sinking ship.

Japanese sales =/= the entire world.

Not that the Vita is selling hand over fist around the world but to judge the world market on the sales of Japan (which is significantly different from other sales regions) is a bit silly. As you noted, they don't have the same type of holiday season we do (in a similar timeframe but still different).

Expect sales of all electronics to begin post-Thanksgiving (in the US at least). Personally I don't consider it "Christmas time" until Santa rolls by in the Macy Thanksgiving Day Parade.

And Sony is a smart company contrary to what people want to think, you'd never think they could turn the PS3 around but they did. They won't let the Vita rot if its fortunes don't turn this holiday season. Personally I don't think Christmas will "save" the system but it does have an interesting roster for the season. Hopefully I'll get mine repaired/replaced soon to get AC Liberation, PASBR (it went from a questionable purchase to a list-maker due to some better information about the single player side of things), R&C Qforce ($20 is a nice price too), P4G (well, it's a "maybe" as I haven't found any Persona game to be OMIGOD amazing but it's one of the few JRPGs I would give two shits too), and uh, did Ragnarok Odyssey ever come out?

 

[Foxi4]

Sony already made a statement about their plans for the PSVita - it's supposed to have a 10-year life cycle, and if it'll be anything like the PSP, it will continue to be used even after this expected cycle ends. They're going to support it till the very end simply because that's how they roll - the PS3 used to be a failboat but they stuck to it and it re-surfaced, the Vita won't be much different.

 

[Lurker2]

R&C Qforce

Thank you for mentioning that game.

The Vita in my opinion just needs a price drop. Plus most of the "good" titles that are coming out for the Vita currently don't sell well in Japan so that does not help the Japanese sales at all.

 

[Psionic Roshambo]

Japanese sales =/= the entire world.

Not that the Vita is selling hand over fist around the world but to judge the world market on the sales of Japan (which is significantly different from other sales regions) is a bit silly. As you noted, they don't have the same type of holiday season we do (in a similar timeframe but still different).

Expect sales of all electronics to begin post-Thanksgiving (in the US at least). Personally I don't consider it "Christmas time" until Santa rolls by in the Macy Thanksgiving Day Parade.

And Sony is a smart company contrary to what people want to think, you'd never think they could turn the PS3 around but they did. They won't let the Vita rot if its fortunes don't turn this holiday season. Personally I don't think Christmas will "save" the system.

Japan is not the entire world but they typically account for about ~30% of console sales. So ignoring Japan would be a huge mistake. Europe and the America's make up the rest.

As far as Sony not being stupid.... I can't really say they are stupid but they have done a metric ton of stupid stuff the last couple of years so, I would not be at all surprised if they completely dropped the ball with the Vita, and thats a complete shame... The Vita is a fantastic machine. I can't help but wonder if the hardware had a different label on it. Would it have sold better?

About turning the PS3 around, not sure if still being in last place is turning things around... I would say that if anything Sony went from being #1 undisputed to #3 undisputed due entirely to the PS3....

 

[Guild McCommunist]

Japan is not the entire world but they typically account for about ~30% of console sales. So ignoring Japan would be a huge mistake. Europe and the America's make up the rest.

As far as Sony not being stupid.... I can't really say they are stupid but they have done a metric ton of stupid stuff the last couple of years so, I would not be at all surprised if they completely dropped the ball with the Vita, and thats a complete shame... The Vita is a fantastic machine. I can't help but wonder if the hardware had a different label on it. Would it have sold better?

About turning the PS3 around, not sure if still being in last place is turning things around... I would say that if anything Sony went from being #1 undisputed to #3 undisputed due entirely to the PS3....

I mean they do their share of stupid mistakes but any company does. Pricing the PS3 as it was originally was stupid. Making a PS3 Slim and selling on a loss was quite smart and its a pretty common strategy now (3DS now sells on a loss, the Wii U will sell on a loss as well). The Vita was surprisingly well priced, it would have been considered that much more if the 3DS price didn't drop in contrast. Considering pre-Vita reveal (not NGP reveal) people were saying it would be "overpriced" and that it launched at the same price as the 3DS, that was smart.

I mean they make their share of smart and stupid decisions now but if they see a product failing, they have their methods. I see the Vita seriously picking up as 2013 dwindles down. Right now they have an issue of keeping focus on the PS3 while marketing the Vita. Nintendo was able to release the 3DS as the Wii was practically being buried and it got a spotlight all to itself. You'll definitely see 3DS releases start to slow a bit as the Wii U comes out.

I think Sony was just in a rough spot with the system's release. If they didn't release it now, the 3DS would be really dug into the handheld market for the Vita to get a foot in the door. But since they did, they have to split focus between the PS3 and Vita. Their presentations show this. E3 was severely disappointing from a Vita standpoint, even I was a bit dumbfounded by it. Gamescom, on the other hand, was the reverse.

I'm going on a bit of a tangent now but a few final points:

The PS3 would have beaten the Xbox 360 easily, quite possibly the Wii as well, if it was in a more competitive price range. If it launched at like $400 it'd be spanking. Considering what Bluray players cost at the time, many families would consider just picking it up as a "smart Bluray player".

The Vita would have done better if the PS3 was dying or dwindling or if the 3DS was released later. Of course games are also an issue but I really don't see a huge discrepancy in releases between the two handhelds. In terms of big names each month the systems have been rather on par in recent months, just from the Games of the Month research I do. This is only counting worldwide/western releases as a small note, I generally don't do Japanese releases because I don't give a fuck about them and, with both systems being "unhacked", it isn't as easy to play them as on the DS/PSP.

 

[Psionic Roshambo]

Sony already made a statement about their plans for the PSVita - it's supposed to have a 10-year life cycle, and if it'll be anything like the PSP, it will continue to be used even after this expected cycle ends. They're going to support it till the very end simply because that's how they roll - the PS3 used to be a failboat but they stuck to it and it re-surfaced, the Vita won't be much different.

Sony when it pushed the PS3 was fresh off the profit monster known as the PS2, these days things are a bit different. Sony is down a couple of studio's and the stock prices falling and credit rating drops, Sony just doesn't have the same pull they had back then. It's no longer an instant success because it has Sony on the box.

Not a Sony hater here, just some one who watches what is happening very carefully.

 

[Foxi4]

Sony when it pushed the PS3 was fresh off the profit monster known as the PS2, these days things are a bit different. Sony is down a couple of studio's and the stock prices falling and credit rating drops, Sony just doesn't have the same pull they had back then. It's no longer an instant success because it has Sony on the box.

Not a Sony hater here, just some one who watches what is happening very carefully.

Keep in mind that the recession didn't hit just Sony - all hardware manufacturers are suffering from the fallout of the recession as well as the unfavourable exchange rates due to U.S.A's and EU's financial situation - in fact, in comparison to other companies engaged in the same sectors of the industry, they appear to be doing just fine.

 

[Deleted_171835]

I did read your reply, I just didn't have anything to add, really.
Meaning Metal Gear Solid, which it has, LittleBigPlanet, which it has, Disgaea, which it has, God Eater, which is getting both a PSP and a Vita sequel, Project Diva, which it has, Killzone, which is to be released, ModNation Racers, which it has, Persona, which it has, Resistance, which it has... we could go on and on.

The state of Vita's library is greatly overblown out of proportion - the system does have good games to offer. As of today, not in the future.

There's a lot of blame one could put on journalists, really. Many writers still maintain that the system has little to offer when that's not the case anymore, and there's only more games to come in the near future.

You've just illustrated one of the Vita's biggest problems, it has too many ports. People buy systems for exclusives, not for inferior ports of games they can get elsewhere. The Vita game library is pretty barren when it comes to good exclusives and there are hardly any upcoming games.

My Vita has become a PSP + movie-watching device because there just isn't much I want to play on it in terms of Vita games. As much as I hate to say it, at its current rate it's going to be dead before the end of 2013.

And in regards to your post on 3DS sales in Poland, judging the sales of a system based on the downloads of a single demo on the eShop is to put it bluntly, foolish. Then again, Poland isn't a major market so sales there don't really matter as much.

Japanese sales =/= the entire world.

Not that the Vita is selling hand over fist around the world but to judge the world market on the sales of Japan (which is significantly different from other sales regions) is a bit silly. As you noted, they don't have the same type of holiday season we do (in a similar timeframe but still different).

Expect sales of all electronics to begin post-Thanksgiving (in the US at least). Personally I don't consider it "Christmas time" until Santa rolls by in the Macy Thanksgiving Day Parade.

And Sony is a smart company contrary to what people want to think, you'd never think they could turn the PS3 around but they did. They won't let the Vita rot if its fortunes don't turn this holiday season. Personally I don't think Christmas will "save" the system but it does have an interesting roster for the season. Hopefully I'll get mine repaired/replaced soon to get AC Liberation, PASBR (it went from a questionable purchase to a list-maker due to some better information about the single player side of things), R&C Qforce ($20 is a nice price too), P4G (well, it's a "maybe" as I haven't found any Persona game to be OMIGOD amazing but it's one of the few JRPGs I would give two shits too), and uh, did Ragnarok Odyssey ever come out?

I've told you this a million times but it seems to go in one ear and come out the other. Japanese sales do matter the most because that's where the vast majority of portable games are developed. But even so, sales are shit worldwide so there really is no argument there.

And Sony didn't turn the PS3 around, third-parties did. Konami with MGS4 and Square Enix with Final Fantasy XIII. Not to mention that they were practically forced into developing multiplats for the platform due to the ridiculously high costs of HD development. Looking at the upcoming game library, that isn't happening this time.

 

[Psionic Roshambo]

The PS3 would have beaten the Xbox 360 easily, quite possibly the Wii U as well, if it was in a more competitive price range. If it launched at like $400 it'd be spanking. Considering what Bluray players cost at the time, many families would consider just picking it up as a "smart Bluray player".

The Vita would have done better if the PS3 was dying or dwindling or if the 3DS was released later. Of course games are also an issue but I really don't see a huge discrepancy in releases between the two handhelds. In terms of big names each month the systems have been rather on par in recent months, just from the Games of the Month research I do. This is only counting worldwide/western releases as a small note, I generally don't do Japanese releases because I don't give a fuck about them and, with both systems being "unhacked", it isn't as easy to play them as on the DS/PSP.

I think the PS3 had it been priced at an even remotely sane price, would have been the #1 console again. I wished it had.... Not that the Wii-U is going to be bad, I am buying two. But I would have liked to see the PS3 do far better than it did.

I think the Vita would have done a lot better if the PS3 had been doing better. Consumer faith and good will is a tough metric to measure but I think it has a huge impact on sales.

 

[Foxi4]

And in regards to your post on 3DS sales in Poland, judging the sales of a system based on the downloads of a single demo on the eShop is to put it bluntly, foolish. Then again, Poland isn't a major market so sales there don't really matter as much.

I had no other resources to base it from as the 3DS sales here are so minute that nobody keeps tracks. Facts are that the Vita flies off the shelves here and the 3DS rots on them, and that's that. Due to the popularity of MGS in Poland, it's safe to assume that at least 50% of the users would get the demo - fair game. It's not a major market, no, and that was never my point. My point was that given areas of the world are more "loyal" to different brand - look back to the original context of the post.

 

[Midna]

(3DS now sells on a loss, the Wii U will sell on a loss as well).

3DS hasn't been a loss leader for months

And as far as the PS3 goes, that was nothing more than a fantastic blunder. They put millions into Cell R&D, only to have it be very expensive to produce, and actually hinder the system's overall performance. The Bluray drive they used was a very early implementation. Its low read speeds ensured bad load times and mandatory installs for many, many games. At that point in time, HDDVD was truly the better option.
Both of those mistakes combined rocketed production costs to over $800, to say nothing of R&D. Nothing about the PS3 was smart, and its mistakes went right back to early development. A 'competitive price range' would have completely impossible in all respects.

 

[Eerpow]

The 3DS is profitable now, but they confirmed some days ago that they will be taking a major impact with the Wii U selling at a loss compared to that of the 3DS. It's the reason why Miyamoto is worried about the system launch even if pre-orders are showing good signs.

 

[Foxi4]

The 3DS is profitable now, but they confirmed some days ago that they will be taking a major impact with the Wii U selling at a loss compared to that of the 3DS. It's the reason why Miyamoto is worried about the system launch even if pre-orders are showing good signs.

The history of Nintendo "taking risks" is not a bright one - whenever they tried to release a system that was up-to-standards, it failed due to inheritent design flaws. Think along the Virtual Boy, Nintendo 64 and Gamecube lines.

Nintendo likes tried-and-true designes, and the WiiU is uncharted territory for them - the fact that it will sell at a loss is a good reason to worry, but hey! You don't win if you don't play.

As for the PS3's inheritent "flaws", the CELL problems are greatly blown out of proportion - the CPU has great capabilities and the initial problems with programming for it were connected with a non-perfected SDK, not the hardware design itself. Programmers weren't used to that kind of an environment and once the SDK was crafted to become more "familiar", those problems subsided. It walked the same path the Sega Saturn did with a convoluted multi-core design with dedicated functionality for each processing unit, however unlike the Saturn, it walked out of it "with a shield", not "on the shield". The BluRay drive, regardless of the fact that it was slow, was one of the major selling points of the system. A large group of users opted for the PS3 specifically because it "played BluRay AND was a console at the same time", the situation was synonymous with that of the PS2 in that regard. It was a novelty and people did want to try it out. The only issue I'm seeing with the system is its memory, and not so much the fact that it's split, since that can be both a pro and a con depending on the circumstances (bandwidth, anyone? Shared memory can be quite a bottleneck at times, split memory doesn't have that problem) but the sheer size of it - 256MB RAM and 256MB VRAM wasn't "enough", even at the time, but adding more would only put the price point higher.

The way I see it, the PS3 was released a tad early and needed some extra polishing before entering the market, but Sony had a fire under their ass and simply had to make a move to prevent the market from being dominated by their competition.

EDIT: This post also marks the time where one day has passed since this thread has started, and it is yet to turn into a shapeless mess of a flamewar. It's also nowhere near closing, at least from what I can tell, which is good - I believe my million bucks is now well-deserved.

I'd also like to voice out my disappointment in the fact that nobody noticed a pun hidden in the article I wrote. I mean, seriously. Sony cuts their forecast with a huge pair of scissors from the PS3 billboard - I couldn't be more obvious about it...

Too late now though.

​

 

[Midna]

The BluRay drive, regardless of the fact that it was slow, was one of the major selling points of the system. A large group of users opted for the PS3 specifically because it "played BluRay AND was a console at the same time", the situation was synonymous with that of the PS2 in that regard. It was a novelty and people did want to try it out.

You say that, but I'm pretty sure that coming off the 150 million unit success of the PS2, people would have bought a $300 game console faster than a $600 bluray/game console combo.

This is an interesting read.
http://gamingbolt.com/developer-exp...loping-for-each-console-ps3-being-the-hardest

 

[Foxi4]

You say that, but I'm pretty sure that coming off the 150 million unit success of the PS2, people would have bought a $300 game console faster than a $600 bluray/game console combo.

This is an interesting read.
http://gamingbolt.com/developer-exp...loping-for-each-console-ps3-being-the-hardest

Oh, I'm certainly not saying that the PS3 was sold at a proper price point - I believe that if it was sold at $350-400, it would've dominated the market with ease, which is why I believe it was released a tad too early. If Sony had perfected the technology and lowered its production costs to achieve this level, it would have sold far better in the beginning of its lifetime. $600 was not exactly achievable for the average buyer. That said, Sony was running out of time at this point... They didn't make the best of decisions, but from a hardware stand-point, the PS3 was state-of-the-art hardware, and your comment seemed to suggest otherwise. The CELL may not be the most greatful of processors to develop for, but it certainly had, and in the case of many developers who didn't use it fully, still has a lot of potential.

Would I like to see the CELL again in the future? Perhaps, in a more polished form. Specialized cores are not a bad idea at all, as long as their usage is well-documented... in fact, preferably automated to an extent. Would it be more sensible and cheaper to use a different architecture instead? Heck yes, and in Sony's situation, that'd be the way to go.

What they need right now is a PS4 that will do what the PS3 does, except better and at a lower price point. They need to prepare a console within the $350-400 price range that will be easy to develop for and up-to-par with its competition specs-wise, and from what I've heard so-far, they're choosing that angle indeed. Of course it's just rumours and fairy tales at this point, but a man can dream.

 

[Midna]

$600 was not exactly achievable for the average buyer.

Ken Kutaragi disagreed, back in 2005.
"[PS3 is] for consumers to think to themselves 'I will work more hours to buy one”
Everyone should get second jobs for the PS3, it's just that good.

Funny Sony quotes aside, the Cell was a mistake. The SPUs have an unnecessary amount of latency, because they're constantly checking back with the main CPU. it's a bad design, as aptly demonstrated by the fact that it apparently has 'untapped potential' six years later.

And no, i do not mean to say Sony was not using state of the art hardware. Quite the opposite, they were using, brand new, underdeveloped, expensive hardware. New and different are not always good, they almost always comes at a cost.