In advance of next week's September video game sales data from The NPD Group, EEDAR analyst Jesse Divnich has sent out his preview note, forecasting a software sales increase of just one percent to $660 million. This is largely due to Halo 3 boosting the market 47 percent last September. Including PC games like Spore, and sales are predicted to rise four percent to $740 million.
On the hardware front, EEDAR sees Nintendo dominating with 600,000 units sold each for the Wii and DS. The Xbox 360 is also expected to sell 320,000 thanks mostly to the recent price cut. The PS3 meanwhile is predicted to sell only 215,000 units, and the PSP has been forecast to sell 235,000.
"The $399 price point is simply too steep to entice the casual and mainstream markets, regardless of how great Resistance 2 and LittleBigPlanet may be."
The PS3 and Xbox 360 would appear to be going in opposite directions. "Due to the price drop, we expect the Xbox 360 to sell over 320,000 units. This would be the first time this year that the Xbox 360 surpasses 300,000 units a single month. This would also be a 31% increase in weekly sales over last month," said Divnich. "For the PS3, we expect weekly sales to decrease by 7% to 43,000 units a week."
Divnich believes price and first-party titles could drive consumers away from PS3 and towards Xbox 360. He's urging Sony to reconsider a holiday price cut on the PS3.
"...the surge in Xbox 360 sales likely came from the mainstream and casual markets who were enticed by a sub-$200 Xbox 360 SKU. We should note that if Microsoft's first-party titles perform significantly better in quality and popularity than Sony's this holiday season, we could begin to see a considerable amount of potential PS3 owners, who may be waiting for a PS3 price cut, to choose the Xbox 360 over the PS3," he said. "Currently, we expect Gears of War 2 to be the single best selling SKU this holiday season."
"We still urge Sony to consider a possible hardware price cut this holiday season. If September hardware sales fall below our estimate (under
200,000 units), it could be an indication that the Xbox 360 price cut played a bigger role on hindering PS3 sales than what we originally expected," Divnich continued. "While we have no doubts that titles like Resistance 2 and LittleBigPlanet will drive the core gaming market to purchase a PS3, we do, however, have doubts that either title will lure in casual and mainstream gamers. The $399 price point is simply too steep to entice the casual and mainstream markets, regardless of how great Resistance 2 and LittleBigPlanet may be."
Reader Comments (4)
if sony dont watch out, microsoft gonna be more than just the next google.
I look at it like this. more gamers own a 360 then they do a ps3. More people are on xbox live then they are on the playstation network. hell there's more games out for the 360 then there are for the ps3. i'm not saying that the ps3 is a bad system but there's barely any AAA titles out for it at the moment. plus from what i've read the 360 has outsold the ps3 in japan due to the price drop and the fact there's a number of JRPGs. heck in an article i read infinite undiscovery helped the 360 surpass the ps3 sales wise. I also have to point out that bethesda (makers of oblivion) is making exclusive downloadable content for the 360 version of fallout 3. same thing for Tomb raider underworld. the 360 version gets exclusive content when the game releases with six hours more play time. Yea the ps3 has blu-ray that's all fine and dandy but the 360 is still the better console at the moment when it comes to games and online play!!!
ps3 cant compare to games coming out for 360, not right now anyways. getting wii too? what for to watch it sit, you only have 1 game for 360 and thats halo, maybe you should play more games for 360 it will be worth it
I like ps3 because of the controller [I am used to this style of traingle,circle,x,square] But I have a 360 the only game I have for it is halo3 plan to get halo wars and the worst game I ever played was gearsOFwar so gearsofwar2 will suck.....to me. everyone one of my games i want this season is for ps3. I have a wii to, but its boring. SO dont think people will go to xbox just because it cheaper, you forgot blu-ray!