Console Sales and Debate Thread

[Smokey]

Viper i just remember a (fair) few yrs ago that it was tracked from what the retailers bought (as there was a big stink about it at time as its an artificial No1). so if retailers bought a million copies but only sold say 200000 to consumers over whatever time it still keeps that number 1 status as that was the way its tracked. but as i said its probably changed since then. i just always thought it was dodgy way to become No1

[Viper]

Ah, that's the old shipped versus sold debate.

Shipped units are units sold to retailers, wholesalers, distributors, etc...and they get reported by the platform holder (Sony, Nintendo and MS).

But consumer tracking firms like Media Create, Famitsu, NPD, Chart Track GfK, VGChartz, etc...all report units sold from the retailers to the consumers.

[Smokey]

ahhh ok cool mate. does music do it the same way as well as there was a big scandal way back when it all came to light.. id say they move on too now in their tracking ways for music too

[Viper]

Not sure how they handle their music tracking but I imagine it's the same way.

[Theo]

^ I might be mistaken here, but as far as I know this thing is even worse in the music industry. Many artists brake new records and what not just because a large market chain has ordered a huge quantity of records. Then we read on the news that artist X has sold this and that, when in fact the actual copies are sitting in store shelves for the most part. And in most cases eventually end up in bargain bins because the stores have ordered too much. I would imagine it goes similary in the dvd and blu-ary business as well. The car business tends to do it too. For example here in EU a certain representative in a certain country like say Audi and UK orders X number of a new model (like the upcoming new A3 series) and then we read news of how well Audi does in UK when in fact most of the cars ordered are sitting in show rooms of the dealers. I know cars are in many cases built along the lines of the actual orders from consumers, but even still this sometimes happens, especially with limited production cars...

[Segitz]

About music sales an interesting tidbit...

Madonnas new album had the sharpest fall off of any "pole position" album EVER this week. Apparently, a lot of the first week sales were CDs gifted to fans at concerts, thus they weren't even real sales at all... pretty much fucked up^^

[Viper]

That's pretty messed up if they aren't polling for consumer sales like all the other tracking firms do.

[Segitz]

Well... it's sales... it has been proven time and again that (at least in Germany) the music charts are fudged massively.

[Viper]

Well... it's sales... it has been proven time and again that (at least in Germany) the music charts are fudged massively.

That's still Chart Track, right? Or is that GfK? One of them owns the other, don't they?

[Segitz]

Hmm... I dunno, actually.

[Viper]

Found it.

GfK bought Chart Track in 2008.

Were those tracking issues all prior to 2008 or still on going?

[Segitz]

Hm... I haven't followed music sales stuff in like ever... and it wasn't chart track of GFK pulling numbers out of their asses. It was the record labels buying cds back from retail and selling them back to retail yet again and such.

[Viper]

Sounds like the kind of thing the EU would fine the hell out of them for.

[Segitz]

That? Nononono... they only fine people if it affects banks or higher ups... not consumer sales... at least in most cases. And if it has higher prices as a result, that's fine, to.

[Gribble-Grunger]

2 million gap now (not that these numbers are particularly reliable of course)

360: 65.5 million
PS3: 63.5 million

http://www.vgchartz.com/

[Segitz]

2 million gap now (not that these numbers are particularly reliable of course)

Don't take this the wrong way, but... you're always the one complaining about this site and now you quote them as a source? Kind of schizophrenic if you ask me (again, no offense, just observation). Even if you take your disclaimer into account.

Looking at it normalized, the marketshare is like 0.4, 0.3 and 0.3 for Nintendo, MS and Sony respectively. If this generation would go on just a bit more, we'd have full parity of all three systems.

[Gribble-Grunger]

Don't take this the wrong way, but... you're always the one complaining about this site and now you quote them as a source? Kind of schizophrenic if you ask me (again, no offense, just observation). Even if you take your disclaimer into account.

Looking at it normalized, the marketshare is like 0.4, 0.3 and 0.3 for Nintendo, MS and Sony respectively. If this generation would go on just a bit more, we'd have full parity of all three systems.

Segitz, i've gone to great pains over and over to point out that whilst they can't be seen as reliable, they are the only source we have. and i'm not offended

[Viper]

2 million gap now (not that these numbers are particularly reliable of course)

360: 65.5 million
PS3: 63.5 million

http://www.vgchartz.com/

So they may hit parity right as the PS4 and Next X launch.

[Segitz]

For all I care, they already have hit parity... it's a difference of less than 5%, which is the margin of error. And PS3 launched a year later, proving that it sold notably better overall, especially at a higher price throughout all the consoles life.

[Viper]

For all I care, they already have hit parity... it's a difference of less than 5%, which is the margin of error. And PS3 launched a year later, proving that it sold notably better overall, especially at a higher price throughout all the consoles life.

Agreed. But I recall back in 2007/8 saying it would take until 2013 or 2014 for the PS3 to pass the X360 and that looks like that will still hold true.