• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

PS5 will outsell Xbox Series consoles 2-to-1 this year, Ampere Analysis forecasts

Ozriel

M$FT
Do you know how many 360s were sold by the start of its 15th month? XBOs? Because we both know those numbers are not particularly high, especially if the 360 for example reached 11.5 million sold-through by its 20th month, and XBO sales started to dramatically slow down after its launch period (~6 months)?

Claims don't mean much if they don't have numbers provided. Things also can change in the span of a year. Series may have been outpacing XBO in January 2022, but I doubt they maintained that for the whole year, because I doubt they've hit 18 million sold-through as of this January.

Again, nothing's stopping Microsoft from making a public statement on general sell-through rate of the system IF it's outpacing both 360 & XBO at this point still. They don't even need to provide numbers. But they won't do it if it's not true otherwise that could end up being a legal liability.

Xbox One hit 10 million consoles shipped in early November 2014. Announced by Microsoft. Following that, Xbox One was the highest selling console for both November and December 2014, selling over 2 million units across both months. December 2014 alone saw them sell over a million units. Here's the GAF thread from Dec 2014.

Microsoft DID make a public statement on Xbox Series sales in comparison to XBO. Phil Spencer told the NYT that the Xbox Series line was the fastest selling Xbox ever. Why you think that excludes the Xbox One is baffling. Additionally, Satya Nadella told investors in July 2022 that "We've sold more consoles life-to-date than any previous generation of Xbox."

How is making a public statement to Investors at an earnings call not a 'public statement'? and how is Xbox One not a previous Xbox generation?


You also seem really confused. First you claim that XBO sales started to dramatically slow down approx 6 months after release. Then a few seconds later, you argue that the Xbox Series - despite having the best quarterly hardware sales record of any Xbox ever - would not outpace the sales of the Xbox One that you already argued had slowed down. How does this make any sense to you? Especially when there's hard evidence that Xbox had a very strong Q1 2022, including best ever March sales for Xbox consoles.


Sold-in (to retailers) != sold-through (to customers).

For the 'next gen' consoles, the difference is minimal.



Do you have a source for the 63.7 million being attributed to end of 2021? I might have missed that part. Given the timing in which they provided the information I figured the results would have been more recent, at least up to the end of their FY 2021 (which ended June 2022).

Why would they provide the CMA with install base figures that leave out multiple months where more units would have been sold and therefore given a more pertinent indication of console sales near the time they actually provided the statement to regulators? I'm pretty sure pertinence of data is rather important to regulators as they investigate into the acquisition.

Every single press releases or news article that covers that figure carries the 2021 date. The PDF response to CMA from Microsoft carries that date.
Not for the first time, you missed the blindingly obvious.


Again, general claims but with no data provided to the public or shareholders on actual console sales units. There's a serious lack of transparency in the way they provide these numbers, yet still want to toot the horn when the optics favor them, that they're outselling competitors in a given time frame.
Not sure why you're bringing up competitors when all I mentioned was the sales comparison vs other Xbox hardware. These sale comparisons were provided to investors...there's legal liability if they're false. So your concern about transparency is unwarranted.


I'm not interested in downplaying anything. I'm interested in talking real numbers, which is something Microsoft are very coy to provide when it comes to Xbox console sales. So I have to use metrics they provide, metrics 3P analysts provide, common-sense deductions, numbers that their competitors provide etc. to try getting a realistic measure of where their hardware sales are actually at. There are also circumstantial things too, like sudden Series S price cuts and promotion deals coming in at odd timings in Xbox's strongest markets (historically) that also have to be considered.

If Microsoft aren't willing to provide transparency on these numbers, this is what they risk happening. The risk members of the public attempting to figure out and extrapolate the numbers themselves. I'm just interested in trying to figure what a realistic range of sales numbers are actually at, and cut past the PR BS.

By all means, extrapolate all you want. But I think we've already established that the basis for your analyses is incredibly shaky, built on a false premise and completely unreliable.
The performance vs Xbox One and the cutoff for the 63.7 million figure are as transparent as it gets...and you somehow bungled that.
 
Makes sense.

Also, MS submitted documents to regulators a few months ago in which they confirmed that "PS4 outsold Xbox One by more than 2." (link to the document MS submitted)

PS4 sold 116 million units, half of which becomes 58 million units for Xbox. But it's "more than 2", so it wasn't 58 million units; it was less than that. An estimate of 50-52 million units seems more likely, which is also in line with several estimates by reputed analyst firms. For instance, Ampere Analysis estimates 51 million Xbox One units.

Well, we have O Ozriel saying MS's statement of 63.7 million was a reference to their end-of-2021 (calendar) sales, and not the end of their FY 2021 (June 2022), even though I think that's a bit BS because why would regulators be interested in install base numbers from January 2022 if you're giving them that info in September 2022? What about the other eight months, did Xbox consoles just stop selling (we know they didn't)?

But anyway, assuming that figure was for calendar 2021, that still leaves Series with 12.7 million at the start of 2022. We can even assume Ampere's numbers in their August report were sold-through. This is where MS's weird PR really messes things up. Either the 12.7 million was sold-in (not sold-through), or Ampere are wrong with the figures of their August report regardless sold-in or sold-through. YET, Aaron Greenberg was willing to quote-tweet VGChartz, who are less reputable and professional (with historical examples) as if they were legitimate, just because it made for good brand optics. So by that measure, everyone who believes the VGChartz claims because of Aaron's quote-tweet should at least believe Ampere's estimates, whether you want to take them as sold-in or sold-through.

At the end of the day, even adjusting for 12.7 million (or even 13.16 million) being sold-through by the start of 2021, and just taking MS word (and silence) as the sole source to listen to (despite the fact they don't provide much transparency in numbers), that only gives us, what? Maybe an additional 3 million? So 16.5 million becomes 19.5 million. But that's a LOT of ifs to consider and it also requires disregarding analysts like Ampere yet trusting dubious sources like VGChartz, which makes no sense.

I guess we'll see what's what around the 18th. If there's no statement that they're tracking ahead of XBO in sold-through, then we'll know they're probably tracking behind. If they give a vague statement, then we can assume they're tracking ahead. However, for ONCE, it would be nice if MS were transparent and at least gave specific language indicating to what degree they're tracking ahead of XBO, if in fact they are. They know their fans would like to know. Shareholders would probably appreciate it. It could even help them with regulators.
Anyone who thinks the Xbox is only at 16 million should be banned for playing stupid.

But I won't get my game from SenjutsuSage SenjutsuSage when I win the bet if I'm banned 😶
 

Ozriel

M$FT
The 35 million (total) forecast (18m for 2022) was actually from Sony's. It wasn't something that Ampere projected. Sony couldn't resolve their supply chain issues and, therefore, missed their mark for 2022, and sold only 30 million units LTD.

The very first sentence in this thread's OP goes

"Ampere research director Piers Harding-Rolls has forecast 18 million sales for Sony’s console in 2022 and nine million sales for Microsoft’s systems."

You guys aren't even trying at all.

That Daniel Ahmed's tweet is overestimating the actual data we have.

Launch aligned, Microsoft sold less than 10 million units by EOY 2006 and slightly more than 10 million Xbox One by EOY 2014. So Xbox Series X|S being the best-selling console could be as low as 10.5 million units. Daniel's jump to 12 million is an overestimation.

approx. 10 million sales reported end of first week in November 2014, then Xbox went on to win November and December 2014 NPD, selling over 2 million units in North America alone.

I think i'll take Daniel's word over yours in this matter.
 

Ozriel

M$FT
Well, we have O Ozriel saying MS's statement of 63.7 million was a reference to their end-of-2021 (calendar) sales, and not the end of their FY 2021 (June 2022), even though I think that's a bit BS because why would regulators be interested in install base numbers from January 2022 if you're giving them that info in September 2022? What about the other eight months, did Xbox consoles just stop selling (we know they didn't)?

https://assets.publishing.service.g...Activision_-_Initial_Phase_2_submission_a.pdf

Read page 9. Feel free to tweet at Spencer to ask why they used a Dec 2021 baseline.

But anyway, assuming that figure was for calendar 2021, that still leaves Series with 12.7 million at the start of 2022. We can even assume Ampere's numbers in their August report were sold-through. This is where MS's weird PR really messes things up. Either the 12.7 million was sold-in (not sold-through), or Ampere are wrong with the figures of their August report regardless sold-in or sold-through. YET, Aaron Greenberg was willing to quote-tweet VGChartz, who are less reputable and professional (with historical examples) as if they were legitimate, just because it made for good brand optics. So by that measure, everyone who believes the VGChartz claims because of Aaron's quote-tweet should at least believe Ampere's estimates, whether you want to take them as sold-in or sold-through.

At the end of the day, even adjusting for 12.7 million (or even 13.16 million) being sold-through by the start of 2021, and just taking MS word (and silence) as the sole source to listen to (despite the fact they don't provide much transparency in numbers), that only gives us, what? Maybe an additional 3 million? So 16.5 million becomes 19.5 million. But that's a LOT of ifs to consider and it also requires disregarding analysts like Ampere yet trusting dubious sources like VGChartz, which makes no sense.

I guess we'll see what's what around the 18th. If there's no statement that they're tracking ahead of XBO in sold-through, then we'll know they're probably tracking behind. If they give a vague statement, then we can assume they're tracking ahead. However, for ONCE, it would be nice if MS were transparent and at least gave specific language indicating to what degree they're tracking ahead of XBO, if in fact they are. They know their fans would like to know. Shareholders would probably appreciate it. It could even help them with regulators.

Imagine clinging to Ampere's data in a thread where they were wide off the mark of their 2022 predictions.

Seems like Sony sold around 13 million PS5 consoles in 2022. You imagining Xbox sold less than half that in 2022, despite having very strong hardware sales in some of their key markets and remaining in close sales proximity with PS5 in the UK and US market...that just reads like fantasy.
 

Gamer79

Predicts the worst decade for Sony starting 2022
The biggest problem with the Xbox is lack of exclusives. Comparing ps5 exclusives to the Xbox right now is a pure joke. Where are all these developers that microsoft bought?
 
Then where's the PR statement? Why is it so hard for Microsoft to be consistently transparent with at least pronouncing system sale milestones if they are consistently trending ahead of prior consoles? No other platform holder seems to have this transparency or consistency problem, only Microsoft.

Are we even going to get Game Pass sub numbers this month? They gave them last January. I guess we'll have to wait nine more days.



They are positioning themselves in that way by buying large publishers who already generate a huge amount of revenue which therein gets assimilated into the Xbox division's revenue. They are also doing things like increased peripheral presence/sales, and increased revenue from 3P advertisers getting attention and traffic through the Xbox console dashboard. Things like that.

If they had not purchased Zenimax, were not in the process of attempting to acquire ABK, and had reduced 3P ad partner presence through the Xbox OS, that revenue increase would be monumentally harder for them to achieve. And while yes they are increasing it, and plan to increase it further, even aside from console sales, the question can be asked if those methods being used to increase revenue are genuinely healthy for consumers or the larger market.

And, in what way(s) would they be, if so.



Companies can increase their market share in a multitude of ways. We already discussed how Microsoft are primarily going about that. For Sony their plan is increased volume of software sales from 3P games on PS platforms (which already looks to have manifested in some cases, extremely so in a particular few i.e Square-Enix, Capcom etc.), and by having recurrent revenue streams from 1P GaaS/live-service titles.

They also count hardware revenue to this and even if overall console sales for PS5 this gen aren't notably more than PS4, the fact Sony doesn't have a significantly cheaper SKU model contributing to their hardware revenue means that even if they sold a small percent of less PS5s than Microsoft sells Series, they would generate more hardware revenue and that contributes to their market share. Most of the Series consoles being sold are the Series S model, and as we saw over the holidays, they can be dropped to very low prices.

That could help with install base numbers but not with revenue, and Game Pass subs aren't guaranteed to make up for the reduced hardware revenue because for starters, not every Series S owner has Game Pass. Not only that, but if the ARPU remains where it's likely at despite install base unit increases, then you won't see exponential increases in division revenue from any Game Pass contribution at the very least.



Italy, France, Argentina, South Africa, South Korea, China, Phillipines, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Canada, Portugal, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Egypt....

...there are a LOT of countries in this world, my dude. They may not account for much individually but combined? Well, we saw how they helped PS3 edge out 360 despite 360's dominance in the US & UK that gen. Microsoft don't have that factor this generation, where at best they'll stay a close 2nd (between them and Sony anyway; Nintendo could either outsell them both or crater depending on how Switch 2 is received). And they are still weak in many global markets outside of the US & UK, to this day.

All the smaller ones start to add up.
There's a lot of failed logic and frankly, poor assumptions here.

• First, you end your Xbox analysis by asking if their supposed strategy is "good for consumers and the larger market". Why would you even include that requisite? Why didn't you for Playstation?

• How can companies increase their marketshare in a multitude of ways? As far as I know, the only way to do so is to.... increase their marketshare. You try to counter Xbox's increased marketshare by claiming that it's actually Sony's that has increased, because they make more revenue on their console sales. So not only do you fail to consider if Sony's strategy is good for consumers and the overall market, you explicitly point to their recent console price hike as being the responsible for them increasing marketshare. Like, really?

• I agree that while many countries totals may not be much individually, they certainly can be when totaled together. But that swings more in Xbox's favor than it does Playstation's. Why you'd point to that being responsible for the PS3 edging out the 360 is beyond me, because the PS3 never "edged out" the 360, and a large part of the reason why is because of the sales from countries like Mexico and Brazil where 360 sales remained strong. Just because MS stopped reporting it's sales figures doesn't mean it quit selling. Sony announcing a higher sales number over 3 three years later isn't the solid argument you believe it is.
Fucking Ms. Always hiding behind the numbers so armchair warriors all over the world can keep arguing on their behalf with numbers pulled out of their asses lol

If nothing else, it make them look like cowards

Smfh
Imagine being this lone warrior. Standing on his battlefield, fully dressed in his best armor. Yelling into the abyss "Show thyself, so that we may do battle you coward!!"

Meanwhile back in Seattle...

MS worker- "Did you hear something?"
"Meh, must've been the wind or something."
 
Xbox One hit 10 million consoles shipped in early November 2014. Announced by Microsoft. Following that, Xbox One was the highest selling console for both November and December 2014, selling over 2 million units across both months. December 2014 alone saw them sell over a million units. Here's the GAF thread from Dec 2014.

Shipped = sold-in (to retailers). I'm only really interested in sold-through (to customers). Plus, this is for XBO, I was asking about 360.

Microsoft DID make a public statement on Xbox Series sales in comparison to XBO. Phil Spencer told the NYT that the Xbox Series line was the fastest selling Xbox ever. Why you think that excludes the Xbox One is baffling. Additionally, Satya Nadella told investors in July 2022 that "We've sold more consoles life-to-date than any previous generation of Xbox."

Huh? Dude I know the statement was in reference to 360 & XBO, I'm not excluding the latter. I'm just pointing out that statement was relevant in January 2022...and a whole year has passed since then.

Not just that, but MS stopped giving these statements right around the time they stopped winning NPDs. But they could have kept giving them in spite of that. I guess we'll find out later this month if they are tracking ahead of XBO or not.

How is making a public statement to Investors at an earnings call not a 'public statement'? and how is Xbox One not a previous Xbox generation?

Where are you getting this idea I'm not considering XBO as a previous Xbox console?

You also seem really confused. First you claim that XBO sales started to dramatically slow down approx 6 months after release. Then a few seconds later, you argue that the Xbox Series - despite having the best quarterly hardware sales record of any Xbox ever - would not outpace the sales of the Xbox One that you already argued had slowed down. How does this make any sense to you? Especially when there's hard evidence that Xbox had a very strong Q1 2022, including best ever March sales for Xbox consoles.

XBO sales could have slowed down for a period of time but then picked up some after another period. This is actually typical of all consoles, even struggling ones. After the TitanFall effect dissipated sales would have taken a dip, but they picked up again nearing Master Chief Collection's launch, or again when Halo 5 and Quantum Break were closer to release, stuff like that.

We've even seen this with PS5 vs PS4 where earlier last year it was notably tracking behind. They've started to fix that in the second half of 2022 but they are still tracking slightly behind PS4 LTD. They're hoping (well, forecasting) to catch up towards the end of this fiscal quarter, then start tracking ahead of PS4 LTD starting next fiscal quarter. So back to XBO, that could also mean fluctuations in trending sales being influenced not just by demand (or lack thereof) but also supply.

With systems like XBO however, demand was obviously more so the issue, as you'd see increases in demand around large exclusive game releases yet this spiking increase would reduce a bit more each time it happened. Also do you have a source for your Series March sales claim? Because what I've found is that their March revenue outdid their previous March 2014 NPD revenue (which was the previous record). Yet I also found this, showing that in March 2014 the XBO was still outsold by the PS4 in NA. And that was TitanFall's debut month, FWIW. And adding to that, we have at least one possible record of March NPD for an Xbox with 360 doing 430K in March 2011.

So from that we can figure that Series X/S outsold 360's 430K for March 2022 (by how much we don't know) and generated more revenu in dollars than XBO's March 2014 (the month Titan Fall released). I think a fair way to assess that is them probably not moving too many more units in sales vs. 360's March 2011, but having a better ratio of Series X to Series S, combined with March 2022 also being Elden Ring's release month and Series X/S enjoying a decent share of NA Elden Ring sales for that month due to a combination of suppressed PS5 supply, somewhat suppressed PS customer spending (PS owners perhaps choosing between ER, HFW, GT7 etc.), and increased Series X supply in NA market for March 2022.

All that said, I don't think any of this really refutes anything regarding my earlier Series sell-through estimates for year-end 2022. If I'm off by a couple million so be it. If they're tracking ahead of XBO still so be it. However I personally can't see that high-end being any higher than 19 million, probably a bit lower than that, if they in fact are still tracking ahead of XBO and decide to communicate that later this month.

For the 'next gen' consoles, the difference is minimal.

For Series X and PS5, yes. For Series S, it's a bit more than "minimal difference".

Every single press releases or news article that covers that figure carries the 2021 date. The PDF response to CMA from Microsoft carries that date.
Not for the first time, you missed the blindingly obvious.

OK, Sherlock.

That still doesn't explain where they got Sony's numbers from, because PS4 & PS5 combined were nowhere near 150+ million units by end of 2021. Even if you counted in PSVR sales, you would not be near that figure. Some websites like Tweaktown asserted that MS were including PS handhelds like the Vita in that mix, plus PS3, but if that is the case then MS were embellishing Sony's numbers in that same report, counting legacy devices on Sony's end but not Microsoft's own like the 360, Kinect, or Kinect 2.

Or, maybe MS DID include Kinect 2 sales in that mix. We simply don't know, and again that's part of the problem.

Not sure why you're bringing up competitors when all I mentioned was the sales comparison vs other Xbox hardware. These sale comparisons were provided to investors...there's legal liability if they're false. So your concern about transparency is unwarranted.

There's still validity to some concerns regarding transparency when you read the above, and see what methodology MS may have used to arrive at competitors numbers versus their own (where suddenly that methodology may have been changed).

By all means, extrapolate all you want. But I think we've already established that the basis for your analyses is incredibly shaky, built on a false premise and completely unreliable.
The performance vs Xbox One and the cutoff for the 63.7 million figure are as transparent as it gets...and you somehow bungled that.

And when you clarified the 63.7 million were for end-of-calendar 2021, I went back and made adjustments. When you references March 2022 Series sales, I looked into that to verify it was in reference to units sold AND revenue, instead of just one or the other. I've taken that and adjusted some of my own estimates in terms of high-end in this thread, as a direct result.

See that's the thing with me; I'm actually open to adjusting my estimates if there's some credible data out there to substantiate them. The problem for me is that Microsoft want to have it both ways. They want to boast about sales numbers or such when the optics look good for them, but avoid providing direct numbers except in ways where you have to extract them from obfuscation (mixing specific platform numbers in with other products, giving vague YoY/QoQ percentages, not having enough granularity in specific sections of the Xbox division breaking down individual section revenue, etc.).

This is an enthusiasts forum for gaming. Naturally, we're going to care about sales numbers. Just because one company in the past has said they no longer matter, doesn't mean they actually don't matter. Until Microsoft start providing more clear sold-through numbers or metrics that cut down the amount of 3P guesswork, and as long as some 3P analysts or trackers continue to employ models that have their share of problems yet gather big enough audiences to buy into what they claim anyway, then you're going to have some of us who try figuring out the numbers of our own accord with as many reputable sources as possible.

And, at least in my case, if I find enough things that may lead to adjusting some things, I'll make adjustments. But I'm saying this right now: I would still be incredibly doubtful that Series are trending significantly ahead of XBO as of this current point in time, by the time they can provide such a PR statement. If it's something like 18.25 million, that's just a bit under 2 million what I was already claiming for a high-end a long time ago. If it's 19 million, that's just 2.5 million ahead the old high-end. IF it's something near 19.5 million or even 20 million, that's still at most 3.5 million more that a high-end I was claiming before.

And realistically, that would be the absolute peak limit of where Series sold-through could be at this point in time. But like I said, we'll get an idea what's up a bit later in the month and if there's no official update, I have no reason to not assume sold-through is in the lower half range of that 16.5 - 20 million figure, at best.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
Then where's the PR statement? Why is it so hard for Microsoft to be consistently transparent with at least pronouncing system sale milestones if they are consistently trending ahead of prior consoles? No other platform holder seems to have this transparency or consistency problem, only Microsoft.

Are we even going to get Game Pass sub numbers this month? They gave them last January. I guess we'll have to wait nine more days.



They are positioning themselves in that way by buying large publishers who already generate a huge amount of revenue which therein gets assimilated into the Xbox division's revenue. They are also doing things like increased peripheral presence/sales, and increased revenue from 3P advertisers getting attention and traffic through the Xbox console dashboard. Things like that.

If they had not purchased Zenimax, were not in the process of attempting to acquire ABK, and had reduced 3P ad partner presence through the Xbox OS, that revenue increase would be monumentally harder for them to achieve. And while yes they are increasing it, and plan to increase it further, even aside from console sales, the question can be asked if those methods being used to increase revenue are genuinely healthy for consumers or the larger market.

And, in what way(s) would they be, if so.



Companies can increase their market share in a multitude of ways. We already discussed how Microsoft are primarily going about that. For Sony their plan is increased volume of software sales from 3P games on PS platforms (which already looks to have manifested in some cases, extremely so in a particular few i.e Square-Enix, Capcom etc.), and by having recurrent revenue streams from 1P GaaS/live-service titles.

They also count hardware revenue to this and even if overall console sales for PS5 this gen aren't notably more than PS4, the fact Sony doesn't have a significantly cheaper SKU model contributing to their hardware revenue means that even if they sold a small percent of less PS5s than Microsoft sells Series, they would generate more hardware revenue and that contributes to their market share. Most of the Series consoles being sold are the Series S model, and as we saw over the holidays, they can be dropped to very low prices.

That could help with install base numbers but not with revenue, and Game Pass subs aren't guaranteed to make up for the reduced hardware revenue because for starters, not every Series S owner has Game Pass. Not only that, but if the ARPU remains where it's likely at despite install base unit increases, then you won't see exponential increases in division revenue from any Game Pass contribution at the very least.



Italy, France, Argentina, South Africa, South Korea, China, Phillipines, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Canada, Portugal, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Egypt....

...there are a LOT of countries in this world, my dude. They may not account for much individually but combined? Well, we saw how they helped PS3 edge out 360 despite 360's dominance in the US & UK that gen. Microsoft don't have that factor this generation, where at best they'll stay a close 2nd (between them and Sony anyway; Nintendo could either outsell them both or crater depending on how Switch 2 is received). And they are still weak in many global markets outside of the US & UK, to this day.

All the smaller ones start to add up.

I can't read your wall of text but maybe let Microsoft have a show to announce these milestones.

Maybe at their show in January they will give an update on how we'll xbox is performing?

So if they can sell 11.5 million by January 2022 then pretty damn confident they sold atleast another 10 million through out the rest of the year. Sony have been the most down with 30 percent down year on year...let's for arguments sake say Microsoft were 30 percent down that still puts them at basically 20 million units...and we know ms aren't that down year on year.

They beat Sony for like the first 4 to 6 months of the year and had an insane q4.

All those countries you listed. If they are 2 to 1 in favour of ps5...give me the actual hard numbers please. We know Spain is 90k units....UK which is the third or fourth largest market in the world is 2.5 million units for the entire year.

Just think man, your talking regions that are lucky to hit 200k total console sales in a year....so what will it be...like 1.5 to 2 million sales in favour of ps5 for the entire world outside of USA, JAPAN AND UK?

That doesn't mean xbox hasn't sold either...it means it sold half...

So you're honestly telling me that Microsoft haven't hit 18 million or more?

Common sense says its just not possible.
 
Last edited:
The very first sentence in this thread's OP goes

"Ampere research director Piers Harding-Rolls has forecast 18 million sales for Sony’s console in 2022 and nine million sales for Microsoft’s systems."

You guys aren't even trying at all.



approx. 10 million sales reported end of first week in November 2014, then Xbox went on to win November and December 2014 NPD, selling over 2 million units in North America alone.

I think i'll take Daniel's word over yours in this matter.
May want to reread your source. They hadn't hit 10M. They would "shortly" hit 10M. Just MS playing with PR, again. How long it shortly? A few weeks. A month or two? It was just a BS announcement because shortly before Sony announced 10M for the PS4 and MS had said the previous gen whoever got to 10M first wins the gen.
 
Well, we have O Ozriel saying MS's statement of 63.7 million was a reference to their end-of-2021 (calendar) sales, and not the end of their FY 2021 (June 2022), even though I think that's a bit BS because why would regulators be interested in install base numbers from January 2022 if you're giving them that info in September 2022? What about the other eight months, did Xbox consoles just stop selling (we know they didn't)?

But anyway, assuming that figure was for calendar 2021, that still leaves Series with 12.7 million at the start of 2022. We can even assume Ampere's numbers in their August report were sold-through. This is where MS's weird PR really messes things up. Either the 12.7 million was sold-in (not sold-through), or Ampere are wrong with the figures of their August report regardless sold-in or sold-through. YET, Aaron Greenberg was willing to quote-tweet VGChartz, who are less reputable and professional (with historical examples) as if they were legitimate, just because it made for good brand optics. So by that measure, everyone who believes the VGChartz claims because of Aaron's quote-tweet should at least believe Ampere's estimates, whether you want to take them as sold-in or sold-through.

At the end of the day, even adjusting for 12.7 million (or even 13.16 million) being sold-through by the start of 2021, and just taking MS word (and silence) as the sole source to listen to (despite the fact they don't provide much transparency in numbers), that only gives us, what? Maybe an additional 3 million? So 16.5 million becomes 19.5 million. But that's a LOT of ifs to consider and it also requires disregarding analysts like Ampere yet trusting dubious sources like VGChartz, which makes no sense.

I guess we'll see what's what around the 18th. If there's no statement that they're tracking ahead of XBO in sold-through, then we'll know they're probably tracking behind. If they give a vague statement, then we can assume they're tracking ahead. However, for ONCE, it would be nice if MS were transparent and at least gave specific language indicating to what degree they're tracking ahead of XBO, if in fact they are. They know their fans would like to know. Shareholders would probably appreciate it. It could even help them with regulators.


But I won't get my game from SenjutsuSage SenjutsuSage when I win the bet if I'm banned 😶
Your name is thick girls are best and you got a skinny girl for an avatar, what do you know :p

I predict Xbox sells at 22 million after Christmas. I have a better track record than Amphere.
 

Banjo64

cumsessed
It’s a 2:1 lead that’s made Sony think it’s ok to charge £10 for settings upgrades, £210 for a controller and adding an additional £30 to the cost of their console. If anyone is wearing this like a badge of honour (which would be mental in itself) you shouldn’t. If anything this just makes me happy as an Xbox customer that they won’t be able to start fucking about with the consumer too much (yet).
 

TonyK

Member
After two years enjoying my PS5 (I'm more or less a Sony fan) I decided to gift me the XBOX X this Christmas. I wanted it only for the upcoming exclusives, to complement the PS5. My plan was to continue buying all multiplatforms in PS5... until I discovered that all the games I tested looked better in the Xbox, specially due to DOLBY vision that looks amazing and better than regular HDR in my LG Cx. Also, the Quick Resume option is the most game changing feature I tested this generation; controller is very comfortable; UX is better and more customizable for a digital collection, etc.

Long story short, after two weeks of intensive testing I decided to change main platform from PS5 to XBOX X and use the PS5 only for upcoming Sony exclusives.
 
Last edited:

Ozriel

M$FT
May want to reread your source. They hadn't hit 10M. They would "shortly" hit 10M. Just MS playing with PR, again. How long it shortly? A few weeks. A month or two? It was just a BS announcement because shortly before Sony announced 10M for the PS4 and MS had said the previous gen whoever got to 10M first wins the gen.

Even for you, this is quite the reach 😀

Also, Sony had hit the 10 million mark 3 months earlier, not ‘shortly before’.

I’m pretty sure at that point everyone knew which console was going to win the generation. Mattrick was already ousted and the xbox One had already taken a $50 price cut for the holidays.
 
But I won't get my game from SenjutsuSage SenjutsuSage when I win the bet if I'm banned 😶

You can easily find me on twitter once it's over. At which time I'll tell you one of the following.

stephen colbert win GIF by The Late Show With Stephen Colbert
Walter White Win GIF by Breaking Bad


But if by some miracle you win instead despite my initial confidence then..

Fail Nick Young GIF
 

yurinka

Member
So you're honestly telling me that Microsoft haven't hit 18 million or more?
I don't know their exact sales, but MS recently mentioned regulators that Sony outperfom them by around (or more than) 2:1 in a few areas like console installbase, market share or MAU and even shared several 2021 market numbers, and I assume if things were in that way for the last genration and this one until 2021, the 2022 should have been pretty similar considering MS didn't release any 1st party superseller in 2021 while Sony released a few of them. Don't remember the numbers MS provided, but I assume they had similar proportions to this:

unnamed-2.png


Series X and specially PS5 have been seriously supply constrained most of the year, so I'd say 2021/2022 console sales comparision don't make a lot of sense. But even considering that apparently yes, the difference is around 2:1 as happened in the previous generation.

Meaning that if Sony sold 30M+ PS5 until now then Xbox Series should have sold around 15M+ until now.
 
Last edited:
I can't read your wall of text but maybe let Microsoft have a show to announce these milestones.

They've announced them before without shows, the blog posts weren't enough?

Maybe at their show in January they will give an update on how we'll xbox is performing?

If that show's even happening. If it is, maybe they do so there. But it's a giant "if".

So if they can sell 11.5 million by January 2022 then pretty damn confident they sold atleast another 10 million through out the rest of the year. Sony have been the most down with 30 percent down year on year...let's for arguments sake say Microsoft were 30 percent down that still puts them at basically 20 million units...and we know ms aren't that down year on year.

Maybe in a world where supply costs increasing and chip shortages weren't a thing they could have done another 10 million last year. Maybe the $100 - $200 subsidization Phil Spencer spoke about was WRT absorbing increasing component and chip costs to maintain a baseline of unit volumes throughout the year. Maybe it was that and some combination of certain stock not moving as much as they wanted, leading to them recalling stock to redistribute it to other markets later on. This all points to the bigger issue with Microsoft's Xbox PR and the muddled transparency.

We do know they forecasted a flat YOY for FY 2022 Q2 for hardware sales, which would have included the Thanksgiving, BF & Christmas period. So whatever their Q4 2021 numbers for Series were, we can use that as a general number to apply for Q4 2022 global sales.

They beat Sony for like the first 4 to 6 months of the year and had an insane q4.

Those were pyrrhic victories at best, though, and only for a specific market: USA (hence why those were tied to NPDs). The one month we have some vague concrete sales numbers to tie to for Series in 2022 is March. Outside of that, it's a crapshoot. They could've been ahead of PS5 in units in NA by 100K, 50K, 10K, or even as few as 1K.

The "insane Q4", do you mean FY 20221 Q4? Calendar year 2021 Q4? If the latter, what were those numbers? Otherwise anything Q4-related for 2022 simply can't be described as "insane" since the notable month they had in early 2022 was March, which is their FY 2021 Q3.

All those countries you listed. If they are 2 to 1 in favour of ps5...give me the actual hard numbers please. We know Spain is 90k units....UK which is the third or fourth largest market in the world is 2.5 million units for the entire year.

Just think man, your talking regions that are lucky to hit 200k total console sales in a year....so what will it be...like 1.5 to 2 million sales in favour of ps5 for the entire world outside of USA, JAPAN AND UK?

Do you know just how many countries there are in the world? 195. There are 195 countries in the world. Even if PS5s are in just 2/3 of those, that is still ~130 countries. Even if just half, that is ~98.

A quick look shows PS5 is sold in 103 countries worldwide. So even taking out Spain, UK, US & Japan...that is still 99 countries you aren't thinking about. Some of those markets are quite small, others are surprisingly big.

For example, in China, PS5 is estimated to have hit 1.5 million as of end of November 2022. However, a lot of those were probably imported models, versus official Chinese models. In other words, Chinese PS5 numbers are only ~ 500K behind Japan's.

So you're honestly telling me that Microsoft haven't hit 18 million or more?

Common sense says its just not possible.

If they have, it's probably no more than 1 - 1.5 million ahead. Again, we have their report to the CMA giving 63.7 million as of end-of-2021 (although that same report exaggerated PS install numbers and might've fudged them to include PS Vita, PS3, PSVR etc. which MIGHT indicate the 63.7 million for Xbox included peripherals like Kinect 2 and maybe even some 360 units, since that did not cease production until April 2016).

Actually...now that I looked up 360 production cease dates, MS's 63.7 million would have included those 360s as well. The only source I can find tracking post-2013 360 sales numbers is Statista. I cut off 2013 and 2017, since 360 production ceased in 2016 (April). They provide a total of 3.9 million 360s having been sold during that 2014 - 2016 period. So, IF Microsoft included late-period PS3 and PS Vita sales into their PS figure of 151 million in that very same report, then they either fudged their methodology between Sony's numbers and their own, or they also included 360 numbers in THEIR figure.

So, uh...this presents something rather interesting and will probably piss more of you off and I swear I'm not doing it on purpose but...well look, there's one of two ways to read that 63.7 million figure in light of this (relative MS & Sony):

[SCENARIO 1]

Microsoft:
Only includes XBO & Xbox Series numbers

Sony: Includes PS4, PS5, PS3 & PS Vita numbers

What It Shows: Microsoft intentionally used methodology for Sony's numbers that included legacy devices which were still in some phase of official production but not pertinent to PS4 or PS5 sales numbers, yet ignored doing so for their OWN products specifically with the 360, which was still officially produced up to April 2016 (and still had (albeit paltry) sales in 2017, but I've ignored those here).

What It Means: Misleading representation of competitor figures to a regulator in order to appear smaller in market share than they actually were.

[SCENARIO 2]

Microsoft:
Included 360 numbers alongside XBO & Xbox Series

Sony: Included PS4, PS5, PS3 & PS Vita numbers

What It Shows: The 63.7 million does in fact represent sold-through for XBO and Series, but ALSO 360 which according to Statistia's 2014 - 2016 (again, just ignoring 2017 and onward from here for 360) was 3.9 million. So, this mean if XBO was at let's say 50 million, and 360 for 2014 to 2016 was 3.9, then that's 53.9 million between the two, meaning Series sales at end of 2021 were at...9.8 million sold-through.

What It Means: Technically would mean Series were still tracking ahead of XBO (remember, it was 10 million sold-in by November 2014, not sold-through) and 360. But it also means any sold-through estimates higher than 10 million by end of 2021 are simply fake estimates.

It also reinforces the likelihood of the Ampere report of 13.8 million Xboxes by August 2022 being accurate, and maybe referring to sold-through. But realistically may also put a cap of total Series sales numbers by end of 2022 to a range between 16.5 million to 17 million. Which basically would reinforce the statement that yes, Xbox Series may actually be tracking behind XBO as of its 26th month on market (16.5 million to 17 million sold-through vs 18 million sold-through).

So here's where you're forced to make a choice. Either accept that Microsoft presented misleading figures of competitor install base numbers to regulators (when they didn't need to; Sony provide actual sold-through numbers for PS4 and PS5 rather regularly) by mixing in legacy devices but failing to do so for their own product line (making the figures being compared worthless, since the methodologies differ), OR....Microsoft's figures presented to the CMA also factored in the 360 (a legacy device that nonetheless is still part of their Xbox hardware line and was still manufactured up to April 2016), meaning Series sold-through is lower than even my earlier estimates, let alone yours or those wanting to claim higher sold-through by end of 2021.

Again, if MS's transparency with their data being presented wasn't so muddled and obfuscating, these scenarios could be avoided. Since they aren't, though, and since you guys convinced me to look at the report MS provided to CMA again, welp...now we're in a scenario where MS either misled a regulator outright, or factored in a legacy console device which would've cut into Series sales if the accepted assumption is that Xbox Series sold ~ 50 million units.

Your name is thick girls are best and you got a skinny girl for an avatar, what do you know :p

I predict Xbox sells at 22 million after Christmas. I have a better track record than Amphere.

Damn, you don't think she's thicc? 😔
 
Last edited:

Ozriel

M$FT
I don't know their exact sales, but MS recently mentioned regulators that Sony outperfom them by around (or more than) 2:1 in a few areas like console installbase, market share or MAU and even shared several 2021 market numbers, and I assume if things were in that way for the last genration and this one until 2021, the 2022 should have been pretty similar considering MS didn't release any 1st party superseller in 2021 while Sony released a few of them. Don't remember the numbers MS provided, but I assume they had similar proportions to this:

unnamed-2.png


Series X and specially PS5 have been seriously supply constrained most of the year, so I'd say 2021/2022 console sales comparision don't make a lot of sense. But even considering that apparently yes, the difference is around 2:1 as happened in the previous generation.

Meaning that if Sony sold 30M+ PS5 until now then Xbox Series should have sold around 15M+ until now.

Serious question: How does it make any sense to compare 2021 software sales - covering last gen and current gen first party, third party and F2P MTX - to current gen hardware sales?

But even considering that apparently yes, the difference is around 2:1 as happened in the previous generation

Source?

Meaning that if Sony sold 30M+ PS5 until now then Xbox Series should have sold around 15M+ until now.

Why stop at ‘15M’? At this point, you might as well peg Xbox Series sales at 5 million LTD since this seems like an exercise in crafting illogical numbers.
 
There's a lot of failed logic and frankly, poor assumptions here.

• First, you end your Xbox analysis by asking if their supposed strategy is "good for consumers and the larger market". Why would you even include that requisite? Why didn't you for Playstation?

Because Sony aren't buying large 3P publishers? They bought Bungie, who worked with ABK in publishing Destiny. Since Sony's acquisition of them, they will self-publish and operate independently of PlayStation (for the most part).

Yes they're technically a "publisher" but it's in a wildly different manner than ABK or Zenimax. Until Sony start buying big 3P publishers (with a history of being publishers) like Capcom, Ubisoft, Square-Enix etc., then no their strategy for revenue growth in gaming isn't the same as Microsoft's.

• How can companies increase their marketshare in a multitude of ways? As far as I know, the only way to do so is to.... increase their marketshare. You try to counter Xbox's increased marketshare by claiming that it's actually Sony's that has increased, because they make more revenue on their console sales. So not only do you fail to consider if Sony's strategy is good for consumers and the overall market, you explicitly point to their recent console price hike as being the responsible for them increasing marketshare. Like, really?

Increase their market share by diversifying their product line, adjusting specific product pricing in specific markets to account for inflation and currency changes, change the way internal accounting numbers are managed and reported (there are obvious risks to this though so most companies avoid doing it). All of this combined with being aware of what your competitors are doing, where their prices are...

...you're able to increase market share by those means. Microsoft can gain market share as well, but it's also possible Sony can gain more market share in the same timeframe and therefore have more market share comparatively.

Sony's model is good for customers and the market because it avoids antitrust violations, and is effectively the same market that the industry has been using since the Atari and NES days. A model where the company with the best overall product for customers, developers & publishers is the one that tends to end up #1. For most of the past 25 years, when it comes to console gaming, that company has been Sony with their PlayStation systems.

If Microsoft's model were better for gamers and the overall market, they would already be seeing the results of that by now. Instead they are making arguments to buy one of the largest 3P publishers in the industry to bolster their console brand and gaming service so that they can better compete (Nadella's words), due to lack of sales and content which would reflect failures on their part to bring a perceived better value to the market with previous and even current systems.

• I agree that while many countries totals may not be much individually, they certainly can be when totaled together. But that swings more in Xbox's favor than it does Playstation's. Why you'd point to that being responsible for the PS3 edging out the 360 is beyond me, because the PS3 never "edged out" the 360, and a large part of the reason why is because of the sales from countries like Mexico and Brazil where 360 sales remained strong. Just because MS stopped reporting it's sales figures doesn't mean it quit selling. Sony announcing a higher sales number over 3 three years later isn't the solid argument you believe it is.

Well it's a lot like Genesis/MegaDrive vs SNES then, isn't it? Sega stopped providing Genesis/MegaDrive sales numbers sometime in 1995, whereas Nintendo continued a few more years. But even if you account for unofficial numbers, Genesis/MegaDrive was realistically at most somewhere between 35 million and 40 million global, likely towards the lower end of that.

One of the few sources we have for 360 numbers post-2013 are Statista; I calculated their 2014 - 2016 numbers for 360 to be 3.9 million. So if official Xbox 360 numbers were at 80 million, that's 83.9 million. Statista also have 360 global sales of 85.8 million as of July 2022, accounting for post-2016 figures.

Conversely, PS3 sales numbers as of July 2022 are shown to be around 87.4 million. So yes, 87.4 > 85.8 and PS3 did edge out 360 for global sales no matter which way you look at it. But it's possible the gap is closer than what some may think (because it seems like PS3 came in short of 90 million after all).

Also this is an aside but, I came across this reporting sell-in (to retailers) for PS systems and for PS5 that was 25 million as of September 30, 2022. I'm only bringing this up because it confirms Sony did not sell-through 25 million PS5s until late October/start of November. Which basically shows they sold through at least 5 million PS5s globally in just November and December alone (Q3 FY 2022 would be quite higher than 5 million; I would guess at least 6.5 million or perhaps even 7 million, depends on how many systems were sold in October).

Back on topic though...I know it can be a bit hard to think other global markets contribute so much to PS5 sales cumulatively, but it's not that hard to believe with a bit of research. For example, I linked earlier ITT that 1.5 million PS5s have been sold in China as of November 2022. Most of those are import units, but the point is to show that the Chinese market (as one example) for PS5 isn't that far behind Japan, which is usually considered one of the "Big 3" markets (Japan, US, Europe).
 
Last edited:

yurinka

Member
Serious question: How does it make any sense to compare 2021 software sales - covering last gen and current gen first party, third party and F2P MTX - to current gen hardware sales?
In different reports to regulators, MS mentioned that Sony had an advantage of 2:1 or more for the previous generation, for the current generation, or for both. Not only regarding console sales, but for other things that may be somewhat related or more or less proportional, such as market share, game sales or MAU.

MS itself, in these reports I mention. As an example, a few posts above someone mentioned one of these MS report to regulators specifying a "page 9". I remember another one, I think to the Brazilian regulator, where I think they admitted that PS4 sold over twice than XBO. Or there's also the game subs, where Sony also has a roughly 2:1 difference too.

This random data from 2021 that shows also a 2:1 diffence seems to indicate that the distance continues.

Why stop at ‘15M’? At this point, you might as well peg Xbox Series sales at 5 million LTD since this seems like an exercise in crafting illogical numbers.
The data seems to suggest that during previous and current gen the distance has been around 2:1. So if at the end of the year PS5 sold 30M+ consoles and Series until the previous year, makes sense to think that they are around the half of that, around 15+.

This is being generous and considering that having no big selling exclusives during 2022 didn't affect them, and that the reason of to stop sharing GP numbers is that they stagnated or decreased subs, which could also indicate a slowdown in sales.

So yes, I think it's fair to say Xbox Series sould be around 15M.

Well it's a lot like Genesis/MegaDrive vs SNES then, isn't it? Sega stopped providing Genesis/MegaDrive sales numbers sometime in 1995, whereas Nintendo continued a few more years. But even if you account for unofficial numbers, Genesis/MegaDrive was realistically at most somewhere between 35 million and 40 million global, likely towards the lower end of that.

One of the few sources we have for 360 numbers post-2013 are Statista; I calculated their 2014 - 2016 numbers for 360 to be 3.9 million. So if official Xbox 360 numbers were at 80 million, that's 83.9 million. Statista also have 360 global sales of 85.8 million as of July 2022, accounting for post-2016 figures.

Conversely, PS3 sales numbers as of July 2022 are shown to be around 87.4 million. So yes, 87.4 > 85.8 and PS3 did edge out 360 for global sales no matter which way you look at it. But it's possible the gap is closer than what some may think (because it seems like PS3 came in short of 90 million after all).

Also this is an aside but, I came across this reporting sell-in (to retailers) for PS systems and for PS5 that was 25 million as of September 30, 2022. I'm only bringing this up because it confirms Sony did not sell-through 25 million PS5s until late October/start of November. Which basically shows they sold through at least 5 million PS5s globally in just November and December alone (Q3 FY 2022 would be quite higher than 5 million; I would guess at least 6.5 million or perhaps even 7 million, depends on how many systems were sold in October).

Back on topic though...I know it can be a bit hard to think other global markets contribute so much to PS5 sales cumulatively, but it's not that hard to believe with a bit of research. For example, I linked earlier ITT that 1.5 million PS5s have been sold in China as of November 2022. Most of those are import units, but the point is to show that the Chinese market (as one example) for PS5 isn't that far behind Japan, which is usually considered one of the "Big 3" markets (Japan, US, Europe).
Nah, the case is different than the MD vs SNES case. Sega didn't "stop counting" at 30.75M MDs sold, they discontinued it and during years they kept reporting that number to the Japanese publishers asociation, because they didn't sell more.

But, they did license MD to a few other other companies, who sold a few millions more. Out of these other companies we only have the sales number from the main one, TecToy who sold it for Brazil with great success selling 3M. The thing is, part of them were before Sega discontinued it, so maybe that part were included on the 30.75M number. But being generous and thinking it wasn't the case we can count to up to 35M or so.

But this is not the case of Xbox. MS discontinued the first XBO models in 2017, then the All-Digital and X in mid 2022 and the S in late 2020. After that, there was no other company selling XBO licensed consoles. Meanwhile, PS4 is still being sold.

360 got discontinued in 2016 and again, no other companies continued selling it. Meanwhile, PS3 got discontinued from late 2015 to early 2017 depending on regions.

The most recent 360 official number we have is 84M, reported by MS in E3 2014:

The Stadista numbers for 360 number are from VG Chartz, numbers that we know are totally fake and historically their WW MS numbers always have been above the real ones while their Sony ones always have been under the real ones. But these 85.8M sound realistic.

360 got discontinued early 2016, meaning that there are not post 2016 sales. MS didn't license them to other companies to continue making it. PS4 got discontinued in 2017, being their final number "more than 87.4M". And again, PS3 wasn't licensed to other companies, so no PS3 have been sold since 2017.

Regarding PS5, Sony provided the official numbers of 25M as of Sept 30 2022 (sell-in, but they get sold out so quickly, in minutes or hours after becoming available) and "more than" 30M sold through as of Dec 31 2022, being that month and quarter the one with the best PS5 sales since launch, "more than" 5M sell-in/sold-through in that quarter.
 
Last edited:

Unknown?

Member
One with a disc, one without a disc. Different options with different hardware. Note you can’t plug a disc drive into the one without a disc, so that also means different software.
They are two different consoles, like a low end Bravia isn't the same as their flagship Oled despite being able to display the same media.
 

anothertech

Member
Hey, it makes no difference to me where you're sitting. Your mom's basement might be decked out for all I know.

Imagine accusing someone of pulling numbers, who hasn't posted or claimed a single specific number. Yikes!
Bruh, I was joking about ppl pulling numbers out their ass from the beginning. You're the one that quoted me and inserted yourself into the ass number pulling masses lolol

Either own up or stop being so narcissistic about what I said. I'm only talking about ass number pulling jokers here.

Literally half the posts in here "wow pulling numbers out your ass..." *Goes on to pull different numbers out their ass*
 
Last edited:

F0rneus

Tears in the rain
I mean yeah, obviously but it's not like XBox is in a bad place. They have been third for two generations in a row but they are making money, and the hardware is solid and Game Pass is incredible. No it will not outsell the PS5 of course, but it's still a great console and much better than the XBox One.
 
Last edited:
How many times did you delete and reopen your twitter account because Musk bought it?

I guess you have no honor in your word.

Iron Man Eye Roll GIF


My original 2009 twitter account was suspended permanently for total nonsense back in 2021. Had I not gone back on my word to not use Twitter, I would have never been able to honor this bet made back in 2021 on my original account.



So yea, don't really care what you think. I changed my mind. So what? And getting my original 2009 twitter back at the start of 2023, which holds a lot more importance to me than some newly created account from last year only further contributes to my decision to keep using Twitter despite my personal opinion of Elon Musk.
 
Because Sony aren't buying large 3P publishers? They bought Bungie, who worked with ABK in publishing Destiny. Since Sony's acquisition of them, they will self-publish and operate independently of PlayStation (for the most part).

Yes they're technically a "publisher" but it's in a wildly different manner than ABK or Zenimax. Until Sony start buying big 3P publishers (with a history of being publishers) like Capcom, Ubisoft, Square-Enix etc., then no their strategy for revenue growth in gaming isn't the same as Microsoft's.
Parroting other's opinions doesn't make it so. Simply saying that MS "are buying large 3P publishers" isn't explaining how it would be a negative to consumers or the overal console market. I'm afraid you're gonna have to do a bit better than that.
Increase their market share by diversifying their product line, adjusting specific product pricing in specific markets to account for inflation and currency changes, change the way internal accounting numbers are managed and reported (there are obvious risks to this though so most companies avoid doing it). All of this combined with being aware of what your competitors are doing, where their prices are...

...you're able to increase market share by those means. Microsoft can gain market share as well, but it's also possible Sony can gain more market share in the same timeframe and therefore have more market share comparatively.
Sure, but that's not what you alluded to in your previous post. At least that's not how I took it anyway. But to counter your previous point. It's extremely easy to point to the specific way that Sony's recent price hike is bad for consumers.
Sony's model is good for customers and the market because it avoids antitrust violations, and is effectively the same market that the industry has been using since the Atari and NES days. A model where the company with the best overall product for customers, developers & publishers is the one that tends to end up #1. For most of the past 25 years, when it comes to console gaming, that company has been Sony with their PlayStation systems.
Sony's model is largely the same as the one that existed before it. While I wouldn't call it outdated, times change and inevitably markets and models do as well. I'd also question your Playstation figures here, as both the Wii and the Switch sold better than Sony's offerings.
If Microsoft's model were better for gamers and the overall market, they would already be seeing the results of that by now. Instead they are making arguments to buy one of the largest 3P publishers in the industry to bolster their console brand and gaming service so that they can better compete (Nadella's words), due to lack of sales and content which would reflect failures on their part to bring a perceived better value to the market with previous and even current systems.
Of course and alas they are. Gamepass seems to be a resounding success at this point, and despite Sony having launched a comparable service earlier. Gamepass gained far more subscribers as well as revenue to the point that Sony ended up revamping their entire service, which doesn't seem to be doing much better. You got that MS's model is different, yet you point to metrics that aren't the result of it for evidence that it's inferior. If your model is more focused on a service such as Gamepass, then why would you point to console sales as proof that it's not working?
Well it's a lot like Genesis/MegaDrive vs SNES then, isn't it? Sega stopped providing Genesis/MegaDrive sales numbers sometime in 1995, whereas Nintendo continued a few more years. But even if you account for unofficial numbers, Genesis/MegaDrive was realistically at most somewhere between 35 million and 40 million global, likely towards the lower end of that.

One of the few sources we have for 360 numbers post-2013 are Statista; I calculated their 2014 - 2016 numbers for 360 to be 3.9 million. So if official Xbox 360 numbers were at 80 million, that's 83.9 million. Statista also have 360 global sales of 85.8 million as of July 2022, accounting for post-2016 figures.

Conversely, PS3 sales numbers as of July 2022 are shown to be around 87.4 million. So yes, 87.4 > 85.8 and PS3 did edge out 360 for global sales no matter which way you look at it. But it's possible the gap is closer than what some may think (because it seems like PS3 came in short of 90 million after all).
Post 2013 figures are indeed hard to come by, but I'd be hard pressed to claim Statistica as a source.

What we do know is that by the end of March 2012, the PS3 was at 63.9m sold, and that by Oct 2012, the 360 was over 70m. We also know that the 360 finished up that year with an additional 1.4m sold that December in the US alone, which was more than double what the Wii U did. NPD didn't give figures for the PS3 for December except to say that it finished below the others.

Of course US isn't the world, but we can only work with the info we have. And outside of one singular IDC forecast... There is not a single iota of evidence that suggests that the PS3 outsold the 360 both before, as well as after MS stopped reporting it's sales numbers. This often cited narrative that the PS3 somehow pulled off this last minute 4th quarter comeback to snatch 2nd place from the 360 is nothing more than just that... a narrative. Sony finally announcing a higher sold figure several years after everyone stopped playing, turned out the lights, and moved on isn't a reason to celebrate for anyone other than the most pathetic of Playstation fanboys.
Back on topic though...I know it can be a bit hard to think other global markets contribute so much to PS5 sales cumulatively, but it's not that hard to believe with a bit of research. For example, I linked earlier ITT that 1.5 million PS5s have been sold in China as of November 2022. Most of those are import units, but the point is to show that the Chinese market (as one example) for PS5 isn't that far behind Japan, which is usually considered one of the "Big 3" markets (Japan, US, Europe).
I don't find that hard to understand at all. Of course there are many countries around the world that while not really comparable to the bigger one's, can absolutely be significant when combined. What I DO struggle to understand, is why you believe that it only applies to the PS5. You've clearly made that distinction twice now, and it's bizarre that you only apply this metric to the PS5.

I'm not looking to get in some long drawn out back and forth here, and I absolutely respect your opinions. I was just pointing to what I believe is flawed logic and interpretation on your part. Nobody is saying that the Xbox Series is outselling the PS5 or even anything near that. Which is why it seems odd to see you go to such extreme lengths to explain and bolster it's sales totals. Especially given that we know what they are. It's the Xbox's that are the question, and yet you're going out into the weeds about how countries like China are game changers for the PS5, and PS5 only.
 

clampzyn

Member
There were no supply issue(its all a myth, if there was 30million unit sold shouldn't be even out there) but there was indeed scalper issue :messenger_tears_of_joy: and Sony really took that scalper issue great for their profit margin and they finally had the reason to increase their console price.
 
Last edited:

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
I don't know their exact sales, but MS recently mentioned regulators that Sony outperfom them by around (or more than) 2:1 in a few areas like console installbase, market share or MAU and even shared several 2021 market numbers, and I assume if things were in that way for the last genration and this one until 2021, the 2022 should have been pretty similar considering MS didn't release any 1st party superseller in 2021 while Sony released a few of them. Don't remember the numbers MS provided, but I assume they had similar proportions to this:

unnamed-2.png


Series X and specially PS5 have been seriously supply constrained most of the year, so I'd say 2021/2022 console sales comparision don't make a lot of sense. But even considering that apparently yes, the difference is around 2:1 as happened in the previous generation.

Meaning that if Sony sold 30M+ PS5 until now then Xbox Series should have sold around 15M+ until now.
2 to 1 in total xbox vs playstation. So that will probably be playstation 4, xbox one, ps4 plus ps5 and obviously I would imagine with those numbers it is close to 2 to 1 or close enough for MS to use it in their court case. Where everyone says they are lying and bending the truth some what. But I guess this statement must be correct as it suits the narrative you guys are painting.
They've announced them before without shows, the blog posts weren't enough?



If that show's even happening. If it is, maybe they do so there. But it's a giant "if".



Maybe in a world where supply costs increasing and chip shortages weren't a thing they could have done another 10 million last year. Maybe the $100 - $200 subsidization Phil Spencer spoke about was WRT absorbing increasing component and chip costs to maintain a baseline of unit volumes throughout the year. Maybe it was that and some combination of certain stock not moving as much as they wanted, leading to them recalling stock to redistribute it to other markets later on. This all points to the bigger issue with Microsoft's Xbox PR and the muddled transparency.

We do know they forecasted a flat YOY for FY 2022 Q2 for hardware sales, which would have included the Thanksgiving, BF & Christmas period. So whatever their Q4 2021 numbers for Series were, we can use that as a general number to apply for Q4 2022 global sales.



Those were pyrrhic victories at best, though, and only for a specific market: USA (hence why those were tied to NPDs). The one month we have some vague concrete sales numbers to tie to for Series in 2022 is March. Outside of that, it's a crapshoot. They could've been ahead of PS5 in units in NA by 100K, 50K, 10K, or even as few as 1K.

The "insane Q4", do you mean FY 20221 Q4? Calendar year 2021 Q4? If the latter, what were those numbers? Otherwise anything Q4-related for 2022 simply can't be described as "insane" since the notable month they had in early 2022 was March, which is their FY 2021 Q3.



Do you know just how many countries there are in the world? 195. There are 195 countries in the world. Even if PS5s are in just 2/3 of those, that is still ~130 countries. Even if just half, that is ~98.

A quick look shows PS5 is sold in 103 countries worldwide. So even taking out Spain, UK, US & Japan...that is still 99 countries you aren't thinking about. Some of those markets are quite small, others are surprisingly big.

For example, in China, PS5 is estimated to have hit 1.5 million as of end of November 2022. However, a lot of those were probably imported models, versus official Chinese models. In other words, Chinese PS5 numbers are only ~ 500K behind Japan's.



If they have, it's probably no more than 1 - 1.5 million ahead. Again, we have their report to the CMA giving 63.7 million as of end-of-2021 (although that same report exaggerated PS install numbers and might've fudged them to include PS Vita, PS3, PSVR etc. which MIGHT indicate the 63.7 million for Xbox included peripherals like Kinect 2 and maybe even some 360 units, since that did not cease production until April 2016).

Actually...now that I looked up 360 production cease dates, MS's 63.7 million would have included those 360s as well. The only source I can find tracking post-2013 360 sales numbers is Statista. I cut off 2013 and 2017, since 360 production ceased in 2016 (April). They provide a total of 3.9 million 360s having been sold during that 2014 - 2016 period. So, IF Microsoft included late-period PS3 and PS Vita sales into their PS figure of 151 million in that very same report, then they either fudged their methodology between Sony's numbers and their own, or they also included 360 numbers in THEIR figure.

So, uh...this presents something rather interesting and will probably piss more of you off and I swear I'm not doing it on purpose but...well look, there's one of two ways to read that 63.7 million figure in light of this (relative MS & Sony):

[SCENARIO 1]

Microsoft:
Only includes XBO & Xbox Series numbers

Sony: Includes PS4, PS5, PS3 & PS Vita numbers

What It Shows: Microsoft intentionally used methodology for Sony's numbers that included legacy devices which were still in some phase of official production but not pertinent to PS4 or PS5 sales numbers, yet ignored doing so for their OWN products specifically with the 360, which was still officially produced up to April 2016 (and still had (albeit paltry) sales in 2017, but I've ignored those here).

What It Means: Misleading representation of competitor figures to a regulator in order to appear smaller in market share than they actually were.

[SCENARIO 2]

Microsoft:
Included 360 numbers alongside XBO & Xbox Series

Sony: Included PS4, PS5, PS3 & PS Vita numbers

What It Shows: The 63.7 million does in fact represent sold-through for XBO and Series, but ALSO 360 which according to Statistia's 2014 - 2016 (again, just ignoring 2017 and onward from here for 360) was 3.9 million. So, this mean if XBO was at let's say 50 million, and 360 for 2014 to 2016 was 3.9, then that's 53.9 million between the two, meaning Series sales at end of 2021 were at...9.8 million sold-through.

What It Means: Technically would mean Series were still tracking ahead of XBO (remember, it was 10 million sold-in by November 2014, not sold-through) and 360. But it also means any sold-through estimates higher than 10 million by end of 2021 are simply fake estimates.

It also reinforces the likelihood of the Ampere report of 13.8 million Xboxes by August 2022 being accurate, and maybe referring to sold-through. But realistically may also put a cap of total Series sales numbers by end of 2022 to a range between 16.5 million to 17 million. Which basically would reinforce the statement that yes, Xbox Series may actually be tracking behind XBO as of its 26th month on market (16.5 million to 17 million sold-through vs 18 million sold-through).

So here's where you're forced to make a choice. Either accept that Microsoft presented misleading figures of competitor install base numbers to regulators (when they didn't need to; Sony provide actual sold-through numbers for PS4 and PS5 rather regularly) by mixing in legacy devices but failing to do so for their own product line (making the figures being compared worthless, since the methodologies differ), OR....Microsoft's figures presented to the CMA also factored in the 360 (a legacy device that nonetheless is still part of their Xbox hardware line and was still manufactured up to April 2016), meaning Series sold-through is lower than even my earlier estimates, let alone yours or those wanting to claim higher sold-through by end of 2021.

Again, if MS's transparency with their data being presented wasn't so muddled and obfuscating, these scenarios could be avoided. Since they aren't, though, and since you guys convinced me to look at the report MS provided to CMA again, welp...now we're in a scenario where MS either misled a regulator outright, or factored in a legacy console device which would've cut into Series sales if the accepted assumption is that Xbox Series sold ~ 50 million units.



Damn, you don't think she's thicc? 😔

Why should you demand a blog post or anything? They can announce exactly when they want. I couldn't really care, you obviously do. Do you care as much about Microsoft console sales as you do aonys software sales? They've completely stopped announcing what their software sales are now.

Also, I can't believe you are this invested to write so much stuff about it. How can you actually be that inspired to write so much about a company and console you don't care about?

It's obvious that ps5 vs series consoles rent 2 to 1, they just aren't and they probably would have been in 2021 if you take the entire ps4, xbox one, ps5 and series sales into account.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
They are two different consoles, like a low end Bravia isn't the same as their flagship Oled despite being able to display the same media.
But they are both called bravia and Sony would announce that the same years bravia are from the same family and generation...

"We sold 2 million bravia tvs this year" Sony said in a statement.

No one would even question that.

I bet next gen when Sony release a lower powered console suddenly the tables turn and everyone's OK with it. Just like everything else that happened in it.
 
Xbox is gaining market share without even releasing any games lol, that’s wild. I’m really interested to see what sales look like at the end of 2023 with the stacked lineup they have.

The assumption being that fans of Forza, Arkane games, Bethesda...Have not already invested in one. I think you will end up being disappointed by the overall impact of the line-up of this year on the sales' figures.
 
Last edited:

jm89

Member
Iron Man Eye Roll GIF


My original 2009 twitter account was suspended permanently for total nonsense back in 2021. Had I not gone back on my word to not use Twitter, I would have never been able to honor this bet made back in 2021 on my original account.



So yea, don't really care what you think. I changed my mind. So what? And getting my original 2009 twitter back at the start of 2023, which holds a lot more importance to me than some newly created account from last year only further contributes to my decision to keep using Twitter despite my personal opinion of Elon Musk.

Weren't supposed be back until june? Awfully cold for june i must say.
 

yurinka

Member
2 to 1 in total xbox vs playstation. So that will probably be playstation 4, xbox one, ps4 plus ps5 and obviously I would imagine with those numbers it is close to 2 to 1 or close enough for MS to use it in their court case. Where everyone says they are lying and bending the truth some what. But I guess this statement must be correct as it suits the narrative you guys are painting.
They are not bending the reality or lying. Nowadays there are still PS4s being sold and there are over 100M PS4 and XBO monthly active players playing and buying games, new games these consoles still continue getting. So when they talk about the current market they also include PS4 and XBO.

When they talk about next gen consoles or next gen, they only count PS5 and Series. But if instead they talk about about the console market they also count PS4 and XBO because they are still part of it, and a huge chunk of their revenue for years like 2021 or 2022. When they mention both generations they can also include there Vita too, which as I remember it was estimated to sell around a dozen million copies.

I don't paint any narrative, I mention the data I saw they shared. If you see any other data they provided that says other thing or shows more accurate numbers feel free to share it.
 
Last edited:

Lunarorbit

Member
Holy shit some of you must have stock in Microsoft they way you are debating. Microsoft would be shouting from the hills if they were leading console sales.

MS is a huge company;divisions within divisions which makes accounting difficult for outsiders trying to glean info.

Xbox got outsold 2:1 last gen. Supply problems, lack of big exclusives, and the ability to play on pc contributed to this. And are still contributing to them being outsold currently.

There's nothing wrong with this. Even if Xbox has only sold 16 million consoles it will go way up this year with the great games they have on deck.

Here's a thought exercise for everyone: take the % of Xbox players that bought a popular Xbox game from last gen and apply those sales percentages to the total sales of a current Xbox game that's doing well. The number of units might give you an idea of how the current gen is doing
 

Ozriel

M$FT
They've announced them before without shows, the blog posts weren't enough?



If that show's even happening. If it is, maybe they do so there. But it's a giant "if".



Maybe in a world where supply costs increasing and chip shortages weren't a thing they could have done another 10 million last year. Maybe the $100 - $200 subsidization Phil Spencer spoke about was WRT absorbing increasing component and chip costs to maintain a baseline of unit volumes throughout the year. Maybe it was that and some combination of certain stock not moving as much as they wanted, leading to them recalling stock to redistribute it to other markets later on. This all points to the bigger issue with Microsoft's Xbox PR and the muddled transparency.

We do know they forecasted a flat YOY for FY 2022 Q2 for hardware sales, which would have included the Thanksgiving, BF & Christmas period. So whatever their Q4 2021 numbers for Series were, we can use that as a general number to apply for Q4 2022 global sales.



Those were pyrrhic victories at best, though, and only for a specific market: USA (hence why those were tied to NPDs). The one month we have some vague concrete sales numbers to tie to for Series in 2022 is March. Outside of that, it's a crapshoot. They could've been ahead of PS5 in units in NA by 100K, 50K, 10K, or even as few as 1K.

The "insane Q4", do you mean FY 20221 Q4? Calendar year 2021 Q4? If the latter, what were those numbers? Otherwise anything Q4-related for 2022 simply can't be described as "insane" since the notable month they had in early 2022 was March, which is their FY 2021 Q3.



Do you know just how many countries there are in the world? 195. There are 195 countries in the world. Even if PS5s are in just 2/3 of those, that is still ~130 countries. Even if just half, that is ~98.

A quick look shows PS5 is sold in 103 countries worldwide. So even taking out Spain, UK, US & Japan...that is still 99 countries you aren't thinking about. Some of those markets are quite small, others are surprisingly big.

For example, in China, PS5 is estimated to have hit 1.5 million as of end of November 2022. However, a lot of those were probably imported models, versus official Chinese models. In other words, Chinese PS5 numbers are only ~ 500K behind Japan's.



If they have, it's probably no more than 1 - 1.5 million ahead. Again, we have their report to the CMA giving 63.7 million as of end-of-2021 (although that same report exaggerated PS install numbers and might've fudged them to include PS Vita, PS3, PSVR etc. which MIGHT indicate the 63.7 million for Xbox included peripherals like Kinect 2 and maybe even some 360 units, since that did not cease production until April 2016).

Actually...now that I looked up 360 production cease dates, MS's 63.7 million would have included those 360s as well. The only source I can find tracking post-2013 360 sales numbers is Statista. I cut off 2013 and 2017, since 360 production ceased in 2016 (April). They provide a total of 3.9 million 360s having been sold during that 2014 - 2016 period. So, IF Microsoft included late-period PS3 and PS Vita sales into their PS figure of 151 million in that very same report, then they either fudged their methodology between Sony's numbers and their own, or they also included 360 numbers in THEIR figure.

So, uh...this presents something rather interesting and will probably piss more of you off and I swear I'm not doing it on purpose but...well look, there's one of several ways to read that 63.7 million figure in light of this (relative MS & Sony):

[SCENARIO 1]

Microsoft:
Only includes XBO & Xbox Series numbers

Sony: Includes PS4, PS5, PS3 & PS Vita numbers

What It Shows: Microsoft intentionally used methodology for Sony's numbers that included legacy devices which were still in some phase of official production but not pertinent to PS4 or PS5 sales numbers, yet ignored doing so for their OWN products specifically with the 360, which was still officially produced up to April 2016 (and still had (albeit paltry) sales in 2017, but I've ignored those here).

What It Means: Misleading representation of competitor figures to a regulator in order to appear smaller in market share than they actually were.

[SCENARIO 2]

Microsoft:
Included 360 numbers alongside XBO & Xbox Series

Sony: Included PS4, PS5, PS3 & PS Vita numbers

What It Shows: The 63.7 million does in fact represent sold-through for XBO and Series, but ALSO 360 which according to Statistia's 2014 - 2016 (again, just ignoring 2017 and onward from here for 360) was 3.9 million. So, this mean if XBO was at let's say 50 million, and 360 for 2014 to 2016 was 3.9, then that's 53.9 million between the two, meaning Series sales at end of 2021 were at...9.8 million sold-through.

What It Means: Technically would mean Series were still tracking ahead of XBO (remember, it was 10 million sold-in by November 2014, not sold-through) and 360. But it also means any sold-through estimates higher than 10 million by end of 2021 are simply fake estimates.

It also reinforces the likelihood of the Ampere report of 13.8 million Xboxes by August 2022 being accurate, and maybe referring to sold-through. But realistically may also put a cap of total Series sales numbers by end of 2022 to a range between 16.5 million to 17 million. Which basically would reinforce the statement that yes, Xbox Series may actually be tracking behind XBO as of its 26th month on market (16.5 million to 17 million sold-through vs 18 million sold-through).

So here's where you're forced to make a choice. Either accept that Microsoft presented misleading figures of competitor install base numbers to regulators (when they didn't need to; Sony provide actual sold-through numbers for PS4 and PS5 rather regularly) by mixing in legacy devices but failing to do so for their own product line (making the figures being compared worthless, since the methodologies differ), OR....Microsoft's figures presented to the CMA also factored in the 360 (a legacy device that nonetheless is still part of their Xbox hardware line and was still manufactured up to April 2016), meaning Series sold-through is lower than even my earlier estimates, let alone yours or those wanting to claim higher sold-through by end of 2021.

Again, if MS's transparency with their data being presented wasn't so muddled and obfuscating, these scenarios could be avoided. Since they aren't, though, and since you guys convinced me to look at the report MS provided to CMA again, welp...now we're in a scenario where MS either misled a regulator outright, or factored in a legacy console device which would've cut into Series sales if the accepted assumption is that Xbox Series sold ~ 50 million units.



Damn, you don't think she's thicc? 😔

When you’re down to throwing in Xbox 360 numbers to try to diminish Xbox Series sales, you know you’re on the wrong path.
Holy shit some of you must have stock in Microsoft they way you are debating. Microsoft would be shouting from the hills if they were leading console sales.

MS is a huge company;divisions within divisions which makes accounting difficult for outsiders trying to glean info.

Try to read conversations in threads before jumping in. Because not a single person in this thread - or even alive - claims MS is leading in hardware sales.

Here's a thought exercise for everyone: take the % of Xbox players that bought a popular Xbox game from last gen and apply those sales percentages to the total sales of a current Xbox game that's doing well. The number of units might give you an idea of how the current gen is doing

With Gamepass in the mix, why would you even think this would be a sensible method to estimate hardware performance? Why?

Back on topic though...I know it can be a bit hard to think other global markets contribute so much to PS5 sales cumulatively, but it's not that hard to believe with a bit of research. For example, I linked earlier ITT that 1.5 million PS5s have been sold in China as of November 2022. Most of those are import units, but the point is to show that the Chinese market (as one example) for PS5 isn't that far behind Japan, which is usually considered one of the "Big 3" markets (Japan, US, Europe).

The same article you linked pointed out that the bulk of that figure is imported and already counted in sales for other countries, including the 2 million sold on paper in Japan. Official sales in China were reported at around 675k units. Yet you’re deliberately and misleadingly double-counting with the 1.5 million number.
 
what's the bet

It's a bet as to whether the deal will be approved by all major regulators with or without concessions. We don't consider the 10 year commitment by Microsoft to offer COD to Playstation to be a "concession" since Microsoft was likely always going to keep COD on PS for that long regardless, and it doesn't in any way limit what Microsoft can or can't do with Activision. So I guess a concession needs to be something that the regulators make Microsoft do, likely something they wouldn't want to do, as in something that somehow limits their level of freedom in how they can make use of activision blizzard king going forward. A major divestiture of one of the big gaming assets would qualify also.

Depending on who loses, we have to buy the other a game of their choice.
 
Because the base isnt as far a part or and because people are already associating COD with Xbox brand....
"Despite the PS5 and PS4's larger install base, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's sales are relatively even between PlayStation platforms (representing 54% of sales) and Xbox consoles (representing 46%). "
 
Top Bottom