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March 2014 NPD (U.S. Hardware) Predictions - Closes April 14th

I don't buy the "library is vastly better" argument because January 2014 was pretty much identical to January 2013 in terms of sales...and February 2014 was pretty close to February 2013 as well. The better library isn't translating into significant YOY gains.

February's results were positively impacted by DKC: TF. Now that the game has released and has made its impact on the market, I expect a regression to follow. Something like this:

January 2013: 57K (11K per week)
February 2013: 66K (17K per week)
March 2013: 68K (14K per week)

January 2014: 49K (12K per week)
February 2014: 82K (21K per week)
March 2014: 75K (15K per week)

but wasn't March 2013 4 weeks?
(not that I think the Wii U is going to be up per week)
 
but wasn't March 2013 4 weeks?
(not that I think the Wii U is going to be up per week)

No.

March 3rd, 2013 - March 9th - 1st week - Tracking Period began
March 10th - March 16th - 2nd week
March 17th - March 23rd - 3rd week
March 24th - March 30th - 4th week
March 31st - April 6th, 2013 - 5th week - Tracking Period ended
 

prag16

Banned
but wasn't March 2013 4 weeks?
(not that I think the Wii U is going to be up per week)

Up per week would be a tall order indeed.

As for the library not making a difference per Aquamarine, I think the jury's still out. February was up (yes, DK launched) and January was down (but still up per-week), but January was absurdly anemic for everybody across the board.

May/June will be interesting. How many days (if any) will MK8 have in the May tracking period?
 
No.

March 3rd, 2013 - March 9th - 1st week - Tracking Period began
March 10th - March 16th - 2nd week
March 17th - March 23rd - 3rd week
March 24th - March 30th - 4th week
March 31st - April 6th, 2013 - 5th week - Tracking Period ended

oh yeah, I just remembered my own post earlier in this thread >_>
 
Up per week would be a tall order indeed.

As for the library not making a difference per Aquamarine, I think the jury's still out. February was up (yes, DK launched) and January was down (but still up per-week), but January was absurdly anemic for everybody across the board.

May/June will be interesting. How many days (if any) will MK8 have in the May tracking period?

Two days (May 30th, 2014 + May 31st, 2014).
 

Abdiel

Member
I seem to remember (i think it was you) that hinted XB1 selling poorly in Feb. At least based on your regional data. I'll try to find the thread.

Edit: Found it, but i dont want to go off topic. We'll see i guess.

[360] 100k
[3DS] 120k
[PS3] 80k
[PS4] 310k
[WIU] 50k
[XB1] 400k

Yeah, Feb. numbers our district didn't match quite exactly with the performance nationally, so I've tried to make sure I look at a larger selection of districts before commenting again, as I referenced in my post above. I was fairly surprised by exactly how much better it did (Though, perhaps it was more just how low the numbers were for everyone in January, cause I was surprised how much everything jumped... Wasn't really surprised by the PS4, because of how little we'd received, barely anything in that month)
 

prag16

Banned
Two days (May 30th, 2014 + May 31st, 2014).

Hmm. I think it should still chart. May isn't exactly full of barn burners. Then again I don't know what I'm talking about. The hardware bump could be tough to really gauge since it could get split between months. The real test could be what happens in July. (I don't mean the test to see whether Wii U is dead or not; I mean the test to see if it's dead or already decomposing.)
 
[360] 87K
[3DS] 98K
[PS3] 94K
[PS4] 297K
[WIU] 72K
[XB1] 328K

Going to XB1 in March. The marketing push was too much for Sony and Second Son.
 
[360] 102K
[3DS] 155K
[PS3] 97K
[PS4] 466K
[WIU] 82K
[XB1] 465K

riot2.gif
 

vinnygambini

Why are strippers at the U.N. bad when they're great at strip clubs???
Most likely going to be a terrible month once again for me, but here goes nothing:

[360] 117K
[3DS] 149K
[PS3] 102K
[PS4] 326K
[WIU] 72K
[XB1] 335K
 
[360] 150k
[3DS] 200k
[PS3] 100k
[PS4] 400k
[WIU] 50k
[XB1] 900k
[PSV] 156 units

So Xbox One will have the greatest March performance out of any console in the 21st century? It will surpass the previous record by 180K units? Titanfall was just so RIDICULOUSLY successful that Xbox One will be the best selling console by far in the USA?

Microsoft and EA have bragged and bragged about ridiculously high March sales? Consoles are flying out of the stores and Microsoft can barely keep consoles in stock? It's peak holiday season?

No? No to all of the above? Well okay then.
 

Abdiel

Member
So Xbox One will have the greatest March performance out of any console in the 21st century? It will surpass the previous record by 180K units? Titanfall was just so RIDICULOUSLY successful that Xbox One will be the best selling console by far in the USA?

Microsoft and EA have bragged and bragged about ridiculously high March sales? Consoles are flying out of the stores and Microsoft can barely keep consoles in stock? It's a peak holiday season?

No? No to all of the above? Well okay then.

That was the most polite snark I've read on GAF, and it genuinely made me laugh. Cheers!
 

vinnygambini

Why are strippers at the U.N. bad when they're great at strip clubs???
So Xbox One will have the greatest March performance out of any console in the 21st century? It will surpass the previous record by 180K units? Titanfall was just so RIDICULOUSLY successful that Xbox One will be the best selling console by far in the USA?

Microsoft and EA have bragged and bragged about ridiculously high March sales? Consoles are flying out of the stores and Microsoft can barely keep consoles in stock? It's a peak holiday season?

No? No to all of the above? Well okay then.

 
Edit: You guys already clarified to him that I work for Best Buy, haha. But, as to some of the other comments, I can say that I have looked over the larger district spreads on really slow days for our store, just to see what it looks like. Seeing some of the Cali districts (San Diego, San Fran, and LA are all their own district structures) and the numbers are very, very similar in terms of how they break down, just with much LARGER amounts. Stores in my district might get 100 PS4s in a single shipment and 50 XB1s, the LA and SD districts will be getting 2-3 times that many, depending on the store. But the spread of demand is still very similar to what I see in my district every week.

That's interesting. I definitely expected it to be at least close. I guess with the lack of Titanfall sales PR and price slashing/bundling, I can't be surprised though.
 
But I'm looking forward to seeing that wedge diminish with Titanfall in the March NPD period. I don't expect Sony's Infamous: Second Son to perform nearly as well as Titanfall will, but I don't expect a >300K discrepancy this month that would leapfrog Xbox One over PS4 once more.
I would've been sure about TitanFall too, if the 360 version released that month. I don't think it's even out yet.

But I have been surprised how the ratio of sales right now just make the XBO demolish the PC version. They did their marketing well.

EDIT: After last month's #s I don't feel confident posting anymore #s, least for now, but I do think PS4 will still win March. Probably by no more than 20-25k tho. TF sales were probably very good but most people who wanted the game were already buying systems at launch and in February.
 
S¡mon;107160356 said:
Wii U
Hooray, Nintendo will sell 100,000+ Wii Us - but only just. Nintendo, just like Sony, will also profit from a small number of sales by customers who were looking forward to Titanfall, only realizing afterwards that Titanfall is not on Wii U.
? Even in-the-know gamers tend to forget about COD games coming out on Nintendo platforms. Who'd ever picture TitanFall dropping for the Wii U?

No offense to Wii U fans/owners, mind you.
 
I think both PS4 and XB1 are going to do over 400K each in March. Pretty big numbers. Wouldn't be surprised to see one of them sell more than 500K (or both...no idea which will do better, honestly).

5 week month vs. 4, TF bundles + price drop, and massive PS4 shipments. Both systems are going to sell tons for March.
 

ascii42

Member
I think both PS4 and XB1 are going to do over 400K each in March. Pretty big numbers. Wouldn't be surprised to see one of them sell more than 500K (or both...no idea which will do better, honestly).

5 week month vs. 4, TF bundles + price drop, and massive PS4 shipments. Both systems are going to sell tons for March.

Same. Even with flat weekly sales, the PS4 would be above 330k, and all signs point to much more supply. I haven't had the guts to put either system over 500k though.
 
here we go, I'm getting back into the top50 for March.


[360] 115K
[3DS] 145K
[PS3] 110K
[PS4] 372K
[WIU] 69K
[XB1] 368K


Theory: Sony stocked 100K more this month, sold out. MS bizarre streak of inability to sneak past (restricted stock) PS4 sales continues for one more month.
 

A_Gorilla

Banned
here we go, I'm getting back into the top50 for March.


[360] 115K
[3DS] 145K
[PS3] 110K
[PS4] 372K
[WIU] 69K
[XB1] 368K


Theory: Sony stocked 100K more this month, sold out. MS bizarre streak of inability to sneak past (restricted stock) PS4 sales continues for one more month.

I think far more than an extra 100k was put in stock. Every Gamestop in my area has had PS4s in stock since early March, enough so that you can reserve them online before you pick them up. Unless demand plummetted this past month (maybe who knows?), I think it was more than 100k extra PS4s.
 

Dire

Member
[PS4]335k
[XB1]297k

Microsoft/EA never made any announcement regarding Titanfall numbers beyond "hundreds of thousands playing." Sony for their part also never made a 7million units sold announcement. The mutual lack of announcements alone probably doesn't mean THAT much, but there's more. In the early part of the month Amazon was the only source for PS4s and even though they ended up #1 for the month on there, they were moving rather slowly and are now widely available. I think that's enough to support the idea that PS4's aren't exactly blowing off the shelves anymore. Microsoft doing price cut after price cut to the point of basically trying to give away XBone's also leads me to believe that they're not really seeing anything like what they were banking on from Titanfall.
 

JaguarCROW

Member
[360] 98k
[3DS] 140k
[PS3] 92k
[PS4] 400k
[WIU] 95k
[XB1] 340k
[PSV] 70k

I think that Microsoft and EA have been too quiet on March results for Titanfall to have the impact they were predicting. I also think Sony has done a much better job in March of shipping consoles to retailers (especially now that they have launched in Japan). Just a quick check of my local Target this past weekend showed again 3+ XB1s in stock (with multiple Titanfall bundle units and $449 as the listed price), but 0 PS4s left in stock.

Overall I am very interested to see how it shakes out (especially globally for March).
 
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