Well, the silly season is here. In the UK, the 'silly season' is the summer months of June, July and August when news outlets seemingly pull news stories out of their, well you know...down there. Anyway, in that spirit HERE
is a little news story about a market projection for the sales of Next Generation consoles. The article states that PS3 will, at best, only have about 50% of the market, it then continues to tout 40%, at best, for X360 and 35% for Nintendo.
Analysis
What does this really mean? It means that the market research company DFC doesn't get it.
The two things that make any sense in this article are a) PS3 and Xbox having nearly 100% of the market between them, and being close in terms of sales, and b) the comments about developers worrying that PS3 is too hard to develop for.
Nintendo getting 35% is a very optimistic estimate. If we're bing that optimistic for a console that is moer than a year away from launch and has yet to see the light of day in development kit form, then why are we being so pessimistic about PS3 and Xbox?
PS3 and Xbox 360 dev kits are out there. Many of the comments about both systems alledging that they are hard to code for or whatever have been made by folks who had not seen the actual hardware yet. IBM, Sony and Microsoft have all indicated that developer support for these new systems is good. Don't expect this to be an issue with games development.
Here's my unscientific market research projections for sales of the three. PS2 has a 70% share, I think that will decline to about a 60% share. Xbox has currently got about 15%, I see that increasing dramatically to at least 30%, perhaps a little more. Nintendo will I think hit maybe 20%. Add it all up and you get 110%, that's OK, I think that there will be an overlap where 10% of console users get more than one of the next generation machines. Mostly this will be Nintendo. I see most people buying either a PS3 or an Xbox 360 as their primary console, and a Revolution as an extra. It will run all those old Nintendo games, so it is a good fit for an 'extra' console.
I also believe that the total gaming market will increase. Sony sold 90 million PS2s, I believe that they will sell at least that many PS3s, perhaps more than 100 million. Microsoft needn't worry, I believe that they will sell at least 50 million consoles, probably more.
Nintendo better start making their games run on Sony and Microsoft hardware, it's only sensible after all....
Who knows, my projections are at least as accurate as those by DFC and what's more they're backed up with an inderstanding of IT, consoles and the history of the market.
~Highlander
What does this really mean? It means that the market research company DFC doesn't get it.
The two things that make any sense in this article are a) PS3 and Xbox having nearly 100% of the market between them, and being close in terms of sales, and b) the comments about developers worrying that PS3 is too hard to develop for.
Nintendo getting 35% is a very optimistic estimate. If we're bing that optimistic for a console that is moer than a year away from launch and has yet to see the light of day in development kit form, then why are we being so pessimistic about PS3 and Xbox?
PS3 and Xbox 360 dev kits are out there. Many of the comments about both systems alledging that they are hard to code for or whatever have been made by folks who had not seen the actual hardware yet. IBM, Sony and Microsoft have all indicated that developer support for these new systems is good. Don't expect this to be an issue with games development.
Here's my unscientific market research projections for sales of the three. PS2 has a 70% share, I think that will decline to about a 60% share. Xbox has currently got about 15%, I see that increasing dramatically to at least 30%, perhaps a little more. Nintendo will I think hit maybe 20%. Add it all up and you get 110%, that's OK, I think that there will be an overlap where 10% of console users get more than one of the next generation machines. Mostly this will be Nintendo. I see most people buying either a PS3 or an Xbox 360 as their primary console, and a Revolution as an extra. It will run all those old Nintendo games, so it is a good fit for an 'extra' console.
I also believe that the total gaming market will increase. Sony sold 90 million PS2s, I believe that they will sell at least that many PS3s, perhaps more than 100 million. Microsoft needn't worry, I believe that they will sell at least 50 million consoles, probably more.
Nintendo better start making their games run on Sony and Microsoft hardware, it's only sensible after all....
Who knows, my projections are at least as accurate as those by DFC and what's more they're backed up with an inderstanding of IT, consoles and the history of the market.
~Highlander
