The NPD numbers for March 2007 have been released, and, as usual, everyone has their own spin. First of all, let's look at the raw numbers (politely cribbed from Joystiq):
- Nintendo DS: 508K
- Sony PlayStation 2: 280K
- Nintendo Wii: 259K (2.1 million total)
- Microsoft Xbox 360: 199K (5.3 million total)
- Sony PSP: 180k
- Nintendo Game Boy Advance: 148K
- Sony PlayStation 3: 130K (1.2 million total)
- Nintendo Gamecube: 22K
- Microsoft Xbox: N/A
All kidding aside, the Xbox 360 is still performing well, with 4 360 titles in the top 10. These titles are: GRAW 2 (#2, 394K), Guitar Hero II with guitar (#3, 291K), Major League Baseball 2K7 (#8, 165K), and Def Jam: ICON (#10, 148K). Gamerscore Blog gives its take on the numbers, noting that Guitar Hero II sold an average of 2500 copies an hour. Also noted was that the Xbox 360 maintained a record breaking attach rate for the eighth month in a row (5.7 games per console).
For the first three months of 2007, the Xbox 360 has sold approximately 721K units in the US. Combined with worldwide sales, Microsoft seems poised to meet its projection of 12 million sold by the end of the fiscal year in June.
[Via Joystiq]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-23-2007 @ 4:45PM
Tony said...
I saw these numbers not too long ago and it was weird to see GH2 that high. It was only out like, what, five days in March?
To me, the biggest thing of interest is that while the Wii continues to sell like crazy, no one seems to be buying many games aside from Wii Play (and that comes with a remote that has been hard to find in many places).
There's all this fury around 3rd parties getting more games on it and how every one else is missing out, but I'm honestly wondering if anyone but Nintendo is going to get much out of the whole thing. Even in Japan, it's basically just Wii Sports and Wii Play every week.
Reply
4-23-2007 @ 5:02PM
iRoy said...
Who keeps buying PS2s?
Are they going into aircraft seats or something?
Reply
4-23-2007 @ 5:15PM
John said...
sigh
im loving my 360, its ruddy awesome lol
I wish it was made by sega instead of Microsoft, then itd sell like hotcakes
lmao
Reply
4-23-2007 @ 5:20PM
Jon said...
Great news on 360 attach rates. That's the kind of thing that will sway developers over to the platform.
Reply
4-23-2007 @ 5:20PM
Matt said...
PS3fanboy was quick to point out that the 360 had a 12% decline over the previous month. I completely expected this considering the growing Elite rumors. I strongly feel people held off on buying the 360 because of this.
Reply
4-23-2007 @ 5:28PM
3cubedminus3squared said...
The Sony fanboys put a spin on anything.
Its amazing to think that DefJam sold that much. Anyone know how many it sold on the PS3?
Reply
4-23-2007 @ 5:51PM
SuicideNinja said...
I wonder what people who buy PS3's (that have played Xbox 360's) do with them. I think brand name is about all that is driving it at this point.
There still isn't anything spectacular for games, and it doesn't do any of it's "features" well in my opinion. The next game I want for it is a couple months away. It's kind of annyoing to have a console that just sits there. At least the Wii sees action when people come over.
I really want to see what will happen with these dueling consoles when Halo 3, Final Fantasy XIII, Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Metal Gear Solid 4, Blue Dragon, and Lost Odyssey come out. We'll see sales all over the place...but will they be about even?
Reply
4-23-2007 @ 5:56PM
jesse said...
You do realize that the attach rate calculated for the month is increased if the sales numbers are depressed. With Microsoft's current numbers slowing to about 300k sold per month world wide, it will be a very long time until they reach their goal of 12 million. In fact, as of June 1st they'll probably just barely crack 10 million units sold world wide.
Of course, Microsoft's goal isn't units sold, it's units shipped. And as they showed in the past, you can have 2 million more units shipped than sold.
Reply
4-24-2007 @ 12:01AM
ShaleX said...
jesse:
Right or wrong... that dosen't change the fact that Xbox 360 games are consistantly in the top 10 selling games for any given month. Point is, No matter what, more Xbox 360 owners are buying games then PS3/Wii owners. And in some cases, PS2 and DS owners.
PS2 has been out 7 years and had 2 games on the list. Wii has been FLYING off the shelves, and has one game on that list. DS is the best selling game system in the world, right now, and had 2 games. Xbox 360... the "Supposedly dead console.. blah blah, sales numbers" had 3 games up there, one of them costing $90 and that one was only out 3 days.
Reply
4-24-2007 @ 8:24AM
hah ha said...
Words from game developers. It is easier and cheaper to start games on PS3 then port to 360. Many third party games to take this route in the future, so get ready for PS3 ports fanboys.
Poor port quality from 360 to PS3 has become an obvious issue, but PS3-specific titles look so much better. Eggebrecht explains the situation: "They created the 360 engine with a unified memory architecture in mind, with the embedded frame buffer with its advantages and disadvantages, and not thinking too much in early stages about multicore. If you try to get that over to the PS3, you're in for a bad surprise. The PS 3 is all about streamlining about the two different memory pools. They are separate. You don't have to do tiling because you don't have an embedded frame buffer. All of these advantages of the PS3 turn into disadvantages if you don't start making your game on the PS3. If you create first on the PS3, it is pretty easy to port it to the 360."
Reply
4-24-2007 @ 2:45PM
hah ha said...
The first-ever class on the Playstation 3's Cell Broaband Engine has just wrapped up over at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
When these MIT dudes graduate and start making games the PS3 will be number one again.
http://kotaku.com/gaming/education/mits-ps3-class-254794.php
Intel and AMD are developing multicore 8 processors like the Cell in the PS3. Looks like Sony was ahead of the crowd again further demonstrating why they will win the console war.
Reply