Can PS3 Recover?
Although some would like to think that can Wii retain hefty sales is the big question of the 7th generation we all know what is the real question. Can the PS3 recover? Actual sales wise PS3 has made a start that is apsolutely pitiful. In the American territory it has had sales that put the playstation brand to shame. Japan wise it has been replaced by the revival of the old brandname, Nintendo. In Europe it has it’s biggest fanbase but even there sales are much lesser than that of PS2 and still falling behind weekly behind the powerful force that is Wii. So can Wii recover. In this in depth analysis we’ll find out if it can.
First of all let’s go to the state of the union. Actual sales wise VGCharts has 360 at 9.77 million sold, Wii at 7.31 million sold, and PS3 at 3.31 million sold as of May 22, 2007. Shipment wise 360 has shipped 10.9 million units, Wii 5.84 million units, and PS3 5.5 million units as of the end of March 2007. Now from comparing the shipment and sales with PS3 obvious something just isn’t fitting. Especially when remembering that the sales figure is about 2 months longer than the shipments. So 2 months after Sony shipped 5.5 million consoles to retailers they’ve only sold through 3.31 million of those. 2.2 million still out their in warehouses and shelves.
So although it looks like PS3 is staying with the Wii it’s not. Many reasons support this. For one VGCharts, Media Create, and NPD sales all show that Wii is outselling PS3 by a lot. Almost a 2:1 ratio worldwide right now. That’s probably the big one.
So why has Sony overshipped so many units and why are retailers still buying it. 2 reasons to this. Sony is shipping so many cause they have to. Sony lost $2 billion last fiscal year becuase of the PS3. They can’t just have PS3’s lying around. Thus what they produce they have to find a way to sale to retailers. Which leads us to why are retailers still buying this. We all know that when retailers buy these things if they don’t’ sale they are losing money. So why is retailers still buying this. Could only be 2 reasons. Stocking up for hopefulness that PS3 will soon takeoff. Or the more dirty reason that takes off MS’s channel stuffing which they used to over ship on 360’s. So it’s one of those reasons. Either way Sony has over shipped heavily and it will soon come to bite them in the ass.
So this is very crucial into the setup as we go into this analysis. With this said, Wii is not overshipping and really somewhat in a shortage, which now it’s starting to break out of. Meaning Wii shipments are still going to be large. While PS3 shipments next quarter can’t be large at all. Retailers are losing money for having all these extra PS3’s lying around which means Sony won’t be able to ship alot. With this also Sony will be losing a hell of a lot of money if they continue production as they are. Either way next quarter is not going to be good for Sony. At most Sony will have 8 million shipped while Wii will be entering the 10 million market. 360 will be around 12 million. All of a sudden we have a hefty race in the second semester.
This is where we leave off going into S2 2007 and beyond. This is where the question will be brought up of can Sony survive. They are falling heavily behind in sales and now falling behind in shipments. And of course billions of dollars lost each quarter. Things are looking rough for Sony. Can they recover? There are many things that could support or oppose this question. Let’s unite with both and we’ll start with sales going region by region.
Japan. The land of the rising sun. If there is one spot in Japan where the sun isn’t rising it’s over Sony of Japan. If there is one place in the world where PS3 is struggling the most it’s Japan. Wii has sold 2.5 million units of hardware while PS3 has only managed 900k. Yes PS3 hasn’t even gone over the 1 million mark. And even worse is the software. Wii has sold close to 6 million in software there while PS3 has failed to even surpass the 360 in software sales, despite having sold 500k more units. PS3 has only sold 1.1 million units of software there and only has one more game to sale more units than Blue Dragon there. It’s no surprise that Japan is looking on the dark side for PS3.
Especially when 2 big Gundam games come to the system. The devs state that they won’t 2 million copies sold, 1 million of each, and you manage to sale less than 400k of those combined. And with things like that happening dev support is starting to feign away from the PS3 while more devs or more focused on Wii and DS. Japanese devs just don’t want to waste their time with the PS3 anymore. They’ll go with their already developing projects but after that kapeesh. It’s too much of a risk to develop for the PS3. High development costs, long developing times, small userbase. The question is Why develop for a console that cost more to make a good game when you don’t eve have a chance of making a 500k seller game let alone one platinum. This is what is going through the mind of Japanese devs.
So can the PS3 turnaround in Japan. Yes. Can it outsell the Wii in Japan. No. We are going to have to face the facts that Wii has won Japan. This will be explained in our second look region wise. But sales can turnaround and PS3 can sale better than the PSP and GC. But chances are it won’t catch up to the Wii. So to answer the question PS3 can recover in japan. By how much so you’ll find out in part 2 of this analysis later on in this writing.
Let’s move to North America. In North America the PS3 started off amazing. Sellouts everywhere and really kinda put the Wii hype to shame and it’s shortages off for the first month as people were so much a shooting people for a PS3. Everyone thought well maybe Japan was bad but North America is where it’s at. Then December came and sales upped and almost caught up to Wii that month. But it was downhill from there. The next 4 months PS3 put up some record low sales for playstation consoles putting the brand to shame. After holiday season PS3 has only been able to sale 600k units of hardware up til now. Even worse to this is no significant software release has been made. How is PS3 supposed to survive if no software comes out? And going into the second semester this doesn’t seem to be changing.
So in North America are their any bright sides in this early time. There is one and only one is that NA is not completely out of reach. Sony can still recover. Once again we’ll come back to this with a why.
And finally Europe/other. This is probably PS3’s biggest market thus far. Saling 800k units in it’s first week. Everything was looking great. But then what happened in America happened in Europe and since then only 160k units have been sold. Another evident case of a deep base buying immediately and then the rest fading off.
Luckily for Sony software has been pretty good which shows optimism and Sony can very well much catch up and recover in Europe.
So this leads us to our second part. It’s possible that PS3 can catch up in all territories but how and by how much. Let’s start back with Japan:
Now I stated that PS3 could recover but not surpass Wii. Well let’s look at how PS3 is going to recover. The most important reason that PS3 can and should recover in the Japanese market is because it does have big games coming to it. Titles such as Final Fantasy 13, Monster Hunter 3, Biohazard 5, Gran Turismo 5, ect. Thus at holiday season 2007 going into 2008 things should start to look up for PS3. But why not up enough to catch up to Wii? 2 reasons. One it’ll be too late. Second brandname.
I’ve talked numerous times about it’s a marathon until someone makes it a sprint. That is the case in Japan. Wii has made control for the Japanese market a dead out sprint. If their pace continues Wii could easily have 5-6 million units of Wii’s sold in by the end of 2007. And easily this will be ensured as Wii is wasting no time putting out big games in Japan while Sony lags. Wii will have all these titles released in the second semester. Games such as Dragon Quest Swords, Super Smash Bros Brawl, Wii Health, Wii Music, Super Mario Galaxy, ect. All of thse most likely coming out before PS3 gets FFXIII. And going into 2008 Animal Crossing and Mario Kart Wii are other big Wii titles to hit. With so many big titles on Wii releasing in 2007 and 2008 it would take the best lineup in gaming history to stop the Wii. Unluckily that is stopped by the second reason: brandname. Brandname is Nintendo. Everything in the gaming world in Japan has switched from Playstation and Square to Nintendo and purely Nintendo. Nintendo hardware and Nintendo games. DS did an amazing job and really cleaned up leading Wii into an almost impossible market to lose.
So with that said and done PS3 can turn it around but not enough to stop Wii.
This leads us into North America. PS3 can most definetly turn it around. But there are 2 factors that needs to happen and in this order. Pricedrop and big software releases. Unluckily for Sony no pricedrop is coming for awhile. And they aren’t just saying this to piss you off. No they have too. The PS3 is costing them close to $400 a system to make and sale. A pricedrop would only increase this. Meaning you aren’t going to see a pricedrop for a long time. We are talking somewhere in mid to late 2008 and possibly even as far back as 2009. If you see Sony make a pricedrop in 2007 and sales don’t highten up then Sony could literally go under as an entire corporation. Somehow I don’t think Sony is willing to take this risk. So as good as the S2 2007 lineup is for the PS3 it won’t matter at all unless a pricedrop occurs. It is obviously the biggest hindering on the PS3. So we’ll go deeper into after 2007 here later on. Let’s move onto Europe.
Europe can definetly be one by Sony. With even the high price so many people buying it you think they could. But slower sales after launch may put all that to shame. If PS3 doesn’t keep up with Wii in Europe then Sony has apsolutely no chance of winning this war. Big games and a pricedrop are what needs to be done here like America. No use repeating myself.
So this leads us to 2008 and beyond. We’ve figured out for pretty much everywhere 2008 is when PS3 has the best chance of turning it around. Maybe we say this because it’s the deep future and we won’t have a chance of being wrong for a very long time. But going over it it really is the only chance PS3 has. Unluckily though it may be very gilded. It is quite obvious that the Wii has taken off in 2007 everywhere. The beautiful part of this is that really none of this has happened thx to strong 3rd party developer support. And I’m not meanign quantity wise but quality wise. Wii has been getting 4th string teams from these devs. Why? Cause Wii surprised them. They had no clue this was going to happen. And if Wii does what it is predicted to do then devs will do what they arleady are doing. Completely shifting their focuse from Sony to Nintendo.
So in essence 2008 sounds great for PS3 to catch up may be the worst turnaround point chance ever as 2008 is going to be Wii’s year. Nintendo’s 3 top dogs will be gone but developer support for Wii will be to the maximum. With the largest userbase going into 2008, Wii will have the largest dev support and finally we’ll see 3rd parties putting their all into Wii games. And with the only significant 1st party game going to release is Mario Kart 3rd parties will flourish.
So if PS3 gets that much needed pricedrop in 2008 it may be at the worst time. PS3 dev support will have dropped dramatically, except for games that are cross platform with PC and 360. Exclusives will be scarce aside from 1st party. Wii will have turned this marathon into a dead sprint come 2008. No shortages. Huge 3rd party support. Mario Kart and a lot of new 1st party games will maximize Wii sales. It is very odd that many do say Wii will fade out come 2008 yet because what Wii is doing in 2007 actually makes it impossible for Wii to fade out in 2008.
So then in 2008 Sony will have to hopefully rely on that 1st party and that pricedrop to keep sales at a good pace. Will have to pass up 360 sales and keep up at a same pace as the Wii. Then we’ll have to look to a very very bright 2009-2010.
Although some of that was opinionated most of it is clear fact and some well made predictions. So here’s my opinion on this. Coming into 2007 Sony will be behind Wii by a good margin. Wii and 360 will be pretty close. But Wii will continue to sky rocket through 2008 leaving 360 behind. If PS3 price drops then it’ll surpass 360 yet I don’t think it’ll be able to keep up with Wii. By the end of 2008 things will be looking grim for 360 and PS3. Although I think as PS3 Fan said before, without Japan it was going to be hard for the 360 to win. Weirdly he didn’t know how much he was right as that lack of one region and of course mediocre sales in Europe is the sole reason why MS can’t win a generation. What PS3 fan failed to realize is how this same factor in Japan was oging to apply to the PS3 as well.
So then comes the question. 2009-2010. People saying 2008 is the year just need to get over it. It isn’t going to happen then. The turnaround just won’t happen like that. It’s going to be 2009-2010. Do I think it can turnaround and catch the Wii. Sadly no I dont’ think it can for a few reasons. By the end of 2008 dev support and sales will be with Wii. I believe it will be way way too late for Sony to catch up. Wii could easily have 40 million shipped by the end of 2008. And even with the pricedrop happening in 2008 Sony will have continued to have major losses. Possibly by the end of 2008 due to mediocre sales Sony could have lost $10 billion in the games department soley becuase of the PS3. This will shorten the lifecycle of the PS3. It’s almost about time to get real that the PS3 will not last 10 years. So my bets are Sony can’t do anything bout it and really I see this generation turning out to be more of a 60/20/20 market share. And because Wii will win the generation will start a little earlier as many have said Wii can’t last 6-7 years. It just can’t. Meaning the next generation will start in 2011. Good for Sony and MS who will have lost and won’t a new product. Especially Sony.
So in conclusion answering the stated question no PS3 can’t recover. It can catch up but not enough to win them this generation. In comes down to the sole factor that it’s a marathon until someone makes it a sprint. And 2008 won’t be PS3’s year but Wii’s year. And then Wii will have made it a sprint and PS3 won’t have enough time to turn it around.
Many people look to this topic and see bad PS3 sales and make the safe assumption of dont’ worry later in 2008 and 2009 it will all of a sudden change. But read what I’ve written and look at the facts and my ideals presented. All of this is based on the fact of Wii’s huge success in 2007 and the idea of a marathon until someone makes it a sprint. We continue here to push back PS3’s success further and further but the further you push it back the further you must push up Wii’s success. As the whole fad ideal has a very limited way of actually occuring as presented here.
So read and rethink. With the facts presented can PS3 really recover if the only time option for it to start recovering is 2009 and beyond. Especially when PS3 is still pacing itsself while Wii is sprinting for the finish line miles ahead.
I hope you enjoyed. Not one of my best quality written analysis but hope ya like it.
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the question here is...why is Disturbed so gay? lol
