Why Did Sony Lose Sales Momentum in November?
As the holiday shopping season kicks into high gear, the monthly NPD results show a surge in sales across all video game consoles. The problem for Sony is that not all surges were equal, and both of the company's platforms lagged behind competitors during the crucial sales month of November. Despite a brand new look, deep price cuts and a strong roster of upcoming exclusives, Sony's PS3 failed to outsell its rival the Xbox 360 last month. The PS3 moved 710,400 units at retail in the United States during November, while Microsoft's machine sold 819,500. Considering the favorable comparisons between the similarly-priced PS3 slim and Xbox 360 Elite, it is puzzling that consumers are still choosing the older Xbox 360 hardware over the BluRay equipped Ps3. Some have suggested that the strong sales of online shooter Modern Warfare 2 skewed the numbers toward Microsoft because users prefer its paid online subscription service over Sony's PSN. Modern Warfare 2 sold considerably more copies on the Xbox 360 platform, suggesting that this is the case.
On the handheld front, news was no better for Sony. Despite recently launching its new download-only PSP Go and introducing a plethora of potential hit games, the PSP failed to set the world on fire last month. Combines platform sales of all models of the PSP were 293,900 compared with Nintendo's impressive showing of 1.7 million DS units sold. It could be that big software releases like Assassin's Creed and Gran Turismo PSP have failed to attract new consumers to the Sony brand.
US Video Game Hardware Sales for November 2009 (October in brackets):
Nintendo DS: 1.70 million (458k)
Wii: 1.26 million (507k)
Xbox 360: 819.5k (250k)
PlayStation 3: 710.4k (321k)
Sony PSP: 293.9k (175k)
PlayStation 2: 203.1k (118k)
US Video Game Software Sales for November 2009:
1 - Modern Warfare 2 - 360 - 4.20m
2 - Modern Warfare 2 - PS3 - 1.87m
3 - New Super Mario Bros Wii - Wii - 1.39m
4 - Assassin's Creed II - 360 - 794.7k
5 - Left 4 Dead 2 - 360) -744.0k
6 - Wii Sports Resort - Wii - 720.2k
7 - Wii Fit Plus - Wii - 679.0k
8 - Assassin's Creed II - PS3 - 448.4k
9 - Dragon Age: Origins - 360 - 362.1k
10 - Mario Kart Wii - Wii - 315.0k
Modern Warfare 2 was the biggest-selling game in November, but most consumers chose the Xbox 360 version.
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Comments
kev
- December 18, 2009 10:50 PM
I can't help wondering if it was because MS banned so many of their users. A big chunk of the Xbox sales were probably Live user buying new Xboxes to get back online.