Game Critics Awards are one of the most sought after badges of honour in the gaming industry, but does wining Best of E3 predict a retail success or impact the sales of a video game? More »
Investors looking to score some easy green on Nintendo’s little white console may be left blue, particularly if they fall for the “red herring” that is the console’s massive install base, says one analyst.
Analyst Michael Pachter has already gone on record saying that Nintendo’s next Zelda game will hit in 2009, but a second has also pegged a Wii follow up to Twilight Princess for next year.
On Tuesday we posted the official Best of E3 awards, but do they really make a difference? Do what the critics feel are the best of the best actually translate into higher sales? UBS analyst Ben Schachter seems to think so, compiling this handy chart to prove it.
“Do awards translate into higher sales? The answer is yes, but not always. Additionally certain categories have a higher correlation between awards and sales. Since these awards began in 1998, the Best Console title has sold an average of 2.42 million units life-time in the U.S., according to NPD”, Schachter explained.
With Nintendo DS sales slowing in Japan, could Nintendo have a successor waiting in the wings? Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter think so, telling investors in a note that Nintendo “has a new handheld device ready for launch in [Japan]before the end of the calendar year”, according to a report from Edge Online.
In fact, it’s those cooling hardware sales on the DS that may force Nintendo to react, making an end-of-year announcement more likely, Pachter writes. The DS has been regularly outsold by the PSP for the past few months in Japan, with marquee software releases doing little to boost matching hardware sales.
Evidence suggests that the mid-level Xbox 360 might soon see a price drop to $US 299, and we’ve seen rumours suggesting that the imminent cut would make way for a new, 60GB Xbox 360.
With price cuts possibly on the horizon that could bring console prices closer to the Wii’s territory, should Nintendo worry? “The Wii audience is not choosing between 360 and Wii”, said Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter. “Either they will buy a Wii only, or they will buy both a Wii and either a 360 or PS3. So Microsoft is right to consider the PS3 as the competition and to ignore the Wii”.
Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter said that Nintendo’s lead over its competitors in hardware sales is no cause for alarm for Sony and Microsoft, even though console sales in the recent month saw declines Xbox 360 and the Wii declining over the month prior. Even though console sales are still within expectations, the analyst said the Xbox 360 and PS3 will see at least a $AU 53.22 price reduction by the Holiday.
“I don’t really think that Microsoft and Sony are doing badly – just doing badly in comparison to Nintendo”, Pachter said. “It makes sense that PS3 and 360 are doing about the same… instead of saying ‘what’s wrong with Sony and Microsoft,’ we should be looking at Nintendo and saying, ‘how the hell do they keep doing this?’”
Microsoft has ranged from mum to cagey on the exact source of the hardware issue that has red ringed thousands upon thousands of Xbox 360s, with Robbie Bach chalking it up to a “a Microsoft design issue”. While the President of the company’s Entertainment & Devices Division would prefer to leave it at that, a report from the EETimes lays blame on the console’s graphics chip, one made on the cheap.
