OFFICIAL August 2008 NPD: Second verse, same as the past ~20 months

[Xisiqomelir]

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=12761777

Hardware Unit Sales

PlayStation 3 185.4K
PlayStation Portable 253.0K
Playstation 2 144.1K
Xbox 360 195.2K
Wii 453.0K
Nintendo DS 518.3K

Top 10 SKU's August 2008
(includes CE, GOTY editions, bundles, etc. but not those bundled with hardware)
Publisher Release Date Rank # Units

360 MADDEN NFL 09 ELECTRONIC ARTS Aug-08 1 1.0mm
PS3 MADDEN NFL 09 ELECTRONIC ARTS Aug-08 2 643K
PS2 MADDEN NFL 09 ELECTRONIC ARTS Aug-08 3 424.5K
WII WII FIT NINTENDO OF AMERICA May-08 4 394.9K
WII MARIO KART NINTENDO OF AMERICA Apr-08 5 328.7K
WII WII PLAY W/ REMOTE NINTENDO OF AMERICA Feb-07 6 200.2K
360 SOUL CALIBUR IV NAMCO BANDAI GAMES OF AMERICA Jul-08 7 174K
360 TOO HUMAN MICROSOFT Aug-08 8 168.2K
WII MADDEN NFL 09 ELECTRONIC ARTS Aug-08 9 115.8K
NDS GUITAR HERO: ON TOUR ACTIVISION BLIZZARD Jun-08 10 111.2K

[boffo]

Thanks for posting as per usual. Some rather bland looking numbers there all around. I'll post up some analysis of it all sometime tomorrow.

[Xisiqomelir]

Originally Posted by boffo

Thanks for posting as per usual. Some rather bland looking numbers there all around. I'll post up some analysis of it all sometime tomorrow.

You're welcome! Here's a preliminary analysis from me: MGS is going to divest themselves of Silicon Knights as soon as they possibly can.

[Darth Daver]

Wow, they are even more boring than usual. The only thing that is of any interest is the 360 beating the PS3, but with the price cut/new model they should've sold way more.

[boffo]

Fortunately business should start picking up from here. Although I don't think anyone will be wowed by the MS sales seeing that this was their clearance sale month. Can't help but make you wonder if the new price drop is going to make much of a difference.

[epfrndz]

mehh Microsoft has foreseen a great competitor...

yep, thats what i think the price cut is for...

PS3 all the way!

[boffo]

Here goes my monthly statistical analysis of all the numbers.

A rather slow month that saw each console sell fewer consoles than they did last month. The 360 saw the smallest drop as it only fell 4.9% while their 195,000 units sold was their 3rd lowest of the year barely ahead of April and May when they sold 188,000 and 187,000 respectively. The PS3 continued to fall back to earth after the MGS4 boom as they dropped 17.7% from last month for their lowest sales month so far this year just behind the 187,000 they sold in April. The Wii saw it's sales drop for the 5th straight month and had their 2nd consecutive drop of over 100,000 units dropping 18.4% from last month. It was their 3rd lowest selling month this year ahead of the post holiday shortage in January and February when they sold 274,000 and 432,000 units.

Lifetime sales have the Wii continuing to pull away from the pack at 11,861,000 which is almost a million clear of the 360 which is now at 10,893,000. The PS3 has 3rd place firmly locked up still at 5,265,000.

All three consoles also sold well below their current lifetime monthly averages. The 360 continues to do the worst when compared to it's whole life cycle as it sold roughly 125,000 less than it's lifetime average of 320,382 per month. The PS3 was about 55,000 under it's monthly average of 239,318. The Wii sold well below it's average for the first time since the beginning of the year as it was about 86,000 under it's lifetime average of 539,136.

Year to date sales saw the PS3 surpass the 2 million mark as it has reached 2,019,000 so far in 2008, well behing the Wii at 4,491,000 but still solidly ahead of the 360 at 1,742,000. Those work out to monthly averages of 561,375 for the Wii, 252,375 for the PS3, and 217,750 for the 360.

Historical comparisons show the 360 sold 205,000 units in August of 2006 vs. 277,000 in August of 2007 and now 195,000 for August 2008. Last year was the month leading up to the release of Halo 3 so that likely explains the larger number sold last year. The PS3 sold 131,000 last August compared to 185,000 this year. So far the PS3 is the only console to have increased their sales numbers year over year in each month so far in 2008, a trend that will likely continue since the PS3 had weak sales in both September and October of last year. The Wii saw a small increase from last year as it went from 404,000 sold in 2007 vs. 453,000 this year.

Through August of 2006 the 360 had sold 1,807,000 consoles compared to 1,695,000 through August 2007 and 1,742,000 to this point so far this year. Despite it looking like it has been selling less based on the other numbers it has actually been relatively consistent each year. We'll see if that continues next month with the price drop of '08 competing with the Halo 3 release of '07. The PS3 continues it's improved year as it is still just short of doubling last year's sales totals through August. It had sold 1,054,000 to this point last year against 2,019,000 so far this year. The Wii has also seen a big jump as it has sold 4,491,000 this year while it had sold 2,939,000 through August of last year.

[Spindel]

Originally Posted by boffo

*snip*... The Wii has also seen a big jump as it has sold 4,491,000 this year while it had sold 2,939,000 through August of last year.

This most probably is due to the upped production numbers of the Wii since it's more or less consistently sold out in most places (and don't forget that still a large part (larger than usual) of Wii shipments have gone to Europe instead of US during many months of this year).