Vita Sales Get Even Worse

[The Wooster]

Vita Sales Get Even Worse

Last week's Vita sales are bad. "How bad?" Less than 20,000 bad.

Last week, Sony's John Koller claimed that the company wasn't bothered by the Vita's less than spectacular sales performance in Japan. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/115242-Slow-Vita-Sales-Dont-Bother-Sony] I wonder if that statement still stands now that weekly sales have dropped yet again. This time by 57%.

This week Sony managed to shift 18,361 Vitas, meaning a total of 500,000 have been sold in the four weeks since the handheld's launch. For comparison, the 3DS sold nearly 200,000 units more during its initial four weeks of sales.

Many Japanese retailers are offering up to a 20% discount on the Vita's current RRP in an attempt to boost sales, and many gamers are wondering if Sony is going to take a leaf out of Nintendo's book and slash the unit's price, presumably driving down sales even more. Sony, however, maintains that despite the Vita's arse-poor sales performance, it's still "selling to forecast."

While market analysts are no doubt already working on their "traditional handhelds are dead; long live the smartphone" spiels, we won't have a real idea of the Vita's overall performance until it launches in the west on February 22nd.

Source: IndustryGamers [http://www.industrygamers.com/news/sony-ps-vita-sales-nosedive-in-japan-down-57-percent/]



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[RA92]

This is what happens when you release an expensive system with arbitrary expensive storage devices and no decent initial game collection. How stupid do you have to be not to get this? Remember the initial PS3 sales? For Cthulhu's sake, Sony...

 

[Hashime]

I will get one, I will get one as soon as home brew is available for it. I am more interested in the hardware than any of the games currently out. There will be cool things possible with specs like that.

 

[Beautiful End]

I just don't see why I need one when it's not that different, or better, that what's already out there on the market for sale. And cheaper, may I add.

Honestly, I would rather to:

A) Get a PSP.
B) Get a tablet.
C) Get a smartphone.
D) Save for college.
E) Get 3DS if I'm that desperate for a handheld console.

Anyway, I see this as a deja vu from the 3DS sales. It will sell bad at first. Then they will realize their mistake and they will do something to increase sales; better games, free stuff, price drops, etc. Then it will sell alright. Then in a couple of years, we'll have no choice but to buy one and be contempt with it.

...I'm still not buying one. I am still in love with my Game Boy Micro, for some reason.

 

[THEoriginalBRIEN]

This is what happens when you release an expensive system with arbitrary expensive storage devices and no decent initial game collection. How stupid do you have to be not to get this? Remember the initial PS3 sales? For Cthulhu's sake, Sony...

This exactly.

And they were considering starting up the Playstation 4 machine?? Get it together, Sony.

 

[OldNewNewOld]

AFAIK Sony can't lower the price anymore.
Nintendo was earning at the 250$ price and they could lower the price so that they have "some" loses for every sale.
Sony on the other hand is already losing at every sale, they would lose even more.

 

[Scrustle]

I think it's too early to write the Vita off as a failure just yet. It hasn't been out for long. Maybe when more desirable games come out and the price drops it'll gather more momentum. That's what happened with the 3DS after all.

That said I still personally think the Vita is pretty stupid and I'll never buy one. And I agree that smartphones are killing the handheld gaming console market. I just don't think it'll happen just yet. Smartphones still need to convince a lot of people.

 

[unangbangkay]

It's too late for me to temper yet more of this doom-and-gloom talk, but the following two points should be noted:

1. Look beyond the raw numbers! This is more a reflection of the end of the holiday shopping rush. The 3DS' sales also dropped 50% in that same week, similar to the Vita's.

2. Japanese retailers have always been quick to mark down on almost everything, mainly because everything in Japan is overpriced. Look at the crazy, Amazon-like sales on everything from Final Fantasy to electric fans.

 

[gunner1905]

I will buy the Vita, when Persona 4 is released for it in the US, if not I won't bother.

 

[FalloutJack]

What did I say? No backwards compatibility, no interest. Welcome to Virtual Boy land, sucka!

 

[BehattedWanderer]

Wait, wouldn't that mean Sony was buying their own product back? How do you get even worse than no one buying it?

Ba-dum tsh

Actually, no. Seriously, developers. You want to do a new system? Release something we want to buy in conjunction with it. Release line up is what sells systems early on. Ay ya...

 

[Noble_Lance]

Wait a minute they were selling to forecast? So their master plan was to sell a pitiful amount of units on what is supposed to be your exciting new system. Wait for it, I'm sure in a few years Nintendo or Microsoft will buy up the corpse of Sony.

 

[laserwulf]

The price is comparable to a full console... or even a cheap laptop. Strike 1.
All of my PSP games on UMD will be incompatible. Strike 2.
Sony doesn't seem to -get- having an online store*. Strike 3.
Why would I want a Vita, again?


*With PS3 and PSP access to the PSN Store, Sony could have the Steam of console gaming. If they had sales comparable to the Steam holiday/Summer/midweek/weekend promos, I'd be much more willing to give them more of my money. Couple that with courting more indie developers (more than just Minis junk), port the rest of the PSP catalogue onto the store, actually release demos of upcoming & new games, and the PSN store might not be a joke any more. If there was also some way we could exchange our UMD games for downloadable versions (mail-in?), I probably would upgrade.

 

[Micalas]

Vita Sales Get Even Worse

Last week's Vita sales are bad. "How bad?" Less than 20,000 bad.

Last week, Sony's John Koller claimed that the company wasn't bothered by the Vita's less than spectacular sales performance in Japan. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/115242-Slow-Vita-Sales-Dont-Bother-Sony] I wonder if that statement still stands now that weekly sales have dropped yet again. This time by 57%.

This week Sony managed to shift 18,361 Vitas, meaning a total of 500,000 have been sold in the four weeks since the handheld's launch. For comparison, the 3DS sold nearly 200,000 units more during its initial four weeks of sales.

Many Japanese retailers are offering up to a 20% discount on the Vita's current RRP in an attempt to boost sales, and many gamers are wondering if Sony is going to take a leaf out of Nintendo's book and slash the unit's price, presumably driving down sales even more. Sony, however, maintains that despite the Vita's arse-poor sales performance, it's still "selling to forecast."

While market analysts are no doubt already working on their "traditional handhelds are dead; long live the smartphone" spiels, we won't have a real idea of the Vita's overall performance until it launches in the west on February 22nd.

Source: IndustryGamers [http://www.industrygamers.com/news/sony-ps-vita-sales-nosedive-in-japan-down-57-percent/]



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Did you mean 50,000 units have sold? If I'm reading your story correct, you're saying that 500,000 (300,000 more than the 3DS) have sold. So confused...

 

[Mr.Mattress]

Vita Sales Get Even Worse

Last week's Vita sales are bad. "How bad?" Less than 20,000 bad.

Last week, Sony's John Koller claimed that the company wasn't bothered by the Vita's less than spectacular sales performance in Japan. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/115242-Slow-Vita-Sales-Dont-Bother-Sony] I wonder if that statement still stands now that weekly sales have dropped yet again. This time by 57%.

This week Sony managed to shift 18,361 Vitas, meaning a total of 500,000 have been sold in the four weeks since the handheld's launch. For comparison, the 3DS sold nearly 200,000 units more during its initial four weeks of sales.

Many Japanese retailers are offering up to a 20% discount on the Vita's current RRP in an attempt to boost sales, and many gamers are wondering if Sony is going to take a leaf out of Nintendo's book and slash the unit's price, presumably driving down sales even more. Sony, however, maintains that despite the Vita's arse-poor sales performance, it's still "selling to forecast."

While market analysts are no doubt already working on their "traditional handhelds are dead; long live the smartphone" spiels, we won't have a real idea of the Vita's overall performance until it launches in the west on February 22nd.

Source: IndustryGamers [http://www.industrygamers.com/news/sony-ps-vita-sales-nosedive-in-japan-down-57-percent/]



Permalink

Did you mean 50,000 units have sold? If I'm reading your story correct, you're saying that 500,000 (300,000 more than the 3DS) have sold. So confused...

No, what he's saying is that Nintendo sold about 700,000 Units, while Sony only Sold 500,000 units. It's saying "Nintendo Sold 200,000 More then Sony Did in X Amount of Time".

OT: I knew Vita wasn't going to sell well. Maybe it will sell fine here in the States when it's launched, but I have this feeling it's gonna be a repeat of the PSP: It won't get the support the Nintendo Console will have, it won't sell at a large number, and it will be so screwed that no one will want to support it, and thus it'll become a useless piece of junk... like my Old PSP that no longer works. Nintendo just has the corner on this market, and unlike Sega who matched Nintendo, took steps to fight it, and thus made home Consoles a match instead of a Nintendo Dominated thing, no one was able to compete with the Gameboy (The Game Gear and Lynx were nice to look at but had such short battery life and were so huge, that no one was gonna stick with it when the Gameboy had Fun games, long life and fit in your pocket easily).

 

[Something Amyss]

I never pictured this selling well in Japan.

Whether it fails or not still is more of a Western thing, I think.

Of course, if it sucks in sales over here, it really is a failure.

 

[Epona]

AFAIK Sony can't lower the price anymore.
Nintendo was earning at the 250$ price and they could lower the price so that they have "some" loses for every sale.
Sony on the other hand is already losing at every sale, they would lose even more.

Can't? Of course they CAN. If they are already losing money, then they CAN lose more money to gain a bigger install base. It's called being a loss leader. Also, how do you know that Sony is losing money on every Vita sold and how much?