View Full Version : Japanese Wii launch sales figures
botticus
12-05-2006, 10:50 AM
Consoles sold: 350,358
Software:
Wii Sports - 176,167
Wii Play - 174,297
Zelda - 139,011
WarioWare - 63,954
Albatros 18: Realms of Pangya (Super Swing Golf) - 16,908
And I'm prety sure that last one is why Nintendo only launched with two first-party games in the US. 3rd party sales were cannibalized in Japan.
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3155653
Complete listing from Joystiq:
Wii hardware: 350,358
Wii Sports: 176,167
Wii Play: 174,297
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess: 139,011
Odoru Made in Wario: ,954
Swing Golf Pangya: 12,908
Ennichi no Tatsujin: 10,7
Red Steel: 9,392
SD Gundam SCAD Hammers: 9,226
Tamagotchi Pika Pika Daitouryou: 8,042
Elebits: 5,791
Chibi_Kaji
12-05-2006, 10:54 AM
Ouch, it looks bad for the 3rd Parties. Hopefully things will get better for them soon.
daroga
12-05-2006, 10:55 AM
Ouch for the 3rd party games.
I'm also very surprised in the tie-in rate with Zelda.
botticus
12-05-2006, 10:57 AM
Word is that Zelda is sold out. Anecdotal evidence: one store had 200 Wiis, 100 copies of Wii Play and Wii Sports, 80 copies of Zelda, all gone. We'll see how true that is in the coming weeks.
How did Wii Sports and Wii Play outsell Zelda? I'm guessing it's either because Zelda was simply sold out or the other titles are cheaper. Kind of a big mistep by N IMO to not have enough Zelda to go around. It's just a matter of pressing more discs right? (Not like the cartridge days when the chips could be scarce.)
shipwreck
12-05-2006, 11:18 AM
Elebits didn't even sell 6,000 units?!? Are they even going to be able to afford to pay the midget in the suit?
Zen Davis
12-05-2006, 11:23 AM
That is only for the first two days of release. That and you have to remember the casual gamers that Nintendo has picked up along the way when they released games like Brain Age (Nearly 4 million copies sold in Japan alone). They are the ones that bought Wii Sports and Wii Play. That and Wii Play came with an extra Wii-mote.
dothog
12-05-2006, 11:26 AM
3rd party sales were cannibalized in Japan.
I don't understand. The 17K in sales ate up the potential sales of other 3rd party titles? It seems to me that 3rd party titles probably didn't sell well because of the overwhelming first party sales figures. I'll click the link--maybe I should read the article first.
botticus
12-05-2006, 11:43 AM
I don't understand. The 17K in sales ate up the potential sales of other 3rd party titles? It seems to me that 3rd party titles probably didn't sell well because of the overwhelming first party sales figures. I'll click the link--maybe I should read the article first.No, just wrong choice of words on my part. What you said it what I meant. I consider all video games to be of the same species. ;)
evilmax17
12-05-2006, 11:54 AM
I want to give Wing Island a hug. :-(
Probably not a good day to be a Hudson employee. Poor guys.
dothog
12-05-2006, 12:01 PM
No, just wrong choice of words on my part. What you said it what I meant. I consider all video games to be of the same species. ;)
Ah, "cannibalize." Understood. :lol:
If you want to talk cannibalization, how about Wario's low numbers (relatively speaking)? That sort of thing will happen with a release that involves four 1st party titles for one console.
While publishers would've liked to move more games with the console, they can't complain too much: at least the smooth sales and assurances of future supplies of consoles reassure them that they'll have a Wii user base in Japan to which they can sell games. It'll all work out.
But it still doesn't take away from the low figures out of the gate. I'm really surprised Elebits only moved 6k copies. That's shocking. I would've thought the Japanese would be all over those cute little whatnots.
Anyhow, this is an interesting thread. Maybe it points to some fundamental differences in NOA v. NOJ styles of thinking? Who knows.
hohez
12-05-2006, 12:04 PM
I wonder how much the robust VC library affected actual Wii game purchase in Japan. Had we launched with all the VC games they launched with, I could have easily spent $50 on VC at release.
dothog
12-05-2006, 12:06 PM
I wonder how much the robust VC library affected actual Wii game purchase in Japan. Had we launched with all the VC games they launched with, I could have easily spent $50 on VC at release.
Me too. I still haven't spent any VC points. I nearly caved on Bonk, but I'm waiting for the VC to feature at least three games I want. Then I'll splurge.
Those damn lucky Japanese.
furyk
12-05-2006, 12:09 PM
Elebits isn't too surprising. Wii Sports/Zelda/Wii Play would all do huge numbers. Wario Ware did what it was supposed to, especially considering how many mini game games there are. Super Swing Golf being the top selling third party game is a bit surprising, but I suppose that states it's quality. NOA was pretty smart not to release a ton of first party titles right off the bat in retrospect. The DS sales will keep 3rd Parties making Wii games even though they got zonked during launch.
evilmax17
12-05-2006, 12:12 PM
I think NOJ's strategy was to launch with as many quality games as possible in order to sell as many systems as they could. If the adoption rate is huge, publishers will continue to make games for it, regardless of how poorly their launch games sold.
wbc1228
12-05-2006, 12:22 PM
How did Wii Sports and Wii Play outsell Zelda? I'm guessing it's either because Zelda was simply sold out or the other titles are cheaper. Kind of a big mistep by N IMO to not have enough Zelda to go around. It's just a matter of pressing more discs right? (Not like the cartridge days when the chips could be scarce.)
humm...
I'm guessing their gaming demographic is a different which is causing this effect. They seems to have a lot more elder gamers than we do. I don't think they can handle games such as Zelda but would be more than excited to play games such as Wii Sports and Brainage (which sold like crazy in Japan).
PS:
Just to prevent any confusion (and flaming)
I'm not saying that Wii Sports and Brain Age are for old people.
I'm trying to say that those are game that are enjoyed by people of all ages (unlike most games on the playstation & xbox)
back to the original subject of this thread
ouch............... (for the 3rd parties)
At this rate, the Wii is going to become another GameCube with great 1st party games and next to nothing in terms of 3rd party support.
banpeikun
12-06-2006, 02:04 AM
looks almost like there were two bundles--a wii sports bundle and a wii play bundle (seeing as their combined sales equal the console sales... almost)
FriskyTanuki
12-06-2006, 02:19 AM
looks almost like there were two bundles--a wii sports bundle and a wii play bundle (seeing as their combined sales equal the console sales... almost)
Wii Play came with remotes in Japan (or maybe vice versa), so that accounts for probably a lot of the sales.
Elebits isn't too surprising. Wii Sports/Zelda/Wii Play would all do huge numbers. Wario Ware did what it was supposed to, especially considering how many mini game games there are. Super Swing Golf being the top selling third party game is a bit surprising, but I suppose that states it's quality. NOA was pretty smart not to release a ton of first party titles right off the bat in retrospect. The DS sales will keep 3rd Parties making Wii games even though they got zonked during launch.
YOU may not be, but I was surprised as hell at the Elebits numbers. I would have expected it to be much higher. But we need to remember that, while not as extreme as for the PS3, there were probably a large number of these initial Wii system purchases that went to resellers. Those are the buyers that bought no games, or possibly Wii Sports/Play as those were the "hot items" (plus the whole Wii Play controller thing). We really have to see how those 3rd party games do over the next few weeks, especially as more systems get sold (and all of the original systems are in their "final" homes ;)).
Elebits just got a fairly glowing preview from IGN - wonder how it will do here? They have at least ONE sale I know about!
Here's a more complete list from IGN:
4. Wario: Smooth Moves (Nintendo, 63,954)
5. Super Swing Golf (Tecmo, 16,908)
6. Ennichi no Tatsujin (Bandai Namco, 10,763)
7. Red Steel (Ubisoft, 9,392)
8. SD Gundam Scad Hammers (Bandai Namco, 9,226)
9. Tamagotchi Pika Pikai Daitouryou (Bandai Namco, 8,042)
10. Elebits (Konami, 5,791)
11. Super Monkey Ball (Sega, 4,423)
12. Crayon Shin Chan (Banpresto, 4,248)
13. Trauma Center (Atlus, 4,107)
14. Kororinpa (Hudson, 2,416)
15. Necro-Nesia (Spike, 1,934)
16. Wing Island (Hudson, 800)
If you add up all the 3rd party they come up to about WarioWare's numbers, which I guess, overall, is probably as expected. The 1st Party games will get snapped up first, and then maybe someone picks up 1 3rd party game AFTER all those - so probably most of the 3rd party games went to people who bought several games (ie, I don't imagine too many people bought a Wii and ONLY Red Steel or Elebits, etc). It would be interesting to have some deeper stats - like a histogram of number of games bought with each system. Or at least what the average games/system is if you take out the systems bought with NO other games.
Does anyone have a link for US sales numbers? Obviously Zelda is WAY out in front, but the lack of other 1st party games (ExciteTruck really doesn't count), as Botticus said, must have really helped the 3rd parties here. I bet Rayman and Madden did pretty well, and things like Trauma Center and Monkey Ball probably did much better than in Japan.
botticus
12-06-2006, 07:59 AM
Does anyone have a link for US sales numbers? Obviously Zelda is WAY out in front, but the lack of other 1st party games (ExciteTruck really doesn't count), as Botticus said, must have really helped the 3rd parties here. I bet Rayman and Madden did pretty well, and things like Trauma Center and Monkey Ball probably did much better than in Japan.We'll need to wait for the November NPD numbers to get that; it's unfortunate the US doesn't have the accurate weekly sales data that Japan does. From what has been said, I'm betting the top sellers will be Zelda, Red Steel, Rayman, and Madden.
OK, here's an article on the Nov US sales:
http://wii.ign.com/articles/750/750168p1.html
It doesn't have actual numbers, but here's the Wii sales list:
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Red Steel
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz
Rayman Raving Rabbids
Call of Duty 3
Madden NFL 07
Trauma Center Second Opinion
Marvel: Ultimate Alliance
Excite Truck
Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2
In addition, they said Zelda sales were nearly 1:1 with console sales. Zelda was #4 on the complete console list (FF XII was 1st, Gears of War 2nd, GH II 3rd) which isn't bad considering it didn't come out till near the end of the month with a fairly limited amount of launch systems. It will be interesting to see what the Dec numbers are. Red Steel cracked the list at #20. Interesting to me that Red Steel is the next best seller as I have very little personal interest in it ;). I'm also surprised SMB surpassed Rayman but it makes sense both of those are in the top 5.
But, overall, (to stay on topic here), as we expected, much more support for 3rd party titles and a much higher attach rate for Zelda than in Japan.
FriskyTanuki
12-09-2006, 12:00 AM
I have to wonder how close "close to a 1:1 tie ratio" is and I wonder how many of those copies were sold to people who couldn't find Wiis. I know of a few, so that claim is a little inflated to me. It was a 75% tie ratio after about a week, so the other 25% jumped on a week later?
botticus
12-09-2006, 12:03 AM
I believe the NPD numbers are 476k consoles, 412k Zeldas, so somewhere in the vicinity of 85%. Substantially lower for the rest of NA, since Nintendo's press release put it at around 75% for NA. It's not really "almost 1:1" unless you look at it in context. Relative to, say, Gears, which was a huge hit, but only has about a 25% tie ratio at best, 85% is damn close to 100.
FriskyTanuki
12-09-2006, 12:17 AM
I believe the NPD numbers are 476k consoles, 412k Zeldas, so somewhere in the vicinity of 85%. Substantially lower for the rest of NA, since Nintendo's press release put it at around 75% for NA. It's not really "almost 1:1" unless you look at it in context. Relative to, say, Gears, which was a huge hit, but only has about a 25% tie ratio at best, 85% is damn close to 100.
I don't think tie ratio is that important of a figure a year after the launch, so the comparison kind of falls flat.
GameSpot (http://www.gamespot.com/news/show_blog_entry.php?topic_id=25212387&sid=6162916&tag=latestnews;title;0)stumbled upon some interesting things relating to Nintedo's 4 million Wiis shipped claim.