Video Game Sales Slump

[Griking]

Link

OMG It's the end of the world. the sky is falling. The industry is crashing. :P

[cyberfluxor]

I'm not really too suprised. Shortages on the 360, like most say, cuts back a decent chunk of money. I'm sure it'll go up the second the PS3 and Revolution get off. Not to mention, the current amount of 360 games are small. Once that gets to a decent size of games people will buy it for those titles.

[Joker T]

Not suprised one bit either. Lack of Huge blockbusters and shortage of xbox 360 systems it was bound to happen.

[swlovinist]

Games and game sales are a very unstable market of peaks and valleys. Right now, we are seeing a very unstable market that I feel is ready to at least correct itself. We are at a pivotal time in which gamers are choosing what all their gaming machine must be(and how much they are willing to spend on it). The more choices the public has on games and systems(the current three with three main portables, followed by the next gen three choices) the more divided they will become. This next year, billions are at stake, with many 3rd pary compaines taking fewer risks due to high development costs. Nintendo, Micosoft, and Sony will face off for Round 2, with much higher stakes this time around. All of them I do believe are going to be going to start expermenting with downloadable games and content for a price(Xbox marketplace and Nintnedo's older games for the Revolution) I forsee in the the next 5 years many more games being able to be downloaded straight to a console, and less games made on disc, cutting out Gamestores which push used game sales(which do not help the game producers at all). The big question I have for this next gen is...Can they push a $60 game price right next to a used $14 game that offers the same gameplay and near graphics experience? Only time will tell, as I dont see a total crash but rather a wake up call...one that is far overdue.

[Arkaign]

Well this is natural, economies around the world have been flagging .. the music and movie industries have already hit well-publicized walls .. only a matter of time before the remarkable growth in gaming was checked.

It won't last forever

[Tanis178]

it's the first christmas in a long time that there wasn't a kick-ass game release at christmas to look forward to

[Griking]

it's the first christmas in a long time that there wasn't a kick-ass game release at christmas to look forward to

There wasn't one huge blockbuster but there were more very good games released in the past few months than in any other holiday season that I can remember without looking back. The sad things is that I can't help but think that this is a bad thing for the industry. So many of these great games will probably only have so so sales because there are just so many other great new games on the market at the same time.

Does anyone have any numbers on how sales of Shadow of the Colossus or Dragon Quest or any of the other recent games have been?

[crazyjackcsa]

Hey Griking, I agree! I've been thinking about it for a while now actually. Back in the SNES and Genesis days, I never complained about not enough games on the system, I thought there were plenty in fact. But the PS1 and 2 game libraries have grown at a huge rate. The Gamcube is roughly going to have the same about of games that the SNES had and people complain about the small library! I think these days there are actually too many games coming out, too many that get lost in the shuffle or overlooked because there is to much noise in the market to actually get a real steady building hype about any game that isn't GTA, MADDEN or HALO. Hell even RE4 on either system didn't get a huge response. Ohh sure it sold well enough, but rember when the first RE came out? It was talked about forever it gained a following if you will, one that doesn't seem to happen anymore.

[exit]

All the games I wanted came out earlier this year, the only one I havn't picked up yet is PoP:The Two Thrones. It seems that this years releases just havn't been that stellar.

[Niku-Sama]

sorry about that, i'll stop buying old used NES games and start buying new games again and that should fix it

[Ed Oscuro]

Games and game sales are a very unstable market of peaks and valleys. Right now, we are seeing a very unstable market that I feel is ready to at least correct itself.

I think the market's relatively stable; the fluctuations affect the market participants, certainly, but the overall market is fine. Small corrections (?) would be a mechanism for keeping it that way.

[orangemage]

i think it is because no one can afford gas to drive to the store to buy the games

[Kamino]

orange, get a bike.

slump? good. I'm rooting for a crash. Most new games are either the same old stale shit or too weird for words. The actual good stuff, I have to drive 75 miles to find (re:chaos field)