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View Full Version : Analysts: Halo 3 "cannibalizes the industry"



Scott
10-21-2007, 12:56 AM
The biggest news to come out of the industry-tracking NPD Group's September US retail sales figures yesterday was that Halo 3 sold 3.3 million copies and helped push Xbox 360 hardware sales in a big way. Today, a handful of industry analysts added a bit more shading to the story with their own interpretations of the numbers.

Jesse Divnich, analyst for the gaming-prediction market simExchange, accused Halo 3's blockbuster sales of cannibalizing the market.

"The most curious result was that all other games severely underperformed the prediction market's expectations, indicating that Halo 3 had a substantial negative effect on other major titles across the board," Divnich said. "Games that were especially impacted were the Xbox 360 games Stranglehold, BioShock, and Madden NFL 08."

Despite Halo 3's taste for its own kind, Nollenberger Capital Partners' Todd Greenwald and Wedbush Morgan Securities' Michael Pachter both saw longer-term gains as a result of the shooter's success. Greenwald called the Halo 3-spurred boost to Xbox 360 hardware sales a "best-case scenario" for publishers.

"While the success of the Wii has been great for the industry, ultimately Nintendo, and not publishers, is the prime beneficiary," Greenwald said. "It is more advantageous for third-party publishers that the Xbox 360 and PS3 grow their installed bases."

Pachter also expects the hardware boost to pay short-term dividends.

"Although sales of Halo 3 accounted for all (and then some) of the growth during the month, the game clearly drove hardware sales that will position the industry for even greater sales in November and December, when many Halo players will be ready for a new challenge," Pachter wrote.

Analysts were particularly downbeat about the performance of the PlayStation 3, with both Greenwald and Pacific Crest Securities describing the system's hardware sales of 119,000 as "dismal."

"We expect similar (dismal) results in October for PS3 hardware units as a result of Sony's low-end price reduction to $399, which does not go in effect until the last two days of the October NPD period," Wilson wrote.

Sony's 40GB PS3 is scheduled to go on sale in the US on November 2, whereas the $100 price cut on the 80GB model is already in effect.

link (http://uk.gamespot.com/news/6181357.html?action=convert&om_clk=latestnews&tag=latestnews;title;1)

The Title should be changed to "Halo: Does as expected". lol

Toxic
10-21-2007, 05:11 PM
I'm gonna start blaming all my life problems on Halo 3. Don't feel well? Halo 3. Raining today? Halo 3...

Ghost
10-21-2007, 05:33 PM
Obviously this happened.
Anyone could have figured that this was coming the moment Halo 3 was announced.
You'd have to be a pretty sad 'analyst' to have been surprised. At all.

IceCold
10-22-2007, 09:55 AM
This is dumb comparing Halo to games that came out weeks and even months before. Of course Madden wont sell a lot compared to when it first got released.

giga_girl
10-22-2007, 10:04 AM
:eek1:.. ouch!!!...they blame Halo3..
from the very start of Sept. a lot of speculation
and scenario about this game...
now this is it...!! they also blame halo3 in north america..
hmmm

Scott
10-22-2007, 10:30 AM
This is dumb comparing Halo to games that came out weeks and even months before. Of course Madden wont sell a lot compared to when it first got released.

Because people don't buy month old games, right?

IceCold
10-22-2007, 10:32 AM
because games that sell at the same pace week to week

Mr Cool
10-22-2007, 10:33 AM
Halo 3 didn't even deserve the amount of hype it received. MS/Bungie made a killing off a recycled sequel

Scott
10-22-2007, 10:34 AM
Halo 3 didn't even deserve the amount of hype it received. MS/Bungie made a killing off a recycled sequel

Actually the sales numbers prove that Halo 3 has lived up to the hype. Video gaming would be boring and stagnant without so called "recycled sequils" like GTA, Halo, FF, Ace Combat, MGS, etc, etc. Great sequils like Halo 3 keep the industry alive. Halo 3 sales figures more than prove that.

Halo 3 haters can complain all they want. The game is epic and the complaining won't make a dent in the phenominal sales numbers.

As for the PS3, those numbers are truly dismal. It looks like the PS3 is dying a slow death.

Toxic
10-22-2007, 10:36 AM
Halo 3 didn't even deserve the amount of hype it received. MS/Bungie made a killing off a recycled sequel

Recycled content is damn fun.

IceCold
10-22-2007, 10:37 AM
As for the PS3, those numbers are truly dismal. It looks like the PS3 is dying a slow death.

You can say its dying a slow death when the sales after FF13 and MGS4 come out are released, along with the likes of Dragon Quest. I guarantee the numbers will be more like 800,656 units in a month, compared to what they are now.

Only then can you tell where the actual PS3 is going to be at. Its not as if they have had any games to compete with even, at this point.

Scott
10-22-2007, 10:39 AM
You can say its dying a slow death when the sales after FF13 and MGS4 come out are released, along with the likes of Dragon Quest. I guarantee the numbers will be more like 800,656 units in a month, compared to what they are now.

Only then can you tell where the actual PS3 is going to be at. Its not as if they have had any games to compete with even, at this point.

With the PS3 it's the same old "wait until this" and "wait until that". I heard that speech about Lair and HS.

The 360 will have Mass Effect, Splinter Cell 5, Alan Wake, Huxley, Fable 2 not to mention that if past games are any indication, DMC, Assassin?s Creed, CoD4 and GTA IV will probably run better on the 360.

Cov3rt
10-22-2007, 10:41 AM
Any publisher that chose to release a new game within 4 weeks of Halo 3 only has itself to blame. Everyone was aware that all other software was going to perform poorly in the wake of Halo 3.

Scott
10-22-2007, 10:42 AM
because games that sell at the same pace week to week

Calm down, clam down. Let's try to form some coherent sentences.

I know what your first post is saying, but it can go both ways. It's reasonable to think that a game like Bioshock would of had more sales if Halo 3 was not released. Even games like Madden were hit. Madden 08 sold a 100,000 copies less then Madden 07 did in the same month.