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Analyst: Lifetime Switch sales to eclipse PS2, NO Switch Pro, new Nintendo console in 2024

Daniel Thomas MacInnes

GAF's Resident Saturn Omnibus
Well, I would hope the next Nintendo system arrives in 2024. I’m still expecting it to be announced next year with a release in 2022-23, right when they release BotW2. After all, Big N always closes out their consoles with a bew Zelda videogame, and they’ve already blown through their “checklist.” They can’t just release legacy titles for the next three years…right?

That said, I would be happy to be oroven wrong. I onlynhave a handful of Switch games and haven’t really spent time on the machine apart from Just Dance, Mario Kart and NSMB U Deluxe. I feel like I’ve missed everything and now we’re at the end.
 

FStubbs

Member
It's not people, it's Nintendo that group the GBC as a revision of the GB.
The reason is that Nintendo was developing a next-gen successor of the GB codenamed Project Atlantis but run into difficulties.
At the same time they were virtually uncontested in the handheld console space due to the lack of meaningful competition and had a killer app that revitalized the aging platform (first in Japan then years later in America and Europe).
The GBC lasted only 2 years and half before being supplemented by the actual next-gen successor because it was nothing more than a stopgap revision meant to ride the Pokemon success.

Ironically if the GBC was a reaction to the lack of competition, NDS releasing just 3 years and half after the GBA launch was caused by a sudden and dangerous surge of competition.
IIRC in Japan the Wonderswan (made by Gunpei Yokoi, who, you know, made the Gameboy) probably pushed them to get the GBC onto the market.
 

Celine

Member
IIRC in Japan the Wonderswan (made by Gunpei Yokoi, who, you know, made the Gameboy) probably pushed them to get the GBC onto the market.
The only thing WS prompted was a price cut to the Game Boy Pocket because Koto/Bandai smartly were trying to use the "Game Boy" strategy against the Game Boy and undercut with its price the recent GBC.
The problem for Koto/Bandai was that Game Boy triumphed not only because it was more compact, cheaper and with better battery life than competitors even if crummier from a tech perspective but also because it had much better software support.
WS could never really compete with the latter point even if it got some nice get like the exclusive support from Squaresoft (though in the beginning Squaresoft just licensed out their IPs).
 

Mozza

Member
There's going to be meltdowns when it passes PS4 without breaking a sweat in 2022 as well.

Switch truly is the gift that keeps giving.
Ah but now the console will bomb, just because Nintendo did not release the core minorities wet dream the Switch pro, no they decided to release a far more sales friendly revision, the OLED model, which has already had around 9 million views on its reveal trailer, with a very positive reception.

Of course the Steam deck will come along and take over from the Switch, or so least that's what some of these internet loonies think, but seriously how out of touch with reality are these people.
 

Marty-McFly

Banned
Switch has broken the record for consecutive NPD wins and that trend could last a long time more given it's momentum and the semi conductor shortage. It effects everyone, but Nintendo must have an easier time procuring parts at this stage than the new consoles.

It will be interesting to see how long Switch can continue to outsell the competition.
 

yurinka

Member
Take for example the NSW and PS4 curves, one can easily spot that they sold at a roughly similar pace but that in the last year NSW began selling at a much faster pace.
Yep, they had a pretty similar curve until Switch's peak went mad, I think that being on the peak covid's bump boosted its sales more. The other consoles were instead in a low part of their sales cycle so there wasn't practically anything to bump, and on top of that had the chips issue. Plus in case of covid, with all the family spending a lot of time at home, with the portable people can play in the bed, while many families may have only a single tv (or the console can be connected to the main one) and the other family members may be fighting to use it. So I think Switch may have been more benefited with covid.

Or compare the Wii curve to the PS4 one, in the latter part the steepness of the two are completely different (in favour of PS4 obviously) therefore PS4 was destined to "effertlessly" surpass Wii total sales.
Yes, after the peak Wii went down faster and got replaced and discontinued faster. This is one of the reasons of why PS4 outsold total Wii sales while ago.

(The quote is a bit out of the original order, I respond first to this argument)

I never said that NSW will have 20M+ sales for every fiscal year until eternity.
I said that currently the NSW selling pace is of a 20M+ console per FY as suggested by Nintendo's forecast of 25M Switch console sold.
My guess is that maybe even the next FY can be 20M+ FY too (BotW2 and Splatoon 3 should launch during that FY).
Covid obviously boosted the NSW sales in the previous FY however I think that even without it NSW was set to sell better than the previous FY (just not as high as 28.83M units).
Obviously any console has a start, a peak and a tail off sales pattern.
It will be interesting to witness what tail off NSW will have because the only chance it has to surpass PS2 and NDS is to have strong sales after the peak year.
Another interesting aspect about the Switch situation is that Nintendo was never forced to use the "price cut" trump card.
In the past for me Switch was easy to predict because like Nintendo I expected it to follow the same yearly sales that PS4 had each that same fiscal year when launch aligned (if ignoring the extra months PS4 had at launch). But now we have covid messing around fucking the economy and delaying games, chips shortages, the Gabe Gear maybe stealing a (small I think) part of their portable/hybrid market, Sony still breaking gaming history records with PS4 and PS5, who knows if streaming or subscription services getting some decent attention before Switch dies, MS maybe making starting comeback in a year and a half from now, no Switch big sellers after Pokemon and BotW2 in the horizon (I think their next ones will be Mario Kart 9 and the next big 3D Mario but I think they may release them as 'crossgen')...

I think in the current FY yes Switch will achieve its target, but after that its sales will drop faster as happened in the other devices, I don't see another 20M year. I thikn BOTW2 will be released at the end of the current FY or at the start of the next one. I think Splatoon 3 will sell way less, and spread over many years.

But in any case I'm sure it won't outsell PS2 and NDS because I think that even if it had this epic peak, it will go back to normal and in 2023-2024 they will release its successor (I'd bet a Super Nintendo Switch, a full BC 4K capable hybrid with hardware similar to the Gabe Boy but with a 1080p display).

No, only some Sony home consoles sold around one third of their sales after their successor has been released and that happen for consoles launched more than 15 years ago, the context now has changed.
I just double checked it and yes, PS3 sold ~15% after PS4, less than I remembered. I thought it was around a third liks PS1 and PS2 achieved. But well, that's still 2 out of 3 being their 'failure' the only exception.

I think SIE is interested in seeking the highest profitability and under that objective they will keep engaged their current active PS4 userbase and share part/most of the software releases between PS4 and PS5, at the same time they will use all their resources to allow the transition of the userbase from PS4 to PS5 as fast as possible.
SIE is aware that the massive profitability they achieved for the first time during the PS4 era is tied to a huge userbase that buy games, microtransactions (a lot of them) and services from their digital ecocystem and also that they are still tied to the concept of a PlayStation box which is why I think they will try to keep alive the software/service part of PS4 (what bring in a lot of money) for users not yet ready to get a PS5 while simultaneously pushing hard to quickly form a strong userbase around PS5 ready to spend money on games, microtransactions (a lot of them) and services on the latest PlayStation box.
Pushing new PS4 hardware sales for people that after 7 years have yet to enter the PS4 ecosystem isn't their priority (because it's not what bring in a lot of profits).

In the coming quarters we will see how the situation will evolve for PS4.
Yep, Sony gets its profit mostly from sofware (1st and specially 3rd party games, apps, subs, dlcs and microtransactions), not from hardware. During the first years Sony consoles are typically sold at a loss and then over time they reduce costs to a point they are sold at a profit, but that profit is way smaller compared to the one from software.

They basically don't care if players have a box of the another one, what they want is to keep players engaged buying games, DLC and so on. As Jim Ryan said, they know that even if they expected to have record sales, the majority of their players need some years to migrate from a generation to the next one. In this case, it may even take more time because they had like 90M MAU on PS4 when PS5 launches (now around 80M) so they knew they had to support PS4 for a while because their players will continue there for a while.

At the same time they will grow the PS5 userbase but won't ignore PS4 until the big majority of players moved to next gen (at that point every PS5 unit sold will generate a nice profit instead of loses).



Switch has broken the record for consecutive NPD wins and that trend could last a long time more given it's momentum and the semi conductor shortage. It effects everyone, but Nintendo must have an easier time procuring parts at this stage than the new consoles.

It will be interesting to see how long Switch can continue to outsell the competition.
I think chips shortages isn't affecting Switch because it has been selling on record numbers and they always had consoles in the stores. PS5 and Series X instead sell way less and it's very rare to find stock and new one get sold quickly.
 
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Marty-McFly

Banned
Yep, they had a pretty similar curve until Switch's peak went mad, I think that being on the peak covid's bump boosted its sales more. The other consoles were instead in a low part of their sales cycle so there wasn't practically anything to bump, and on top of that had the chips issue. Plus in case of covid, with all the family spending a lot of time at home, with the portable people can play in the bed, while many families may have only a single tv (or the console can be connected to the main one) and the other family members may be fighting to use it. So I think Switch may have been more benefited with covid.


Yes, after the peak Wii went down faster and got replaced and discontinued faster. This is one of the reasons of why PS4 outsold total Wii sales while ago.




In the past for me Switch was easy to predict because like Nintendo I expected it to follow the same yearly sales that PS4 had each that same fiscal year when launch aligned (if ignoring the extra months PS4 had at launch). But now we have covid messing around fucking the economy and delaying games, chips shortages, the Gabe Gear maybe stealing a (small I think) part of their portable/hybrid market, Sony still breaking gaming history records with PS4 and PS5, who knows if streaming or subscription services getting some decent attention before Switch dies, MS maybe making starting comeback in a year and a half from now, no Switch big sellers after Pokemon and BotW2 in the horizon (I think their next ones will be Mario Kart 9 and the next big 3D Mario but I think they may release them as 'crossgen')...

I think in the current FY yes Switch will achieve its target, but after that its sales will drop faster as happened in the other devices, I don't see another 20M year. I thikn BOTW2 will be released at the end of the current FY or at the start of the next one. I think Splatoon 3 will sell way less, and spread over many years.

But in any case I'm sure it won't outsell PS2 and NDS because I think that even if it had this epic peak, it will go back to normal and in 2023-2024 they will release its successor (I'd bet a Super Nintendo Switch, a full BC 4K capable hybrid with hardware similar to the Gabe Boy but with a 1080p display).


I just double checked it and yes, PS3 sold ~15% after PS4, less than I remembered. I thought it was around a third liks PS1 and PS2 achieved. But well, that's still 2 out of 3 being their 'failure' the only exception.


Yep, Sony gets its profit mostly from sofware (1st and specially 3rd party games, apps, subs, dlcs and microtransactions), not from hardware. During the first years Sony consoles are typically sold at a loss and then over time they reduce costs to a point they are sold at a profit, but that profit is way smaller compared to the one from software.

They basically don't care if players have a box of the another one, what they want is to keep players engaged buying games, DLC and so on. As Jim Ryan said, they know that even if they expected to have record sales, the majority of their players need some years to migrate from a generation to the next one. In this case, it may even take more time because they had like 90M MAU on PS4 when PS5 launches (now around 80M) so they knew they had to support PS4 for a while because their players will continue there for a while.

At the same time they will grow the PS5 userbase but won't ignore PS4 until the big majority of players moved to next gen (at that point every PS5 unit sold will generate a nice profit instead of loses).




I think chips shortages isn't affecting Switch because it has been selling on record numbers and they always had consoles in the stores. PS5 and Series X instead sell way less and it's very rare to find stock and new one get sold quickly.
According to Nintendo they are also being affected by the chip shortages.

https://www.videogameschronicle.com... to the global shortage,(via Nikkei, paywall).
 

Celine

Member
I just double checked it and yes, PS3 sold ~15% after PS4, less than I remembered. I thought it was around a third liks PS1 and PS2 achieved. But well, that's still 2 out of 3 being their 'failure' the only exception.
PS3 sold roughly 8% of its sales after PS4 was released.

My comment was less about 2 out of 3 and more about the 2 ones were the older consoles because I think the context has changed since then (PS4 was way way more profitable than PS2 even if PS4 has no chance to match PS2 sales that's because SIE focus shifted to expand the software/digital ecocsystem more that try everything to increase the hardware sales of a console which his already in the mature phase).
 
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yurinka

Member
PS3 sold roughly 8% of its sales after PS4 was released.

My comment was less about 2 out of 3 and more about the 2 ones were the older consoles because I think the context has changed since then (PS4 was way way more profitable than PS2 even if PS4 has no chance to match PS2 sales that's because SIE focus shifted to expand the software/digital ecocsystem more that try everything to increase the hardware sales of a console which his already in the mature phase).
PS3 sold a total of 'more than 87.4M'. PS4 was released November 2013, and just saw Sony announced PS3 achieved the 80M milestone that month. So you're right, 8.5%.

The number I had was ~75M and was an estimation for the end of September, the previous quarter.
 
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I'm sure Sega was thrilled to lose heaps of money with the technological competent Dreamcast.

Extremely condescending of you to boil my point down to the Dreamcast; I never said the market rewarded technological competency 100% of the time. That unfortunately was one of the cases, but there are factors well outside the console itself (or the software) which led to Dreamcast's short life.

Also for what it's worth, they sold a lot of Dreamcasts in the West from 1999 and 2000, the reason they didn't generate enough profit was because Peter Moore priced the unit $50 lower than Sega of Japan wanted but due to positive reception they felt they had to stick with $199 vs. $249. Jenovi covers it very well in one of his videos.

People buy consoles for all the qualities that represent the console and characterize its perceived value among the consumers.
The more a console perceived value is shared and agreed among the mass market the higher the console total sales will be.
There are a moltitude of factors that concurr to make a console successful.
Technological competency and innovation are only two factors among others.
Not just that but it must be attested how much the chosen "technological competency" and "innovation" actually improve the console desirability.
To cite a recent example:
The interaction between the smaller screen of the WiiU gamepad held by the player and the big TV set afar was certainly innovative however the appeal it had on the mass market (through software that used it) can be attested to have been limited.
Conversely Switch's concept of quickly and intuitively transform itself to adapt to the user lifestyle so to increase the chance to play games was also innovative and its reception among the mass market was overwhelmingly positive.

I feel like you're underselling the marketing (specifically effective marketing) element here and how it tends to have even more of an impact than most other elements to a console's success. Wii U had one of the worst marketing campaigns ever placed upon a console; Nintendo did a terrible job advertising it clearly to the Wii audience, who mistook it as an add-on. They also failed to advertise it to PlayStation/Xbox players who skipped the Wii that gen, and were itching for 8th-gen hardware to upgrade to.

The Switch has been the complete opposite in terms of effective marketing and advertising, which has been the biggest reason for its success. In terms of technological innovations it's actually not innovative at all in and of itself. However, the fact it was able to adapt that type of design to a mass-market, low-priced platform backed by their 1st party content and getting back to the Wii-era style advertising (in some ways I'd argue it's better than Wii advertising was) has helped push it to become a success.

Too bad they have gone very complacent with the Switch OLED, IMHO, but that doesn't negate the success of the Switch itself.
 

Celine

Member
thicc_girls_are_teh_best thicc_girls_are_teh_best
The marketing for Switch and Wii was better than WiiU because the concepts behind Switch and Wii are intrinsically better (more attractive, easier to understand the quality) than the concepts behind the WiiU.
No marketing could salvage the WiiU because the big problem for WiiU was that the console had a weak foundation.

If you think Switch isn't innovative at all then you are blind.
 
S

SpongebobSquaredance

Unconfirmed Member
The Wii U concept was a though sell to be honest. I couldn't really find a way to make it marketable, except If they had the right games at launch to showcase its benefits (Super Mario Maker for example). Games that could've make great use of the gamepad like sequels for Mario Paint and Zelda Four Swords for example were to far and between. In most cases the gamepad allowed for some cool features, but nothing really substantial except the gyro.

They should've just made a Wii 2. Release one model aiming for the Wii crowd and another one with a regular controller aiming for the hardcore crowd. Motivate devs to make use of both playstyles to have options. Maybe also dip their toes into VR, because it fits the gesture controls. They could've sold the gamepad as an add-on. Selling the gamepad separately would've downsized the system's productions costs and thereby they could've put better hardware into the system or sell it for a cheaper price.
 
tv1BkqM.jpg
 
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IbizaPocholo

NeoGAFs Kent Brockman

Said next-gen console might only be a few years off, if industry analyst Piers Harding-Rolls is to be believed. GamesIndustry.biz recently spoke to a number of analysts to get their predictions for gaming in 2022 and beyond, and one of Harding-Rolls’ predictions was that a new Nintendo console will debut in 2024. He also touched upon the rumored Switch Pro model, adding that with Nintendo likely releasing a whole new console in just two years’ time, he’s not convinced the Switch’s mid-gen upgrade will happen at all.
 

Kabelly

Member
switch pro and switch 2 is just playing with semantics at this point. i want the same hybrid form factor with more power. not just prettier screens with the same laggy performance. if i get that in the next console then i don't care what it's called unless nintendo decides to laugh in our faces and make a completely new non backwards compatible console.
 

jigglet

Banned
switch pro and switch 2 is just playing with semantics at this point.

Not necessarily, given their really bad track record of BC, I'd see Switch Pro as being backwards compatible while Switch 2 would burn everything to the ground (accounts system, eshop, games, peripherals) and start again: because
 

Kabelly

Member
Not necessarily, given their really bad track record of BC, I'd see Switch Pro as being backwards compatible while Switch 2 would burn everything to the ground (accounts system, eshop, games, peripherals) and start again: because
basically said what i said in the part you deleted. also, wii u had wii backwards compat. wii had gamecube backwards compat. 3ds had DS backwards compat. this "really bad track record" doesn't hold up. Digitally they have a terrible track record though. I can agree. Not having BC from Wii U to Switch made sense because of the different form factor. We shouldn't have that problem with a switch successor unless it is a completely different console.
 
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Hope it does surpass the PS2 just to put all the complainers in their place.
It’s possible. It is a handheld. So people can just say its still not the best selling home console.

I can see them releasing a Switch “Max”, thats just the same thing but with a higher resolution screen, a bigger battery, better loading speeds, and not including the dock(but still works with usb-c to hdmi unlike the lite).
 
After anticipating a Switch Pro, I hope we don't see one until 2024. Hopefully the tech is good and the system benefits from the extra time. Now that it is an Arm 64 architecture they have a great base to keep evolving. Should allow for full backwards capability, and even if the next Switch just somewhat matches today's high end cell phones for performance, that mixed with being a dedicated game system with no OS bloat, it should punch above it's weight and be truly impressive. 1080p handheld and 4k docked makes sense.

As always, I am excited to see what the eventual successor to the Switch is. Nintendo has always been the most exciting game company to follow, even though they can disappoint. You just never know what they will come up with.

Although I'd rather play it sooner, I also wouldn't mind Metroid Prime 4 debuting with it. The thought of Nintendo finally making a PS4 level, or greater, game visually makes me froth at the mouth.
 
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