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[DrAspirino]

Ok, GAF, I know this is going to be a heated issue, but well... numbers don't lie.

I called this thread "The fallacy of exclusives" because people here seem to think that what defines the success of a console are its games and specially the exclusive ones; that most people that buy consoles are gamers (they're not) and that those gamers actually care about exclusives (they don't).

So... I want to start with some facts about the current situation in the console market:

• Xbox One sales up to february 2020: 51.51 million units sold.
• PS4 sales up to february 2020: 107.5 million units sold.
• Nintendo Switch sales up to february 2020: 51 million units sold.

Now, let's look at the top sold games for each of the 3 main console platforms up to february 2020:

Xbox One:



As you can see, only ONE of the top-10 best-seller games on Xbox One platform is an exclusive game (Halo 5: Guardians), which sold 4.92 million copies worldwide. That means that about 9.55% of Xbox One owners (best case scenario) actually bought at least one exclusive game.


PlayStation 4:



From the chart, we can see that only two exclusive games made it to the top-10 list of PS4 best-seller games: Uncharted 4 (10.33 million copies), and Spider-Man (8.76 million copies). If we take the biggest figure here (which is Uncharted) and compare it to the PS4 installed base, it means that only 9.61% of PS4 owners (best case scenario) bought at least one PS4 exclusive.


Nintendo Switch:



From the chart, 9 out of the top-10 best-seller games for the Nintendo Switch are actually exclusive games, and in the best case scenario, the exclusive that sold most is Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (13.05 million copies worldwide). If we compare it to the Switch installed base, it means that roughly 25.58% of Switch owners bought at least 1 exclusive game. That's around 2.6 times more than Xbox and PS4 users.

So... numbers show that - except for Nintendo - exclusives and games don't matter much in console sales, considering that in PS4 and Xbox one the leaders are GTA V (a game released in 2013), CoD: Black ops 3 and the yearly Fifa (in case of PS4). I.e. "exclusives matters" is just a fallacy.

Since games (and exclusives moreover) don't matter that much within the great scheme of things, what would be the factors that could induce "the average joe" to buy one console over the other?

I leave that question open to discussion, since I don't have the answers for that (I have some ideas though).

 

[Romulus]

Its spread out. As a playstation fan theres so many its impossible for all of them, or even close to be on that chart. Not to mention we get alot if them free at some point. For example I waited for Beyond Human.

 

[DrAspirino]

Its spread out. As a playstation fan theres so many its impossible for all of them, or even close to be on that chart. Not to mention we get alot if them free at some point. For example I waited for Beyond Human.

Same can be said about Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, yet the games that drive console sales are Multiplayer multiplats. (except Nintendo Switch, of course).

 

[vaibhavpisal]

It is belief among company executives (sony, ms, Nintendo) that whoever has most no of core gamer fanbase, its the winner. They are biggest game buyers and influencers as well.

If you are a casual and wanted to get a console, whom would you ask? Ofcourse your gamer friend. Even if all you wanted was to play fifa.

For them exclusives matter.

Also, one of the reasons why sony win is they have a trickle of games all the time. None of them are at halo or legend of Zelda level (few are) but you always have something to play. At least for my taste, I still have games on PS3 I would be happy to play.

 

[Blond]

That's cool and all but all that typing you failed to realize that I can't play Halo on PS4, I can't play Spider-Man on Switch and I can't play Death Stranding on X1.

I buy consoles for the games they have and nothing more. Also, look at the games you posted for the PS4 you posted the top 10 games that have MASSIVE appeal across users and are multiplayer-centric and will of course get more of a consoles audience than it's exclusives.

American Dragon: Jake Long for Nintendo DS - Sales, Wiki, Release Dates, Review, Cheats, Walkthrough

VGChartz delivers comprehensive game chart coverage, including sales data, news, reviews, & game database for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Series X, Nintendo Switch & PC

www.vgchartz.com

When you post a chart like this you'll see exclusives up and down 10-100, pretty much every major Sony exclusive has cracked the top 100 so what point are you making here?

 

[Kumomeme]

its about the mindshare...which one having lot mindshare, will have lot of user base..and here exclusives play important role..user who will buy console will perceive this information and wil be looking foward for possible long term buying decision

the issue of comparison here, is casuals player more tend towards multiplayer and casuals accesible game like gta, fifa and cod, these is behemoth in number compared to single player and exclusives user base..this is why there is tremendous different of top selling here...for ps4 and xbox one you can see top selling is casuals favourite game like gta and black ops.. there huge number of casuals compared to single or 'hardcore' player

but hey, ps4 exclusive in there as there is xb1 games like halo too..it wont be in top 10 if it not matter. But you cant compared these type of game directly as it had different numbers of audience (casuals vs non casuals).

but these less number of people who willing to pay for exclusives playing big role, its still not small number and it play important role for mindshare..for example these 9.61% average for ps4 still managed to generate tons of money for sony, those game sell alot, and even enough to bring mouth to mouth fuss that attract people to buy the console. Dont downplay the important of exclusives as simply by viewing this chart like that.

what make xbox and ps4 had tremendous differences in sales? same goes during ps360 era..what make the over expensive, not devs friendly ps3 that time managed to catch up to xbox 360? most of casuals doesnt care about power...then what it is? Its exclusives. If there is no, from the chart you show both system will have same game and sale wont be much different either, but from the chart show, we can see starting around no. 7 there exclusives listed there..which is if not important, it wont be there, sitting along with historically top selling franchise like rockstar game.

• Uncharted 4: A Thief's End – 16 million
• Marvel's Spider-Man – 13.2 million
• The Last of Us Remastered – 10 million
• God of War – 10 million
• Horizon Zero Dawn – 10 million
• Grand Turismo Sport - 8 million
• Detroit: Become Human -3.2 million
• Killzone Shadow Fall -2 million
• Bloodborne – 2 million
• Driveclub – 2 million
  
  and more..if multiplat is the cake, then those excusive is the cream on top of cake
  and dont forget, for botw, that game at launch even outsell the console(switch) itself. Nintendo been 'surviving' for all these time due to their exclusive who bring loyal customer. And we can see despite lacking the top selling game on both ps4 and xbox like gta v and rdr2, and yet around 3-4 years the console already bypass 6-7 years of xb1 sales and we can see their exclusives monopolize the top 10 chart. This is thanks to mindshare and loyal customer they had.

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

OP didn't account that the customer base on the PlayStation 4 is twice as much as the Xbox One.

Therefore, his math is factually incorrect.

 

[Pallas]

He makes a fair point though, the majority of the gaming market are casuals and they eat up the maddens, fifas, COD’s, etc. Nintendo would be the only exception since their exclusives is all they really have aside from some niche 3rd party exclusives, but they seem to be doing better with third party support altogether compare to the Wii and Wii U(would like to see a top ten list for the Wii U since it’s still technically this gen.

 

[Tamy]

I agree, in the end, for most customers, exclusive games don't really matter. Just look at the PS4 charts, they have 2 FIFA titles in the top ten. 2!

I know so many people that buy a PS5 just to play fifa and nothing else! And since PS4 was the most powerful machine it was the best place to play fifa, obviously, that's why many people bought the PS4 and only fifa for it, that's it.

 

[turtlepowa]

Old news. People buy Nintendo for exclusive games and Xbox + PlayStation for 3rd party games.

If you ask me only about 15-20% of the PS4 buyers actually care about exclusives and this only because of those insane amounts of money Sony puts into marketing those games. Xbox is not even 15% because of Pc ports and less marketing.

 

[VCL]

vgchartz ugh!

 

[dottme]

I'm not sure why showing the higher sales will change anything. The idea for exclusive sales is that some buyer will think this way (me included).
-> if it's a Multiplatform game, it will run nearly the same way on both consoles and it's not because Digital foundry is telling me that one pixel is missing in the corner that it will impact my enjoyment.
-> if it's an exclusive, I can only play it on one platform.

So I should decide what platform I want based on the exclusive I'm expecting to be interring in. Because anyway, both will have the Multiplatform game in a nearly identical state.

 

[hunthunt]

Most people buy stuff based on what their hear "is the best thing available".

I dont think that anyone, even the most hardcore xbox fanboy, can deny that Sony has been putting the best package (balanced consoles, nice balance quality/price, good hardware, best first and third party support, best marketing) since forever.

thats why people buy PlayStation, and yes, first party games are part of the equation, not a fallacy at all.

 

[Mr Hyde]

Xbox One sales up to february 2020: 51.51 million units sold.

The first link you have here from Statista shows Xbox One at 51.51 million console.

But the second link you provide for PS4 sales, the one from VGchartz, says Xbox One is at 46,5 million units sold.

Xbox One Total Sales: 46,538,906

Which one is it? It's important to know the exact numbers since your calculating the attach rate of each consoles exclusive games.

 

[Danjin44]

I don't care for sale numbers, at end of the day I choose which system to buy based on what games they have and yes exclusives are part of that decision.

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

He makes a fair point though, the majority of the gaming market are casuals and they eat up the maddens, fifas, COD’s, etc. Nintendo would be the only exception since their exclusives is all they really have aside from some niche 3rd party exclusives, but they seem to be doing better with third party support altogether compare to the Wii and Wii U(would like to see a top ten list for the Wii U since it’s still technically this gen.

His point is completely misguided and frankly biased towards making Sony's exclusives irrelevant to the overall narrative of console gaming.

 

[Pallas]

His point is completely misguided and frankly biased towards making Sony's exclusives irrelevant to the overall narrative of console gaming.

Maybe, I’m not looking at it from that perspective, Sony has a lot of solid exclusives, a couple of really great ones but you got to ask yourself and this goes for Xbox as well, take away those FIFA’s, COD’s and then look at consoles sold. Sony May still look ok but nothing impressive and Xbox would be in disarray I think. Casuals dominate the console scene.

 

[lukilladog]

You are making a special pleading fallacy.

 

[DeepEnigma]

Not this shit again.

 

[theclaw135]

Every generation, exclusives have become less significant than the preceding gen. With development costs what they are today, it's rarely sensible to bankroll a 3rd party to keep a game on a single platform indefinitely.

 

[DrAspirino]

I don't care for sale numbers, at end of the day I choose which system to buy based on what games they have and yes exclusives are part of that decision.

And that is my point: only core gamers (like the ones here in GAF) are the ones that actually care about exclusives. The rest (the vast majority) are casuals, which for them, exclusives are a non-issue.

I've seen some really good posts here and I agree with most of them: when you put exclusives out of the equation, other things come to play, such as value, price, word-of-mouth, marketing, convenience, etc. which puts consoles on par with other electronic devices, like blu-ray players or TVs.

So... the morale here is that we shouldn't extrapolate our view that exclusives are important (at least for us), when we are just the minority.

 

[Damigos]

That thread would apply to someone, for sure. That someone is not the one that reads NeoGAF.

Also, regarding your numbers that dont lie : Maybe only 10% of PS4 users have Uncharted 4 but PS4 has double the sales of the One, BECAUSE of its better exclusives and DESPITE lacking a sub model like Game Pass.

 

[turtlepowa]

So... the morale here is that we shouldn't extrapolate our view that exclusives are important (at least for us), when we are just the minority.

At least one person gets it. Many core gamers think, because exclusive games are important for them and and for like-minded on sites like NeoGAF, they must be important for the rest of the world too. But casuals don't visit sites like this, they just play their Fifa/Madden/COD/BF and they are the majority.
My friends are all casuals. If i ask them about exclusive games perhaps one or two could name Halo, Forza and GT, that's pretty much it. But they all know GTA/RDR/BF/COD and so on.

 

[Romulus]

Same can be said about Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, yet the games that drive console sales are Multiplayer multiplats. (except Nintendo Switch, of course).

I think its variety that drives the console sales. When you buy a ps4, you know they'll be alot of franchises to choose from that you can't play anywhere else. If I see something I like on Xbox, PC is there. Switch is dirt cheap if they every got anything I really wanted, but I'll probably wait for emulation for decent resolution/performance.

 

[turtlepowa]

That thread would apply to someone, for sure. That someone is not the one that reads NeoGAF.

Also, regarding your numbers that dont lie : Maybe only 10% of PS4 users have Uncharted 4 but PS4 has double the sales of the One, BECAUSE of its better exclusives and DESPITE lacking a sub model like Game Pass.

Well actually it was the 100 bucks price advantage and the mistakes Microsoft made with Kinect and tvtvtvtvtv. Just like PS3 came too late and was too expensive. That made Sony drop from 160M PS2 to 85M PS3 and Microsoft could quadruple the sales from the original Xbox.

 

[Hobbygaming]

Ok, GAF, I know this is going to be a heated issue, but well... numbers don't lie.

I called this thread "The fallacy of exclusives" because people here seem to think that what defines the success of a console are its games and specially the exclusive ones; that most people that buy consoles are gamers (they're not) and that those gamers actually care about exclusives (they don't).

So... I want to start with some facts about the current situation in the console market:

• Xbox One sales up to february 2020: 51.51 million units sold.
• PS4 sales up to february 2020: 107.5 million units sold.
• Nintendo Switch sales up to february 2020: 51 million units sold.

Now, let's look at the top sold games for each of the 3 main console platforms up to february 2020:

Xbox One:



As you can see, only ONE of the top-10 best-seller games on Xbox One platform is an exclusive game (Halo 5: Guardians), which sold 4.92 million copies worldwide. That means that about 9.55% of Xbox One owners (best case scenario) actually bought at least one exclusive game.


PlayStation 4:



From the chart, we can see that only two exclusive games made it to the top-10 list of PS4 best-seller games: Uncharted 4 (10.33 million copies), and Spider-Man (8.76 million copies). If we take the biggest figure here (which is Uncharted) and compare it to the PS4 installed base, it means that only 9.61% of PS4 owners (best case scenario) bought at least one PS4 exclusive.


Nintendo Switch:



From the chart, 9 out of the top-10 best-seller games for the Nintendo Switch are actually exclusive games, and in the best case scenario, the exclusive that sold most is Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (13.05 million copies worldwide). If we compare it to the Switch installed base, it means that roughly 25.58% of Switch owners bought at least 1 exclusive game. That's around 2.6 times more than Xbox and PS4 users.

So... numbers show that - except for Nintendo - exclusives and games don't matter much in console sales, considering that in PS4 and Xbox one the leaders are GTA V (a game released in 2013), CoD: Black ops 3 and the yearly Fifa (in case of PS4). I.e. "exclusives matters" is just a fallacy.

Since games (and exclusives moreover) don't matter that much within the great scheme of things, what would be the factors that could induce "the average joe" to buy one console over the other?

I leave that question open to discussion, since I don't have the answers for that (I have some ideas though).

I bought my PS4 for its exclusives

 

[petran79]

Exclusives are mostly advertised and bought for their single player campaign. Also PC version comes as a late afterthought with months of delay that can even reach close to a year, like recently with Samurai Shodown or 6 years like with Valkyria Chronicles. This is not the same as releasing on all platforms at the same time. If you add the win10 store situation and the high system and internet requirements that makes things even more difficult, it is far better to get an xbox for those games.

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

So... the morale here is that we shouldn't extrapolate our view that exclusives are important (at least for us), when we are just the minority.

Remind me: How many studios did Microsoft acquire over the past two years or so?

Its pretty clear why Xbox acquired all these studios: To make exclusives.

 

[turtlepowa]

Remind me: How many studios did Microsoft acquire over the past two years or so?

Its pretty clear why Xbox acquired all these studios: To make exclusives.

They bought those studios to push the Game Pass and xCloud and since all Microsoft games have a Pc port (+ smartphones, tablets and so on via xCloud), they are not exclusive. Some even came to Switch.

 

[Business]

If we take the biggest figure here (which is Uncharted) and compare it to the PS4 installed base, it means that only 9.61% of PS4 owners (best case scenario) bought at least one PS4 exclusive.

it means that 9.61% bought this exclusive, with the actual percentage of consumers buying at least one exclusive being most probably several fold higher.

 

[Great Hair]

Your fallacy was to use old-out-dated VGZ Chart numbers.

(not official) 2020 stats

PlayStation 4 100,000,000+
Software 1,500,000,000+
PSVR 5,000,000+
PSNow 1,000,000+ subscribers

EXCLUSIVES (millions, estimates, if anyone has up2date numbers, please share)

Spoiler

50millions (a good estimate), not included are TLOU2, GoT and few others
Uncharted 4 15+ (well past the 41mill. franchise 2017)
God of War 2018 11+
Horizon Zero Dawn 11+
GT Sport 6+ (reaching 90mill. franchise since 1998)
TLOU RE 11+
Spiderman 13+

30 millions, seems doable with the following list

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80 Millions sold PS4 exclusives

 

[rofif]

It's not about how many exclusives you sell but how many consoles

 

[bhunachicken]

Wow, this list is massively out of date. Uncharted 4 and Spider-Man have sold 16m and 13m each.

God of War, Horizon : Zero Dawn, and The Last of Us Remastered have also shifted over 10m each.

Yeah, sorry, but exclusives DO matter. As does using up to date data.

 

[Ridaxan]

The attach rate wrt exclusives definitely isn't that great (and never really has been). When you consider the best selling PS4 exclusive is UC4 coming in at north of 16million copies (digital and retail). 16% in effect.

The numbers show that most console owners don't care about exclusives and are typically there for the FIFAs, Maddens, CODs and GTAs.

 

[DForce]

Xbox fan trying to downplay exclusives with inaccurate numbers. Doesn't surprise me.

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

The attach rate wrt exclusives definitely isn't that great (and never really has been). When you consider the best selling PS4 exclusive is UC4 coming in at north of 16million copies (digital and retail). 16% in effect.

The numbers show that most console owners don't care about exclusives and are typically there for the FIFAs, Maddens, CODs and GTAs.

Attachment rate is a garbage metric.

 

[MH3M3D]

It all comes down to which machine runs the games I want to play. I know I can play CoD anywhere, but only one machine runs God of War or Gears. I choose God of War.

 

[Pallas]

Xbox fan trying to downplay exclusives with inaccurate numbers. Doesn't surprise me.

Which numbers are inaccurate?

 

[DForce]

Which numbers are inaccurate?

He's using VG Charts. I'll post better and more accurate data in about 15 mins.

 

[turtlepowa]

It's not about how many exclusives you sell but how many consoles

Actually It's about how many 3rd party games and subscriptions you sell.

 

[turtlepowa]

Which numbers are inaccurate?

I think the numbers are higher today, but the same thing goes for the 3rd party games and the list shouldn't change that much. Even the best selling PS4 game doesn't reach 15% of the user base. A number Nintendo laughs about.

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

I think the numbers are higher today, but the same thing goes for the 3rd party games and the list shouldn't change that much. Even the best selling PS4 game doesn't reach 15% of the user base. A number Nintendo laughs about.

Nintendo Attatchment Rates are going to drop off considerably more as the switch install base increases

Zelda is nowhere near it's 100% attachment rate it used to have, for example.

 

[BlitzerRadic]

The attach rate wrt exclusives definitely isn't that great (and never really has been). When you consider the best selling PS4 exclusive is UC4 coming in at north of 16million copies (digital and retail). 16% in effect.

The numbers show that most console owners don't care about exclusives and are typically there for the FIFAs, Maddens, CODs and GTAs.

That makes no sense. All those games on an individual basis sold similarly to the best selling PS exclusives.

 

[turtlepowa]

Nintendo Attatchment Rates are going to drop off considerably more as the switch install base increases

Zelda is nowhere near it's 100% attachment rate it used to have, for example.

Of course. The more choices you have the less important exclusive games become. If Nintendo would make a strong 4k console with all the 3rd party games Sony and MS have, they would drop to 10-15% too with their big games.

 

[Pallas]

He's using VG Charts. I'll post better and more accurate data in about 15 mins.

VGChartz has been used on here before to dispute Xbox360/PS3 sales on who sold more, no one seemed to throw a fit much back then.

I don’t care for VGChartz personally and I’ll usually agree it’s data can’t be trusted but honestly I’ve see fanboys from the other side using it as references.

 

[DForce]

Ok, GAF, I know this is going to be a heated issue, but well... numbers don't lie.

1. You're using VGChartz and their numbers are inaccurate.




2. Members from the XBox community use attach rate to discredit the impact of PS exclusives.

Here is BETTER data for PlayStation 4's top exclusive.


Killzone: Shadow Fall

This game sold 2.1 million units from November 2013-January 2014. This is very good considering how many PlayStation units were on the market at the time

Sony sells 5.3 million PlayStation 4 consoles, exceeds full-year target

The console will go on sale in Japan on February 22, the last country currently scheduled to handle the device.

gadgets.ndtv.com

Infamous: Second Son


It sold 1 million in 9 days.

Infamous: Second Son sales topped 1M units in nine days

Infamous: Second Son publisher Sony Computer Entertainment sold more than 1 million copies of the PlayStation 4 action title in the game's first nine days on the market worldwide, the company a...

www.polygon.com

During this time, about 7-10 million units have been sold.

Sony Says 7 Million PlayStation 4s Have Been Sold Worldwide

And Sony adds that it's sold more than 20.5 million PS4 games worldwide across retail and digital content.

time.com

Now we can look at the biggest games this generation in terms of units sold.

Uncharted 4 sold 16 million units

Niko Partners: Uncharted 4 sold 16 million copies, The Last of Us – 20 million | Game World Observer

Naughty Dog celebrates 10th anniversary of Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. Daniel Ahmad, an analyst at Niko Partners, used this opportunity to discuss the sales of Uncharted 2: Among Thieves and Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End.

gameworldobserver.com

Spider-Man 13.2 milion.

Spider-Man PS4 Sells 13.2 Million Units Worldwide

gamingbolt.com

God of War 10 million, Last of Us 2 million (mostly on PS3), Horizon Zero Dawn 10+ million.

What you're doing is saying, "look at the top 10 games on the list, it's mostly multiplatform titles!"


Most of the games on that top 10 list are mostly the same games. There's Call of Duty and FIFA. Not too many games outside of those games, which means there's only a very small amount of games that sell better than the top PlayStation exclusives.


PlayStation games are selling really well according to actual sales data. Only a few games like Call of Duty, Grant Theft Auto, Red Dead Redemption are hitting 20+ on multiple platforms (Yes, there's a few other games, but not many. )

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

Of course. The more choices you have the less important exclusive games become. If Nintendo would make a strong 4k console with all the 3rd party games Sony and MS have, they would drop to 10-15% too with their big games.

They're going to drop to that amount regardless of third party support. You just need to look at the Wii as an example. Outside of a handful of titles most of their exclusives have the same attachment rate as the PS4

 

[Radical_3d]

The falacy here is to infer the reasons for buying a console based in some raw numbers of sales. That is poor analysis and abysmal sociology. Let’s see how this generation went, and make educated guesses about what the reasons were (because with no study is impossible to know)...

The first two months the consoles were flying off the shelves. I’d say that brand attachment and pure thirst for next generation was the main driver here.

Then, as stock started to keep up with the sales we saw the first ratios in favor of PS4. 5:1 in Germany and stuff like that, this eventually led to the global 2:1 ratio since Xbox is very strong in the States. I’d say that perceived value vas the main delta here. That lasted about a month or two.

After that MS dropped the XOne price to keep perceived value close to the PS4. From this moment to the first price reduction of both consoles what matter the most in my opinion are exclusives. They are still 400€ boxes but everyone is waiting for his or her game to arrive to buy it. In 2015 what mattered the most was not fortnite, was that everybody said that Bloodborne was the shit. And shortly after we had the E3 of the promises. Those hardcore gamers buying a full price console and creating a mindshare were the main delta in the sales difference.

After that it’s just a matter of traction and inertia. You can force the inertia like the PS3 did but it takes your opponent to loose grasp and you to maintain a sustained effort. Microsoft draped the ball after 2009 in games big time. They had Bioshock, Lost Planet, Mass Effect Japanese games and many other games exclusive, or with big temporal exclusivity deals, aside from their first party productions. Then as MS turned towards Kinnect (a huge casual sales driver, I must say, specially in the States) Sony kept their first party production at full force. That combination of things that will never happen again (MS has Spencer now, thank god) was the how turning in momentum in a generation happened.

So, my point is that exclusives matter a lot. At least to the people that drives the zeitgeist every generation: to us.

 

[GamerEDM]

i thought Xbox was at 46 million consoles sold but Statista says 51.51 million. How reliable is Statista?

 

[Self]

I only judge/buy consoles according to it's exclusives. The rest ist negotiable...