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December 2018 NPD Results: Switch highest selling console of 2018 by units and revenue, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate top selling game of December

Lwill

Lwill

Member
Oct 28, 2017
1,629
Benji said:
But I agree with Mat. Lots drop all discussion of me for the rest of this thread. I only posted the ground rules because I'm on edge and that poster in the thread set me off. That's exactly why I'm blocking people now because its not healthy for me to read this sort of stuff.

Again apologies and I really dont want to talk anymore about myself in this thread or the January one PLEASE
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Sounds good to me. From what I see, the relative underperformance of the Xbox1 threw the numbers of most of the estimates off. Most of us were expecting at least 1 million, so the numbers showing you around 2x XBox1 would have gave you a safe estimate of 2+ million for the Switch. Despite that issue, the overall picture was impressively on point.
MatPiscatella said:
This is like a soap opera with none of the fun bits.

Anyways, to get back on track with more sales chat and less drama, best-sellers for PlayStation Vita:

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I agree with that. Thanks for your contributions.

I have a quick question and I'm sorry if it was already answered: how is Pokémon LGP/E doing in comparison to the evolutionary Pokémon games? Since the charts of revenue-based, my assumption is that it is doing very well and may actually be up to par with them due to the pricing difference.
Dekuman said:
Really Benji Biggest takeaway for me is your last point about the outselling of both PS4/XONE combined. That ended up being the headline anyway. Thar was IIRC the first insight you posted way back in the middle of the month and people thouth you were crazy.

The sales-talk specifically at the number being over 2 million was latched onto by certain individuals who were very much wedded into the not making 20 million camp so they probably feel a special sense of vindication that it didn't make 2 million and are harassing you about it. But there's really no reason Nintendo still couldn't get to 20m even with their still super impressive december.
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Agreed.. though the 20 million thing is kinda petty considering that the Switch is in a great position either way. I wonder how close Nintendo is to its software goal.
 
Oregano

Oregano

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
22,878
Lwill said:
Sounds good to me. From what I see, the relative underperformance of the Xbox1 threw the numbers of most of the estimates off. Most of us were expecting at least 1 million, so the numbers showing you around 2x XBox1 would have gave you a safe estimate of 2+ million for the Switch. Despite that issue, the overall picture was impressively on point.

I agree with that. Thanks for your contributions.

I have a quick question and I'm sorry if it was already answered: how is Pokémon LGP/E doing in comparison to the evolutionary Pokémon games? Since the charts of revenue-based, my assumption is that it is doing very well and may actually be up to par with them due to the pricing difference.


Agreed.. though the 20 million thing is kinda petty considering that the Switch is in a great position either way. I wonder how close Nintendo is to its software goal.
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There's a good chance Nintendo has already exceeded their software goal before Q4 even starts.

They had already shipped 40m units(out of their 100m goal) and Super Mario Party, Pokémon and Smash will account for another 20m alone.
 
HeroR

HeroR

Banned
Dec 10, 2017
7,450
Dekuman said:
Really Benji Biggest takeaway for me is your last point about the outselling of both PS4/XONE combined. That ended up being the headline anyway. Thar was IIRC the first insight you posted way back in the middle of the month and people thouth you were crazy.

The sales-talk specifically at the number being over 2 million was latched onto by certain individuals who were very much wedded into the not making 20 million camp so they probably feel a special sense of vindication that it didn't make 2 million and are harassing you about it. But there's really no reason Nintendo still couldn't get to 20m even with their still super impressive december.
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Actually, it was latched onto because everyone assumed Xbox One sold over a million. So the Switch would be over 2 million or closed to it even if Sony sold 800k. What messed people up was that Xbox One didn't crack one million, which surprised even Ben if I recalled correctly.

So Nintendo selling more than PS4 and Xbox One combined feels sorta 'meh' since they both had a lackluster December.
 
Slam Tilt

Slam Tilt

Member
Jan 16, 2018
5,585
In a completely unrelated vein, my kid is playing Pokemon Let's Go Eevee and decided to do an online battle against a random stranger.

She faces off against ... "Benji", who starts a double match with a Mewtwo and an Aerodactyl.

And, of course, I'm here wondering if it's THAT Benji ...

("When you've been reading Sales-ERA too much...")
 
Dekuman

Dekuman

Member
Oct 27, 2017
19,032
HeroR said:
Actually, it was latched onto because everyone assumed Xbox One sold over a million. So the Switch would be over 2 million or closed to it even if Sony sold 800k. What messed people up was that Xbox One didn't crack one million, which surprised even Ben if I recalled correctly.

So Nintendo selling more than PS4 and Xbox One combined feels sorta 'meh' since they both had a lackluster December.
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Maybe some did, but the ratio was spot on, so people overestimated sales accross the board.
 
HeroR

HeroR

Banned
Dec 10, 2017
7,450
Dekuman said:
People are pretty. You have Mat on multiple occasions questioning why people even care about it.
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I think the interesting thing is if Nintendo just ships 18 million Nintendo would missed the 20 million mark by only 1%. Yeah, missing the shipping marks sucks and Nintendo would need to explain themselves to their investors, but it seems like a lot of drama over 1%.
 
HeroR

HeroR

Banned
Dec 10, 2017
7,450
Dekuman said:
Maybe some did, but the ratio was spot on, so people overestimated sales accross the board.
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I don't recall anyone predicting or sell insides implying that Xbox One wouldn't sell a million. Unlike with Sony where it was stated for weeks it wasn't selling that well. So no one really overestimated the PS4.
 
Lwill

Lwill

Member
Oct 28, 2017
1,629
Oregano said:
There's a good chance Nintendo has already exceeded their software goal before Q4 even starts.

They had already shipped 40m units(out of their 100m goal) and Super Mario Party, Pokémon and Smash will account for another 20m alone.
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That is true. Nintendo was very modest in agruably the most important stat.
HeroR said:
Actually, it was latched onto because everyone assumed Xbox One sold over a million. So the Switch would be over 2 million or closed to it even if Sony sold 800k. What messed people up was that Xbox One didn't crack one million, which surprised even Ben if I recalled correctly.

So Nintendo selling more than PS4 and Xbox One combined feels sorta 'meh' since they both had a lackluster December.
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Well, it is a good bullet points, but I agree that there are more things from the data that are more impressive. The fact that the Switch has an US userbase that is less than half of the XB1 but is dominating software sales with several titles with extremely high tie-ratios with the system is insane. The sales of MK8D (a port from a failed system) is barely believable by itself.
 
Dekuman

Dekuman

Member
Oct 27, 2017
19,032
HeroR said:
I don't recall anyone predicting or sell insides implying that Xbox One wouldn't sell a million. Unlike with Sony where it was stated for weeks it wasn't selling that well. So no one really overestimated the PS4.
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Benji's insight was Switch > PS4+X1 combined, he was right. It's actually abit more than the two combined too. X1 did slightly under a million, but it's not like it did 600k, we're talking a variance of 100k or so units. It's why other people wonder why people get so caught up on round numbers.

And let's not kid ourselves, not hitting 2 million aside, there's nothing about Switch's december number that isn't impressive considering in 2017, it had a ho hum sub 1m November, this year, it had a 1.3 million November in what is essentially a 3 way tie. And it still manage to increase yoy on that in December and bested both X1 and PS4
 
HeroR

HeroR

Banned
Dec 10, 2017
7,450
Dekuman said:
Benji's insight was Switch > PS4+X1 combined, he was right. It's actually abit more than the two combined too. X1 did slightly under a million, but it's not like it did 600k, we're talking a variance of 100k or so units. It's why other people wonder why people get so caught up on round numbers.

And let's not kid ourselves, not hitting 2 million aside, there's nothing about Switch's december number that isn't impressive considering in 2017, it had a ho hum sub 1m November, this year, it had a 1.3 million November in what is essentially a 3 way tie. And it still manage to increase yoy on that in December and bested both X1 and PS4
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I didn't say Ben was wrong. He was right on the money about Switch selling more than PS4 and Xbox One. But even he was surprised that with all the deals Xbox One had over the holidays, it didn't crack a million. Which was how his Switch numbers were off, just like everyone else. So it was more people overestimating the Xbox One that snowballed into making people overestimate the Switch.

Nintendo's December is impressive, especially in term of software. But beating two units who didn't crack a million isn't that impressive. Especially with the idea that the Switch would be the first 2 million in December console in a generation along with the #1 selling game that overtook Halo 3, and you can see why the news feels dampened even if it's all great news.

But there's no way Ben's fault. That's just how the cookie crumbled. People got overhyped and unjustly attacked Ben who got most of his predictions right. Unfortunately, a lot of supposed 'hardcore' game fans have the maturity of pre-teens.
 
Lwill

Lwill

Member
Oct 28, 2017
1,629
About the XB1.. the December data for NPD ran a few days into January. The system could have had a harsher decrease of unit sales compared to the other systems after Christmas and impacted its final numbers.
 
foxuzamaki

foxuzamaki

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Oct 25, 2017
21,608
HeroR said:
They actually started that with Skyward Sword since before then all cell shaded Zelda's was Wind Walker style chibi style. Breath of the Wild further that along with using Wind Waker's Arts as the base.
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I wanted to say that bur yeah it started with SS and they expanded on it in BOTW
 
wrowa

wrowa

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,384
MatPiscatella said:
SpongeBob Kreature from the Krusty Krab has been selling steadily for, like, ever. Very small units, but still. Every month it keeps happening. So surprisingly consistent for a long time.
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I guess this might be too specific or too mich of a bother to find out, but what's the oldest game that got sold last month?
 
hussien-11

hussien-11

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,315
Jordan
foxuzamaki said:
Nintendo more so went for style that represented both artstyles
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I didn't think about it like that to be honest, interesting.

HeroR said:
This comparison is highly flawed. Twilight Princess was a Wii launch game while Skyward Sword came out after Nintendo abandoned the Wii for the 3DS and left it to die almost completely to focused on the Wii U after Skyward Sword was released. Nintendo would know that they couldn't directly compare the two.
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Not necessarily, companies usually only look at results, and many times they come to -in my view- wrong conclusions (especially Japanese companies). look for FFXIII for example, I know it had development issues, but a reason for its corridor-like structure was FFXII's feedback and sales, people said they didn't like walking too much in that game and SE went for an extreme in the opposite direction to never let the player feel lost. XII sold well but not as much as they want from a main FF game (8m+ like X), they never let Ito or his team direct a main FF game after that and Kitase became the main producer for the series.

It is very easy to blame the game director or the style of the game and Japanese companies really do that all the time instead of improving the game and listening to the right type of feedback or not being very extreme about it. in fact, this is something I really respect about Nintendo, they always take full responsibility for the performance of their games and they don't blame their creators if a game didn't do as well as they wish. they look at things from a gameplay perspective and this is really great.

I imagine if Aonuma was a SE employee and Zelda was a SE property and he came with Wind Waker to sell only 3m~ after Ocarina of Time they would've never let him touch the series again.
 
HeroR

HeroR

Banned
Dec 10, 2017
7,450
hussien-11 said:
I didn't think about it like that to be honest, interesting.



Not necessarily, companies usually only look at results, and many times they come to -in my view- wrong conclusions (especially Japanese companies). look for FFXIII for example, I know it had development issues, but a reason for its corridor-like structure was FFXII's feedback and sales, people said they didn't like walking too much in that game and SE went for an extreme in the opposite direction to never let the player feel lost. XII sold well but not as much as they want from a main FF game (8m+ like X), they never let Ito or his team direct a main FF game after that and Kitase became the main producer for the series.

It is very easy to blame the game director or the style of the game and Japanese companies really do that all the time instead of improving the game and listening to the right type of feedback or not being very extreme about it. in fact, this is something I really respect about Nintendo, they always take full responsibility for the performance of their games and they don't blame their creators if a game didn't do as well as they wish. they look at things from a gameplay perspective and this is really great.

I imagine if Aonuma was a SE employee and Zelda was a SE property and he came with Wind Waker to sell only 3m~ after Ocarina of Time they would've never let him touch the series again.
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If they were gong to blame 'art style' they would have never gone cell shade again after Wind Waker as you pointed out. Heck, Majora's Mask wasn't that hot in sells despite it literally being Ocarina of Time's engine and style.

Unlike Enix, I doubt they were expecting Twilight Princess' numbers simply because you can't compare a launch game to a game that came out after you didn't support the system for months and left it to die afterwards. Unlike third-parties, they have to look at their software and hardware. If anything, Nintendo has showed that they will throw their hardware under the bus before their games.
 

Fafalada

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,087
MatPiscatella said:
Anyways, to get back on track with more sales chat and less drama, best-sellers for PlayStation Vita:
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Seeing Jak and GoW collection so high in the top 10 is depressing. I mean I get the draw of the IP and all that but Jak1 is locked to 20FPS, it's barely playable, and both collections look (and obviously run) worse than PS2 originals, by a large margin.
 
Arthands

Arthands

Banned
Oct 26, 2017
8,039
HeroR said:
I didn't say Ben was wrong. He was right on the money about Switch selling more than PS4 and Xbox One. But even he was surprised that with all the deals Xbox One had over the holidays, it didn't crack a million. Which was how his Switch numbers were off, just like everyone else. So it was more people overestimating the Xbox One that snowballed into making people overestimate the Switch.

Nintendo's December is impressive, especially in term of software. But beating two units who didn't crack a million isn't that impressive. Especially with the idea that the Switch would be the first 2 million in December console in a generation along with the #1 selling game that overtook Halo 3, and you can see why the news feels dampened even if it's all great news.

But there's no way Ben's fault. That's just how the cookie crumbled. People got overhyped and unjustly attacked Ben who got most of his predictions right. Unfortunately, a lot of supposed 'hardcore' game fans have the maturity of pre-teens.
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Its unimpressive those 2 units didn't crack a million.

fiendcode said:
Capcom did have MHP3rd at the Vita reveal to show off it's backward compat, including improvements like dual analog. It wasn't exactly delusional to think the series would be on Vita back then. They also had a Lost Planet 2 tech demo that went nowhere too.

The MH3G/4 megaton was actually what sealed Vita's fate but that wasn't until August/September 2011.
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Nearly every 3rd party developers back then, were just showing tech demo and engine demo, but stop short at actually announcing anything, that should have been a major warning sign. HD development cost was crazy back then, and smartphone gaming was on the rise, its nonsense to assume AAA developers will invest million of dollars on portable gaming (unless they are some cheap, outsourced spinoffs like Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed Vita), especially an unproven one that's going to face against a Nintendo handheld.

Nintendo have shown that their portables were actually the right compromise between everything, like power, battery life and cost. Their portables look old only because their failed competitors were too powerful (while compromise on cost and/or battery life). The Vita have shown nothing that it was not going to repeat the same mistakes
 
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m051293

Member
Oct 29, 2017
1,658
Benji

Any comments on Fitness Boxing? Its been creeping up in the Japan thread - slow starter but quietly climbing the charts. Wonder if might do the same here and put up solid numbers in some of the slower months this year.
 
Welfare

Welfare

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Oct 26, 2017
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Kingdom Hearts was always going to outsell RE2.
 
allan-bh

allan-bh

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Oct 25, 2017
425
Kingdom Hearts 3 is a new entry in the main series, and really desired after so many years. RE 2 isn't even a new one, but a remake that appeal primarily older fans.

KH 3 should outsell RE 2 easily, with doesn't mean RE 2 will not sell well.
 

Deleted member 49804

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HeroR said:
I didn't say Ben was wrong. He was right on the money about Switch selling more than PS4 and Xbox One. But even he was surprised that with all the deals Xbox One had over the holidays, it didn't crack a million. Which was how his Switch numbers were off, just like everyone else. So it was more people overestimating the Xbox One that snowballed into making people overestimate the Switch.

Nintendo's December is impressive, especially in term of software. But beating two units who didn't crack a million isn't that impressive. Especially with the idea that the Switch would be the first 2 million in December console in a generation along with the #1 selling game that overtook Halo 3, and you can see why the news feels dampened even if it's all great news.

But there's no way Ben's fault. That's just how the cookie crumbled. People got overhyped and unjustly attacked Ben who got most of his predictions right. Unfortunately, a lot of supposed 'hardcore' game fans have the maturity of pre-teens.
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I don't think that is what actually happend.
Peope were just overestimating the Switch by itself. Had nothing to do with Xbox One.


People didn't overestimate the Xbox One by much anyways:
donny2112 said:
Finally got predictions collated. Haven't looked to see if the results are known, yet, though. Will check for that later, and then put up prediction results. :)

ResetERA Aggregate Predictions - Dec-2018

1. NSW - 2375K (stddev: 292K)
2. XB1 - 1135K (stddev: 131K)
3. PS4 - 870K (stddev: 142K)
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That's just 200k off instead 600k for Switch.
 
Benji

Benji

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KH3 opening > RE2 in the US

Platform split is incredibly lopsided for PS4. That said Xbox version is definitely selling so likely worth the effort of putting on the platform
 
kowalski

kowalski

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Oct 27, 2017
2,539
US and Japan always will prefer KH3, Europe is the only place where RE2 has a chance to win.
 
WestEgg

WestEgg

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Benji said:
KH3 opening > RE2 in the US

Platform split is incredibly lopsided for PS4. That said Xbox version is definitely selling so likely worth the effort of putting on the platform
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Sounds about right. KH3 has had a way longer lead up, though I expect RE2 to end up better since JRPGs tend to be more front-loaded.
 
slavesnyder

slavesnyder

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Oct 26, 2017
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comparing kingdom hearts 3 and resident evil 2 sales only seems like totally stupid and unrelated at first sight, but only few people know that once, disney offered their license both to square enix and capcom, and in the end the concept of resident evil had to be changed from disney characters to zombies.
 
Oregano

Oregano

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slavesnyder said:
comparing kingdom hearts 3 and resident evil 2 sales only seems like totally stupid and unrelated at first sight, but only few people know that once, disney offered their license both to square enix and capcom, and in the end the concept of resident evil had to be changed from disney characters to zombies.
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That's why there's Goof Troop assets in the first game.
 
Aleh

Aleh

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Oct 27, 2017
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Benji said:
KH3 opening > RE2 in the US

Platform split is incredibly lopsided for PS4. That said Xbox version is definitely selling so likely worth the effort of putting on the platform
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Saw this coming from miles away, and some people even thought RE is more mainstream than KH lol.
 
Benji

Benji

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Aleh said:
Saw this coming from miles away, and some people even thought RE is more mainstream than KH lol.
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Keep in mind I'm referring to console sales only. I have no visibility to RE2s PC sales which look to be very strong

It's possible RE2 still outranks KH3 in NPD if the PC sales are large enough. But in terms of console performance KH3 had a bigger opening
 
julian

julian

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Oct 27, 2017
16,869
Benji said:
Keep in mind I'm referring to console sales only. I have no visibility to RE2s PC sales which look to be very strong

It's possible RE2 still outranks KH3 in NPD if the PC sales are large enough. But in terms of console performance KH3 had a bigger opening
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Any thoughts on NSMBU possibly appearing on the top 20?
 
Rouk'

Rouk'

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Jan 10, 2018
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julian said:
Any thoughts on NSMBU possibly appearing on the top 20?
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I'm not Benji but, I don't understand, top 20 for January ? or 2019 ? (And surely you mean NSMBUDX, not the OG Wii U game. But if you are indeed talking about the WiiU game, then no chance at all)

For January, I would say top 3 is guaranteed, but I don't know if it can beat either of KH3 or REmake 2, but I do believe it will rank higher than Ace Combat 7. And those 4 games are the only notable games of the month. The rest of the top will likely be composed of evergreens (Smash, RDRII, CoD, MK8D, NBA, Madden...)
 
julian

julian

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Oct 27, 2017
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Rouk' said:
I'm not Benji but, I don't understand, top 20 for January ? or 2019 ? (And surely you mean NSMBUDX, not the OG Wii U game. But if you are indeed talking about the WiiU game, then no chance at all)

For January, I would say top 3 is guaranteed, but I don't know if it can beat either of KH3 or REmake 2, but I do believe it will rank higher than Ace Combat 7. And those 4 games are the only notable games of the month. The rest of the top will likely be composed of evergreens (Smash, RDRII, CoD, MK8D, NBA, Madden...)
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January. I didn't feel like writing the DX (and didn't remember what the last few letters were....too many letters). I said 20 cause I never in a million years expected it to beat KH3 or RE2. I really don't know how it will do honestly. It's such a divisive game, I'm just curious how it's doing so far.
 
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