Really? I don't live in the US so wouldn't know. In my country, most DS games are around the same price as console games. I feel riped off. :( Touch generation games cost about half as much. According to this article, Big Brain Academy (DS) (and Brain Age) were originally priced at $20, which is still less than $30, the normal price of a DS game, and certainly a lot less than $50, the price of Big Brain Academy (Wii).
VGCharts isn't that bad. They do collect some of their own data, though it's only like 5% of the market. I agree that we should move away from treating VGCharts' data as fact, but we should still factor in their data making our analyses.
@Starless, this analysis makes a lot more sense than just pulling up VGCharts guesses. I didn't realize the DS version was priced at a discount--though isn't $30 normal for a DS game?
@Lithium, my thoughts are to not rely so much on VGCharts. It should be used as a data point for comparison, but not the basis of your model. VGCharts data is wildly unreliable before NPD data comes out. They haven't even been doing their weekly charts thing for very long.
Yes, I know that they are the only site posting numbers and so many of you think that is all we have to go on...but if you think about it...those numbers have as much credibility as anyone posting numbers here.
As others have mentioned, I'd like to hear some retail channel checks on games. Another thing we can do is starting pulling up Wall Street Analyst reports.
This stock seems over valued to me. VGC has 200k sold in Japan and 80k in the US. It's coming out in Europe soon but sales should be similar to the US. My estimate is maybe ~550k copies sold with the US and UK ~200k each. Grand total of 950k copies sold.
Maybe I'm off on my estimates. I've only just started VGC and trying to predict sales a bit more. Any one else have any opinions?
I think one of the big things holding this game back is that it's full price ($50 US). The DS version of this game (and the other games in the "touch generation") were priced at $20-$30, and I think their low price saw one of the keys to their success.
Is the only reason people have been shorting the June future the fact that VGChartz has been reporting low numbers? Does anyone have any more substantial indicators, like the 5 Best Buys they went to, the game was still stuffed on the shelves or they talked to some Gamestop employees and they said no one has been buying it?
Additionally, there appears to be an arbitrage opportunity between the stock and the future. The stock is currently priced at 10x the future, which is pretty high considering the future is first month sales.
The problem with the first hand knowledge and analysis idea is that while most of the people on this site are gamers they may be intimidated to provide input because of the risk of being £drowned out" by a higher ranked gamer who has a business degree or something like that or fear of being bidded down.
I think people are also content to trade off the info of other peoples submissions in case they feel they don't understand the totallity of the gaming indutry from a business point of view. I know that when my 13 yr old brother saw me on this site and asked to join he went straight for the games he thought were cool from the leading picture or name.
After losing a bit of money and with a little bit of guidance from me he realised that this is actually about sales, but being too young to understand the complexities of the video game industry he now relies on comments and relevant content submission on what games he longs or shorts...and some advice from me still :D
Thats the obvious danger of having "more discussion about the expected quality of the game to evaluate sales potential". I do agree but in the end it can play only a fractional role in final sales.
But we DO need more sources of information and analysis. I know, it feels good to be able to provide relevant submissions and see a few up bids.
@jameseyryan, I definitely agree with you, but I would like to see more people trading based on first hand knowledge and analysis, like what you mentioned with your visit to Japan. A prediction market isn't supposed to just mirror one source of information but aggregate info from everywhere. It would be good if there were more discussion about the expected quality of the game to evaluate sales potential--especially since many of the people here are actual gamers.
I agree that using VGChartz is risky as I have heard that they are likely guesstimating their figures and correcting some of them when the top 10 NPD ones come out but what i'm going on with this game is that they have to be underestimating by almost 150% at current predictions in order to clear the average value of my stocks on this future.
I have to think this future was put in at the price that was set as they were expecting it to sell like some of the brain training titles in japan have.
Having been in tokyo recently for 3 weeks and seeing a glimpse at the culture I knew straight off the bat that brain games are not going to sell in the US at all like they do in japan. If this future was introduced at 200k for the month for one of these games releasing in japan i probably wouldn't hold a stock as it would be close to call but in the US its one of them instinctive things that it will not sell.
And while I have no point of sales figures to base my figures on, they are a necessary evil as, if someone doesn't have a figure to short to they 1. are less likely to short as they can't see the likely return on their money and 2. if they do short they will only short a small way (like 10%) before they are unsure how low it really should go.
Sorry for going on so long but my feeling is that based on the quality and timing of the Wii releases and games selling well right now, coupled with cultural influences, this game will take a back seat in it's most important period (first month) and will never reach it's future price or even it's projected lifetime
@jameseyryan, although Big Brain Academy may continue to be overvalued, I warn against over relying on VGChartz as the main driver for shorting. We have seen how inaccurate VGChartz can be, so just because VGChartz is only showing 75k sales, that does not mean the true sales are anywhere near that. You should not trade entirely based on what VGChartz is posting.
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Really? I don't live in the US so wouldn't know. In my country, most DS games are around the same price as console games. I feel riped off. :( Touch generation games cost about half as much. According to this article, Big Brain Academy (DS) (and Brain Age) were originally priced at $20, which is still less than $30, the normal price of a DS game, and certainly a lot less than $50, the price of Big Brain Academy (Wii).
VGCharts isn't that bad. They do collect some of their own data, though it's only like 5% of the market. I agree that we should move away from treating VGCharts' data as fact, but we should still factor in their data making our analyses.