@soupsoup, I am willing to bet that there are no more Rock Band 1 Wii version released by the publisher AFTER they release RB2 Wii. That holiday discount is to clear up retailer stocks, to avoid "dead item", which is common practice in retail industry.
This mean that once RB1 is gone, it is gone (no re-supply from publisher, no re-order from retailer).
@Arbiter, While I'd agree that the userbase was an important factor, you can't discount the effect of the discount. The Wii and PS2 Special Editions were both dropped to $99 just in time for the holidays. Cheaper than the other platforms, cheaper than GH, and much cheaper than the $190 sequel. That's a pretty good reason to prefer it.
As for the headline, I'm sure it's supposed to sound silly.
@Arbiter, Yes, it should be. Unless there is something severely wrong with RB2 Wii. So far the feedback from those who purchased the game is good, so I came to that conclusion.
I believe that the price of this stock has gotten out of hand lately, with price increase from 102 to 130 (25% increase) in less than 30 days. This price (130) assumed that RB Wii are still going to sell in 2009, which I highly doubt (because of RB2 Wii are finally out in Dec 08). I am going to short this stock when it reached higher #, something like 200 DKP.
IGN's title for this article sounds a bit silly. I would agree with JoshuaJSlone. It's more likely that the large Wii customer base combined w/ the game preferences of those consumers is resulting in high Rock Band sales--rather than consumers preferring "gimped" Rock Band.
@apujanata, I found NPD 07 YTD for Rock Band 1 X360, which is 770K. This means that NPD's LTD for Rock Band 1 is 1570K, and NPD over-tracked it by 12%.
The big story is the Rock Band 2 X360 discrepancy, which is huge (VGC's # is 80% higher than NPD's #). I have shorted RB2 X360 accordingly, and my comment and analysis can be found here
@soupsoup, Current VGC # for Rock Band, converted from America to US, compared with NPD US : Wii 1,224,000 1 Million + PS2 612,000 (right behind it, probably mean 900K - 1 Million) X360 1,791,000 (800K is probably 2008 YTD, not LTD) PS3 810,000 (no NPD #)
"According to data from the NPD group, the Wii version of Rock Band was the franchise's best-selling SKU last year with over a million units sold. The PS2 version was right behind it. The original Xbox 360 Rock Band came in at just under 800,000 units. Rock Band 2 on 360, available since September, sold just under 600,000 units." As IGN's headline points out, the Wii and PS2 versions of Rock Band had many features removed.
1
I am willing to bet that there are no more Rock Band 1 Wii version released by the publisher AFTER they release RB2 Wii. That holiday discount is to clear up retailer stocks, to avoid "dead item", which is common practice in retail industry.
This mean that once RB1 is gone, it is gone (no re-supply from publisher, no re-order from retailer).