· Industry sales +35%. December NPD results will be released after the close on Thursday, 1/17. We expect industry software sales to rise 35% y/y, primarily driven by sales of top Nov titles: Guitar Hero 3, Call of Duty 4, Assassin’s Creed, Halo 3, Rock Band, and Super Mario Galaxy. Channel checks and recent hardware updates at CES from MSFT (17.7mm 360 units worldwide LTD) and Sony point to strong retail trends. December data track sales from 12/2/07 to 1/5/07. ...
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Hitachi revealed this week at CEATEC JAPAN 2007 that it has successfully developed a quad-layer Blu-ray Disc that is capable of storing 100GB of data. Hitachi claims that its quad-layer technology would be compatible with existing Blu-ray Disc drives after a firmware update. They are now working on improving the signal quality of its quad-layer technology so that it will be ready for market. It is still unclear what costs, if any, would be added onto the manufacturing side of the equation.
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"According to the study, mature-rated titles, comprising 10 percent of all US retail games examined, have both the highest average MetaCritic scores and the highest average gross sales in the United States -- despite the fact that some major retailers decline to sell them."
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Nintendo sold 245,653 units of the Wii in the four weeks ending August 26, compared with 81,541 units of Sony's PS3, game magazine publisher Enterbrain said. The ratio was more than four to one in favor of the Wii in July and six to one in June.
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Pachter Predicts Wii Sold More Than Double PS3 in March
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Guitar Hero 3 Coming to Wii
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-Enterbrain/Famitsu numbers -9/8～9/14 -28,681 hardware units sold -86,708 copies of Infinite Undiscovery sold -360 LTD at 717,275 -Wii sold 27,057 -PS3 sold 8,050 (Translated)
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"Sony Computer Entertainment Japan has said that there are no plans to drop the current price of the PlayStation 3. Speaking to investors, chief financial officer Nobuyuki Oneda said the company remains focused on profitability for its games division. "Our strategy is not to sell more quantity for PS3 but to concentrate on profitability" "Our plan is to not reduce the price."
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According to the NPD Group's year-end figures, the US retail gaming industry took in $18.85 billion during 2007. That's nearly twice the Motion Picture Association of America and Nielsen EDI's record-setting US box office take of $9.6 billion for the year. The gaming industry even surpassed DVD sales in 2007, reported to be $16 billion by the Digital Entertainment Group and $15.9 billion by Adams Media Research.
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"At its ongoing WWDC developer event, Apple has revealed that its App Store for third party developers, as well as a new, faster $199 3G iPhone will be launching in July, with Sega again on hand to demonstrate motion-controlled Super Monkey Ball, as well as other indie devs."
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