Topic: Xbox 360 outsold Wii U In Sales For Black Friday This Year

With their biggest game this season being virtually unplayable online where that is the main part of it, large price cuts are really all you can do to try and save your system. Of course I'm talking about Halo Master Chief Collection in which most people play Halo games for the online multiplayer.

I'm also going to mention that the source is potentially incorrect. They the XBOne outsold the PS4 last holiday, which as we all know, didn't happen.

Yet, it is still making more money for Nintendo than PS4 is for Sony, which is one of the fastest selling consoles besides Wii and PS2.

Actually, they updated it and it works most of the time, now.

EDIT: Also, Xbox 360 is $99, which is the same deal as last year. Every Wii U sold at $300 equals 3 Xbox 360 sales, based on price. Money wise, Nintendo is still winning.

"Funny how when I see different Nintendo fans I automatically assume they all had the exact same reaction to both systems."

Besides, 3DS is the best gaming handheld right now despite the domination of iOS, not by being the most successful system.

The Xbox brand has been profitable for years. The quarter that Halo was released in was just the first time.

And those costs from years ago are sunk cost and irrelevant (As are the large losses early in the 360's lifespan due to the RROD fiasco). Furthermore, Microsoft always knew that the original Xbox was going to be a money loser. They were spending money to establish a beachhead, not win the war in a single generation. As seen since, it definitely did its job and deserves to be considered a success.

It even managed to outperform Nintendo its first time out the gate, the 2nd straight generation in a row where a newcomer managed the feat (Albeit, just barely with a million or two lead compared to the original Playstation that handily outperformed both Nintendo and Sega).

Winning what? The Xbox 360's direct competitor was the Wii, not the Wii U. Instead of an apples to oranges comparison, how did the 360's sales match up to the Wii Mini's?

Plus, we don't know what their profit margins are. Discounting everything else from the equation and if we use your logic where 1 Wii U sale equals 3 Xbox 360 sales, it's still entirely possible that Microsoft is making more money than Nintendo is just on the hardware alone.

And they also increase their install base three times as much as what that one Wii U sale did. That's three potential customers for Xbox Live subscriptions, accessories, and software to just an increase of one for Nintendo. And those are the areas where the real money is made. The console sale is just a means to an end.

You should tell the OP what you just told me about comparing apples to oranges. I didn't make this thread, dude, and the thread is specifically comparing Wii U to Xbox 360 sales. Tell them; not me.

It could be true that Microsoft is making more money per Xbox 360 than Wii U consoles. but that still doesn't change that Nintendo is ACTUALLY making ANY money, when all is said and done. Microsoft and Sony aren't making money off of their investments. Nintendo is.

Even with the Xbox Live/PS+ subscriptions, publishing fees, hardware sales, and software sales, Nintendo is still making more money than Sony and Microsoft. End of story.

Without rereading the original post that's based on data I find very suspect (Only 1% of any major retailer's Black Friday videogame business being PS3 related in 2014 is extremely odd sounding), I think he rather was using that to help illustrate just how tough of a situation that the Wii U is in.

The point of my response to you is that regardless that there might be some form of loose equality there between the two with these statistics, it's still ultimately Nintendo's weapon of the current generation going up against Microsoft's previous.

So the fact that a $300 Wii U equals three $100 Xbox 360 consoles in direct revenue, which means according to this chart that they've brought in roughly the same amount of revenue, doesn't make this fact any better.

If you weren't trying to suggest that Nintendo isn't as bad off here as it may first appear, just what was it you were trying to say?

Nintendo isn't making money here.

The Xbox 360 has been sold at a profit for years and Microsoft's financial results continue to show that the division responsible for the Xbox is healthy and in the black, as it has been for a number of years now.

And again, three consoles sold is better than one. The real money is earned after the sale of the console itself. Thus, three potential customers instead of just one is the superior situation of the two.

Not surprising. Most of the hottest titles are out on previous gen as well so latecomers/newbies are going for the cheaper option.

@GoneFishin
I already explained. $300 > $100. Even if the Wii U sells 1/3rd the amount of consoles as Xbox 360, they would still physically have the same amount of money as Microsoft had in that specific area. The only other area to discuss is their investments. Since Microsoft and Sony still aren't posting a profit, that means they are making more money off of the consoles, but it still did not compensate their investments. We know Nintendo is making profit off of Wii U. We don't know whether Xbox 360 is making more money. We do know that Nintendo is still making more money than both all of Xbox 360 and Xbox One combined, and the same thing goes for PS3 and PS4, because Nintendo posted profit, while Sony and Microsoft didn't.

Nintendo is making more money, period. That means that Nintendo invested their money into places where they knew they could make money. Based off the chart, I'd guess they are making around 2/3rds the money of the Xbox One, which means that Nintendo invested less than how much money they are making. Microsoft invested more and hasn't seen compensation. They either invested poorly, or it will take more time to make profit. In Nintendo's case, Wii U was out for an extra year, so Nintendo is ahead in 8th gen, in terms of finances.

Except that they are. Even with 3 Xbox 360 customers, and roughly 9× more Xbox Ones, Microsoft has still been posting a loss as a company. That means Nintendo is making more money off of a single Wii U than Microsoft is as a whole company, including PC. Nintendo doesn't have more money, they are just making more, which means they are still doing well as a business.
This also includes their money from 3DS.

I just read your comment, and while I agree with most of what you said, this quote makes me wonder ... is that really true?

1) Speaking of performance levels, the direct competitor of the WiiU on M$'s end is definitely not the Xbone, but the 360.
2) Looking at prices, esp. sales prices, it's somewhere inbetween I'd say, maybe more often than not just the WiiU is closer to the price of a 360 than to that of an Xbone, but either way no "direct competition" can be established.
3) While the 360 still has better 3rd-party support than the WiiU, it is also beginning to show signs of being in fact cut-off from big "current-gen" AAA releases like AC:Unity, in this it is also more similar to the WiiU than the Xbone, since, if there ever was a chance for a AC title on WiiU this year, it would have been Rogue, like on the 360, and not Unity, just to name one example of course, but the direction here is clear I think.
4) Xbone was market as an entertainment center for the living room, giving M$ a foothold in that area, it was originally not market as "Just another gaming console", while this has somewhat changed over the course of 2014, it's still not a "direct competition" to the WiiU, which is aside from a few basic feautes, as purely a gaming console as one can be. In this regard, the WiiU is much closer once more to the 360 and is marketing and features than to the Xbone.
5) The WiiU is marketed towards kids, I don't want to get into the whole "mature" thing again, but simply looking at the major games on the system superficially as well as the actual advertisement, there is no doubt that the target audience of the WiiU is not the average late 20s still mostly male gamer, but a younger generation. While there is no clear distinction here on M$ end, I'd say - at least right now- the Xbone is more target towards the older end of the spectrum. First it's not just for games, therefore less of a "toy", secondly it is more expenisve, and there are good reason for keeping the cost for "toys" down, since kids can be quite "demanding" users, and thirdly the actual content: The Xbone has little to offer (sofar) in terms of entertaiment for kids, very few things on the system stand out in that regard, the X360 doesn't fare great in this regard, not exactly, but thanks to it's age it has a library able of accomondating a younger audience reasonably well, just think of one of Rare's better efforts on the 360, Viva PInata. The 360 is not a system aimed at kids, not like the WiiU, but it's right now better suited for the same task than the Xbone, and maybe than the Xbone ever will be - only time will tell.

So I think that looking at it realistically, Nintendo is actually very much competing agains the 360 and also the PS3, unfortunately this market is very much an integrated arena, and someone buying either a 360 or Xbone is rather unlikely to buy a WiiU at the same time or thereabout, and vice versa, thus in the end, when it comes down to the nitty-gritty the WiiU is actually competing against every other console still selling in meaningful numbers. So no, I would disagree with your "apples to oranges comparison". Aside from the release date of the WiiU, there is very little that is suggesting, that - at the very least - the WiiU is in any less "direct competition" with the 360 than with the Xbone.

Should never be a benchmark.

There is no way to know what Microsoft is doing because of everything being lumped in with Devices and Services (Windows Phone / Surface / Xbox). Probably other stuff (Skype ?)

Why?Cause your favorite system sold less than another one?

And for the last time, according to this data, Microsoft is selling more Xbox 360's. Furthermore, we don't know what their profit margins are. All the revenue in the world doesn't mean a thing if your cost are higher than what you're bringing in and I suspect that Microsoft has a higher profit margin on a $99 Xbox 360 console than Nintendo does on a $300 Wii U.

And not only is this $99 Xbox 360 not the MSRP of it, it was far from a universal deal. And these figures surely include a healthy selection of more fully loaded 360's that are going for prices in the ballpark of a Wii U.

And lastly and once again, the Xbox 360 dates from the previous console generation. The Xbox One is Microsoft's direct competitor to the Wii U and in just a year, they've sold millions more systems than the Wii U has in twice the time.

We most certainly do not know this. What evidence do you have that the Wii U suddenly has become profitable? Nintendo has routinely been losing money. They've posted a roughly 1.2 billion USD operating loss over the previous three fiscal years.

If Wii U is making money, just where are these losses coming from?

Nonsense, the division responsible for the Xbox is routinely showing healthy profits.

Nintendo didn't launch a new console in 2012 to fight a war that saw its opening salvo seven years earlier. The Wii U is Nintendo's next generation console. The Wii was their offering during the 360 and PS3's generation.

They've just taken a different approach for two generations running. instead of competing directly in the horsepower arms race, they craft hardware powerful enough to realize their own visions. And it basically worked for several years with the Wii until HDTV penetration rates became high and Nintendo shifted their own development focus to next generation hardware, creating what felt like an almost overnight game drought on a system so dependent on Nintendo's own development abilities to keep it flourishing.

I don't see how a $300 MSRP makes the Wii U a member of the previous console generation. Seems like a peculiar line of thinking.

The Wii U is Nintendo's premier console in 2014. That fact alone means that it's Nintendo's competitor to the premier consoles of the competition.

Most AAA games still see 360/PS3 versions. That Nintendo isn't even receiving those indicates that their troubles aren't merely a horsepower issue.

If the customers were here, the publishers would be chasing after them. If there was money to be had here, even a publisher like Activision would be going after it as regular Call of Duty releases on the Wii demonstrate.

It was going to be an issue (Although I suspect that downgrading a true next gen game to the Wii U would've been easier than the task that they faced the last time out), but 3rd party development all but died before that ever happened. 360/PS3 development is still going strong, yet the Wii U is all but finished in the eyes of major 3rd party publishers.

I'm not familiar with Nintendo's marketing. But it seems like a failure judging by the results. That said, I believe that Nintendo has everyone in mind here. That's typically been their thinking. I doubt they've shifted it to just targeting kids.

That said, how does that matter to the statement that you're disagreeing with?

Exactly, and the same goes for Sony. I think Microsoft is losing money on Xbox One, making money off of Xbox 360, mobile, and PC. Somewhere down the line, Xbox is losing Microsoft money, becayse they haven't seen a return in investments.
Sony is making money on PS4, but is losing in other markets like TVs and such, but they are also losing money on PS Vita.

AFAIK, they are both posting losses as a company. Nintendo posted profit, which means Wii U and 3DS are still making more money for Nintendo as a company than all of Microsoft and Sony's products, because otherwise they would be posting profit.

@SCAR392 Microsoft is posting losses? That's news to me, they just posted a $4.5 Billion profit for last quarter if I recall correctly. Nintendo is as far as I know barely back in the black, making some $100 Million or so profit last quarter, which is not quite the same, even for a much smaller company.
Also, M$ just as Sony is not just Xbox or Playstation, they got plenty of other divisions selling services and producing goods (goods are actually mostly the real problem for both, M$ as well as Sony). Any comparison between M$ and Nintendo on the basis of their overall balance sheet won't work for that very reason - at least not for drawing any such conclusions as you did.

@GoneFishin
http://www.businessofgames.com/nintendo-posts-profit-¥24-22-...
Nintendo is making more money than Sony and Microsoft, as a company.

Well, as far as I can tell, Xbox 360 is making money, but now they are trying to make money off of Xbox One. Sony is making money off of PS4, but they are still losing money in other places. In this specific market, Nintendo is making more money, because it is the only market they are in, to begin with.

If we want to find out whether Microsoft or Nintendo is making more money, we'd have to total each company's value, then see what the ratio is between that their profit. Microsoft has more money total, but ratio wise, Nintendo can still make more money, because otherwise you really are ignoring that they get alot of money from other places.

If you're going to include the results of divisions that have nothing to do with the Xbox, Microsoft is still profitable. I show an operating income of nearly 6 billion dollars with the most recent quarterly results.

Nintendo isn't much more than videogames though so a much more direct comparison is with the individual results of the division actually responsible for the Xbox line.

Yet the message coming out of Nintendo a few weeks ago is that they "hope" that they're in for the first profitable year in four years. I haven't the slightest clue where you've gotten this idea that Nintendo is making money and apparently a lot of it judging by your posts. Go look up some annual reports and see what the figures actually are.

Nintendo's most recent results show revenue of $1.6 billion during the course of this fiscal year. That translates to an operating loss of 215 million Yen, which resulted in a net profit of $131.5 million thanks only to a positive exchange rate.

Yet again, here's a graph that shows the recent performance of the division that is responsible for the Xbox brand.

But again, the point that is going over your head is that we're talking about Nintendo's next generation gaming console and Microsoft's previous.

That rather solidifies right there the point that I assume the original poster was attempting to make to provide Nintendo's current precarious position some context.