PS4 and Sony Enjoy Dominant Week in Japan With Price Cut and New Releases

Sony just got quite a bit of cash!

Why would they lower the price, it's not like the Wii U will start selling like hotcakes all of a sudden, a price cut would make Nintendo loose money if anything.

Not only did the price cuts help but it also moved a bunch more games. However with the ps4 being down so much the last couple weeks it kinda averages out so it's not that big of a difference.

hmm...hadn't heard of yoru no kai kuni and since it it on EVERYTHING i may want to check it out.

Also, PICROSS! Enjoyed the demo.

So I went back and added the last 3 weeks for both Wii U and PS4.

Wii U has 46,900
PS4 has 58,623

That's not that big of a margin and I'm willing to bet Nintendo made more money off the systems they sold in that period.

If you go back another week Nintendo closes the gap even more.

Wii U and PS4 are practically the same price now on Amazon.co.jp

For a moment I thought I accidentally opened Push Square with that "PS4 and Sony..." headline. xP

Ehm, so far the price cut didn't do a lot for the PS4. Except it pushed all the sales they would have made last week to this week.

I don't see why people are arguing against a price cut? Are you shareholders? Systems sold at a lower price still make more money than systems sitting in a warehouse and hopefully those extra systems sold will lead to more people that are happy with Nintendo, playing Nintendo products and more games being sold and who knows maybe just maybe Nintendo can help salvage it's Brand just a tiny bit going into their next generation. It really worked for Sony and the PS3.

Everything will go back to normal in a few weeks. No price cuts because Nintendo want to make money.Nintendo will make negative money if the cut the price.

We all saw this coming.

With so many cross-Sony-platform games launching this week, it's really amusing to see how the PS4 still has to fight to convince certain segments of the Japanese market, at least, that it's worth using over the PS3.

So what? Still doesn't change the fact that the 3DS has better library than the PS4 besides certain games that obviously can't be on the 3DS.

@NandN3ds Nintendo wants to make money sure, but they have plenty of Wii Us not in homes. They'd at least get some money back with a price cut than just sitting in a storage area earning nothing. Also, the more Wii Us out in homes, the more software can be expected to be sold.

Ninty better localizer picross 3D 2...

@Mrclaycoat I think people are arguing why Nintendo won't make a decision to cut the price further. Not that they are actually against it. To bring a realistic counter point to the calls for the price cut, that's all.

WiiU should have received a global price cut by now. Ridiculous it hasn't yet. It's like Nintendo didn't have a president for awhile to make any intelligent decisions. Really hoping the new guy starts doing SOMETHING soon.

The problem with a Wii U price cut is that the gamepad is expensive. Since it failed to catch on, people generally overlook it when discussing prices, but it's still there.

Savages

@Fath So many PS4 games releasing this week? A multiplat football game, a western movie adaptation, a spin-off Warriors game from a niche series and, what seems to be, a niche RPG. None of them seem to be popular in Japan, except for PES, which was already available on PC.

You'd think a price cut for the PS4 would have brought forth more sales than that after weeks of people waiting for it, which had numbers down to the 4k region. If this continues with high numbers, then ok. But from the look of it, it's just showing delayed accumulation of sales from those who would have likely gotten a PS4 anyways without a price cut.

If Nintendo is reducing the price of the Wii U, they're doing it the right way. Announce it the day or week of the change so you don't cannibalize sales of systems prior to the price cut. I would be very surprised if Nintendo doesn't lower the price of the system for holiday 2015, especially with the company's focus moving to the new system in 2016.

"Price cuts can help, Nintendo"

[cue massive, roaring laughter heard from outside their headquarters in Kyoto]

@Spoony_Tech how about adding the couple of weeks before that when MGSV was launched and see what the difference is. The last 7 weeks as far as I can tell put Wii U at 101106 and PS4 at 164706 so I would say that's a bit of a gap

I'm in the camp that doesn't consider it to be a smart move for Nintendo at all. Not in their position.

The Wii U needs a price cut everywhere, a quick check online shows all of Nintendos problems in that it is only slightly cheaper than the PS4 and that's before you consider buying those silly Wii remotes to be able to play all of its games. This is all because of the gamepad and it may be a mistake with which it repeats with the NX if patent rumours are you be believed. Then they hide behind the smokescreen of innovation when it is no such thing. Instead of creating new games and then designing the controller around them, they designed the controller and then spent 3 years wondering what to do with it.

It might seem like I hate Nintendo but I don't and have been playing their games for 25 years or so. I just want them to make a sensible console so that we may enjoy them doing what they do best and that's making great games, not making us wave controllers in the air or having second screens nobody uses

@Spoony_Tech Thanks for doing the math, as I was considering going back and doing it myself. I do think however many weeks you go back thats how many weeks you should go forward though. I think we agree this was a 1 week blip, and mostly accounted for postponed rather than new sales, but the next 2 or 3 weeks going forward are what will really tell if the price cut helped or not. If PS4 drops back to pre-announcement levels of 15k each week then the price cut didn't really help much, but if it levels off around 25 or there abouts then there are accumulative new sales to consider if Wii U were to continue to sell at around 12k/w. Of course as we get closer to the holidays I would expect both consoles to show moderate increases regardless of price due to the holidays.

The week before you didn't mention low PS4 sales were because of future PS4 sale, now the headlines say something like "PS4 is selling a lot because it's on sale". LOL

PS4 week! Wii U still perform respectable though, next week will give us better perspective of how PS4 will perform. Wii U does need a price cut soon. I don't understand why they haven't, I'm sure they have reason (i.e clearing old stock that was produced with higher cost?), but Nintendo reacted aggresively with 3DS and seems reluctant to do the same to Wii U.

Anyway, maybe rather than a price cut, they could launch a new SKU that take the current price point and drop the current one, for example a 64GB Wii U Super Deluxe?

On the software front, a lot of new Sony releases! But I guess most of them were front-loaded, so Yokai Watch and SMM will probably took the top spot next week again. SMM is still strong this week and Splatoon is respectable.

@rjejr And if the sales are already more than made up even if by just a little every high week from now on is more than they would have had. I'm not sure if the attach rate of games to consoles on PS4 but it won't take many to make up the difference and then its net positive with a new momentum to build from on top of it.

How much this would relate to a similar Wii U price cut is uncertain but hasn't Nintendo usually waited for the other guys to price drop first traditionally? Seems like a no-brainier in Japan at least. At the right price I'd have gotten a second Wii U by now, myself.

Oh btw I bought my first slightly higher prices amiibo on import from Japan. Totally screwed up getting the classic color 8-bit Mario just because "I forgot". sigh Soon after preordered Yoshi bundle because I wasn't going to let that happen again. Just too busy I guess. DI 3.0 is building with nothing close to full price yet so that's good

@electrolite77 Well there's a line it needs to cross and it could sell many more games as a result and make enough money to not only overcome the loss on each console but make significantly more money.

I didn't think of this but @rjejr suggested that one complication could be that so few were sold that Nintendo is still boxing up consoles from the original manufacturing deal. No savings from lowered component costs that would usually go with a price cut later in the life of a console, and little chance of a refresh.

If that's the case your assessment of the situation could be sadly accurate.

There's a sort of intangible failure here that is important, though. Fewer and fewer people know what Nintendo is or care. Somewhere along the line that needs to accounted for and maybe loss-leader sales and short term risk is going to be necessary to build momentum in the other direction.

New president, what does he think I wonder?

@aaronsullivan There are so many DI 3.0 toys taking up so much space in Target, but I'm really only interested in the original trilogy. Actually only the original movie, and Yoda. I wish Yoda was in the original movie so I could stop having to add him in every time I talk about only liking Last Hope. At some point I'll own that poorly titled set and the toy box and Toybox Takeover, all for about $50.

I've given up arguing the merits of a Wii U price drop w/ people. I'm surprised at just how many people are opposed. The industry has worked that way for 20 years, I almost always buy my home consoles right after a price drop, so if 20 years of history can't convince them, I surely can't.

@Monado_III

I would suggest taking a business class on product cycles. The Wii U is at the end of it's life cycle, and never sold well to begin with. Right now, their overall poor sales with the previous margins wasn't bringing in too much money, so they slash the cost a bit, and though their margins won't be as much, the overall increase in sales will maybe (not always, but usually) increase profit. Of course, you would only do this at the end of a product cycle.

I want Picross 3D 2 so much! Stop taunting me with it's picture and no news of it coming to Europe, Nintendolife >.<

I went for Wii U the day Super Mario 3D World was released, that was the game I wasn't prepared to miss out on. It was Black Friday, & I got the NSMBU / NSLU Premium pack for £179.99. I think it was a great price & I've not regretted it for a second. Got it along with SM3DW, obviously, & treated myself to the Mario & Luigi remotes. I'd love to see a price cut because I'd love others to get the joy out of it that myself and my family have had. I'd really, dearly love to see it in more people's hands

@ricklongo this argument is no longer valid. It's 2015; the GamePad costs and technology are around 1/3 of what it cost in 2012.

The Wii U's price is totally unjustified.

@electrolite77 hard to turn a profit when nobody is buying them.

Only 40k? I mean sure it's quite a jump from last week, but I expected more. Maybe with some better titles it'll jump higher.
If the price drops significantly here in Australia I might consider get one, same for the X1. The price for these consoles here are too damn high!

@gatorboi352 Do you have hard data to back that claim? I'm not doubting you, I'm just curious.

And for what it's worth, I wish Nintendo would indeed drop the price. I just haven't seen convincing arguments showing that this is feasible.

Man you people really dig deep into this stuff.

I got my Wii U already, so personally I don't care what they do. Sell em for $1,000 each, give em away for a buck a piece... I really don't care.

I got my console, I got my games to play, I got great games to look forward to... I'll just be over here gaming in my little bubble thank you

@electrolite77 @Monado_III, the Wii U has been out for almost 3 full years now, they were making a profit off the system from the start, then they had a 50$ price drop, because no one bought it (just think how much more poorly this system would have sold if it had retained it's original price point...) I'm sure if they drop the price by an other 50$ (maybe even 100$) they would still be making a profit off every system, just not as much as now (the tech has to be much cheaper to make now). What would happen with a new price drop, is that it would get more late adopters that would pick up Nintendo's awesome (but small) library of games which would more than make up for the price drop. I don't know if they will benefit so much from a price drop in Japan, but they would certainly benefit from it in NA. There are a lot of people out there that would love to play SM3DW, DKTF, MK8, SSB, Bayonetta, etc but just aren't willing to pluck down 300+ on a dying (or dead) console.
I bought my Wii U near launch so it won't affect me, but the price drop would only benefit them. I think is they simply don't have any faith in the Wii U, so they just aren't bothering with it.

Gamers are buying $500 graphics cards.
Casual gamers (adopted from the Wii) are buying pre-price cut PS4s, 100k at a time.
The Wii U needs a price cut?
No.
The Wii U NEEDED (as in past tense, but still relevant today):

• built in Ethernet
• Blu-ray (spending over a million to make their own disc and hiring someone to custom make a drive was idiotic then and now)
• better audio support, better HDD options, powered USB ports, USB 3.0 (it was a better option in 2012 too)
• better battery, screen (impact resistant, scratch resistant, higher resolution) for the Gamepad
• faster, more adaptable processor, separate video processing
  and a little thing that NL readers like to complain about, namely user accounts

On the financial side of things, they needed 3rd party support (throwing their hat in with EA was a great way to anger companies like 2K), better marketing and a more aggressive retail presence.
All of which Sony does 100% better.
Which is why a price cut helps Sony and does nothing for Nintendo.
Sony has marketed the PS4 in such a way that, gamers anticipate upcoming releases. They talk about them with their friends. They pre-order. They pre-purchase DLC. They attend midnight launches. They buy season passes. They might even buy a second, limited edition console and store it away as a spare.
Nintendo doesn't have that kind of audience.
Honestly speaking, they never have.
The N64 didn't have it, the GC didn't have it.
The SNES was the follow-up to the NES, the system that saved gaming. So that was enough.
The Wii had motion control. That was new. But once people played it once, there was never any incentive to go back. It was one or two games that literally everyone played and then forgot about.
It was relatively cheap but it was a puff of smoke.
Once the moment passed, it might as well have never happened.
And Nintendo acts as if that moment was this massive revolution and their entire mindset has been driven by that ever since.
There is no 'Oh wow' for the Wii U. Everything inventive had already been done before.
So, Nintendo tried to help us forget the Gamepad exists and work around it as often as they possibly can, which sounds (and is) painfully stupid.
Sony gets it. Gamers aren't complicated. They aren't even bogged down by price. They just want a tiny little break every now and then so they can choose Destiny AND Uncharted, instead of picking one or the other.
With the Wii U, there are so few games, no one is sacrificing one game to play another. That was Sony's issue and now, problem solved.
But hey, if Nintendo suddenly finds themselves amidst awash of fantastically fresh titles, then maybe a price cut would help.
But without outstanding new software to sell on a consistent basis, who cares anyways?

@SahashraLA Though the words you're using sound compelling, almost everything in that rant is either wrong, nonsense, or personal bias. Your main correct points were that the Wii U needed better marketing and better third-party support, though even your reasoning for the lack of third-party support is a maelstrom of WTF.

@Artwark way to sourgrape man. Good job!

Way to go Sony! PS4 OWNS.

We dont need any competition, just 1 Sony is enough D

@carlos82
"or having second screens nobody uses"
Excuse me, that's exaggeration and ignorance. At least there's this one person who can claim to find a good use of Gamepad: me. My TV suddenly turned off on its own in the middle of my Wind Waker HD session. It failed to turn on again, something was broken. I just push a button to continue my game in the gamepad anyway. If I play in any other console, surely I would be forced to forfeit my session and lost my hard earned progress.
Another example, while Fatal Frame V wasn't a smash hit in Japan, surely of all those thousands people who bought the game used the Gamepad too (because it's integrated to the game mechanic). Thousands may not equal to million but definitely not 'nobody'.
The gamepad has many potential. It's just under-utilized. I'm not blindly defending Nintendo, the wasted potential of Gamepad is something I love to complain. But your kind of ignorance and cynicism about 'gimmicks nobody uses' won't help the situation.

It's neither exaggeration or ignorance, the nobody i was referring to are the game developers themselves (looking back in didn't make that too clear). Yes there are exceptions but the vast majority of games on the console do not require the gamepad in any meaningful way. I get the off screen play thing, even if your example is a little extreme. My point is Nintendo isn't thinking of game ideas and building controllers and consoles around them. They are basically doing the opposite and creating them in the hope that someone at some point will work out what to do with it. Let's look at Nintendo themselves, launch with a 2d Mario that doesn't need it. Since then Mario Kart, Smash Bros, Mario 3d world, splatoon all games where it didn't make any difference, DK had it switched off and finally we get Mario Maker after 3 years and this from those who designed it in the first place.

Remove it and you have a console which is nearly £100 cheaper probably giving it a bigger user base and the knock on effect of more games. More power available to developers for those games created, indeed they may have simply created a more powerful console in the first place

A price cut would help sell a little more Wii U's, but I don't think nintendo will do it, just because of them getting ready for their next system already. I think they're main concern is with the upcoming NX...and that's going to need the price point that will help them get back into the race. Everyone knew the PS4 was going to take a price drop (they sold enough systems to do so), and it's going to have bundles out for the holidays too. Wii U, just needs some good bundles...I saw that a Mario Kart and Mario Maker bundle is coming out over seas, does anyone know if it's coming out in the US??? If so, that's a pretty good bundle for holidays...throw in Super Mario 3D World, and I think that would sell pretty good over the holidays!

@aaronsullivan OK, I may need to pick up 1 more DI 3.0 playset, but it's not out until next March so I have time. I havn't even seen Avengers 2 yet.

http://nintendoeverything.com/disney-infinity-3-0-first-marvel-battlegrounds-play-set-details-and-trailer/

The Wii U could be a great system to own...if Nintendo freakin lowered the price on it!! The PS4 is now $429 (Canada), the ps3/ 360 is $220, and the Wii U went from $349, to $299, up again to $329. Seriously Nintendo, do you hate sales?!? $429 isn't that bad for a ps4 because it's getting games, you guys got games but only Nintendo ones, and that's definitely not enough variety. Please lower the price to tempt some ppl to buy the freakin thing!! ><