Kinect sells 2.5 million in 25 days

Black Friday must have really helped sales for the Kinect, it did for Nintendo. I guess all we need are Sony to say something soon.

Truth be told success or failure of a platform is irrelevant what needs to be observed is success or failure within what sort of demographic.
The Wii is a decent console, sold crap loads and sold ridiculously during Black Friday in the US alone (that’s basically just a few days sales period). The thing is, the console sold in a large quantity to non-gamers initially who then became casual gamers or core gamers who retired to a casual state. What it meant was that the games that sold on the Wii weren’t the good ones but pretty casual stuff which set the trend on the platform and leading ultimately to a lot of core and interesting titles not really selling much at all by comparison to meh titles and the actual size of the install-base.
The same is going to happen to the Move and Kinect. People always discredit the importance of the initial mass install-base.
So far Move seems to be bought by more non-casuals which means the games that will move numbers to suit its sales would probably be games that we (regular gamers) want to see with motion controls.
I do not know about Kinect’s market but I do believe that it probably will be more gadget-freaks (who won’t really use it with a 360 but would like to hack it a bit) and a casual crowd that were impressed with controller-free motion controls. The game sales over a few months will paint a better picture. If the games that sold were not the average gamer market, you know what’ll happen is that more people will continue to buy it, but there will be fewer core experiences to go with it. Not that developers won’t try, but there won’t be enough people buying them and then they’d say there isn’t any interest in such games. Which leads to only low-budget core games succeeding. (This will change once the price of the peripheral goes down, otherwise even with ‘core-games’ most won’t be able to justify its price – the regular gamer is the one that’s more concerned with price than the casual (which is why there was a hue and cry over the 3DS estimated price))
We have to wait and see what the initial-market that bought these peripherals is like. If it’s mostly casual be prepared for a wave of games that won’t interest you and games that interest you failing to sell adequate which leads to 3rd party devs not really making them anymore.

Just from the way each console launched we can tell what sort of experience has hit each console. The Wii is good, but a lot of good games have pathetic sales and toy-games sell well. The PS3 is good too but due to the high price point and initial programming difficulty we see more quality first party attempt than third party and it becomes more of the device for an older audience. The 360 being more of a PC architecture we see it the ideal console for the western teenager due to its price point, the games and the fact that some of them are xenophobic and people who program PC games find it easier to transfer their stuff. Teens and those in their early 20s also have more time to play games than others (unless of course you are jobless). PSP is the new superfamicom and the DS is the real successor to the Gameboy (unlike the GBA).

In a sense the Crytek guy is right about current gen of consoles holding us back. Perhaps he didn’t word it eloquently. The 360 is as good as mid-high end 2004/05 computer and games on the UE3 engine mostly go well with it and devs have now learnt to somewhat efficiently or half-heartedly port to the PS3 (which was good specs for 06 to early 08) or dev from the PS3 and port to the 360 leaving people to work efficiently with older infrastructures. Not to mention people like portable games and graphics aren’t the key thing there (thought that might change soon).

TLDR; (except the last para) Console and peripheral sales (in total numbers) don’t define what experience will come to a platform but initial demographic and initial game sales do. All platforms and peripherals have their pluses and minuses.

Kinect is more of a novelty than anything, just like Rockband, great fun with a few mates or family members, but without those aspects, it will likely sitting there getting dusty, not saying the occasional person plays it by themself, but it’s more of a party gimmick.

Somewhat surprising, I wasn’t expecting it to do nearly so well. Although I surmise these are Microsoft’s ‘shipped to retailer’ figures rather than actually ‘sold to consumers’.

You assclowns should be thankful for Kinect, Move and Wii all doing so well.
They bring some much needed new blood into the circle of gamers, so maybe said circle will expand enough for publishers to make actually impactfuly, mature and meaningful games that have a chance of selling, but for that to happen, we need people other than dudebros to pick up a console/a controller/their body.

you’re all just eating up the same shit every year. who of you did not buy assassin’s? or call of duty? or halo? I mean sure the ps3 fanboys are going to get all riled up “OH I DIDN’T BUY HALO I AM SO MUCH BETTER THAN YOU XBOTS”… and then they’ll go and buy Uncharted 3 next year (which actually has more soul than most of the Gears of Duties) but is still the. same. fucking game.

So keep crying in your sad little corner while I’ll hope that thanks to the expanded audience gaming will finally mature into something worth playing once you’re over the age of 22 and/or are not a moron.
If it all goes to shit due to Kinect, I’ll gladly eat my crow.

Well said, mesca.

When I showed Kinect to my girlfriend, she wanted it straight away. And she’s a fairly avid gamer. But she also has two kids, and is also a bit of a Netflix addict.

When I showed it to my best friend, he was initially interested, but decided against it after trying out Dance Central in my place and coming to the conclusion that the “song selection is a bit crap”.

The conclusion? Different strokes for different folks. Insulting the technology and it’s creators is just blind ignorance though. Half of you make it sound like they’re responsible for murdering your family and friends.

I think core gamers are irrationally scared of their style of play becoming irrelevant. Which is, quite simply, paranoid. Right now, we are being bombarded with great game after great game. We’ve never had it better, frankly.

And now we have diversity to add to the mix as well. Facebook games, casual Wii games, Move, Kinect, handheld gaming, hardcore PC titles, deep and enjoyable console titles.

I’m perfectly happy with playing Square Enix’s Chocobo Breeding Facebook game in the morning before I start work, while putting some time into Pokemon or Kingdom Hearts while I’m commuting.

If I’m going to the gym that day, maybe I’ll put some time into Your Shape: Fitness Evolved to build up my energy and burn some calories in the process. If the family calls over, that’s always an excuse to turn on the Wii.

Later in the evening, I can sit down with my friends and kill some time in Bad Company 2. Next thing I know, its 3am and I’ve just spent five hours playing Civilisations 5 because I lost track of time.

You’d be amazed how much fun you can have by diversifying your hobby.

word to that.

@55. the diversity you mention is mainly a pain in the ass imo and this stuff plays a big part of the problem we have in gaming these days. the old quality / quantity debate. most of the games are indeed only time killers. it´s wasting time (for me at least). i would never waste my time on facebook games or fitness games. people have to balance their gaming behaviour. gaming distracts you from reality and that is awesome but if you do that every time you only got the slightest chance to do so it´s not godd for mental health imo.

“the diversity you mention is mainly a pain in the ass”

You cannot be serious. No joking, there is no way you can actually mean that.

“..the problem we have in gaming these days”

What problem? There are incredibly high quality games to suit every taste out there. Gaming has never been in such a healthy state!

“i would never waste my time on facebook games or fitness games”

Welcome to being a minority gamer.

“people have to balance their gaming behaviour”

No they dont. people play what they want, in whatever proportions they like.

“it´s not godd for mental health”

Honestly? You make a post about how the market should lose diversity and everyone should play only the specific games you like and you worry about peoples mental health?

The comments in Kinect articles make me laugh so hard. There is such an obvious atmosphere of hurt and desperation from the people who are too aloof or too uptight to actually let themselves enjoy something that millions of others do because doing so would damage thier perceived ‘hardcore’ status.

Hardcore does not exist. Casual does not exist. Only games do.

Games of all kinds are are a frivolous fun activity and anyone taking them ‘seriously’ should take a good long look at themselves, and be ashamed.

In other news, congrats MS on reaching the halfway point in your 5 million prediction. I am enjoying Kinect immensely ( alongside my miltary shooters, racing sims and squirrel bludgeoning games) and am looking forward to a new year chock full of motion control and hybrid control games, and the accompanying indignation from ‘hardcore’ (lol) gamers.

What’s your gamertag, Gadzooks?

I’ve lost all faith in the ‘Hardcore’ & ‘Casual’ tags since I spotted one of the most supposedly ‘hardcore’ members of my friends list playing Singstar Dance over the weekend…

why, because someone who is supposedly a hardcore gamer can not enjoy karaoke with choreographed dance moves? :/

@61

‘Twas a joke my friend. It’s just that I’ve never seen him play anything other than CoD or BFBC since he’s been on my list. If anything, it made me smile to see someone who I’d previously judged solely on his addiction to FPS’s having some fun doing something that I would have considered completely out of character only a few hours previously.

I think I was trying to point out that it’s wrong to label both games & gamers, even if I’ve been guilty of it in the past. ‘Hardcore’ & ‘Casual’ are just easy labels for people to use, but don’t really mean anything. I spent a great deal of time playing Sonic 4 over the weekend, and depending on who you talk to that can be referred to as both Hardcore or Casual.

I’d also like to highlight that I too have a Singstar addiction, but haven’t branched out into choreographed dance moves just yet. I’m sure it’s only a matter of time…

@62 You’re missing out. Dance Central is awesome.

Kinect Move and Wii are garbage. These casual stuff must fail badly if real gaming is to survive.

I mean look at Microsoft, their lineup for next year is unbelievably empty apart from Gears 3. They are all about kinect now, they have abandoned real gamers. Nintendo has some great games but the Wii is a joke, so we only have Sony and their awesome 2011 lineup (if the games dont get delayed) to look forward to.

They are abandoning real, core gamers in favor of the casual shit.

I’m afraid I haven’t got a 360, so Dance Central will have to wait for now. Singstar Dance is probably the most likely alternative, might be good for Christmas parties and stuff.

@64 *yawn*

Michael are you satisfied with what MS has to offer gamers in 2011?

@67 Entirely. Anything that opens up gaming to a wider audience is a good thing.

That kid who got the Kinect for his birthday is going to get older as the years pass by. He’s going to see all those interesting games and titles advertised on Xbox Live, and eventually, he will become one of those “core” gamers.

Each console manufacturer – Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft – bring diverse and unique things to the table.

“Entirely. Anything that opens up gaming to a wider audience is a good thing.”

Why you care?
It’s not a good thing. We are going the Holywood road right now.

“That kid who got the Kinect for his birthday is going to get older as the years pass by. He’s going to see all those interesting games and titles advertised on Xbox Live, and eventually, he will become one of those “core” gamers.”

Eventually he can also think that pads, diablos, WOWs are trash.
No kid stopped from having a pad in his hands and thinking about Core games later either if he never touched games before. I don’t see how it helps.
I’m sure you started with pad too, not with Powerglove.

@68, I think he was looking for specifics.

Forget about the damn kid/family/etc. What are you really looking forward to from MS in 2011? OK, Gears 3. But what else? My point is, they already seem to be focused entirely on Kinect and that is unacceptable.

@27 – He isn’t.

“Why you care?”

Because I’m a grown adult, and there’s a world of people out there with different tastes to my own.

Different members of my family will like different things – my nephew likes handhelds, my brother in law likes sports games, my sister likes casual stints on the Wii when she has the time. So on and so forth.

“Eventually he can also think that pads, diablos, WOWs are trash.”

Two points to make here.

1) The joypad is not the only form of controller out there, and it never has been. Joysticks were the main form of controller before joypads came around, and the keyboard / mouse combo is still as relevant now as it was when Duke Nukem 3D was all the rage.

The Kinect and Move are simply new ways to play games. They are not going to kill off the existing controllers, and I laugh every time a “hardcore” game claims its going to be.

2) We’re completely spoilt for choice with “core” games nowadays, many of exceptional quality. There’s so many great games being released right now that I can’t even afford to buy them all.

That’s proof enough right there.

“I’m sure you started with pad too, not with Powerglove.”

Actually, I started with a keyboard and a joystick. My first gaming capable machine was an Amstrad CPC 464.

@71 “Forget about the damn kid/family/etc. What are you really looking forward to from MS in 2011?”

I honestly couldn’t care about Gears of War. I never have, and never will. What I’m looking forward to on the 360 are all of the potential exclusive high quality Xbox Live games, the Kinect offerings, and the expansion of services on Xbox Live.

It doesn’t matter if its Microsoft or someone else offering it. What matters is what appears on the machine.

I also prefer to play mult-format titles on my 360, simply because that’s what most of my regular gaming friends own, so I enjoy multiplayer games on that format more enjoyable as a result.

I’m well aware that the Xbox 360 has never been focused on console exclusive releases. Which is why I own a PS3 as well. LittleBigPlanet 2 is coming out on my birthday, and I’ll probably spend half of next year just playing that. Hahaha!

My Wii will probably be getting a lot of love from me once The Last Story is released as well.

When you own every gaming device, it stops being about which is better, because you can pick and choose from everything.

“Eventually he can also think that pads, diablos, WOWs are trash.”

Even if anything like that happens (which does not seem logical to me), it will be in hands of the skilled developers of Diablo, WoW, StarCraft to convince him otherwise.

Compared to someone who has never played a videogame before, the developers’ chances to tempt a young casual gamer are much better.

Kinnect will not change gaming, how could it? A updated eyetoy with a line up designed to lure away the Wii market. Diversify? No it’ll be more of the same, party games are what sell. That’s what will be made. How it can be used as a operating tool, now that’s interesting. Full voice controls of your 360 menus would be great.

@71
MS tend to announce stuff closer to release than Sony with a more solid release date – so the question is a bit odd given we don’t yet know what MS has to offer gamers in 2011 do we?

4.1 million units of Move sold apparently, and they’ve come out and said that doesn’t include individual sales of the eye or navigation controller.

link: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-11-30-sony-over-4-1-million-moves-sold

Great news IMO. It’s a great piece of kit and I want to see more games for it.