Nintendo Wii Fanboy

Cowen Group analyst Doug Creutz knows the public and, according to him, they want Guitar Hero: World Tour. Even though the guitar bundle for the game has been discounted like crazy over the last week (and selling just as crazy, we assume), he says that most folks are looking for the full band kit, which is difficult to find on store shelves.

"Supply of the full band kit version at all retail locations was very tight, with the title selling out quickly," Creutz said, even pointing to online resellers who continue to resell the full band kit SKU for ridiculous sums of money. "This picture of high demand and tight supply remains consistent with our previous channel checks."

If these supplies were higher, Activision would be making a lot more money off the title. As it is, however, the company must mostly rely on sales of the game itself and the other guitar bundle SKU.

Even though we're all facing FINANCIAL ARMAGEDDON and will be trading berries and colored stones for drinking water this time next month, gamers are still buying consoles like they're going out of fashion.

According to sultan of sales figures Michael Pachter, the Wii and DS each shifted a tidy 600,000 units in North America during September, a respectable rise on sales in August. If the analyst's crystal ball-gazing is correct, that means Wii has added another 40,000 to its lead over the Xbox 360.

Pachter's estimations for Nintendo hardware are echoed by new prediction kids on the block EEDAR, who also have Wii and DS at 600k apiece; apparently people are struggling to make ends meet, but not struggling that much. We'll have the super-official NPD figures later this week.

Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter believes that Nintendo is preparing the duct tape for a new Wii that will feature high-definition visuals. Speaking in an AFP piece about Wii's bid to appeal to "hardcore" gamers, Pachter insisted that Nintendo needs to overcome the technical gulf that exists between its console and those of rivals.

"A Wii HD would really position Nintendo well, which is why I'm absolutely convinced there is a Wii HD coming," stated Pachter, who thinks the console needs to shed its "toy for my mom" image. Ouch. If you're currently experiencing déjà vu, that's probably because Pachter made this exact same prediction more than a year ago, when he estimated a Wii upgrade to be "two to three years" away.

For the record, we non-analysts at Wii Fanboy still think that's too soon for an upgraded version of a system that continues to fly off shelves -- and developers seem to agree.

[Via videogaming247]

Mito Securities analyst Yoichiro Watanabe has weighed in on the buzz surrounding tomorrow's Nintendo Media Summit, suggesting that a Wii price cut is unlikely. Frankly, it's hard to disagree with the man. As Watanabe points out, demand is still through the roof, and the Holiday season is only going to ramp up Wii fever to ridiculous, hair-pulling levels.

More controversially, Watanabe thinks Nintendo should force us all to add to our growing collection of plastic doohickeys and controller shells, on the basis that adding new peripherals to the Wii has worked well for the company. That's not exactly a move we're in favor of (our living rooms are now mostly plastic), and Iwata has already stated that new add-ons are unlikely.

[Via Gamasutra]

At least one analyst thinks it is, and he's not short of support. Cowen Group analyst Doug Creutz's comments were prompted by the latest NPD figures, in which the Xbox 360, PS3, and PlayStation 2 versions of Madden NFL 09 hogged the top three positions, with the Wii version relegated to ninth place, behind Wii Play, Wii Fit, and Mario Kart Wii. "We continue to believe that the Wii is a relatively inhospitable platform for third-party publishers," said Creutz.

Is he stating the obvious, or does the success of certain third-party titles suggest otherwise? In the past, we've found many fans pin the blame for low third-party sales on third-party developers, suggesting that better quality products would compete with Nintendo's own wares. Can the same be said, however, when even critically acclaimed titles such as No More Heroes and Zack & Wiki sell poorly?

We all know Michael Pachter has no problem tossing his two pennies around, and his estimations for the month of August might surprise some of you. When it comes to sales, the Wedbush Morgan analyst sees Nintendo making around $100 million on software. As for hardware, it's a different story, as a decline is expected.

"Because the U.S. has received only around 1/3 of total Wii production to-date, instead of a more normal 40 percent, there has been a severe shortage of Wii supply here that has yet to let up," says Pachter. He thinks that the supposed production increase won't take effect in North America until September.

See also: GameStop CEO sees no 'end in sight' for Wii shortages

And statements don't get much vaguer than that, do they? Lazard Capital Markets analyst Colin Sebastian has published an investor note concerning the next round of consoles, full of words such as "may" and "could." According to Sebastian, new hardware is most likely to appear from the industry's major players in 2012, though he thinks Nintendo's next home console may release sooner, and could be an upgraded Wii with increased processing power, greater storage for moaning geeks and otaku, and DVD playback capabilities.

Our problem with this? Sebastian seems to automatically assume that Nintendo will simply produce a box stuffed with superior technology. Anybody who has followed Nintendo over the last five years will know that that is probably the last thing the company is likely to do.

Even as holiday seasons go, the previous two were pretty damn horrible if you were a parent trying to find a Wii for your offspring. You could spot a harried, stressed parent almost everywhere you turned on the high street, their wide, panicked eyes and expressions of fear and uncertainty giving them away in game emporiums up and down the land.

But it doesn't have to be the same this year! This year, lil' Timmy will be opening a fresh new Wii come Christmas Day -- as long as you buy early enough. And if not, at least now we have somebody to blame: EEDAR's director of analytical services Jesse Divnich. Writing on Gamasutra, Divnich suggests that falling prices on the Wii's gray market mean that supply and demand are now close to being equal. "Given the trend," reasons the analyst, "it is likely that supply will finally outpace demand before the holiday season."

Don't just rest on your laurels, however, for Divnich thinks that demand may outpace supply again during November and December. The best solution? Buy one now and hide it until the time for gift-giving has arrived.

Hide it well, though -- or at least, hide it better than this blogger's parents hid Virtua Racing during the Christmas 1994 season. I must have had a solid four weeks with that game before I was required to act surprised on Christmas Day morning.

Despite the fact that it sells like gangbusters week after week, wherever it can be found (except New Zealand), some people still like to argue that the Wii is just a fad. Other people (like the analysts at DFC) believe that the Wii "has the chance to be one of the best selling systems of all-time."

If you visit this site you most likely enjoy playing the Wii, but where do you weigh in on this fad business? Do you think that the Wii's sales will eventually plummet? Or do you believe that the Wii might even overtake the PS2 at some point? Maybe you fall somewhere in between?

It's time to bring out your inner analyst and let us know where you stand on the issue.

Note: Stop -- Hammer time.

Hollywood, eat your heart out. It looks like gaming is lined up to be a big money enterprise come next year (as if it isn't already), according to analyst firm DFC Intelligence. David Cole, one of the firm's analysts, thinks that the driving force behind this sharp rise is none other than the Wii.

"The Wii does not appear to be a fad and it has the chance to be one of the best selling systems of all-time," said Cole. Another analyst, Jeremy Miller, is quick to point out that Nintendo is also a very successful publisher, stating "The Wii not only has unique features and a broad demographic appeal, but Nintendo is dominant as a software publisher." Despite Nintendo's winning formula that is the Wii, the firm sees the PS3 selling more than the Wii in 2012. We know of at least one entity that agrees.

[Via Joystiq]

You see that chart right there? That's the predicted outcome of the console war this generation, courtesy of CNET. Aside from the hate in your heart caused by those black bars cruising past those lovely blue ones around the year 2012, what else do you see? Grim future for that Xbox 360? According to CNET, it will be.

What do you all think about this projected outcome? Do you think the Wii's popularity will sustain at such a high level for the next 4 years (it does have a lot going for it)? Do you see the demand dying down a bit soon? Also, what are all those people of the future buying PS3s for? Is it a prediction of the future for some kind of alternate universe where the PS3 has games worth playing?

[Via NeoGAF]

Even though the Wii is barely past its infancy stages, many can't help but wonder when the system's successor is coming out. As of now, those of us at Nintendo Wii Fanboy are content to put that question on the backburner and simply enjoy what we have in the present. Analysts are always hungry for this type of speculation, though, and Pacific Crest Securities has decided to throw their opinion into the ring.

So, what's their guess? According to PCS, Nintendo's next platform will be out by 2010. Evan Wilson of the firm stated, "We believe that peak industry sales will occur in 2010, given that Microsoft will likely introduce its next console that year and Nintendo will likely launch before then."

Now, we're not pretending to be analysts (okay, maybe a little bit), but we couldn't disagree more. We think the Wii will have a longer lifespan than three-and-a-half years, based on its current popularity and past systems' life cycles. Considering also that much of the Wii's success can be credited to the casual market, releasing a new console so soon wouldn't be a smart business decision. While core gamers and Nintendoholics would gobble it up, casuals would probably be more wary about dropping another few hundred dollars on a video game console in such a short amount of time.

The firm's analysis brings up another interesting question -- will Nintendo release its next console before Microsoft? While we agree that Sony will be the last to upgrade its hardware, it shouldn't be taken for granted that Nintendo will be first, especially since the company seems to be in no rush.

[Via Games Industry]

2007 was the year of the Wii. So, which console's cuisine will reign supreme in 2008? According to super-analyst Michael Pachter, that would be the PS3.

In the latest issue of EGM, Pachter predicts that the Wii will fall to the PS3 this year. The thing that will bring about this fall is not software (well, that too), but price. That's right, Pachter predicts that the price will soon be right for the PS3. The Wedbush Morgan analyst stated, "I think the Wii momentum will last until the Playstation 3 is under $300, so another year."

Perhaps Pachter is making too many assumptions: Will the PS3 drop to under $300? And if so, does that necessarily mean that Nintendo won't cut the price of the Wii to compete? If Nintendo doesn't price drop, will people even care (check eBay, for example)?

Of course, it's his job to make assumptions, so we suppose we can't fault him for that.

[Via NeoGAF]

In the most recent simExchange report, analyst Jesse Divnich had some interesting predictions about Wii software sales. According to Divinich, the top selling games will be as follows (including estimated worldwide sales for the software during the Wii's lifetime):

• Wii Play – 20 million
• Super Smash Bros. Brawl – 13.95 million
• Mario Kart – 13.16 million
• Super Mario Galaxy – 12.61 million
• Wii Fit – 8.73 million

We're not surprised that Divinich would predict Wii Play to be the top selling piece of Wii software, since the game is constantly popping up in the top of the NPD and Japanese charts. Since two of the five predicted games aren't even out yet, and one of them is only out in Japan, it's hard to tell by trends if the rest are good choices. Still, taking our best "we're not paid analysts" guesses, we'd say that Wii Fit will have much higher sales than Divinich predicted. The game already sold one million copies in Japan, and it's only been out for a month. We do think that those are a solid top five, though, even if we don't agree on the order and total sales for all games.

How about you? What are your best guesses for the Wii's top five?

[Via Joystiq]

Did you know that every time someone can't find a Wii console to buy, God kills a kitten? Okay, maybe not, but the shortages are definitely costing Nintendo a lot of money. The total adds up to an estimated $1.3 billion, which we're sure Nintendo would like to have in its pocket.

Analyst James Lin of the MDB Capital Group believes that Nintendo could sell twice as many Wiis as it's making each month. Since 1.8 million consoles are produced on a monthly basis, that means Nintendo might be missing out on a heck of a lot of sales. Just because it's not making as much money as it could be, though, doesn't mean that the company is hurting for it. In fact, we think Nintendo will be just fine.

[Via NeoGAF]