That’s right, everyone’s favourite analyst, Michael Patcher from Wedbush Morgan Securities has some new predictions for us regarding the prices of the consoles this year and his views of the NPD for the Christmas period
Firstly he believes that 3.25 million Wiis, 2.6 million DS handhelds, 1.35 million Xbox 360s and 750K PS3s were sold over the Christmas period. This leads him to think that there will be a 13% increase in hardware sales and software sales to rise by 10% over the period.
But the biggest point he made was regarding the the PS3’s price which he expects to drop from $399 to $299 by April and as a reaction to that expects another price drop by mircosoft. If true this will help promt more PS3 sales, as said by patcher himself.
Once the PS3 is at a more affordable price point (we expect a cut to $299 in April), we think that sales of that device will once again begin to grow. We expect another cut in price for the Xbox 360, with the feature-laden Pro model likely to come down in price to $249 at or before this year’s E3 show in June. We expect Nintendo to maintain Wii pricing at $249 until the company sees signs that demand is slowing, which means a price cut may not happen until late in the year, if at all
My Opinion:
I can’t see anything wrong with his predictions for the NPD results, since other anaylists have forecasted similar numbers, it’s still unsure if the current credit crunch is putting people off buying games. Guess we will have to wait for the NPD results until we can confirm he is correct.
As for the Price drop it could happen, it’s something I wish would happen. With the 360 being at such a good price, the PS3 needs to have a more competitive price in order to stay in the race. The price drop from Mircosoft seems like something they would do to keep the lead. I also agree with his opinion on the Wii’s price, they have no reason to lower it at this moment in time
I would also like to mention that Patcher predicted the big 360 price drop early last year, he just ended up being 6 months out.
Do you agree with Patcher?
WarDragon989
January 13, 2009 at 6:14 pm
“Do you agree with Patcher?”
I can’t say, i go to GT.com and he has a rep. Patcher i don’t mind but i could have predicted it, actually i predict a price drop around Killzone 2, or if that fails E3. See what i did there =D
Darkandroid
January 13, 2009 at 6:33 pm
Bonus Round FTW
It’s a prediction that everyone expects to happen anyway, hopefully Sony will listen and finally do it and not just release a bigger harddrive and consider that a reason to not lower the price.
Though in recent months Patchers gone a bit WTF, especially after stating that PSN only had 1 million members which the editor of the Bonus Round was able to prove wrong with a screenshot of an article. XD
WarDragon989
January 13, 2009 at 7:45 pm
Well that depends if Kotaku can be trusted on “how much Sony has reported lost” it could every well be never. Though i would like to see one week where they cut the price, then put it back. It would be funny with “which week will the price cut be and how much. Place your bets now” XD
Bonus Round is good i just wish Geoff would be a bit more forceful, and Pachter it is just that he is on constantly on it, 14 appearances to the second lowest who is N’Gai Croal with 5 appearances. I mean i don’t mind him, he is fun to listen to and good anaylst but like he said he knows nothing about gaming and he is just there to make the show look like its knows its stuff.
Its a shame the fourms didn’t see it that way, it was a war zone. =/ After the Pachter cock up.
Also hate to be a nit pick but Patcher is actually spelt “Pachter”. Everyone gets it wrong except the credits on BR. =P
Darkandroid
January 13, 2009 at 9:22 pm
Ha ha, that would be brilliant. XD
There needs to be more N’Gai on the Bonus Round. While Pachter is good, he’s only good for the prediction and sales based ones, when it comes to talking about the games himself he falls short. Though with GT anything console based causes a war.
Oh it’s spelt like that, I had no idea, I will try and remember to spell it like that.
Project Sora
January 14, 2009 at 12:19 am
Yeah, Pachter a good analyst when you take a business approach to gaming. I lost a shit load of respect for him though when he completely made himself look like an idiot talking about the PSN and the future of online for Sony.
And I also agree with more N’Gai on Bonus Round.
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