Read this article at: http://www.pixeljumpers.com/pixelfeed/2010/5/12/the-decline-of-third-party-sales.html
Many gamers will hype themselves up for months over a game that hasn’t been released yet. When the game finally hits stores, they wait in line for hours so they can be the first person to play the game. After they complete the game, they most likely forget about it and move on to the next game that they can buy on the launch date. They are only interested in what’s new and quickly forget about last months new toy that they shelled out $60 for because they feel like they have to buy their games brand new. Or so this seems to be the habit of a lot gamers according to video game sales.
Hit games that do well in sales seem to be forgotten quickly. They may be shelved in the collection of its owner occasionally being replayed, but the general public doesn’t continue to follow these games. Typically, once a game releases, it will receive its initial sales within the first week. From there sales go downhill. Soon people forget about the highly talked about games. Mostly what I’m referring to is third party games. While third party games make up the majority of video games available, they seem to all fall into the category of soon-to-be-forgotten. One first party company seems to be an exception to this classification: Nintendo.
Gamers will hate on Nintendo because of their lack of third party support. This is an accurate argument since a lot of third party developers don’t feel like reconfiguring their control system for a motion controller that falls into the minority of input devices; but even with the lack of third party support, Nintendo has been more successful in terms of console sales than its competitors. The main contributing factor to this success in console sales is first party games. Nintendo’s first party games not only have the ability to sell a system that has little third party support, they also don’t fall into the category of soon-to-be-forgotten games.
New Super Mario Bros Wii remains on the top ten weekly video games sales charts months after its release, while the original New Super Mario Bros for DS remained on the top ten a couple years after it release. Not even just Mario has this lasting power; the new Wii Fit and Wii Sports franchises continue to sell hundreds of thousands of units each month. Some may argue that Wii Sports only sells so well because it is included with the Wii, but even Wii Sports Resort has sold well. Currently Pokemon Heart Gold and Soul Silver are dominating the sales charts having not left the top ten since it’s release in America in March 2010. I predict it will continue to sell enough copies to remain in the top ten for at least another month: http://www.pixeljumpers.com/pixelfeed/2010/5/11/worldwide-weekly-sales-425-51.html (Your own predictions are more than welcome. Just leave a comment). Something about Nintendo games seems to make more people buy their products.
My interest in gaming branches out further than only Nintendo games, but lately more and more third party games decline in sales so quickly that they seem almost forgotten by the general public. I’m glad there is a company out there that understands games and has the ability to keep bring in new consumers to their games that have been available for months.
