November 2015 NPD: PS4 Smashes Xbox One in Important Holiday Month

Surprised Need for Speed did that well.

Xbox One apparently sold 1.2 million, it wasn't that bad.

@get2sammyb

This is the thing, it won't collapse, but I think the gaming press, or some of it, is leaning too much to one direction on this issue..........Exclusives are important!! They define a console, a brand, and I point to the PS3, and without those exclusives, Sony may not have pulled out of that generation. Microsoft is in the same position right now, beating on the exclusives drum to differ themselves from Sony.

It's easy to say exclusives don't matter when your on top and riding high, but I would reckon it's best not to live solely in the moment. As a gamer, I want exclusives! Give me a reason to buy your console.

Just Dance 2016 GOTY lol

Not to say exclusives don't matter, but I think they don't have the power people claim them to have. I feel like "exclusives sell consoles" really only applies to Nintendo.

@get2sammyb Yeah i feel like Halo, Gran Turismo, God of War, and maybe gears are the only Sony/MS IPs that really match Nintendo IPs in terms of system selling power.

@get2sammyb

You make a good point about global sales, and although I don't have hard numbers, in the US (and probably Canada as well), the PS3 really didn't become a contender until around the Uncharted 2 time frame, I would allude a lot of that to Sony exclusives and Microsofts shift at the time to a more casual, kinect focus.

Meh, Enix screwed themselves, pretty funny. Bethesda should have teamed with PS4 and Xbox should have kept CoD nonsense. Star wars, who cares. That'll keep selling because clueless nostalgic dad's will keep buying through to January and then the sales will die, what a heap of bear person crud.

Did it really have to be another "PS4 crushes Xbox One" title? Why not just a simple "PS4 leads holiday month?"

at my store Football Mangaer on PC not only sold more than 5 times as many copies as Tomb Raider, FM actually completely sold out BEFORE we sold 3 copies of RotTR

I'm surprised to see that CoD still sold better on Xbox. I guess the whole "PS is the new house of Cod" talk didn't really go that well. Also, JD still selling more on Wii, it just won't die! NX will come, Wii U will be long dead, but people will still buy JD on their Wiis!

Not surprised as I thought I'd be. Part of that is because I knew with Halo 5 being received the way it has, it wasn't going to have the lasting impact MS wanted. The Tomb Raider fanbase is on PlayStation (colossal waste of money on MS' part and frankly d*ck move by SE) and Sony lined up PS4 with the right third party games. Maybe MS bounces back and takes December but the fact it lost November despite having Halo 5 and Tomb Raider, as well as the Fallout 4 marketing deal has to have MS wondering what it needs to do and I'll be interested to see the response. Maybe something unexpected like a price drop to $250. MS can afford to take the hit.

@get2sammyb Need for speed was on sale for 35 in a few areas, but other than that, the Need For Speed Rivals game was nowhere to really be found (unless it was used at Gamestop), so there was only that Need For Speed title shown.

Great news for Sony but kind of a shame for X-box. Does anyone know how nintendo did??? It seemed that after black friday ended, anything playstation (including PS3) was almost scarce, so I kind of figured that the Ps4 sold well...plus, it was shown (even now) as being $50 less than the X-box One.

@JLPick
The way Nintendo fanboys were acting after the news that Wii U sold out at target.com I would've thought Nintendo was on track to not just win Black Friday but also take November. Obviously that wasn't the case but Nintendo fans, much as they like to pretend they aren't as bad as MS or Sony fanboys, are as rabid any other fanbase. I'd be interested to know the real numbers myself though. Wii U had some big exclusives and I saw the system going for $275 or lower pretty much everywhere.

@Tulio517
I actually didn't think the CoD deal would make a difference in sales, the series is so heavily associated with Xbox at this point. With third party games being so paramount to success these days though it doesn't hurt to align your console with as many as possible and if Sony's smart it'll do everything possible to keep AC, CoD and other big franchises in the fold next year as well.

"as Square Enix's business decision came back to haunt it in the worst possible way." so juicy heheheheh

Yeah, I finally got a PS4 on Black Friday at Amazon. PS4 is just selling like crazy. Too bad about Tomb Raider though, I really enjoy the game. I guess Enix won't do a deal like this again. Well, maybe they can sell more units when it hits PC and PS4.

@Gamer83 Yeah, it won't be easy to dissociate Cod from Xbox. Maybe if they keep getting the deals over ther next few years, who knows. I was wondering if it would be better for them if resources were moved towards other deals, but this really looks like a long term strategy.
Regarding Nintendo... There's no way to sugar coat it. Not a single Wii U exclusive made it to the top 10. As always, Wii U sold better than last year, but it's still really low. It's been like this for so long, only a really blind fanboy would start an argument!

@shonenjump86 to be honest, and I say this as a massive tomb raider fan and someone who loves the direction the reboot went, I sincerely hope by the time rise hits ps4 and pc it still sells poorly. The decision to make an active, ongoing 3rd party multiplatform sequel exclusive is an act that takes buying exclusive content/timed dlc to a whole new disgusting and quite frankly disturbing level. Despite owning both systems, I refuse to buy it in protest to the practice.

I would have felt the same way If it were sony who bought the exclusive time period. Quite frankly as a whole, exclusive content tied to a manufacturer, retailer, pre order, is getting out of hand. To be clear I have no problems with the titanfall deal, or sunset overdrive, or blood borne. Those were new ips, or say the tomb raider reboot had been exclusive, I would also have been fine because prior to the reboot it was for the most part a dormant franchise. I want to go on explaining my thoughts on this but I will spare you the novel. Im just happy that the numbers hopefully showed square, and other 3rd party developers with active ips that going from multiplatform to exclusive for any amount of time is unacceptable.

I will leave like this. What if Sony retailiated, backed up the truck full of money, and bought exclusivity for the next gta. As highly unlikely, where does this practice stop. Does ms respond with getting the next elder scrolls, and before you know it, in order to play a franchise your hopping consoles to play sequels?

So much for Halo being the xbone saviour. Where was it...number 8 in the charts. As for tomb raider, a game that looks great, what a disaster for ms. If the xbone was to start to compete with the playstation, november was their big chance. Dont forget they lanched their windows 10 aswell on the console. I can only see the ps4 getting even more dominant now that the xbone have fired all their guns as it were.

I don't understand the gloating and the cheers; when last have you played "incredible sales numbers"? People who honesty feel that Sony had the stronger showing just because they outsold 2 struggling consoles need to think again. All PS4's biggest games weren't Sony made and for me that kinda stings.

When we talk Wii U, we talk about what a terrible year it been, but Wii U owners got Splatoon, Mario Maker, Yoshi, Kirby, Mario Party and Xenoblade Chronicles X. Surely, you wouldn't wanna trade because of the total lack of 3rd parties, but from a gamer POV both Nintendo and MS had a pretty strong showing with games that define them as console manufacturers and developers, where Sony leaned back and let MS and Nintendo fight for scraps when they took the crown.

But I think we as consumers and gamers should start realizing more that the business side of things doesn't directly makes us any happier as a gamer. We can cheer about defeating MS, but they had Halo, Forza, GoW, Rare Replay, Tomb Raider and FREE BC... Sounds like a Pyrrhic victory to me.

Exclusive's don't matter one little bit the main thing I hear (not read) about when it come's to why people chose PS4 is because the PS4 is more powerfull simple, if MS had chose "for the player's" and made a console equal to PS4 power and not chosen the "XBOX1 will be the centre of your living room and the heart of your entertainment" aproach then it would of been much closer and maybe would of been better for the fan's.

Great news for Sony, I love my PS4 and it is well on its way to becoming the best console of all time. Also a quick peek at some of the games coming up, exclusive or not are suggesting I'm not going to have much free time soon. Let's see Uncharted 4, Ratchet and Clank, No Man's Sky, Persona 5, FFXV, FFVII remake, Horizon Zero Dawn, Ni No Kuni 2, Grant Turismo, Dragon Quest XI, Cyberpunk 2077, Detroit, Dark Souls 3, Doom and The Last Guardian. I'm sure there are many more and thinking about it many of those are exclusives

I take a positive and a negative away from all this:

• Seems like this annoying silliness of "holiday exclusives are crucial" is a myth busted. Most of my favourite games are exclusives, and I love it when a first party studio puts proper effort into exploring the hardware, but that doesn't mean it will automatically shift consoles.
• It seems like Sony might be getting complacent. Even without anything to really distinguish themselves from MS since Bloodborne, other than a more powerful console (and IMHO, far better OS and more features), they are still outselling Xbox. That is a potential cause for them to care less about what makes them special and double down on CoD marketing deals. Really need to start seeing more from Sony.

@Boerewors And still they lost so what is your point. We had Bloodborne, Until Dawn, GoW, Dragon Quest Heroes, Sword Arts, Tales of Zesteria.

Apparently Xbone sold 1.29m v's PS4 1.54m and I'm a little surprised by this seeing as MS brought out all their big guns this holiday. Could explain why they lowered X1 price $50 again for December?

@Flaming_Kaiser
This is my point, you claiming a sales victory where that doesn't matter a single bit for us gamers: it isn't about winning, it's about having the typical 1st party Sony exclusives we own a PS for. The only 1st party effort you named was GoW, which was a remaster, and you forgot the uncharted remaster.

Why be all cheerful about a sales victory, rubbing it in Xbox owners faced when they had wonderful 1st party exclusives and BC. We should be more critical as consumers and ask more of Sony; paying €15 for Rogue Galaxy when I have the disk is ridiculous, paying €180 a year to play games on PSnow I already own is ridiculous... But the "new" Sony community (read: former 360 owners) is too busy with their imaginitive war to notice they are scr*wed over. Arguments like: well, just buy a PS3 and PS2 when you wanna play old games aren't helping the consumer, they are helping Sony...

Neither Sony nor MS are our friends: they are companies that wanna make money of our backs. To celebrate that the company that's making money off of your back is doing that with more people than the other companies is plain silly. Please understand that this isn't a sour Xbox owner speaking, but a PS fan that remembers the time where we all stuck together to ask more from Sony, not because we were self entitled, but because history has shown us time and time again that they become arrogant and complacent the moment their consumers get arrogant and complacent.

you know MS have no one to blame for the poor reception of the XB1 but themselves

they shoot themselves in the foot with their initial reveal, the always online, mandatory Kinect, no used games or lending, a focus on TV and Media instead of games and of course the whole "Deal With It" fiasco

now they were able to fix a lot of these issues both before and after launch (although i find the system is a lot slower and clunky since the last update) but by that point the damage was done, people were already burnt

they say there is no such thing as bad publicity but i think MS would disagree with that

@get2sammyb
I still say with the way PS4 is dominating the headlines, Uncharted 4 would've done fine this holiday season, especially considering the relative lack of quality exclusives. I have to assume it would've averaged 90 or close to it on Metacritic like all previous Uncharteds and people would've flocked to it. And Sony still would've had enough to dominate the headlines early next year. I can appreciate the business strategy too but as a consumer, not a suit who benefits from Sony's business decisions it would be nice to get a big PlayStation 4 game to call our own one of these holiday seasons like we always used to get with previous PS consoles.

Briefly off topic but since you mentioned it, the overall sales may look good but I don't think it's as positive as it seems. The push is still to go all digital and I can't shake the feeling both Sony and MS want to get away from traditional consoles, at which point the switch to PC to continue gaming might make sense since PS4 and Xbox One are basically very weak PCs to begin with.

I despise MS and the Xbox brand so i am HAPPY

@shonenjump86
If one of the console makers goes to a third party with an insane amount $$$ they'll do a deal no matter how little sense it makes from a gamer perspective or how bad it could damage a franchise. The only discussion around Rise of the Tomb Raider right now should be its worth as a game of the year contender, we're still talking about exclusivity. Unfortunately I think the franchise is done and the worst past is it's not because of the developers it's because of some suits born with silver spoons in their mouths who don't need anymore $$$.

@get2sammyb
Four years away, at most. Digital sales are setting records, even freaking Nintendo is hyping up the digital side of its business. It'll be a slow but steady rise and MS and Sony implement more strategies over the next few years to get an even bigger digital presence. No later than early 2019 I predict both companies announce the next evolution of PS and Xbox but it won't be PS5 and Xbox whatever MS wants to call it. It'll be as services tied to different pieces of hardware. I don't want it but I've resided myself to the fact that this is what's going to happen. The only benefit I can think of is the convenience factor. Pre-order and pre-load a game week in advance and then you can start playing right at midnight of launch day. The downsides will be always online, no physical copies of games and no true ownership of games you buy (could already say the latter is mostly gone anyway) but I guess they're necessary evils in a constantly changing industry. I just hope it doesn't also mean an end to 'traditional' single player games because I'm not big on co-op or competitive multiplayer. I come home from work and just want to kick back and enjoy playing some NBA 2K or Tomb Raider or inFamous by myself.

Yeah Uncharted 4 probably would have done well still, but it didn't need come out yet obviously. The big first party PS4 exclusives are coming guys. Patience. And while Xbox might take December, I think its clear that Halo did not work. And that is the strongest Xbox IP.

And then PS4 will be going all out next year, in what could be the highest hardware sales year in PS history.

I agree with @Boerewors, sales mean nothing beyond securing third party support, something that Sony has never had an issue with. I seldom care about the chart toppers (shooter, sports, shooter, sports, rinse, repeat) and Splatoon is still my personal GOTY. No other shooter ever would make me go online for 100+ hours.

Thankfully Uncharted 4 is coming and then Sony has some interesting exclusives like SFV and Persona 5 for next year.

@WebHead
Not really sure how much better PS4 can do. At a certain point, just like with the original Wii, sales momentum has to slow down.

@Gamer83 at this rate I wouldn't expect ps4 to slow down until 2018.

2016 is set to be full of great first party games and isn't it better to spread them out throughout the year rather than squeeze them all into one three-month window? There are so many games coming out anyway I'm not sure how people have time to play everything immediately!

@Tulio517 I think its simply the type of gamer on each platform. As much as Microsoft pretends to they are offended by the "Bro-Shooter Console" label, their fanbase is overwhelmingly FPS fans. Their flagship exclusive on Xbox platforms (Halo) just reinforces this. I am not surprised in the least bit that an basic FPS game (basic as in: one that is not RPG-like, like Mass Effect, BioShock, etc...) sells much better on that platform; there are just so many more FPS fans there.

@sinalefa Sales mean quite a bit for first party support too. They still have to pay first party studios, and the more money Sony makes as a whole, with Playstation, the more money they can invest back into their first party studios, and into new innovations (like PS VR) or into development of more/better UI features, etc...

@get2sammyb I think "exclusives selling consoles" is a joke. They don't. Some long awaited sequel to some critically acclaimed exclusive series (like a Halo or GoW) might move the needle a little bit, but chances are, fans that rush out to buy those games have either already bought the console, or are already planning on buying it, so that game launch is just giving them a reason to make the choice they were likely to make anyway. It just speeds up the timeline.

I wish that we did away with exclusives entirely. I choose my console based on many, many points. Not a single one of those is the exclusives on that system. I know this won't ever happen, but I can dream.

When you're leading the pack in sales, the idea of exclusives sustaining a holiday season isnt needed. Take into consideration what has been announced and how that keeps the console in the limelight for consumers. The PS4's 2016 line-up looks amazing, it's selling on its future prospects as well as its position at the top of the totem pole.

That's not to say the other two are doing badly, as this November "was the best month for Xbox One, PS4, and Wii U software ever, exceeding the second-best month December 2014, by 34 percent."
http://venturebeat.com/2015/12/10/november-npd-cod-beats-fallout/

Good exclusives sell consoles, make no mistake about that. Otherwise no one here would've been gushing over FFVIIRemake (wouldja look at that, it'll have timed exclusivity with Sony...sounds familiar), UC4, Horizon Zero Dawn, or Shenmue3.

As I have boldly predicted many times on this site, exclusives simply do not move the needle on console sales like they once did. Your CoDs, Fallouts, Battlefronts etc are and will almost certainly always be the heaviest of the heavy hitters. Sure some exclusives will sell really well (uncharted, gran Turismo etc), but that is the exception.
I much prefer Sony's strategy of spreading games out over the entire year and then letting the big thirty party blockbusters Duke it out come November and december. It allows for greater mind share of your new exclusive IPS in the slower parts of the year thus growing new and exciting franchises and maintaining the exclusive franchises we already have.
Sony just seems to understand the console business better as a whole than Microsoft. I will say I am glad that both are doing really well and that hopefully leads to awesome new IPs and gaming experiences. A toast to consoles and their continued health!!

"Rise of the Tomb Raider, the timed Xbox One exclusive, failed to breach the charts – in fact, rumours suggest that it didn't come close"

So they got their "uncharted" game after all!

BA-DUM ... TSH

Thank you, I'm here all week.

@Paranoimia
That was pretty good but Kaz Hirai already beat everybody to it..,. https://twitter.com/KazHiraiCEO/status/499187317735956480

@Gamer83 Well, damn! I follow him on Twitter as well. Didn't see that... clearly need to check it more often!

@BigDaddyT0101
I hear ya, I'm hoping other companies don't do something like this in the future, but I agree at what @Gamer83 said about a console maker making a deal with a third party with an insane amount of money.

From my personal experience exclusives don't mean much at all, I think I went the whole last gen without really enjoying one. I had a 360. I've had my PS4 for nearly 2 years now, and I have really enjoyed TLOURM and UC collection (so far) Killzone was decent and Resogun was fun too. I really want the whole God of war collection but doubtful with a Vita and Ps3 collections already out... Exclusives maybe help you decide on which console you want but when MS fu**** up bad I don't think having the best exclusives would of helped anyway. (Even though all there exclusives bore the s*** out of me)

@Carl-G Did they hurt your feelings?

@sub12 Thing is, time and time again we see them not mattering. Nintendo always have more exclusives and from the N64 onwards have been trounced by their competitors. The Wii's faddish success was nothing to do with exclusives - as I've said before, in the period of time the Wii itself sold 90,000,000 units, Skyward Sword sold just 250,000 copies. It was all to do with marketing a gimmick at moms and aunties in a way they couldn't repeat again, hence the abject failure of the Wii U.

It's more to do with what you can't play on a given device. Nintendo have the most exclusives each time, they also have by far the least games in total. The Gamecube had two Zeldas, multiple Mario games, several Metroids, a Mario Kart, and a load of other exclusives yet it did absolutely pathetically because it lacked so much stuff the PS2 had - not exclusively, just had alongside other platforms like Xbox and PC. The Wii U has a load of exclusives too but it it also lacks just about 99% of all other games released during its lifetime.

I firmly believe that's what people look for each time and it really bears out as you look at each console in each generation. Right now it's true that I can only play Mario Maker on Wii U and I can only play Halo 5 on Xbone, but I'm missing out on less games by having a PS4 as opposed to having either of those. One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 and Tales of Zestiria aren't exclusives for PS4, yet they're not on Xbone or Wii U. Final Fantasy XV isn't an exclusive but it's not on Wii U. That accumulation of all these games you can't play are more important than the presence of just Uncharted 4.

@Gamer83 I know what you mean about the nintendo fanboys. I love nintendo, have since the NES days, but I feel that the Wii U isn't holding the titles as much as their previous consoles (not a lot of depth or detail put into the games and they all seemed kinda rushed except for a few titles)...put something like that on nintendolife, and you have many people calling you every name in the book...especially when they see that I preferred the PS3 and PS4 over the Wii and Wii U. It's like you can't love two companies anymore...even when it was Nintendo versus Sega, it was the same way, and I just don't really get what the big deal is...all of the companies have good games and have their ups and downs. I'd love for a console to be made with Nintendo and Sony together to back it up! Imagine with both of the companies franchises together in a console...it would be the ultimate gaming system!!!

@Gamer83 Kinda the only reason my old consoles are placed in bins for the time being...you know it'll be coming, even Disc Movies are starting to disappear, and I really don't want to pay in full for something as a download-only, find out it's not worth the cost, and then be stuck with it no matter what. For games, it's fun to play and if you want to TRADE it in for something new, you have that option...I really don't want the digital-only era to come, but I think by 2020, it'll happen...but it may not for older people that don't have the internet or know how to do that stuff, so some things (movie and music wise) may stick around.