As reported by MCV, the launch of the PS4 Pro last week had a positive impact on sales of Sony's current-gen console. In the UK, PS4 sales tripled, jumping a rather impressive 204 per cent week over week. 65 per cent of those sales came courtesy of the new Pro model.
We imagine that it'll be a similar story in most other regions, too. The Xbox One has been outselling the PS4 in North America for four months straight now, so Sony will be hoping that the Pro has a similar effect on sales across the pond. We eagerly await the next NPD report.
Last Friday, we polled you lot on whether you had bought a PS4 Pro at launch. 262 of you voted, with 40 per cent of you saying that you'd grabbed the supercharged machine. A relatively small sample to draw from, but perhaps it's indicative of the bigger picture - especially when sales have seen an increase like this.
What do you reckon? Will the Pro be a real success for Sony, or are we just seeing an initial sales boost? Supercharge yourself in the comments section below.
[source mcvuk.com]
Comments 50
That's a good boost. PS4 also had over 50 per cent marketshare, despite Microsoft selling Xbox One for £179.
@get2sammyb
The most exciting thing bout the launch of the Pro so far, are the sub-headers on PushSquare!
I think the sales will slow if they don't address the performance issues that DF have been talking about. If word starts to get to the average consumer on the street, it may hurt sales over the holiday period. I still want one though!
Sweet! I just wish they released actual numbers to explain the 204% increase. I loves me some data
@Diymhoshei @JoeBlogs The obsession with this kind of thing is mind boggling. While I agree it shouldn't be happening, it's a few frames in games that are running at double the resolution... Context is key.
It also ignores the dozens of other games that are running at both a higher resolution with a significantly more stable framerate. Which will unquestionably be the standard moving forwards, by the way.
@JoeBlogs There's definitely more than 20. There are at least 10 PlayStation VR games that look and run better alone. But yeah, fair enough if it doesn't represent value for money for you... I kinda think that's the beauty of the product in some ways. It's just a boosted PS4, really.
Got my pro on Saturday and have to say I'm loving it so far! Think I'll have another play through of the last of us and Skyrim looks great.
@JoeBlogs Looking at the positive reception on tomb raider, infamous second son and nioh, I think we''ll be getting this option (to choose resolution or framerate) in more and more games. I don't have 4k tv yet so resolution boost is kind of useless to me since I think ps4 graphics already good, I prefer more stable / 60 fps.
Still, I do think ps4 pro is more usefull to 4k tv owners, it's okay not to upgrade if you still have 1080p tv.
@get2sammyb I would completely agree with you, a few frames is nothing to moan about. However, I feel this Pro iteration should be performing better in ALL respects, otherwise why the upgrade? I am sure that these small 'issues' will be fixed soon though. But any bad press is bad press and Sony really don't need something this minor to drop sales if, as I mentioned before, the average consumer starts hearing about performance issues. But I still want one and I am currently trying to persuade the missus!
Why can't developers add the options of better framerate or fancier effects into base PS4 games?
Im getting the ps4 pro for xmas and giving my son my original ps4 for xmas it all works out lol.
@Diymhoshei I agree.
that's nice, but didn't sales plummet recently in anticipation for the slim and pro releases? So they're up on last month, how do they compare to the same time last year, or is that not such a positive headline?
Picking mine up tomorrow. Nom Nom Nom.
When Sony state in their own policy that Pro support games must run at the same performance level or better than that of the PS4, and yet they don't then, we have a serious problem.
Sony need to respond to these issues fast. Tell consumers that fixes are on the way etc. This could be very damaging to future and current sales not to mention the returns they could be facing if unresolved.
I have been saying for months that MS's improved sales and 'wins' are temporary until the Pro released - even with the confusion and 'benefits' to 1080p TV owners.
I do think its been 'slightly' mis-sold none the less. Sold on improvements to games - unfortunately those improvements are in less than 5% of games, no improvement to games with unlocked frame rates/dynamic scaling unless patched despite al that power and even some of those patched games fall short in performance (but do look better).
These enhancements though do show the potential for the next few years even if its barely an improvement right now...
It will be interesting to see how the sales go after the initial early adopter rush finishes for both this and PSVR. The release windows of both being relatively close to Christmas doesn't help with getting a good feel for how successful either item is though and I'm guessing it will be a full year before we have a decent idea of how well either has done.
Having said that I also wonder what impact both the Switch and Scorpio will have on sales after the initial burst. I think from a business perspective Sony will want to get as many units out before Christmas as possible, as the competition ramps up next year. My feelings about the Pro aside, I think it is a very volatile period coming up for Sony that may backfire on them if they're not careful.
@get2sammyb But that is the trouble it isn't a few frames here and there. I played Tomb Raider at the 4k setting over the weekend and the frame rate is an absolute mess, it is all over the place and gets worse the further you get. I doubt that it maintained 30 fps for more than a few seconds at a time.
There are many other Pro supported games with performance issues and frame rate instability.
This is unacceptable in a product that has been advertised in the way it was. PS4 owners were led to believe that the Pro would offer a better experience than the standard PS4. Yes it is early days and there are bound to be teething problems but remember Sony cannot directly fix all these games they are dependant upon the developers.
My folks got me one for Xmas, can't wait!
Not surprised, PS4 Pros were selling like hot cakes when I was picking mine up from GAME.
I really hope this puts SONY back on top of sales each month in the UK(& USA) because I can't stand Microsoft :-/
@get2sammyb i get the 4K argument but I think one of the issues highlighted by DF that people are unhappy about is that running at 1080p the Pro is dropping frames vs base due to supersampling. In those instances one option would be to let the user run the game in base mode which is what happens when a non-pro game is played anyway. This could be enabled at a system level as an option and would mean that the Pro could never perform worse than base at 1080p.
@get2sammyb So what's your take on this?
"Will the Pro be a real success for Sony, or are we just seeing an initial sales boost?"
First week sales were always going to be good, gamers waiting for their next fix can't be denied. But this holiday and going forward? I'm not following Xboxen as well as I should but I think there are 3 base models - 500GB, 1TB, 2TB-at $299, $349 and $399 - bundled w/ games like Gears of War, Madden and B1. That's a lot of option for a lot of people.
As far as I can tell PS4 has $399 Pro still w/ no game, and $299 Slim w/ U4, and $449 FFXV Slim which is really limited I'm sure.
So I guess I'm wondering w/o answering, what happens when BF rolls around and people start holiday shopping, PS4 Slim + U4 will be $249 almost everywhere alongside some $249 X1S, will $399 Pro keep rolling then? And after the holidays are over? What's your feel b/c sales surely won't keep this high. When do you think they kill the Sim - before holiday 2017 or 2018? Or will it stick around at $199 like that ugly slide top 12B super slim PS3? (I own 1, it's an ugly mess, but I got it cheap)
Oh, we in the US take our discount shopping very seriously, here's a group effort spreadsheet from CAG. I'll be buying a lot of cheap old PS4 games at Gamestop this holiday.
Spreadsheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1JG8yUuE9zpAJhhj5aikE8QaqeMG4sJA2rTnfPyOiOuY/edit#gid=1562863453
Master thread:
https://www.cheapassgamer.com/topic/358988-black-friday-2016-video-game-deals-the-epic-master-thread/
@JoeBlogs every game I've tried other than uncharted 4 has multiple options. You. Can set both Infamous games to 60fps with increased lighting
Loving my PS4 Pro and I can't say I've noticed these issues, infamous runs at a significantly higher framerate at 1080p as does Tomb Raider which also looks simply stunning in 4K. I've played a bit of Skyrim and it seemed to run the same as it does on the standard model just without the really soft looking appearance. I'm really looking forward to next year with the likes of Horizon and Days Gone to see what this console can really do because I suspect we're only just scratching the surface at the moment
I want a PS4 Pro but I want a 4K tv first.
@GBMatthew Check out digital foundry call of Duty review and battlefield, fifa 2017. All dramatically improved and rock solid framerate on all games even in high demanding areas. Fifa especially gets 4K NATIVE 60fps with way better FOV so to say there are no improvements is a bit misleading. You could say Dishounered 2 runs like trash on PC but we all know a patch is coming. Or all games run worse on Xbox especially battlefield wich at times dips below 720p. And I have tomb raider and it runs smooth and looks way better so do many other games so your comments are a bit misleading. Seems that the newer games coming out run far better on the PRO. Something I am disappointed in is I haven't seen anyone compare the Pro games to Xbox, I think Microsoft have payed a lot of money to reviewers and you tubers because the differences are huge.
@SnowstormX Is it even possible to dip below 720p? Isn't the resolution always the resolution? What does it dip to 640p?
I agree about the lack of Xbox comparisons but that's probably b/c people just naturally assume PS4 is better than Xbox One so what's even the point of comparing Pro to X1S? I do expect a lot of Pro-Scorpio comparisons if and when Scorpio ever releases.
Bundles are pretty crap, what a disgraceful shame.
@JoeBlogs I'm not so sure you can dismiss the Switch so easily, I think a lot of gamers who already have a base PS4 would think very carefully as to whether to get the Pro or Switch if they had to choose or find it hard to justify extra purchases.
Then on the other side you have the Scorpio which Microsoft only announced so early to throw a spanner in the works for Sony. The closer it gets to releasing the more the people who want the latest cutting edge gadget will hold off for it and given that is a huge chunk of the market for the Pro it makes Sony's position wobbly at best. The flip side is, as a PS4 owner, you could argue that you'll get all Sony's games any way so it might be better to get a Scorpio over a Pro if you don't already have an Xbox1.
As we've seen many times, a console maker only stays in pole position until someone else offers something the consumer likes more. Sony ran away with this generation early on due to Microsoft's inability to see what they were offering was not what people wanted, now though Sony are getting a fair few pieces of bad press and Microsoft are being careful to woo any potential customers. The balance could shift at any point if Sony are not exceptionally careful. I expect an eventful 2017 either way.
@Dichotomy I don't think switch will make a dent on ps4 sales, I mean the talk around switch is if it's capable of 1080p or 720p, in 2016!! Third party will not support the switch because they still using cartidge (can you imagined battlefield 1 with patch on cartridge?) and mobile cpu (I don't think battlefield 1/titanfall 2 can run 60 fps on switch).
I still think microsoft problem are games, not it's console. The reason people buy xbox this 4 month is because they cheap like chips, do people will buy it's next machine if it doesn't have exclusive games and expensive? For console, the most important thing is having a lot of 3rd party and exclusive games.
@get2sammyb
Performance matters in games, especially on a console that is supposed to be more powerful. When the Xbox Scorpio comes out with four times the power of the Xbox One, you can be sure people will be expecting far better performance and if it fails at that, journalists, probably even some here, will no doubt be sure to point it out, so lets not be hypocritical because this is a PlayStation website. The fact is ALL, not just many, games should be performing better on PS4 Pro. Simple as that.
@Carl-G
MS winning a few months is actually a good thing though. If Sony loses this holiday bad enough, which I hope happens, maybe they'll learn to release exclusives in more than just the months of February-May.
@wiiware What you have to remember is you are arguing against Nintendo on the aspect of power, but not mentioning exclusive, but then you are arguing against the Scorpio based on exclusives and ignoring power.
While I'd not expect the switch to be a powerhouse, there is too little concrete information to judge its exact power yet. Given the Wii U showed you could have good looking games running at 60fps on weaker hardware I think Nintendo at least got the message to some of us that good design and optimisation should be part of making games. That brings me on to the other point, I would love it if console manufacturers turned around and said games had to be released finished on their machines. Day one patches being a potential problem highlights a problem with the industry and not Nintendo (although I'd expect patches may work by flashing the cart with the latest build). Despite everything though, ignoring the fact it is a portable console is the biggest issue here - even if it comes in behind the X1 it is still going to be something you can use in places you can't use the others.
As for exclusivity on the Xbox, they did well last gen with arguably (definitely, but using this to be objective) weaker exclusives than Sony and the Wii U tanked this gen despite having more and generally better exclusives than the other two combined. So far Sony has released little in the way of quality exclusives this generation, but has shown that it doesn't really matter as long as you have 3rd party support and can push your console on being more powerful. It is unfortunate, but resolution and a few frames per second have become more of a talking point than good games and fun.
As I said though, we shall see how it all plays out in the next year. I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss any party though as this round has just begun.
@SnowstormX Where exactly did I say that there were no improvements?
Your the one misleading people not me I simply stated facts and my experience.
You listed 3 games with good support I can list more than 10 with the opposite. I do not find it acceptable that we pay £350.00 for a console that is stated and advertised to deliver a better performance yet clearly doesn't in more than 60% of the titles supported.
I am 75% through TR and yes it looks good at the 4k setting but the frame rate is all over the place and nowhere near 30 at times.
@GBMatthew In fairness it does depend how you define performance. I really don't like that Skyrim struggles to run as well on a PS Pro but it is running at twice the resolution with only a few frames dropped. So if your priority is resolution, then it does perform better on PS Pro.
So games don't run "worse" on the Pro. I would like to see more options implemented like Tomb Raider has done so we can prioritise the performance boosts we would prefer to see in our games.
Anyway, it's clear that the power is there, hopefully the developers use it properly.
@kyleforrester87 I think you'll find that Skyrim is running at 4 x 1080p resolution as it is a native 4k game.
I define it by what SONY themselves stated 'the games should run with equal or better performance than the standard PS4'.
If a standard PS4 console runs a game at a locked 30fps 1080p but the Pro runs the game at 4k but only around 25 - 30 fps then that is worse performance. Not a viewpoint fact otherwise, what is the point of the Pro.
@Dichotomy You need 3rd party games more than 1st party for a successfull console, nintendo doesn't have that, and I'll bet the switch will be the same, no blurays & tablet prosessor will make a inferior console for third party games, another mario and zelda won't be enough.
@GBMatthew This is the first time I heard tomb raider ps4 pro framerate problems on 4k, digital foundry says they have no problem with 4k framerate, it's smooth 30 fps. Also that 60% stats
@GBMatthew Apologies, that's right - so even better then. 4 times the resolution for a few drops in frame rate could well be considered an improvement in performance. Since performance isn't defined solely by frames.
But, I tend to agree - to me it should be "running" properly before they think about increasing the graphical quality, and if quadrupling the resolution results in drops in frames, they should either NOT increase the resolution so much, or provide options for the player to reduce the res and have a higher FPS.
But clearly the power is there for developers to use, just hope they use it well and give us some options.
@wiiware I did also read that DF said that while TR did perform well initially it began struggling toward the end.
@kyleforrester87 Thanks for your mature replies.
Agreed it is a good console and I am happy with it but also it is frustrating that a lot of these games are preforming worse with regards to frame rate on the Pro. I hope that these are just teething issues and eventually will be sorted.
I just get annoyed with the performance especially after all the SONY comments regarding equal to or better than PS4 frame rate.
@wiiware The frame rate gets worse the further into the game you get. Why would I lie about it? Even DF mention it.
As for the Stat yeah probably not accurate but I know more games with issues than without So it's over 50% for sure.
@GBMatthew Me too, playing Skyrim on my 1080p TV at lower frame rates than on my old PS4 - What's that all about?! I am being optimistic about it though, and when my 4K set arrives I'll at least benefit from the higher resolution, so it's not a kick in the teeth.
@kyleforrester87 Hopefully a lot of these games will be sorted by the time you get it.
Just out of interest when are you getting it and which model did you decide on?
I have a 4k Panasonic with a fantastic PQ but sadly no HDR so I will probably get a new HDR one next year.
@wiiware Since the days of the Gamecube Nintendo have been a great second system pick-up though - you have your primary system for third party games and then, if you're after a second system, the Nintendo one is always a great choice. Most people considering the Pro will already have a PS4, X1 or PC meaning the Switch is a viable choice even without 3rd party stuff as you already have access to it.
As for the Mario/Zelda game thing that gets wheeled out all the time, I think it is just brought about by people's need to justify their purchase over that of a Nintendo machine. Even if we accept that all is ever released is Mario and Zelda games, the diversity in Mario games alone means you are just picking out the mascot rather than the game. He's in platformers in 2D and 3D, racing games, tennis games, RPGs, fighting games, football games, puzzle games, party games and probably others I've missed. So a Mario game is an ill defined concept.
The fact the Wii U is getting one new Zelda game is another thing that makes it odd to pick out this franchise as Nintendo's go to (it is equivalent of picking out Smash for instance). Then of course there are a load of other games such as Xenoblade, Splatoon, Wonderful 101 and Pikmin that don't fall in to the same category. I think Nintendo get a bad rap for doing a lot of things better than their competition and it is unfortunate people only pick up on colourful visuals, assuming the game isn't mature enough for them. If they manage to get enough people to see what they've really been doing in the industry (releasing games that work out of the box, not charging for online, keeping local play a thing and so on) and forget for a moment about processing power they might do pretty well.
Aside from all of this they do very well in the portable market and, depending how they push the switch, it could well be a hit with those gamers that like to take a dedicated device with them. If we got the best of both worlds - Nintendo's first/second party console games and their big handheld games - the system could be a phenomenal success. Arbitrarily ruling them out though would be a mistake.
@GBMatthew I ordered a Samsung KS7000 last night, ariving Saturday. It sucks that you don't have HDR, I'm looking forward to seeing what it's like, especially on FF15!
@kyleforrester87 Yeah no HDR but that's the price I pay for early adoption. That's a nice TV your going to be in gaming heaven. Have you played on a 4k screen before? If not your in for a treat.
@GBMatthew First time, and for the price of entry it better leave my eyes on the floor! Lol
@JoeBlogs It doesnt really matter for the most part how existing games, patched post release do on the Pro. What matters is what future games do.
It seems it moved around 65k units in Japan as well in the first 4 days, that's way more than I expected!
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