FF7 Rebirth was Japan's no.1 selling game for March. Ampere data suggests it has sold around 2 Million copies. |UP| Analysts says it's underperforming

JAHGamer

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Mat is the face NPD for like 20 years. Who else is working there? Is he just by himself in an office đŸ¤£

They should be using a blog with all the stats instead of his personal twitter account.
They cover sales data for pretty much every industry, not just gaming. Mat is just head of gaming.

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voke

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I just saw someone say persona, Xenoblade, yakuza are now more popular than FF đŸ˜‚

Persona is arguable but even then, it’s not like it’s running laps around FF.
 

Evilnemesis8

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I just saw someone say persona, Xenoblade, yakuza are now more popular than FF đŸ˜‚

Folks just say anything, the numbers don't back that up.
The only thing you could say is that, in recent years, other JRPGs are narrowed the sales gap through various means(made strides in the west/more platforms leading to more higher total sales) compared to FF.
But it is still the premier selling JRPG franchise.

You could also say social media engagement for some of those franchises are probably higher, but that's because they have a younger audience(for the most part). Oldhead FF fans aren't talking about the games much, but they are pre-ordering those games and playing them at home all the same.
Persona is arguable but even then, it’s not like it’s running laps around FF.

I am very curious if Atlus/SEGA can replicate the success of P5 with P6.
P5 is such an outlier when you compare the sales of previous games in the franchise.
 
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Yurinka

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Mat is the face NPD for like 20 years. Who else is working there? Is he just by himself in an office đŸ¤£

They should be using a blog with all the stats instead of his personal twitter account.
Mat needs to understand it is an issue generated by own NPD/Circana when they stopped to give sales data.

NPD/Circana aren't VG chartz posting guesses, they are instead a professional team of market researchers who do proper market research and tracking for their customers, who pay for it: the ESA and other similar associations from other countries, game publishers and developers, other market researchers, investors, platform holders, some big retailers and similar. The people who pay for these reports get them.

If they would release their work for free nobody would pay for it and they wouldn't be able to make such research. Matt is generous enough to periodically share part of it. Harassing and insulting him may only result on changing his mind, he may stop sharing this info for free. He may say: do you want the data? Then pay for it.

They already have a blog where they publicly share for free a portion of what Matt shares in social media:
https://www.circana.com/intelligence/entertainment-top-10/2024/top-10-video-games/
https://www.circana.com/intelligenc...watch-growth-in-gaming-among-women-and-girls/
 
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ethomaz

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NPD/Circana aren't VG chartz posting guesses, they are instead a professional team of market researchers who do proper market research and tracking for their customers, who pay for it: the ESA and other similar associations from other countries, game publishers and developers, other market researchers, investors, platform holders, some big retailers and similar. The people who pay for these reports get them.

If they would release their work for free nobody would pay for it and they wouldn't be able to make such research. Matt is generous enough to periodically share part of it. Harassing and insulting him may only result on changing his mind, he may stop sharing this info for free. He may say: do you want the data? Then pay for it.

They already have a blog where they publicly share for free a portion of what Matt shares in social media:
https://www.circana.com/intelligence/entertainment-top-10/2024/top-10-video-games/
https://www.circana.com/intelligenc...watch-growth-in-gaming-among-women-and-girls/
That has nothing to do with what I said.
They always give the sales data for consoles and TOP10 software and never had any harm to their business.

They stopped (because some big publishers didn’t like people to see their low numbers) so created the issue he is complaining about.

Just to make better example… NPD shared units sold for over two decades and just now they are reaching a decade without give units sold.
 

Dabaus

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Folks just say anything, the numbers don't back that up.
The only thing you could say is that, in recent years, other JRPGs are narrowed the sales gap through various means(made strides in the west/more platforms leading to more higher total sales) compared to FF.
But it is still the premier selling JRPG franchise.

You could also say social media engagement for some of those franchises are probably higher, but that's because they have a younger audience(for the most part). Oldhead FF fans aren't talking about the games much, but they are pre-ordering those games and playing them at home all the same.


I am very curious if Atlus/SEGA can replicate the success of P5 with P6.
P5 is such an outlier when you compare the sales of previous games in the franchise.
I guarantee 75-85 percent of all of persons 5 sales all from ps4 and Ps5. In fact persona was this niche franchise UNTIL ps4 and covid hit at the same time. Then they released a complete version later on down the line. Then RELEASED it a THIRD time to be multiplatform. What were Persona 5s sales the third go around? Did they announce any? Did switch, pc, and Xbox add anything substantial to what was already sold on ps4/ps5? Idk so I’m genuinely asking.

I’m not discounting it being a great game or rave reviews but…is persona 5s success due to the ps4 installed base and covid starting to become a thing? You know, kind of like FF7Remake getting a boost too? Is it possible P6 could come out and under perform too? Everyone is sure it’s this slam dunk guaranteed success and it might be but if 80, or 90 percent of all the sales come from PlayStation again I’d say what’s the point of all this multiplatform stuff?
 
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Gods&Monsters

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I guarantee 75-85 percent of all of persons 5 sales all from ps4 and Ps5. In fact persona was this niche franchise UNTIL ps4 and covid hit at the same time. Then they released a complete version later on down the line. Then RELEASED it a THIRD time to be multiplatform. What were Persona 5s sales the third go around? Did they announce any? Did switch, pc, and Xbox add anything substantial to what was already sold on ps4/ps5? Idk so I’m genuinely asking.

I’m not discounting it being a great game or rave reviews but…is persona 5s success due to the ps4 installed base and covid starting to become a thing? You know, kind of like FF7Remake getting a boost too? Is it possible P6 could come out and under perform too? Everyone is sure it’s this slam dunk guaranteed success and it might be but if 80, or 90 percent of all the sales come from PlayStation again I’d say what’s the point of all this multiplatform stuff?
Vanilla sold about 5 millions on PS4 (Strikers is also included in the total so it's hard to know exactly). Royal sold 3.3 millions with 1 million coming from the next-gen ports (PS5, Switch, X, Steam). The rest was sold on PS4.


Over 7 millions total on PS4/PS5
 
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Evilnemesis8

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I guarantee 75-85 percent of all of persons 5 sales all from ps4 and Ps5. In fact persona was this niche franchise UNTIL ps4 and covid hit at the same time. Then they released a complete version later on down the line. Then RELEASED it a THIRD time to be multiplatform.

Persona 5(PS4) release dates

JP: Sept 2016
WW: April 2017

Persona 5 Royal release dates(PS4)
JP: Oct 2019
WW: Mar 2020

Persona 5 Royal release dates(Switch/PC/Xbox/PS5)
Simultaneous release: Oct 2022

Persona 5 + Royal 7.2M copies sold as of April 2023
On its own, Persona 5 (and Royal) has sold 7.2 million copies (as of April 2023), making it by far the best-selling entry in the series.

Snopping around, we can start with this: Persona 5 Royal Re-release 1M in a month(Nov 2022)

The remastered version of Persona 5 Royal was released for the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Windows PC and Steam on October 21st. A little more than a month later, and Atlus has announced that the game has achieved over 1 million copies sold worldwide on the aforementioned platforms.

As of March 2023 it was 1.7M copies sold.

In Sega Sammy’s report, the updated sales number for Persona 5 Royal Remaster has been confirmed as 1.7 million copies as of March 2023.

I think we can be quite confident that the third release is majority PC+Switch sales.
Xbox is Xbox... And PlayStation already have been able to buy base P5 for years and P5R for 2(or 3 if you're in Japan).
We also have SteamDB(yes I know) estimates to give us an inkling of how much the dual platforms(PC and Switch) are responsible for copies sold for this release(it's a lot).

For Persona itself we have another entry to help us legimitize these estimates a bit: Persona 4 Golden which sold 1M on Steam after a year

I'm too lazy to fact check everything but an Installbase user also said this at the time:
Persona 5 didn't even hit the Top 10 for the Xbox and Playstation monthly NPD charts, and the Xbox and Playstation versions combined for only 21% of the boxed sales in the UK on the week of release.

Honestly, you can make the argument that the 1.7 million sold was virtually just Switch and Steam. Though we'll never know for sure unless Atlus gives us a platform breakdown.

Obviously the last part is a bit of exaggeration, but it's probably pretty close to the truth.

So to answer this question:

What were Persona 5s sales the third go around? Did they announce any? Did switch, pc, and Xbox add anything substantial to what was already sold on ps4/ps5? Idk so I’m genuinely asking.

Yes, the 2022 release of P5 has sold quite a decent amount from its third release, especially from non-PlayStation users(PC and Switch).

Of all the the JRPG series that have started doing more multi plat releases, they're the ones who benefitted the most from the strategy.

I think this is has been a long term strategy by Atlus/SEGA for quite some time now.
They've been releasing old and new Persona games on as many devices as possible to increase the brand visibility in preparation for a huge multiplat/worldwide simulatenous release for P6.

I think this is why SEGA have this forecast for P6:

This is from the Q&A section from their current FY(July->September 2023)
Q: Is there a chance that, with its overseas popularity, the Persona series could sell 5 million copies in its first year?

A: By increasing the number of platforms it is available on and the regions it is released in, we have been increasing the sales of Persona 5. We believe that it would be possible for a major Persona title, such as a numbered release, to sell 5 million copies in its first year by releasing it on multiple platforms and simultaneously worldwide from day one.

Considering how Japanese execs usually do not like answering questions like this directly means that's probably their real internal expectation for the game. Which is a ludicrous number for almost any JRPG not named Final Fantasy.

Which is why, if you recall my previous post, I was saying I was looking forward to P6 and seeing if the success of P5 could be repeated. They've invested(and profited) a lot in this, but it's possible their biggest commercial success is yet to come
 
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PlacidusaX

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Context can only get you so far, though. Games like Rebirth need to hit certain revenue targets in order to hit certain profit targets to justify the increases in their budgets and marketing. It being one of PS5's top performing games in Japan doesn't mean much when the bar is as low as it seems to be.

I think both Square-Enix and Sony are at fault for perhaps not addressing as many needs for the Japanese gaming market as they should've. Square-Enix WRT releasing too many FF games in a short span of time (and maybe also some backlash for design decisions from previous entries), and Sony WRT not providing either a proper portable for the market or not providing enough PS Portals alongside sensible pricing for it & the PS5 in the country (considering you need a PS5 to use the Portal).

Like I didn't think weekly averages for PS5 in Japan would drop below 40K yet the past several weeks now they've been struggling to do 25K between SKUs. And whereas it was 2:1 between Switch and PS5 in Japan last year, now it's increased closer to 3:1.

How do you lose ground to an aging handheld that's already pushed something like 40 million in that same market?
Because mobile gaming is more popular there PERIOD!