Report: Not Many Americans Interested in Buying PS4 Pro or Xbox Scorpio

Megalith

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Nielsen has released its annual Games 360 report, and the latest stats suggest that the PS4 and Xbox marketing departments have some work to do when it comes to boosting the interest of their newer, beefed up consoles: the numbers indicate that few people care. For instance, only 15% of surveyed gamers intend to buy a PS4 Pro, while only 13% are interested in purchasing an Xbox Scorpio. Some of this sounds fishy to me, though, since they also say that only 20% of gamers have heard of the Nintendo Switch, even though it’s been pretty successful.

Of the general population surveyed, only 11% have ever heard of Project Scorpio, compared to 21% for PS4 Pro. The numbers are slightly better for gamers over the age of 13, with 14% having heard of Scorpio, and 27% having heard of PS4 Pro. Xbox Scorpio also has the lowest awareness among all current-gen consoles for non-gamers, at a meagre 3%. Things look better when looking at the standard PS4, and Xbox One consoles, though Xbox One is consistently the lowest of the two. The Nintendo Switch also doesn’t rank very high, with 29% of gamers surveyed saying they have heard of it, compared to 22% in the general population group.
 
Well if you're going to upgrade hardware like a PC, then you might as well buy a PC. Guess where the console peasants are going?

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Of course there's not a lot of interest. Console gamers are not PC gamers (some overlap notwithstanding). As long as they can play the most recent AAA titles, which they will continue to be able to do on the OG PS4 and XB1, they will be happy.

That said, I do respect what MSFT, and to a lesser extent, Sony are trying to do: keep their hardware relevant by upgrading at more frequent intervals that will support new features e.g. VR. A brand new-console-every-5-years model isn't sustainable. That said, I don't think either company really pushed the envelope as they're both using what I'd call mid-tier GPUs (essentially rd470 and gtx 1070) and older CPU tech in their refreshes. Gone are the days of consoles having cutting-edge tech on release.
 
I'd buy a console again if they didn't charge for MS live or PS plus. I don't like subscriptions.

Also. No exclusives. No buy. Without exclusives I'll just play on my PC. -- I'm not advocating exclusives --- I don't want games to be exclusive, I'm just noting the fact of the matter is I have no reason to buy a console, if there are not exclusives.
(Lack of exclusives is why I didn't buy a Xbox One --- that and annoyance with Microsoft greed - like expiring $100 bucks of my live points arbitrarily when they moved away from points to cash. How about not running industry parallel sales on old games (If steam can sell old AAA games for $3 why can't Microsoft?), and accessorizing every single last thing and charging outrageous prices for them. (E.G.$100 USB wifi adapter)) It all got real old.

I've owned
Wii
Xbox
Xbox 360
PS3
PS4

Played very little PS4. Very little. So little I shouldn't have bought it. I bought it in anticipation of God of War 4 when I saw a trade in option for my PS3 early on. Still no GOW4.


My favorite of the consoles I've owned is Xbox 360 - the whole experience was really good, (except those things I mentioned above) but I'm now jaded by Microsoft's bad policies and decisions.
 
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Remember, when they do surveys like this the categories (outside of demographics like age/sex/income/etc) are generally self-reported. They ask a question like "How many hours a week do you spend playing games?" or some variation of it. If your answer corresponds to their category designation, you're in. That could mean you only play Pokemon Go, or you play Solitaire on a Pentum 2 with Windows 95, or you own a top-end PC with a 1080Ti and 4k monitors, or you have a PS3, or whatever. All these people are "gamers" in a survey like this, so the quality of results is dubious. Without some detailed information on how they defined their categories and a look at their actual survey questions, the study is largely meaningless. We'll never see that stuff though, because that sort of data is what Nielson sells. This is just the high-level overview to attract attention.
 
Played very little PS4. Very little. So little I shouldn't have bought it. I bought it in anticipation of God of War 4 when I saw a trade in option for my PS3 early on. Still no GOW4.

You should try some of the other PS4 exclusives, most notably the Naughty Dog games like the Uncharted Series and The Last of Us. They're pretty much the reason I bought a PS4 and are worth the price of admission alone, IMO. The GoW series is cool too, but not a reason to buy the console for me.

If that's the only reason you bought a console though, you should have waited until the game released so you could get the newest/revised version of the console for quieter operation and whatever other hardware improvements (or better variants like the PS4 Pro) they inevitably bring to them over the life of the console.

That's what I'm doing with the Switch anyways. I'll wait until a new revision comes out when there's lots more games available and the hardware doesn't come with as many issues/compromises as the current 1st gen hardware has.
 
good try sony/microsoft, the market isnt like phone users who lines up every year for a "newer" phone model. still waiting for the day where we can buy our own parts to upgrade consoles.......oh wait! that's a pc

Agreed, while I like the idea of it, i see the problem too. I found out about the ps4pro a while ago so when I decided to get a ps4, i waited for the pro. By doing this they start causing a fragmentation of their users. You will get people to wait and leapfrog. Not sure if they want people to own each new release but that isn't realistic, at least not across the mass of consumers. I am thinking about a scorpio but only because my xbone is starting to get a bit flakey, it was a launch version. But I also didn't bother with the oneS. I dunno, i do like the idea that they keep the same path, would be nice to keep playing old games instead of changing architecture each time. But yea, pretty much acting like a pc at this point.
 
Wtf, so polling 13yr and under? These are their "gamers"?

They certainly don't seem to be focusing on the more concerning point of those gaming teens and adults who are going to use their own money to purchase the latest and greatest.

If they're asking kids/teens/adults who don't have the cash flow to whimsically throw $400-$600 into a top of the line console every 3-5 years, then a good percentage of their percentages are nothing but wishes and dreams- not probable intents to purchase.

Would I buy pretty much every new PS/XBox console or AAA title if I had the means? Sure! Can I reasonably do so? Not so much!

Microsoft, Sony, et al, need to remember their attempting to peddle hardware as if it were a software release, It isn't. It's more costly given the cycle time and doubly so if there is a lack of backward compatibility built into their platform release.
 
good try sony/microsoft, the market isnt like phone users who lines up every year for a "newer" phone model. still waiting for the day where we can buy our own parts to upgrade consoles.......oh wait! that's a pc
By the time the Scorpio launches at the end of the year it will have been 5 years since the ONE launched. There was only 5 years between the original Xbox and 360, 7 between the 360 and ONE.

For all intents and purposes the Scorpio is an all-new console with 100% backward compatibility, while the PS4 Pro is simply a refresh.
 
I am waiting for the scorpio to come out. I have 2 xbox one's in the house for me and my daughter to play on and we have 2 4k TV's. She will use it for gaming but I'm interested in the 4k bluray built in. I figure i'll give our two xbox one's to family when we have our scorpio's. Just my 2cents
 
What I get out of this is that Nielsen do a very lazy and piss-poor job and they shouldn't be taken seriously by anyone.
 
Folks are sick of the utter lack of backwards compatibility & future adaptability/upgradability... think changing that would bring more folks to the buying table
 
Very different here, PS4 pro is STILL backordered over this side, every major store has upwards of 100 pros on backorder.

No idea about Xbox One though.
 
I'd rather wait to see a bigger jump in fidelity. The difference between ps4 and ps4pro is just not great enough. Probably the same holds true with scorpio... it may only sell well if they DON'T make it backwards compatible, because otherwise why upgrade to it if it only provides a sharper/smoother image? Not worth the money for the vast majority of folks...

even if buying a new ps4, many will just go with the cheaper base model
 
Very different here, PS4 pro is STILL backordered over this side, every major store has upwards of 100 pros on backorder.

No idea about Xbox One though.
They were out of stock at amazon for like a month for the pro, not sure if they are just selling really well are if sony just aren't manufacturing that many.

Folks are sick of the utter lack of backwards compatibility & future adaptability/upgradability... think changing that would bring more folks to the buying table
I hope that's what is happening right now, these console refreshes may just end up replacing console generations while keeping backwards compatibility.
 
Allow me to trade in my POS Xbone for Scorpio credit along with I dunno, release some good game, seriously the PS4 seems to have all the good ones. Bought Xbone for some coop Scalebound and then they cancelled it
 
Allow me to trade in my POS Xbone for Scorpio credit along with I dunno, release some good game, seriously the PS4 seems to have all the good ones. Bought Xbone for some coop Scalebound and then they cancelled it

Hmm a trade up program is kind of a nice idea.

edit: wait no, because then we will turn this into cell phone payment plans where you just are always paying.
 
Very different here, PS4 pro is STILL backordered over this side, every major store has upwards of 100 pros on backorder.

No idea about Xbox One though.
Florida here. Walked right into a store one day when I decided I wanted one, picked it up off the shelf, and walked out with it under my arm. No drama. Now trying to find PSVR, that was a pain in the ass.
 
ppl get hyped about New consoles not extensions, by limiting your new console to be a buffer of your old console, running the same games at different resolutions or fps, most will be happy with the old consoles, since it's practically the same game library.
 
Florida here. Walked right into a store one day when I decided I wanted one, picked it up off the shelf, and walked out with it under my arm. No drama. Now trying to find PSVR, that was a pain in the ass.

You stole your PS4 from the store? Do you brag about this often? I'm doing the right thing and waiting till I can afford it to get a ps4. In the mean time the Vita serves my needs.
 
Nielsen sends physical mail to anyone who will open it with a dollar inside if you fill out a card and return it. They may have only gotten responses from 15% of the gaming community which may mean that almost 100% of them want to buy them /rolleyes
 
Yeah, I wouldn't trust Nielsen numbers for anything. They haven't been relevant since the 1990s.

But I'm not seeing a lot of excitement for the PS4 Pro among friends. After the initial holiday rush, they've been in stock everywhere, including Amazon. So not not seeing sustained demand for the mid-life upgrade, with only 2GB more GDDDR5 ram available, same old crappy processors, and marginal GPU bump.

Scorpio? I have friends who are barely 1-2 years into their One purchase, and not looking to drop cash for another upgrade. Especially when this beast is looking to cost at least $450-500, and STILL BE SADDLED WITH THOSE SAME SHITTY JAGUAR CORES!

If this were a PC, we'd just go with a better processor. But no, this is AMD, a company that moves at the speed of molasses, so you get Jaguar from 2013.
 
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So, an XBox that cannot be purchased is something fewer people are interested in? Color me surprised. :D
 
The PS4 Pro is definitely not getting the same sales hype Sony dropped right at launch (70% of sales are PS4 Pro, etc).

http://www.cgmagonline.com/2016/11/...on-4-pro-sales-account-70-per-cent-ps4-units/

And the sales falloff is not being reported officially, even though the total sales numbers don't look substantially better than they did last year. So, it stops the bleed, but no home-run hit like the original.

http://nseavoice.com/games/sony-may-be-hiding-ps4-pro-sales-failure-920020612.html

And in Japan, the two-week numbers from April show the Pro is only 20% of total PS4 sales. Might be higher in other territories, but I don't expect it to be.

http://bgr.com/2017/04/12/nintendo-switch-sales-numbers-4-3-local/
 
Love my pro. Easily notice the difference in just about all of my games. Also updated to an Xbox One S. Sold the old so saved almost half. Will buy a Scorpio day one. Geez they don't cost that much! But I also just bought a water cooled 1080ti so you can see where my priorities are. Stop buying coffee at Dutch Brothers and Starbucks and make your own with Costc0 products and you will be able to afford more expensive gaming equipment.
 
Of course there's not a lot of interest. Console gamers are not PC gamers (some overlap notwithstanding). As long as they can play the most recent AAA titles, which they will continue to be able to do on the OG PS4 and XB1, they will be happy.

That said, I do respect what MSFT, and to a lesser extent, Sony are trying to do: keep their hardware relevant by upgrading at more frequent intervals that will support new features e.g. VR. A brand new-console-every-5-years model isn't sustainable. That said, I don't think either company really pushed the envelope as they're both using what I'd call mid-tier GPUs (essentially rd470 and gtx 1070) and older CPU tech in their refreshes. Gone are the days of consoles having cutting-edge tech on release.

It is worse from a development perspective, because devs still have to target the the lowest end hardware. The reason why BF4 didn't get more weapons in DLC? Because the Xbox 360 ran out of RAM for weapon animations. Having a generation last 5-6 years is better than having it last 7-8 with some "update" partway. Just makes it a pain in the ass for developers and actually hurts PC gamers when games have to be designed around the limitations of the old console hardware.
 
Yeah, those Switch stats are a little dubious. Well, lets see if Project Scorpio will make a bang at E3. Personally, I'm hoping for them to step in the VR fight.
 
I purchased a PS4 pro in March. My first console since the original PS. I am loving it. So far horizon zero dawn, bloodborne and uncharted series which I got for $7. Recently bought Neir Automata even though I could get it on PC, still bought it for PS4. Never thought I'd see the day. I don't play shooters in consoles though but I don't play shooters on my 4 year old PC anymore either... Besides where's the cutting edge PC exclusives ? Oh wait...
 
The console companies definitely aren't targeting their audience correctly. But then again, PC is taking over!!!
 
If Scorpio support is better than PS4Pro then it will be worth it. Otherwise, PS4P is a joke and has been insanely inconsistent in the level of support from publishers for the hardware. I'm glad I didn't get one. (As I've dreamed for consoles with SSAA for years).
Because I'd be pissed about how bad the support is.
 
I sold my PS4 and got a pro for perhaps a $150 premium. For the price of two games, every game I own runs smoother. Kinda like trading up video cards. Pretty much everyone I know with a PS4 had done the same so I guess I'm not in their demographic (PC gamers who buy consoles for the exclusives and imports because we love the games, not the platforms).
 
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