Analyst projects December game sales up 5 percent

Lazard Capital Markets' Colin Sebastian expects NPD figures for last month to reflect "solid" sales trends, but fall behind the rest of the year's growth rate.

While estimates about holiday hardware sales of the Wii, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 have already drawn attention, it's about time for analysts to shift their focus to end-of-year software sales and the industry-tracking NPD Group's December figures, expected to be released next week.

Lazard Capital Markets' Colin Sebastian this morning issued an NPD preview to investors, estimating that the group's numbers will show roughly 5 percent growth in US game sales for the month of December.

According to Sebastian, the growth will be "driven by incremental sales of next-generation software (Xbox 360, Wii, and PS3) and ongoing solid Sony PS2 and Nintendo DS game sales." His expected top sellers for the month include Call of Duty 3, Guitar Hero 2, WWE SmackDown! vs. RAW 2007, Gears of War, and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Beyond Zelda, he expects Resistance: Fall of Man and Red Steel to turn in strong performances on the PS3 and Wii, respectively.

While Sebastian said his estimated December growth figure reflects "solid industry sales trends," it lags a little behind the rest of 2006. Software sales through November were up 6.7 percent over the first 11 months of 2005, Sebastian noted.

For the full year of 2006, Sebastian estimates industry game sales growth of 5.5 percent.

39 Comments

  • _Sam_

    Posted Jan 21, 2007 1:56 pm PT

    2007 will probably be good due to the new consoles and the higher price of games

  • xatman911

    Posted Jan 7, 2007 11:58 am PT

    They must have gotten it wrong, totattly, Only five percent boost? Everybody is buying the next gen...

  • Chief_Kuuni

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 8:51 pm PT

    I only got gears of war and it was awesome

  • ocdog45

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 10:43 am PT

    4 of those games i got in early dec.

  • CaptainCrazy

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 8:28 am PT

    Development costs are rising that's why they charge more. I'm not down with it either but on the bright side, I've seen x360 games go on sale much sooner than previous systems. You can find lots of launch games for $35 and some games that are only 4 months old are marked down by $10-15. There is also a lot more stores selling used games which can be a great deal except at EB Games, they only sell for about $3 less than the brand new version.

  • GIJesse77

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 7:20 am PT

    5.5 percent? After making everything cost so frikin much, i'm not suprised to see it boost so little. I don't know about yall but i'm not really into the price of things nowadays. Why is it that an xbox 1 game and dvd or pretty much equivelant and cost a maximum of 50 bux(mabye dvd), but an xbox 360 game just for some mysterious reason, cost 10 dollars more? Its still just a regular cd, isnt it? Thats about it though, i'm pretty satisfie with the price of the actul xbox system itself becuase usually PCs equal to the xbox 360's power cost into the thousands.

  • DickDarlington

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 7:10 am PT

    "Yes, we need that info badly. I can't live without 3 analyst predictions per month."

    LOL

  • Humorguy_basic

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 6:41 am PT

    Folks! Please remember that generic numbers don't mean anything! Suppose, for a second, the Wii games account for ALL that growth. That would mean all the other platforms had a zero growth December, which would be terrible!

    Until the numbers get broken down into formats, you can't really tell anything!

    Remember if a format sells 15% less and another format sells 20% more you can say there has been a 5% growth when you give out the big number (like this one), but the details would be very different, obviously!

  • axillia

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 5:35 am PT

    How about the actual reports instead of a prediction?

  • princeofgames90

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 4:21 am PT

    Hahaha correct me if i'm rong did they say predection

  • cjcr_alexandru

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 2:25 am PT

    Yes, we need that info badly. I can't live without 3 analyst predictions per month.

  • RaiKageRyu

    Posted Jan 5, 2007 12:33 am PT

    Yep, great work. We so needed that info...

  • Doolum

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 9:18 pm PT

    analysts.fun job

  • thefjk

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 9:13 pm PT

    LOLing at this news!

  • Sandro909

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 8:04 pm PT

    How can you predict something that's already happened? It's January... -_-

  • psychojakrabbit

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 7:44 pm PT

    Look Batman ascension. Good work Robin.

  • Lord_Daemon

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 6:32 pm PT

    It's hard to believe that people get paid for this sort of shoddy guesswork.

  • TryMe01

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 5:40 pm PT

    Colin Sebastian needs a life. anyone can slap on a percentage and make a prediction of games sales during any period of the year, seriously!

    i also think that the ps3, wii, ds, psp and 360 will continue to sell

  • bigcrusha

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 5:34 pm PT

    If these numbers get any higher, other companies will get the idea that major money can be found through this industry. Then companies like Apple and Toshiba will make their own home consoles to sell on the market. When the next generation comes in, expect a fourth home console.

  • Enterprise-E

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 5:16 pm PT

    Well as long it is going up i am happy.

  • ultimate_zero

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 4:28 pm PT

    yea, I'm thinking its a little more than that to.

  • gatsbythepig

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 3:53 pm PT

    not too bad

  • the-very-best

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 3:00 pm PT

    I expected a little higher...you'd think PS3/Wii/360 would of sold a solid amount of games.

  • faridmon

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 2:55 pm PT

    ok, those guys who bash Red Steel never played that game, its true it got very harsh reviews, but that game rocks, after you figure out its mechanic its a blast to play.
    and even if its crap, its better than all the FPS because of its controllers, shoot the guy with pointing at the screen never becomes so old, no more FPS on other consoles for me, after you play Red Steel others will become lame.

  • comthitnuong

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 2:02 pm PT

    i think it could possibly be around 6.5%

  • Humorguy_basic

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 1:58 pm PT

    5.5% growth for the year. With 2 new consoles and 5.4% growth for DS gaming meaning no growth really outside of the Nintendo handheld, or much more likely based on other figures about 3-9% down in 2006 over 2005. Led by the downturn of 12% in PC games in 2006.

    It's getting to the point with these biased toward the industry (it's customers are all in the industry after all) Market research companies to just half the numbers given and every quarter put a minus in front for the real figures!

  • ConManWithGun

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 1:48 pm PT

    I contributed to that

  • datniccah187

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 1:46 pm PT

    Good the more money that goes into the industry, the more money they have to make better games. This is good news.

  • Gaara79

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 1:38 pm PT

    Didn't the same people say sales would be down a couple of months ago?
    Spelling gloom and doom for the industry?

  • natester10

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 1:27 pm PT

    Naw Really? I wouldn't figure sales would be UP around CHRISTMAS TIME!!!

  • Re_ensurer

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 1:14 pm PT

    I would've thought it would be more than 5%.

  • AngelCage

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 1:03 pm PT

    Redsteel only needs a tomb. What stupid game.

    If it sell so well, Ubi will continue doing stupid games... I'm afraid about Assasin Creed....

    What if the Hype about the game becomes a crap just like redsteel?

  • LordAndrew

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 12:52 pm PT

    Gears, Zelda, Resistance; that's cool. Red Steel, not so much. That's a Wii game I hope did not sell too well. But I'm sure it did.

  • Bananna2

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 12:25 pm PT

    Go Resistance

  • kamicolo

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 12:25 pm PT

    That's a good prediction. NPD sends me surveys, I joined in hopes of winning ca$h....pockets still flat :~

  • g-stuart

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 12:25 pm PT

    post on my blog

  • Riviera_Phantom

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 12:19 pm PT

    Let's hope Red Steel doesn't sell well.

  • fahad2mail

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 12:19 pm PT

    hmmm. seems one day game rules the earth.

  • AnubisCraig

    Posted Jan 4, 2007 12:05 pm PT

    Gaming shall take over ze world!

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