AXIOS: Why do we swiftly know what Super Mario movies make, but not Super Mario games?

[Astral_lion02]

Pretty interesting article about opacity in video games industry especially in the United States:

https://www.axios.com/2023/11/02/video-game-sales-circana-npd

Why do we swiftly know what Super Mario movies make, but not Super Mario games?My story about gaming's lack of a Hollywood box office chart...- What game companies wanted in the 2000s- The change in 2010 that reduced the info we get- And more!

July 2009 NPD

NPD (Circana) 2009 Full Year Results: Discussion Thread

Dates in Tracking: January 04, 2009 - January 02, 2010 [52 Weeks] Console Full Year Results Month Wii Xbox 360 PS3 PS2 January 679,000 309,000 203,000 101,000 February 753,000 391,000 276,000 131,000 March 601,000 330,000 218,000 112,000 April 340,000 175,000 127,000 172,000 May...

www.installbaseforum.com

September 2023 Circana

Circana (NPD) September 2023: #1 Starfield #2 Mortal Kombat 1 #3 EA FC24; PS5 #1 Units + Revenue, XBS #2 Units + Revenue

State of the market September 2023 US Video Game Market Highlights from Circana - U.S. consumer spending on video game content, hardware and accessories grew 10% compared to a year ago, totaling $4.5B. Growth in spending on video game content and accessories offset an 8% decline in hardware...

www.installbaseforum.com

The digital stores making it up to the publishers to share the data is the big obstacle. It makes it impossible to fully track the market as it would require hundreds/thousands of different contributors rather than a few select retailers

""Everybody would like to have the data from their competitors," former PlayStation U.S. boss Shawn Layden tells Axios. "Not everyone wants to offer up their own.""

 

[fiendcode]

The digital framing is convenient but NPD was cracking down on public data in the mid 2000s and has always been more opaque and less consistent on this stuff that other markets. The draw down in what they publicly release started well before the 2010s and they never actually lived up to initial agreements in what they'd release back when they struck the NeoGAF deal in 2006.

Perhaps Circana finds their hands tied now but this is fundamentally a problem of their own making, both in their track record of obfuscating public data and their general mishandling of the transition to digital marketplaces.

 

[Bernd Lauert]

On the one hand it's sad that we don't have more detailed numbers. On the other hand it's more interesting to discuss the market when you don't know everything. It's like back in the days before Google existed, where one would have heated discussions about things and nobody would really know for sure. Now you just "Google it" and discussions instantly die.

 

[Astral_lion02]

The digital framing is convenient but NPD was cracking down on public data in the mid 2000s and has always been more opaque and less consistent on this stuff that other markets. The draw down in what they publicly release started well before the 2010s and they never actually lived up to initial agreements in what they'd release back when they struck the NeoGAF deal in 2006.

Perhaps Circana finds their hands tied now but this is fundamentally a problem of their own making, both in their track record of obfuscating public data and their general mishandling of the transition to digital marketplaces.

What was concretly the agrement NPD had with neogaf in 2006 ?

And what was NPD sharing officialy before 2006 ?

Because the huge leaks from early 2000s were not really legal.
GFK like NPD would have never accept such leaks.
Although it was fascinating to have so much information, these leaks probably had a very negative impact afterwards.

 

[Oregano]

Interesting premise but my first thought is that Super Mario is probably a bad example given how relatively open Nintendo is about how their games sell...

 

[storres]

I think publishers are too proud in a way too. Way more proud than movie directors, etc.

At least, that's how I see it.

 

[fiendcode]

What was concretly the agrement NPD had with neogaf in 2006 ?

And what was NPD sharing officialy before 2006 ?

Because the huge leaks from early 2000s were not really legal.
GFK like NPD would have never accept such leaks.
Although it was fascinating to have so much information, these leaks probably had a very negative impact afterwards.

I'm going off memory here but NPD agreed to a monthy and YTD top 20, per platform monthly top 10s (which at this point was 9 active consoles!), hardware (including ltd) and top 20 accessories all with unit sales. This was framed as a "deal" and NeoGAF in return would moderate any data leaks, as NeoGAF was generally the source for those giant spreadsheet leaks. You can still find a lot of those old numbers but NPD did a pretty thorough job of scrubbing most of it (RIP Shrine of Data), even wiping Archive sites like Wayback Machine.

To be fair NPD did deliver a good amount of that coverage upfront, I think it ended up being a general monthly and ytd top 10s, too 10 accessories and hardware all with numbers. Then the next year numbers for everything but monthly hardware went away. (edit: looked it up, numbers went away way later, in mid 2010 when they shifted from units to revenue and combined platforms).

Before 2006 NPD/TRSTs was periodically sharing data as far back as the mid 1990s though they didn't have any standardized regular release.

 

[Man God]

Because the vanity and industry press that grew up around the film industry quickly got entrenched with them and got access to said numbers. Because ticket sales is how the distributors and the film makers fight it out with the cinemas.

Note that we don't get the actual movie accounting that usually fucks over everyone who isn't a producer with the dark accounting of Hollywood.

 

[Undead Warrior]

There's just way fewer barriers to knowledge in general in the film industry. Films are publicly announced as early as a script is commissioned, and said scripts circulate widely throughout the industry. There's not a lot of secrecy in how a studio makes their CGI or practical effects, or what lenses they put in the cameras, or what colour grading they'll have in editing.

The industry culture is fundamentally different at a basic level.

 

[Welfare]

Circana should just sign a deal with Install Base to release some general numbers, like milestones and gen over gen comparisons

 

[Vena]

Circana should just sign a deal with Install Base to release some general numbers, like milestones and gen over gen comparisons

I agree.

 

[HK-47]

On the one hand it's sad that we don't have more detailed numbers. On the other hand it's more interesting to discuss the market when you don't know everything. It's like back in the days before Google existed, where one would have heated discussions about things and nobody would really know for sure. Now you just "Google it" and discussions instantly die.

I don't think it is, especially when you have so little information. Just makes it easier for bad takes to exist.

 

[Xevross]

For movies it's pretty unique as theatres all report their earnings via comscore which a lot of people have access to. All distributors can see how much money all movies are making and a lot of media outlets have established sources to get these numbers.

Movies are just as opaque as games when it comes to earnings on digital release, in fact they are even more so.

So yeah it's a shame that we have been getting less and less physical data from the games industry, the lack of a comscore type system has made these restrictions possible. But physical only is becoming less and less relevant as time goes on anyway and we're somewhat lucky that we get any decent digital reporting for the games industry.

 

[Nanashrew]

I saw the article yesterday and it really didn't provide much insight into anything. It was so barebones just like the NPD data we get. But an important aspect to the movie industry comparison is that they have unions, and unions fought for that transparency which is why it's standard practice now. They fought for it because if only the big companies had access to that data, it would be detrimental to the industry and smaller independent studios and the unions themselves.

 

[Drblitzk]

As said before, we don't get swift numbers from games because there is not a centralized 3rd party tracker place that share them unlike with movies at theatres, Movies studios basically don't share anything, and that doesn't mean we don't get any data from games early, and at least when it comes to Nintendo biggest games like Mario we get detailed numbers until they end selling, so it's a weird headline. Maybe a few years ago something like comscore for games would been useful, now with digital, it's impossible for a third party to get or share this information without publishers permission.

 

[Nanashrew]

One of the things unions are fighting for in Hollywood is transparency of digital too, and WGA won that front recently and will be allowed to release information in aggregate. It's important to know digital because pay is based on performance, and companies would carefully craft how something would perform digitally and streaming without ever giving any numbers. Directors, producers, actors, anybody who works on a film was never allowed to know the performance of digital whatsoever.

What we need are people who will fight for transparency for the industry as the corporations are never going to be that. NPD/Circana will never provide that either as they also keep hiding more and more information and becoming useless compared to any other tracker in other regions.

 

[Aquamarine]

A major catalyst for the industry shift into secrecy was persistent leaks on forums just like these. Back in the early 2000s, Gaming-Age, then NeoGAF had insiders like bunkum who dumped full spreadsheets worth of sales data on the forum each month, which essentially mirrored the reports they received.

Clients like GameStop noticed these egregious data breaches and complained to the data aggregate services to amp up their enforcement. Ultimately they were forced to address the issue. Initially NPD struck an agreement with NeoGAF to release the Top 10 + hardware each month to hopefully lessen this issue, but leaks continued, just more sporadically (the creamsugar era).

In the late 2000s and early 2010s as the broader economy faltered through a recession, clients became increasingly reticent about disclosing hard data. At best it didn't really amplify their brand, and at worst (like when Xbox One wasn't selling well or when a Vita game flopped hard for example) it was negative PR that diminished their brand perception. They wanted to mitigate negative PR risk as much as possible.

So gradually NPD cut back their relationship with NeoGAF and orgs went the hostile route instead. They preferred to target leak sources wherever they popped up with abrupt severance of contracts and incessant Cease & Desists, either through DMs or even formal complaints sent directly to the moderation team. This occurred in tandem with the declining relevancy of physical-only data, and institutional clients were unable to get combined physical + digital sets, so they increasingly stopped subscribing.

Abrupt severance of contracts occurred when people leaked exact numbers. Since all aggregate sales numbers are upweighted estimates, data points are uniquely seeded to each subscriber. Like for example, Client A gets "Super Mario Wonder sold 1,392,383 in the USA opening month" and Client B gets "Super Mario Wonder sold 1,392,485." So if 1,392,383 leaks then NPD etc. know exactly which client leaked it. As an industry insider I was embroiled in the heart of that madness, which I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy as it eroded my mental health significantly.

Gaming sales data is now treated as trade secrets within the industry. Even on internal company platforms, hard sales data is cordoned off to managers and analytics teams only. So for example if I were a low-level employee at Nintendo of America it is likely I'd be unable to find out how Super Mario Wonder performed at launch. Any org-wide announcement is liable to leak, so it remains on a need-to-know basis.

This will never change without external regulation that mandates public disclosure of sales data. Theaters are independent of studios so it's easier to set up a framework for public disclosure, analogous to how physical retailers voluntarily send over their retail POS data to NPD / GfK / etc each month. But centralized digital sales remain closely and meticulously guarded.

 

[Mekanos]

I saw the article yesterday and it really didn't provide much insight into anything. It was so barebones just like the NPD data we get. But an important aspect to the movie industry comparison is that they have unions, and unions fought for that transparency which is why it's standard practice now. They fought for it because if only the big companies had access to that data, it would be detrimental to the industry and smaller independent studios and the unions themselves.

I would say in general the unions in Hollywood help limit a lot of the worst abuse and mistreatment (even though there is still much of that). Video games rose into prominence in the Reagan era where unions and labor were being dismantled so the industry has virtually no oversight in comparison.

 

[Lelouch0612]

It is a big shame and while leaks were basically killed; the excitement/interest on that side of the industry was severely eroded too.

NPD/Circana got itself in a tough spot. With digital being only shared among members of their Digital Leading Panel; they restricted their consumers to a small pool of clients (publishers basically).

As digital grows; some of these publishers won't even need to get access to the data NPD/Circana provides, since they will get their data from the digital storefronts.

They are heading into a wall with their current approach.

 

[Dalthien]

As an industry insider I was embroiled in the heart of that madness, which I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy as it eroded my mental health significantly.

I remember those times, and it was very unfortunate that you got caught up in all that mess back then. It's great seeing that you are still active and participating in the discussions here all this time later.

 

[Terrell]

Another aspect is the data from NPD/Circana seeing wider distro impacts non-professional stock traders. Tighter data control means that the only verifiable public data that retail investors had access to for investment in game companies was what the companies were willing to disclose, which could at times be a tightly-crafted message to mitigate damage to stock prices, or at least gave them a timed date when drops could be expected from unequivocal bad news so that they could be prepared for it and use it to (for example) prepare for stock buybacks and such. It’s effectively an entirely legal means to mitigate sudden downward movement in their stock prices so they can plan accordingly for when they anticipate it could happen. The control they attempt to exert on enthusiast media functions the same way.

 

[Astral_lion02]

This will never change without external regulation that mandates public disclosure of sales data. Theaters are independent of studios so it's easier to set up a framework for public disclosure, analogous to how physical retailers voluntarily send over their retail POS data to NPD / GfK / etc each month. But centralized digital sales remain closely and meticulously guarded

Digital is really the biggest probem for transparency in the video games industry.

However repports like the one we got in UK and France pouve that it's possible to have a quitte detailed vision of the market market (obviously far from perfect and only on a yearly basis).

https://eraltd.org/media/72551/2023-era-yrbk.pdf

https://www.sell.fr/sites/default/files/essentiel-jeu-video/lessentiel_du_jeu_video_bilan_marche_2022_sell_eng.pdf

Problem is that they are the exeptions rather than the norm.

 

[Koti]

Yeah we do get copies sold from most public companies, but we never really know how much revenue and profit each game made. Tbf, we don't know that with movies either, we can only assume. As a person that loves these kind of data, it would be great if things would be more open.

 

[Shadow of the Void]

It also doesn't help things that sales data is typically managed by these gigantic market research companies like NPD/Circana that have de facto monopolies in their respective markets, and their business model is predicated on selling that data at a massive premium.

Meanwhile, in Japan we've had a video game magazine doing weekly sales tracking (much better than monthly tracking) since the 90s, with the data being freely available.

 

[kwaogh]

I would definitely like more data like in the old days of NPD. However, I wonder if it would lead to content becoming samey once developers see how the best performing games sell.

 

[theprodigy]

I would definitely like more data like in the old days of NPD. However, I wonder if it would lead to content becoming samey once developers see how the best performing games sell.

But they already know what the best selling games are?

 

[Welfare]

I would definitely like more data like in the old days of NPD. However, I wonder if it would lead to content becoming samey once developers see how the best performing games sell.

They've always known that data. Why do you think the 80's and 90's had so many platformers? They were trying to get at the success of Mario. 90's platformers after Sonic started heavily leaning into animals.

The 7th gen's infamous color grading being greys and browns, with protagonists that mostly consisted of white bald/near shaven middle aged men that carry guns was because of Gears of War and Call of Duty 4.

Developers have always chased trends to try and grow.

 

[Koni]

They've always known that data. Why do you think the 80's and 90's had so many platformers? They were trying to get at the success of Mario. 90's platformers after Sonic started heavily leaning into animals.

The 7th gen's infamous color grading being greys and browns, with protagonists that mostly consisted of white bald/near shaven middle aged men that carry guns was because of Gears of War and Call of Duty 4.

Developers have always chased trends to try and grow.

Go back a couple of years ago and there were battle royales popping up everywhere due to the success of PUBG and Fortnite. Even now developers are still on the live-service train despite so many failing in recent times. Hell, you can even argue open worlds are pretty much this.

 

[Astral_lion02]

It also doesn't help things that sales data is typically managed by these gigantic market research companies like NPD/Circana that have de facto monopolies in their respective markets, and their business model is predicated on selling that data at a massive premium.

GSD will start to track North America in few months.
Nothing was published for now but they recently start tracking Japan.

Like GFK in Europe Circana will start to have competition.

From an interview:

Nous collaborons avec la fédération depuis 2014. Depuis lors, notre champ d’action s’est considérablement développé en intégrant les données de l’Australie, la Nouvelle Zélande, le Japon ainsi que plusieurs pays d’Afrique et d’Asie. A l’exception des continents américains, nous couvrons aujourd’hui la quasi-totalité du marché.

Sparkers compte aujourd’hui 35 clients et une cinquantaine de collaborateurs, principalement ici, à La Hulpe mais aussi à Paris, Madrid, Londres, Sydney, Los Angeles et Erevan.

Nous avons une opportunité d’encore élargir le scope de GSD, notre étude phare, en y intégrant les continents américains, dont les Etats-Unis bien sûr qui est le plus grand marché du jeu vidéo. La digitalisation du secteur favorise la centralisation des données auprès d’un acteur central et nous sommes très bien placé pour être cet acteur.

Media Marketing | News | Sparkers, des data et des jeux

Media Marketing (MM) est éditeur de supports (site, newsletters, magazines, moteurs de recherche) consacré au secteur du marketing, de la publicité et des médias en Belgique.

www.mm.be

 

[RDragon]

They've always known that data. Why do you think the 80's and 90's had so many platformers? They were trying to get at the success of Mario. 90's platformers after Sonic started heavily leaning into animals.

The 7th gen's infamous color grading being greys and browns, with protagonists that mostly consisted of white bald/near shaven middle aged men that carry guns was because of Gears of War and Call of Duty 4.

Developers have always chased trends to try and grow.

That was more RE4 since GOW was heavily inspired by RE4 from the color filter, the snark humor, and horror elements.