SuperData analysts have cut the PlayStation VR sales estimate by almost more than 2 million by the end of the year, arguing the relative fragmented catalog and a modest marketing effort on the part of Sony.
After the past Black Friday and Cyber Monday, many analysts are examining how Christmas will present itself. SuperData claims that the virtual reality sector has been the biggest loser, and is that talking to GamesIndustry they have commented that “noticeably fewer units have been sold than expected due to a relatively fragmented game catalog and a modest marketing effort”. So now it is expected that much fewer units will be sold than the previously estimated 2.6 million.
According to the new Superdata values, they estimate that PlayStation VR will sell 750,000 units, which is almost 2 million less, and Daydream that also drops from 450,000 to 261,000 units. For the rest of the viewfinders, the previously known values are maintained with 450,000 units for HTC Vive, 355,000 for Oculus Rift and 2.3 million for Gear VR.
“PSVR had the best opportunity to benefit from the holiday, but its supply inconsistencies and lack of marketing have put it behind its potential. They did not offer any first-party game offers this weekend, did not restock the packages or did marketing of the device, pushing instead to the purchase of PS4 Pro. They’ve also pointed out that VR looks a lot better on a Pro than the standard edition, so the message now for most gamers is: Buy the Pro now and PSVR later. As a result, we won’t see them break the one million mark until well into the new year,” said Stephanie Llamas, research director at SuperData.
Llamas also added that Sony might be intentionally limiting the supply of PlayStation VR until they can do a better job with supporting the platform. “If Sony had pushed PSVR the same way they have been doing with their other new hardware, the demand would certainly have exceeded 2 million. However, given their launch, it is clear that they are being cautious before fully investing in the technology. Without a killer app and with the slow release of AAA content, they will release less than 1 million devices until they have content they feel confident about. They can afford to take it easy since they have no competition for now, so their supply and sales will be steadily increasing until 2017,” concludes Llamas.
Stephanie Llamas has also commented on the launch of Oculus Touch, arguing that they have taken a possible risk by fragmenting their user base, with or without controllers, which will cause developers to have to decide what to do, reducing speed and adding a new barrier to growth.
