PS3 Break-Even At 500K Says Namco Boss.

Namco Bandai president Takeo Takasu says the company must sell 500,000 units of every PlayStation 3 game in order to turn a profit.

He said the average game now costs $8.6 million to create. "We have to sell at least 500,000 copies per title worldwide to make a profit on PlayStation 3 games,'' said Takasu. The firm offered two games or PS3's launch in Japan and the U.S, Ridge Racer 7 and Gundam, both of which are "selling well " he said.

[shikwan]

Good luck with that! Cause there's aren't even enough consoles out there then to justify further production for games.

[kornbeaner]

one week does not the determine the future. over time the PS3 will sell millions and a game can easily sell 500,000 on hype alone.

[Balance]

from what i have read the gundum game is one of the worst launch titles ever, that company had better figure out fast how to make better games and not just riiiidddge racer 2,764.
next gen means everything has to be on another level, cheap unoriginal ps2 games don't hack it this gen.

[Marty8370]

He'll mean over the PS3 life cycle.

[shikwan]

Check your sentence structure and grammer before using adjectives like "idiot".

[Smellslikepie]

Check your spelling before trying to correct someone else's English.
*giggle*

And anyway, 'Idiot' is a noun. If it were an adjective in his statement, it'd be along the lines of 'an idiotic remark'.

[Thugbot187]

The way it’s worded it’s a bit misleading but being that this sentence doesn’t account for the games to come, “must sell 500,000 units of every PlayStation 3 game in order to turn a profit.” If they had to sell 500,000 units of every single game that came out they would almost never reach a profit because not every game sells close to that. Therefore they are talking about at current time with the current amount of systems available on the market today. Currently they have 16 games to date available, which would mean 8,000,000 games. Going off Sony’s information of having released 1 million consoles (I know reports have said less but we don’t know how much less.) That would mean everyone that owns a console with have to buy 8 of the available titles or an attach rate of about 8 (maybe a little more if you cont accessories like controllers). I’m sure you can agree they looking at the actual math and knowing the PS3 will drop price and more units will be sold and more games will be released, they are talking about the PS3’s life cycle. Think you should read a bit more before calling people idiots but looking at how many people agreed it shows about the same low level knowledge coming from the PS3 fanboy base.

[calderra]

Gundam is "selling well"?
Come on.

[Lex Luthor]

As TopGamer has said before sony fanboys hardly buy Playstation Games, which means a terrible attach rate. There is no way they will be able to shift that many games; especially if they are terrible(P$3 launch titles.)

[THAMMER1]

Every thig for the PS3 req. for you to wait?

Over the life.

In a few years.

Your paying for potential.

Come on is this thing a time machine too!?

[MicroGamer]

but I bet the fanboys wish they had one so they could go to the future to see where all this 'potential' they paid so much money for is going to lead.

"The average game now costs $8.6 million to create"

Hmmm....if it takes 500,000 copies of a game that costs $8.6 million to create to make a profit, then Killzone better be a massive blockbuster hit, and sell more copies than any other game in the history of games.

[marcusfenix]

Blu-Ray is failing. The 360 is more powerful. The multi-platform games look almost identical but run smoother on the 360. First-Party games look a he!! of alot better on the 360. GOW vs. RFOM>they had about the same amount of development time and Gears of War curb stomps RFOM then chainsaws it to little pieces.

[bambam1901]

If you try real hard I bet you may actually contribute something meaningful to this site... eventually. Grow up and get a life. This is coming from someone who owns both consoles and a PC.

[QuietMan69]

They better start finding ways to reduce the cost of making games, or wait until 10 million PS3's are sold

[Geohound]

hmm. Yeah, that whole 500,000 thing doesn't sound too good.

[shysun]

Thats not alot of games bro....hell suck ass games will sell 500,000 on the PS3 in time.

[Thugbot187]

Not with the Current install base of 1 million and an average attach rate right now being 1. Let's not forget with each game developed on the system and each console sold that adds more to the overall amount Sony has to make up.

[PS3n360]

I thought it was a blu-ray player.

[shysun]

Thats not alot.

[Thugbot187]

Those numbers really don’t seem to add up. If there are 16 games available and it takes on average $8,600,000 to create the game that would put the total production cost of all 16 games at $137,600,000. With Sony’s official statement saying they were going to release 1million consoles total USA and Japan and knowing that Sony looses $399 to $494( http://www.gamespot.com/new... ) just making the console. That would put Sony at a lost of $399,000,000 just going with the 399 dollar loss. We also have 16 games that we have to sell 500,000 copies of which gives us a total of 8,000,000 games that need to be sold at an average price of $60 dollars $480,000,000 for the game. Finally taking all those figures the $137,600,000 for the production of the games subtracted from the total profit from of $480,000,000 from the games we get $342,400,000. Now looking at the minimal amount Sony would loose for console $480,000,000 that puts us short by $-137,600,000. Meaning the attach rate would have to go up to 2.29 making that 10 for rounding purposes. Overall saying these calculations only give the developers a 3.4% take on the sell of each game which I’m sure is vastly lower than what they take. So this person clearly didn’t do their homework or my math is totally off :) However if I’m right I just wonder about the validity of many of these news articles.

[gearhead]

Ridge Racer will never top a million, so if they do make a profit it will be pocket change. The PS3 is doomed if the cost of development is that high and it is basically the same game as the 360 version, smae tracks and everything, even though they are less detailed.

[videl]

the ps3 is far better than the crapbox. and the ps3 will have the japanese games, thats the most important thing. i dont care what some xbots think, they are only jaleous, that the ps3 is far better. it does not burn houses, and it is not as loud as a jet. xbox360=crap.

[marcusfenix]

Doesn't burn down houses. Atleast the 360 can sync controllers correctly, display HD correctly on all HDTVs, it actually has a true next gen game, it is the current market leader and will continue to be. They have sold more HD-DVD addons than PS3's. They have alot better exclusive lineup. Blu-Ray is getting outsold 5 to 1. I'd say your shiny new grill is just that a grill, because it can't do anything else.

[DJ]

360 runs hotter and a LOT louder than the PS3. And yet it's the PS3 that'll burn down houses? Hah! Getting jealous of its features already, huh.

[slugg]

So far, according to various outside sources, Sony has only sold around 300,000 PS3's, about 25,000 of which are still for sale on ebay or other online auction sites. This DOESN'T include systems being sold in local papers, local internet boards, etc. I work at a Gamestop, and we STILL haven't gotten the 16 systems we were told to take reservations for. (Well, actually, Sony told us we would get 20, we took 16 reservations because Sony ALWAYS over-promises and under-delivers, but we only got 10 at launch and 3 more since...) So it will be a long time before ANY game, even a decent one like RFOM makes a profit, let alone a so-so port like RR7 or a steaming pile of cr@p like Gundam.

[TheMART]

So uhmmmm...

Wasn't the average attach rate @ launch a very nice 1.5 game per unit sold???

Where the PS2/Gamecube already had 1.9 game, the original XBOX 2.4 and the 360 had 4.5 game attach rate at launch?

Pathetic Sony. This will lead to bankruptcy if you'd ask me. The new Nintendo. From nr. 1 to nr. 3

[DJ]

not at launch. Took a year to get there. I wonder if people are still arguing whether that's a good thing or not.

[NextGen24Gamer]

No. The 360 has 5.2 attatch rate right now. Get your facts straight DJ. And don't worry about attatch rates. Sony's is right on par with the ps2's life cycle. 1.5 for the ps3 and 1.8 for the ps2. And the die hard sony fans are the ones who bought the first batch. I would have thought that sony's die hards would buy more than 1 measily game per console. ha ha ha ha ha ha WOW.

[bambam1901]

See my reply to marcus. All of your posts are a complete waste of time. It's funny that posters like DJ and The Truth, two guys who can actually form a sentence and be unbiased, get ripped by the 360 fanboys. Death to all fanboys!

[FirstknighT]

Gundam is selling well??? Its one of the worse launch games ever! It averaged a horrible 37.1% on gamerankings.com and its still selling well? Well just goes to show that ps3 fan standards are pretty low...no wonder they dont like the 360!

[HaKeRsCanRotINHEL]

Better break-out the plastic......

[TheMART]

Wrong DJ, so wrong.

The 360 had 4.5 games AT LAUNCH

Now they have 5.2 indeed Topgamer.

The PS3 has 1.5 game attach rate at launch.

As I said. Pathetic. Even less then the PS2/Gamecube 6 years ago.

Almost too said to be true. Go search it up DJ. You are a master in twisting facts, but these facts are all over the net. Eat them.

The PS3 is doomed, Sony fanboys don't spend. That's logical, because most of them are teenage kids with little pocket money to buy games. They can hardly save cash for the PS3, borrow the money from their parents of get it as a gift. But then the games... Too expensive... Like the attach rate of the PS2 also wasn't great.

360 owners spend big time. Actually it's not only about selling the most consoles (at the highest loss Sony!), but a combination of a good amount of consoles and more important:

sell them to a target group that spends afterwards on games and additional hardware devices! And sell 500k of every game? Guess not with only Motorstorm (props there for this game) being worth to buy

[bambam1901]

Congrats for being the 360 ringleader. Go back to school, learn proper English and then come back and try to post something intelligent. Thanks.

[FKN Unbelievable]

Add me in too. And no matter what you say your opinion won't sell a single game for the system. 1.5 attachment rate is the worst.Software sells systems and if you need 500k worth of sold games to break even with lot less than 500k systems sold then your Assed out plain and simple.No matter how you say it Jay-z said it best "Men lie,Women lie but the Numbers don't"

Ownage.
Xbox 360, Get Down or Lay Down.

[bambam1901]

Unlike MS fanboys, I'm not trying to to sell games for Sony's system. I could care less about attach rates and all of these other useless statistics and analysts. I own and enjoy both systems so I don't feel the need to root for "my" system to "win." Ownage? What are you, twelve? Go do your social studies homework, kid. Leave this forum to the adults.

[Retard]

Is it just me... Or does he look like an anime character...

[Jay da 2KBalla]

bambam dont get mad because ps3 has a horrific 1.5 game attach rate while 360 had a 4.5 attach rate at launch and now has a 5.2 attach rate. Damn get a life.

[bambam1901]

Why would I be? Got my PS3 and 360 hooked up to my 65 inch DLP and 5.1 sound system. Congrats, you can read and re-post some nonsense statistic. I have a life and enjoy it very much. Can't say the same for all the morons that pollute this site.