enough with VGchartz!!!

[TheTenth]

I'm sorry, it's a bit long :

Absolutely nothing can prove their numbers are right, even if they were right, it would be a part of the truth (nothing can oblige any shop or internet site to give their numbers) for USA, but how in hell could they get - moderately accurate - numbers for Europe, even worse, Japan?
OK they try to convince you with this :

"As obligated by law, videogame companies report shipment data in their financial reports" : law only obligates to report your sales numbers, meaning how much money you made, and not how many of this product you sold ; even then these numbers go to the finance department, which VGchartz doesn't have access to.

"How VG Chartz comes up with its figures

Sales figures are determined through two important methods
Data Sampling – VG Chartz gathers random data from a sample of the total number of retailers.
Shipment information – VG Chartz has contacts with publishers who give their best estimates on number of products shipped.
Because the number of retailers selling videogames is quite large, it is possible to attain statistically valid results from a small sample.
It then becomes a matter of working backwards by having:
The approximate number of retailers.
Historical sales figures.
Data from sales tracking agencies as reference points in accuracy.
There are obvious limiting factors as well – few games have above a 40% attach rate, a game will never sell more than the console user base, publishers do not ship significantly more or less than they expect to be sold"

These arguments show nothing but probability calculations based on "some" shops and "some" publishers, which may not always be even accurate based on lack of internal communication.
They are even full of contradiction, as if "videogame companies report shipment data" and they have access to it, why would they need "some" companies and publishers to give their numbers to VGchartz who then use them to build some probability numbers?

People don't come to their site to have accurate probability, they believe the numbers they see there and there's no way other than legal numbers, which are most secret, to really know what sales have or not been done.

[phranctoast]

I was under the impression that VG chartz made up their own numbers until the official numbers came out. Making them reliable for older information, and thats it...

[reiella]

VGCharts reflects the pulse of the gamespot forums. Near as I can tell, that's where they get their information .

[stockstar1138]

40GB PS3s are in shortage this week.

don't get mad, because 360 beat us for only the 2nd time this year.

vgchartz.org is the most accurate week-to-week source on the interent, they are not perfect by any means, but its better than having to wait every 6 months when Sony announces how man PS3s they've sold (and even that isn't usually accurate).

NPD only covers America and vgcharts covers a lot more than just America (even though its not accurate, its the best you can do).

[Terjyn]

Japan Numbers are easy to get in retro, they are announced, just like NA numbers are.

VGChartz is a good source of past information from NA and Japan, because they go update their numbers with official numbers after they are announced.

European numbers, I have no idea if they get real numbers or continue to go with fakes, but I just generally don't believe European numbers from them for this reason.

[SGRSBSKIER]

Because of that shortage the 360 has now sold 7k more consoles this year than the PS3 in America (that is probably within the margin of error).

They have been pretty accurate, they have been within a few weeks of when the Wii passed 360 sales in America and the 10 million marks for the consoles.

[Terjyn]

Originally Posted by SGRSBSKIER

Because of that shortage the 360 has now sold 7k more consoles this year than the PS3 in America (that is probably within the margin of error).

They have been pretty accurate, they have been within a few weeks of when the Wii passed 360 sales in America and the 10 million marks for the consoles.

Within a few weeks is because they retro-fit their numbers monthly, so being off by a few weeks is terrible.

I call bull on the 360 lead for the year in America, through June the PS3 had outsold the 360 by almost 300,000 consoles for the year. Are you really going to tell me that the 360 in July outsold the PS3 by 300,000 units? Are you really going to believe vgchartz if they say it did?

[quexos]

Originally Posted by TheTenth

I'm sorry, it's a bit long :

Absolutely nothing can prove their numbers are right, even if they were right, it would be a part of the truth (nothing can oblige any shop or internet site to give their numbers) for USA, but how in hell could they get - moderately accurate - numbers for Europe, even worse, Japan?.

If you say so, fair enough but then please provide us with an "accurate" link to figures because I am interested. Short of that don't complain about VGChartz figures.

[blu-dave]

Woah chill

Even if xbox figures have risen slightly, there is nothing we can do about. PS3 shall win no matter what, so its just a matter of waiting.

[Simplayer]

Originally Posted by quexos

If you say so, fair enough but then please provide us with an "accurate" link to figures because I am interested. Short of that don't complain about VGChartz figures.

There are no accurate weekly figures for NA. We have reasonably accurate monthly figures with NPD.

[AranhaHunter]

VGChartz numbers come out of ioi (the site's owner) ass. He got perma banned from GAF for trying to spew his bullshit there. The guy is smart though he knows there are plenty of dumbasses who'll believe his magic numbers so he made up a site, made up some numbers and made the site sound legit.

He has argued that his numbers are more accurate than Famitsu's, MC and NPD, his game database link is all messed up full of innacurate data and duplicate games with different data on each link. Anyone that mentions VGShitz should be ridiculed.

[stockstar1138]

Originally Posted by AranhaHunter

VGChartz numbers come out of ioi (the site's owner) ass. He got perma banned from GAF for trying to spew his bullshit there. The guy is smart though he knows there are plenty of dumbasses who'll believe his magic numbers so he made up a site, made up some numbers and made the site sound legit.

He has argued that his numbers are more accurate than Famitsu's, MC and NPD, his game database link is all messed up full of innacurate data and duplicate games with different data on each link. Anyone that mentions VGShitz should be ridiculed.

ioi has access to about 8-9% of sales information. he interpolates the rest. meaning that vgcharts is far from accurate, but they are far from just pulling numbers out of their asses.

famitsu, npd, mc > ioi

however, he is able to be relatively close on a month by month basis to the real sources, meaning hes not full of sh1t. and his site is good for a week by week play of the video game market.

[Hedchekr]

I am constantly suprised at the amount of crybaby fanboys on this site. It is truly amazing and really sad.

[joeorc]

Originally Posted by stockstar1138

ioi has access to about 8-9% of sales information. he interpolates the rest. meaning that vgcharts is far from accurate, but they are far from just pulling numbers out of their asses.

famitsu, npd, mc > ioi

however, he is able to be relatively close on a month by month basis to the real sources, meaning hes not full of sh1t. and his site is good for a week by week play of the video game market.

and no way are their numbers for world wide sales: even though VGchartz claims world wide sales data. which i very much doubt. because in order to have Sony's sold through numbers they would have to have sales data for quite a bit more countries than they have listed. because the site lumps them into "OTHER" which is no way accurate because 1. the xbox360 is not shipped to as many countries as Sony's an Nintendo's since SONY's and Nintendo's systems are shipped to more regions in the world

[Terjyn]

Originally Posted by Hedchekr

I am constantly suprised at the amount of crybaby fanboys on this site. It is truly amazing and really sad.

Must suck knowing that 100% of the threads you post in have at least one major fanboy in it, eh?

[ThePhantomOak]

VG chartz could be more accurate than Sony/M$/Nintendo...

Reason being, is companies can say how many units they sent to retailers, not how many moved to customers. All those PS3's sitting on shelfs and stacked in the front of the stoor in many locations, as far as Sony cares, could be listed as sold. (Replace Sony with M$ and PS3 with 360 if I hurt your fanboy muscle)

There are many companies who got caught double and tripple shipping product at the end of quarters/years, to please stockholders...As hard as it is to catch them, think about how many dont get caught. That is proof enough for me that the numbers a company puts out "could" be BS.



Further, Does M$ count all the units that replaced dead units as new sales, or as replacements?






Anyway, VGChartz seems to be "good enough" to get short term information... Saying that VGchartz is no good is like saying that the Consumer Price Index is no good because the sample is too small. BOTH serve a short term need, and both adjust when longer term numbers are known...

As it is, anyone who is against VGChantz needs to show where there numbers are wrong, and post it. It is much more likely that they are off by a percentage (10%?) and not wrong, and that would STILL make them useful. Just announcing VGChartz is crap does not make it so. I have not seen a single detractor provide any data to counter them...

Originally Posted by stockstar1138

40GB PS3s are in shortage this week.

don't get mad, because 360 beat us for only the 2nd time this year.

vgchartz.org is the most accurate week-to-week source on the interent, they are not perfect by any means, but its better than having to wait every 6 months when Sony announces how man PS3s they've sold (and even that isn't usually accurate).

NPD only covers America and vgcharts covers a lot more than just America (even though its not accurate, its the best you can do).

[joeorc]

Originally Posted by ThePhantomOak

VG chartz could be more accurate than Sony/M$/Nintendo...

Reason being, is companies can say how many units they sent to retailers, not how many moved to customers. All those PS3's sitting on shelfs and stacked in the front of the stoor in many locations, as far as Sony cares, could be listed as sold. (Replace Sony with M$ and PS3 with 360 if I hurt your fanboy muscle)

There are many companies who got caught double and tripple shipping product at the end of quarters/years, to please stockholders...As hard as it is to catch them, think about how many dont get caught. That is proof enough for me that the numbers a company puts out "could" be BS.



Further, Does M$ count all the units that replaced dead units as new sales, or as replacements?






Anyway, VGChartz seems to be "good enough" to get short term information... Saying that VGchartz is no good is like saying that the Consumer Price Index is no good because the sample is too small. BOTH serve a short term need, and both adjust when longer term numbers are known...

As it is, anyone who is against VGChantz needs to show where there numbers are wrong, and post it. It is much more likely that they are off by a percentage (10%?) and not wrong, and that would STILL make them useful. Just announcing VGChartz is crap does not make it so. I have not seen a single detractor provide any data to counter them...

their numbers are an interesting guideline to see the direction the market is moveing.

you stated this :

It is much more likely that they are off by a percentage (10%?) and not wrong, and that would STILL make them useful.

one only has to look at the part of "OTHER" that they lump every region other than the US,JAPAN,AND EUROPE to see there is no way that they have any concrete data based on the fact that in order to show true sale through numbers. which is what they claim "world wide" for example Sony ships the playstation 3 to over 48 countries world wide .

do you think VGchartz has that sale through data when we know for a fact they get data from NPD etc. its all a guess they are

ANALYSTS. PURE AND SIMPLE THEY GUESS...!

[Icemage]

VGchartz has never been a good barometer for current sales. They're no more accurate than Michael Pachter or any other analyst; all they're doing is looking at past trends, reading tea leaves, and taking a best guess, much as any of us would do.

[Maximus]

Originally Posted by stockstar1138

ioi has access to about 8-9% of sales information. he interpolates the rest. meaning that vgcharts is far from accurate, but they are far from just pulling numbers out of their asses.

famitsu, npd, mc > ioi

however, he is able to be relatively close on a month by month basis to the real sources, meaning hes not full of sh1t. and his site is good for a week by week play of the video game market.

Haha, that's not true.

ioi basically pulls numbers out of his ass, go onto GAF and have a look see what they think of him...

I could "track" console sales on a website if I wanted to, it's relatively easy, all you have to do is look at quarterly shipments take away a few hundred thousand per region off the shipment LTD, make a guesstimate on general availability, and hey presto we have monthly sales figures.

I think it has been proven plenty of times that the game sales figures by ioi are pretty much always wrong and somehow Wii Sports is the top selling game even though it is only available on sale in all of four regions, hmm...

Anyway, off to Heathrow for me tomorrow, South Africa awaits!

[Winn]

VGChartz is often off by 20-25%, says that is pretty accurate and assumes they are correct and NPD or whoever is wrong.