Kinect Sales Pass One Million

Dan Lee 36 Comments

Microsoft has announced that Kinect sales have exceeded the one million mark, which has taken ten days to achieve.

Interactive entertainment business boss, Don Mattrick, had the following to say:

“We are appreciative of the response we have seen from consumers that has culminated in sales of more than 1 million units in the first 10 days on the market for Kinect for Xbox 360.

This is a great start to the holiday season, and we will continue to work with our retailer partners to keep pace with high demand and deliver against our plan to sell more than 5 million Kinect sensors worldwide by the end of this year.”

Critical reception for Kinect’s launch games have been mostly positive, although the phrase ‘simplified’ appears quite often.  Even so, there’s no denying that with a group of friends or family, it’s a lot of fun.

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36 Comments

  1. Wow. At 130 quid each or so, that’s a lot of money! Frankly i’m quite amazed it’s sold that many, quite an expensive gift to buy for your kid so soon before christmas. I imagine it’ll sell by the bucket load over christmas.

    • It worked for the Wii balance board though and that was about 100 quid when it released.

    • To be fair after the relentless hyping and celeb endorsements I would have been surprised if it hadn’t sold at least a million (how many has Oprah given away in the last few weeks for a start!) – purchasing isn’t the issue for Kinect, the issue is how many of the million will come to regret the purchase and how many of the million will end up on eBay or gathering dust in a corner by next year.

      At the end of the day when you look at games like DJ Hero and other peripheral based games paying for Kinect and the dance game doesn’t seem unreasonable for that niche market. The real test for Kinect (and for Move) is how many they are selling next Christmas and how many games are in development for them. After the hype dies down sales will depend on good games and good word of mouth, only then will we find out how successful they are…

      Move is arguably easier to make games for as it can benefit from ports of good Wii games like No More Heroes and Dead Space Extraction, and from dual control schemes like Killzone 3 etc. Plus Sony have the benefit of a big 1st party development community.

      However with Kinect developers need to set out to make a game just for Kinect and why would you want to limit yourself to such a small share of the market unless (a) Kinect sold like hotcakes or (b) Kinect owners buy a lot of games, but the latter would depend on how engaging the games are as you only need so many fitness titles at the end of the day.

      Kinect may become a phenomenon like the Wii and hats off to MS if it turns out that way, but at the moment I still have this nagging doubt that after the launch hype dies down Kinect titles will dry up, either in terms of quantity (like the EyeToy) or quality (like the Wii). By next year we will have a better idea of the pipeline for Kinect (and Move) games, the type of games that are available and the type (and number) of gamers playing them. Only then will people be able to make an informed decision on the success of each platform…

      • Post of the month.

        I agree 100% and couldn’t possibly have said it better myself, I tip my hat to you sir.

      • Ditto (i suppose thats the Threespeech in ya) ;-)

      • my exact thoughts! i have been saying an thinking this since they announced it!

      • this post is…wow…simply awesome.

  2. The advertising has been relentless, and not just in the States. Watching an hour or so of TV last night I must have seen 5 different adverts.

    • the UK has been battered by the 360 ad team once again this year, xmas is just going to get worse! i just hope they use a different songs and not just stick to one. “These girls fall like dominos” was a form of torture come the end of Christmas last year!!! EVERY advert break, at least twice per a break!

  3. Is this just in the US or worldwide? I would think if it’s worldwide it’s not that impressive when compared to how much the Move sold without such a huge advertising campaign behind it.

    • I think worldwide. Its a decent figure bearing in mind the price point.

      • The fact it mentions 10 days would lead me to think it was US only as by the time they were getting these figures together it would have only been out a few days in the rest of the world.

  4. I wish we knew how many homes Move was in, its alright saying x amount sold after a month, but I’ve bought 3 bits of kit alone.

    1,000,000 in 10 days is impressive, it took the iPhone 74 days to sell a million and the similarly advertised iPad 28 days.

    They are apparently on track to sell 5m by the end of the year which will ensure great 3rd party support in the future.

    Odd how people mention how much its advertised… I thought that’s how you sold a product, and then once the ad phase dies off it’s in enough people’s homes to sell itself through word of mouth

    • It’s being mentioned because MS really know how to push a product. Sony seem to think their stuff will magically appear in people’s homes, I swear. Where’s the Move advertising at my local stores? No where. Asda has Kinect sleeves over the security-tag gate-scanner thingies for god’s sake! They know how to market something. Why Sony doesn’t learn makes me more frustrated.

      • What’s interesting is that here in Australia things were very VERY pro Xbox prior to the PS3 Slim, but since then retailers have been giving the PS3 more shop space. Recently I’ve noticed some reasonably decent Move advertising despite the imminent release of Kinect in this country.

        On the flip side I’ve just returned from the US and can tell you that places like Gamestop and Best Buy are pimping Kinect 3x harder than Move.

        I went into Best Buy in the heart of San Francisco to buy a second Move controller and there literally wasn’t a single one to be found. There were however, about 60 starter packs (move+eye+sportschamp), and about 40 navi controllers but not a single move controller. I asked two staff members and they shrugged their shoulders. WTF? How can it sell when a) they don’t stock the key component and b) they don’t give a f#$k.

        CC: The iPhone costs about four times as much as Kinect, likewise the iPad. It’s also unlikely Apple were making a loss on their phones even with a massive advertising budget. Also, iPhone and iPad had literally dozens and dozens of killer apps on launch.

        iPhone 3GS sold 1 million in it’s first weekend and iPhone 4 1.7 million in 3 days. They also didn’t take pre-orders.

        1Mil for Kinect is impressive, but is that sold or shipped? MS are notorious for quoting shipped figures so I wouldn’t be surprised. Based on $150(USD) selling price, the estimated $54 (USD) in raw parts to manufacture and other associated cost it’s fair to say MS couldn’t be making more than $75 (USD) per device. Now consider the $500 million they reportedly spend on advertising Kinect and MS have a $425 million (hardware) deficit to make up just to start to become profitable. To put it another way, for each Kinect sold for $150 Microsoft spent $500 advertising it.

        It will probably still work of course because MS work on product saturation, but as Apnomis says above, it’s questionable whether this will be successful in the long run or end up as a kooky fond memory like the Nintendo Power Glove.

      • The difference is Sony want to make money out of their peripherals and would be quite content for lower but profitable sales (same with their 1st party games). You only need to look at Sony’s financials to see Move is helping them return to profit.

        MS on the other hand are interested in hype and sales numbers and have enough money not to care how much money they lose. A Kinect is around $150 so they’ve made $150M so far at retail, but how much actually reaches MS and how much of that is profit? Let’s be really generous and say they end up with a quarter of that figure in which case they have made $38M but have already spent $500M on advertising, was it around $50M for the company that invented the tech, plus a few other motion/gesture based companies they have bought recently, plus the R&D and all the other costs. The fact is MS is the only company with enough money to make something like Kinect a success at any price.

        So at the end of the day it depends how you measure success…

      • Kinect’s components cost around $50, so I think you’re barking up the wrong tree by going for that angle.

        Success will be units in people’s homes, more units = more software sales = more profit in the form of the platform holders licence. With such a huge outlay its clear MS aren’t after a quick hit and they will see it through as long as it takes.

  5. I’d be interested to know how many Kinects bundled with a console have sold.

  6. I’m so tempted to sell my dildo dust gatherers to subsidise a 360+Kinect bundle, not just for the launch lineup but the future seems brighter too with every single 3rd party fully on-board, the only thing on the horizon for Move for me is Sorcery and there’s a chance that could be delayed when it never appeared on the PlayStation Blog’s Move list… an ‘oversight’ that still hasn’t been rectified.

    • Yeah, you should totally do that.

      Kinect has such a better line up (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Kinect_games) compared to Move (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_games_compatible_with_PlayStation_Move), hell I might do the same thing myself.

      Pause pause not.

      • Who cares about games which replace the DS3… my DS3’s work just fine, The Shoot & Time Crisis show just how bad the Move controller is at pointing through lacking the old skool IR beam, so good luck with half the games on that list.

      • I had no issues with the Time Crisis or Shoot demos.

        There are only 2 Kinect games that currently have my interest. Grand Slam Tennis and Kinect Star Wars. The problem is that I would want a tennis game to be accurate (which i think the Wii has more chance of offering). As for the Star Wars one I would want something in my hand to replicate the light sabre. The jedi moves will probably be great but the first thing anyone does when they pick up a stick (or anything similar) is use it has a light sabre. It isn’t as natural without. Hopefully you’ll be able to use any item to to replicate it for Kinect otherwise I’ll have serious doubts about it.

        Move has a longer list (FPS are a genre a especially want to use Move with, even if its just to inject a bit of freshness in a stale genre). SOCOM & Killzone 3 are high on my list (and MAG has been tempting me too).

        On top of that there’s Grand Slam Tennis, LittleBigPlanet 2, Sorcery, Stranglers Wrath, PS Move Heroes and echochrome II.

        Neither lineup is that impressive yet which is while i haven’t found a good reason to buy a 360 and Kinect over buying a couple of Move controllers and using my ps2 eyetoy games.

        None of the motion games compare to upcoming games like Dead Space 2, Motorstorm, Batman, Bioshock Infinate, Theif 4 other than those that can use a standard controller anyway.

        For me there are still must have PSP games coming out than must have Kinect or Move games.

      • Worst. Comeback. Ever.

        1) There are 24 (of 63) games on that list that are Move only, and quite obviously many more to come. Good luck playing any of them with your DS3.

        2) There are also several dual control method (DS3 / Move) games that either are or highly likely to be significantly more accurate/rewarding with the Move (Flight Control, Dead Space: Extraction, High Velocity Bowling, Hustle Kings, John Daly’s Golf, Tiger Woods, No More Heroes, Res Evil 5, RUSE, The Sly Collection, SOCOM 4, Time Crisis, Under Siege etc).

        3) There are two (2) games on that list of 63 that are point and shoot. Not half, two (2). I think thou dost protest too much.

        4) Demonstrate to me how The Shoot and Time Crisis “show how bad the Move is at pointing”. I’ve tried both (The Shoot demo and Time Crisis in store) and have found them nothing short of pinpoint accurate. Show me a single review that says the Move is bad or inaccurate in The Shoot or Time Crisis. You can’t, because they don’t exist. Even IGN who clearly favour Kinect couldn’t fault the Move’s accuracy in The Shoot.

        But please, if rhythm-dance-fitness-kiddy games are your thing then don’t let me take the Milo out of your Kate.

      • Didn’t take long for you to descend into throwing fanboyisms as a means to reply.

        You probably either need to read more or get better sources, there’s a perfectly accepted technical reason for ‘Cursor Drifting’ on a controller without an IR beam. Tumble also highlights this with the need to press a button relatively often to realign the cursor with the controller/camera combo. Its not a fanboyism unlike your comments – its a fact.

        Move is incredibly accurate (unrivalled accuracy in fat) in a 3D space thanks to the pingpong ball and also its accelerometers & gyro thingys, but cursor drift is a certainty and whilst its no problem in light-hearted, bordering on casual games that I’ve mentioned, it will be a nightmare in precision, core games like the one’s everyone’s so keen on mentioning.

      • Ah, the good old fanboy defence. If you can’t defend your own position any longer just start calling the other party a fanboy, instantly discrediting anything intelligent they may have to say.

        A fairly rich tactic coming from someone who so staunchly defends Kinect at every possible turn, without even owning an Xbox. Don’t you think?

        As for cursor drift, sure it accept can exist in some scenarios, but it’s always a case of calibration. If your PS Eye is on a slant, or if you fail to calibrate your Move controllers (in extreme cases of magnetic interference you may need to disable the magnetic sensor) it may appear, but otherwise it’s a complete non-issue. Additionally, in a practical sense both The Shoot and Time Crisis don’t suffer in any appreciable way from ‘cursor drift’ as testified by those reviewers and players who have tried them . I only go on about it because the bulk of your dismal of Move seems to be based on the control scheme in these being rubbish despite clear evidence to the contrary. I will grant you that when it comes specifically to ‘light gun’ type games then a light gun will theoretically be marginally more accurate – however light guns are a one trick pony whereas Move has a whole suitcase of tricks of which this is just one.

        From your comments about Tumble, I can’t help but think maybe you have faulty Move hardware, haven’t calibrated or have some funky magnetic inference in your playing area. I most certainly do NOT need to constantly recalibrate when playing Tumble, save for the requirement to reset your view if you want to move up or down the tower.

        In any case, I hope Kinect brings you true happiness less you become even more grumpy, disenchanted and miserable than you already are.

        Peace.

    • would thought you had one the way you back it up.

      • Ditto… cc, instead of sitting on the fence and being ‘impartial’ to anything 360 related, just go and bloody buy one mate. This devils advocacy is getting on my tits…

    • Do it, were not stopping you.

  7. Kinect is the kind of product that, because of all the advertising, will sell well to start with but I wouldn’t be surprised to see sales drop considerably within 3 – 4 months or so.

  8. I loved the fact my in-laws came over the other day to tell me all about kinect and how amazing it is from the adverts. MS are certainly the best at marketing. The only thing that is a problem is they would NEVER go out and spend the sort of money required to get one – or many of the games TBH. Still think they’d end up buying a Wii if they were pushed to get something.
    If they had a 360/kinnect bundle with the kinnect being thrown in for free then I would be interested in getting it.

    • Free haha you will be waiting a long time!

  9. No surprise tbh. Living in the Caribbean I didn’t see a single Move commercial, but Kinect was all over the place. In Guatemala now, and the only time I see a Move ad on tv is on the Sony channel. Kinect? All over the place. So yeah, MS really knows how to sell their products. As we all know, sales figures don’t really reflect how good a product is.

    • You live in the Caribean?? my heart bleeds for you…
      /sarcasm (lucky git)

      • Sodding keyboard…’Caribbean’

        *laughs whilst pissing all over previous comment*

  10. Considering it’s had the most expensive, aggressive marketing campaign probably ever in gaming and has regularly been touted as the “future” of Xbox, I’d have expected sales of at 1 million minimum on day one really. It’ll be interesting to see if the momentum keeps up, but the first couple of million was going to be a shoe in with the fanboy rush at any rate, lets see how it does when there’s only the casual market to sell to in a few weeks time.

    I imagine UK sales can’t have been too extraordinary either, considering the look of the charts and the fact there have been Kinects on shelves in every shop I’ve been in lately. Makes me wonder how online retailers claim to be sold out yet high street retailers are clearly well stocked up.

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