Just watched the Bonus Round part 1 on Game Trailers and Michael Pachter thinks Mass Effect 2 won't be a big hit, selling 1-2million on consoles and only 200,000 copies on PC.  
 
Garnett Lee agreed and thinks that the game's barriers to success will be the fact that some people haven't played the original and will be also scared off by the RPG nature of the game. 

Am I crazy or was Mass Effect a hit?  It sold 1.6 Million on XBOX 360 alone in the first six weeks.  
While NPD won't produce data on total PC sales it remained in Direct2Drive's top ten for quite a while too.  I can't find Steam sales figures so if anyone knows or can point me to them it would be appreciated.
 
I think their PC sales prediction is extremely low.  What do you think?

This coming from the same guy who said "no one owns a PC faster than a ps3".

Why...why do people listen to this D bag anymore?

He thought people wouldn't appreciate Borderlands too. 1.36 million people  (on the xbox alone)   told him otherwise!

PC gaming is dead.
 
... except for Farmville.

That's the nature of his job, to make predictions. Much like a stockbroker's job, It's a game of guessing. To take his claims as abulote truth is the wrong thing to do and I am sure he will be the first person to admit that. However, claiming that everything he says is wrong is also a mistake. There's a reason the guy still has a job and believe me there are tons of analysts who would be happy to take over his job.  
 
Personally I am still trying to figure out when did selling 1-2 million copies became a "not a major hit".  

" @SeriouslyNow:@Darkstar614:@Mrnitropb:  He also said it could be game of the year, the OP is a lemming "

" @DuhQbnSiLo said:

" @SeriouslyNow:@Darkstar614:@Mrnitropb:  He also said it could be game of the year, the OP is a lemming "

I didn't say he said it would fail, he and Garnett Lee said it wouldn't be a hit with those predicted sales figures.  A Game of The Year is a critical success and may not relate to sales.  "

Goodness gracious, get off of Pachter, he even said that the idea of a "big-hit" had changed post MW2. What he meant is that 1-2 million might no longer be considered a "big-hit," so even if ME2 sells very well, the idea of a big-hit, in the eyes of investors (this is key, since his job deals mainly with investors), has changed.

" @DuhQbnSiLo: 
 
He is an ass.  He said that MW2 would outsell ANY game released at the same time and said that New Super Mario would be just "OK" sales wise.
 
Well NSMB Wii outsold MW2.  For a tech stock financial analyst he's wrong way too often.
 
You might want to do some research on the discussion and avoid throwing out useless epithets like "lemming" if you want to be taken seriously.  
 
If by lemming you mean a marsupial which has been misrepresented by an anti Semite as being seasonally suicidal by being pushed off a cliff, then I'm not sure how you connect my OP and that epithet.  "

" Goodness gracious, get off of Pachter, he even said that the idea of a "big-hit" had changed post MW2. What he meant is that 1-2 million might no longer be considered a "big-hit," so even if ME2 sells very well, the idea of a big-hit, in the eyes of investors (this is key, since his job deals mainly with investors), has changed. "

Mass Effect 2 might surprise everyone - because it may very well be the first SHOOTER with heavy RPG elements, instead of a RPG with Shooter elements. (If you don't consider Stalker a Shooter RPG - that is... or Borderlands).
 
According to the new early 'Launch Trailer', it's getting perfect 10s and high 9s in the early reviews. If it keeps the metascore over 90% and it's actually a tight shooter, I can see more action fans jumping the bandwagon, than anybody expects. In that case, it might break the 10 milion copies sold treshold and become a MEGA-HIT like GTA IV or MW 2.
 
But then again - I'm blowing hot air out of my ass, just like Pachter and Co. Awesome job to have though ;D

Here's said Mass Effect 2 Lauch Trailer...
 
 

" @SeriouslyNow said:

" @DuhQbnSiLo: 
 
He is an ass.  He said that MW2 would outsell ANY game released at the same time and said that New Super Mario would be just "OK" sales wise.
 
Well NSMB Wii outsold MW2.  For a tech stock financial analyst he's wrong way too often.
 
You might want to do some research on the discussion and avoid throwing out useless epithets like "lemming" if you want to be taken seriously.  
 
If by lemming you mean a marsupial which has been misrepresented by an anti Semite as being seasonally suicidal by being pushed off a cliff, then I'm not sure how you connect my OP and that epithet.  "

I dont care about that, i just dont like when people like you, take one sentence out of a paragraph to judge. I think the GOTY part is big piece you left out for ppl who don't know who hes like me, just was to see what he says. Now if i didn't watch the video i would have thought he was calling it garbage the way you make it sound. that all im trying to imply by the lemming, (making ppl follow over the cliff, you get it now) "

" @SeriouslyNow: 1.6 million is a hit, I don't give a fuck about what he says. "

" Mass Effect 2 might surprise everyone - because it may very well be the first SHOOTER with heavy RPG elements, instead of a RPG with Shooter elements. (If you don't consider Stalker a Shooter RPG - that is... or Borderlands).  According to the new early 'Launch Trailer', it's getting perfect 10s and high 9s in the early reviews. If it keeps the metascore over 90% and it's actually a tight shooter, I can see more action fans jumping the bandwagon, than anybody expects. In that case, it might break the 10 milion copies sold treshold and become a MEGA-HIT like GTA IV or MW 2.  But then again - I'm blowing hot air out of my ass, just like Pachter and Co. Awesome job to have though ;D "

The first game sold well didn't it?  I bet this game will sell at least 2 million.

" @SeriouslyNow: DO NOT CHALLENGE THE INFINITE WISDOM OF THE ORACLE! HE IS THE SEER OF THE FUTURE!  Well, maybe not the seer of the future part...or the infinite wisdom part. Oh well. *chants* PACH ATTACK! PACH ATTACK! Alright, I'm done with this. *leaves* "

Humble Pie? AWESOME NEW INTERNET MEME!
 

This game will sell amazingly I can feel it in the air, I can feel the Mass Effect air and it's going to be big. And SO many people have played the first... maybe not on PC, but definitely on 360

Dude - I just switched my online retailer for the chance to win a freaking Mass Effect 2 BEANBAG!
 
My usual retailer, where I had a preorder for it, only had a ME2 lighter, which I have no use for, since I gave up smoking recently. Also - trying to win a ME2 beanbag and fail is like 100x more awesome than getting a ME2 lighter 100%.
 
If I actually win the beanbag... Oh brother - I'll remodel my gaming space around that thing!

They leave a lot of room for interpretation with the numbers, especially the PC numbers.  Gabe Newell is always making his counterpoint when faced with PC numbers that those are talking about retail boxed copies and his steam sales have been much better.  I for one intend to buy this through steam, so it's hard for me to say whether I'll be one of 200,000 or one of many many more who buy it digitally.

I think 1 million+ sales on any platform should be considered a pretty big hit.  Those PC sales probably aren't too far off.  The public never sees much PC sales data, but obviously each and every PC game maker does know about how many these games sell.  What evidence we have had of game sales often puts PC games selling ~1/6th to ~1/20th the 360 version.
 
I think titles like Valve's stuff, and games really designed for PC like Dragon Age probably have a much more favorable ratio for the PC.  Mass Effect started as a 360 game, so I have little doubt it'll sell much more on 360.

I think their PC sales prediction is extremely low.  What do you think? "

I love how so many people take anything he says at all seriously. Funny thing is if it only sells about this many retail copies, Pachter is going to think he was actually right, but since digital sales don't count at all, these kinds of things are honestly pointless.

When was the last time Michael Pachter was right about anything?

" I wish steam would release sales data to shut this douchebag up once and for all. "

" That's the nature of his job, to make predictions. Much like a stockbroker's job, It's a game of guessing. To take his claims as abulote truth is the wrong thing to do and I am sure he will be the first person to admit that. However, claiming that everything he says is wrong is also a mistake. There's a reason the guy still has a job and believe me there are tons of analysts who would be happy to take over his job.   Personally I am still trying to figure out when did selling 1-2 million copies became a "not a major hit".   "

He is just pretty dumb.

" @SeriouslyNow said:

I think their PC sales prediction is extremely low.  What do you think? "

I think Pachter is part of the ongoing organized campaign to destroy the PC market once and for all. "

" I think 1 million+ sales on any platform should be considered a pretty big hit.  Those PC sales probably aren't too far off.  The public never sees much PC sales data, but obviously each and every PC game maker does know about how many these games sell.  What evidence we have had of game sales often puts PC games selling ~1/6th to ~1/20th the 360 version.  I think titles like Valve's stuff, and games really designed for PC like Dragon Age probably have a much more favorable ratio for the PC.  Mass Effect started as a 360 game, so I have little doubt it'll sell much more on 360. "

Is there any way to check how many concurrent Xbox Live players there are for a certain game? Because that way we can compare it to Steam's statistics and get a rough indication of the sales on PC.

Come on now.  There are roughly 360million of PCs in the world and if only 1% can run the game that's still a much higher figure than the install base of 360 consoles.  If only 30% of that single digit percentile buy the game then we're talking roughly 1 million copies sold. I'm being extremely generous with those figures too as I'd be certain that the number of PCs that can run the game would be more than likely a double digit percentage, based on sales figures for Intel and AMD CPUs and corresponding componentry.     We have no real figure on PC game sales because it's been buried by big businesses who want PC to die.   You can probably find EA's sales figures for PC by investigating their EEC filings, but that doesn't cover all companies as many of them are private. Steam and Direct2Drive's top 20 games aren't an awesomely accurate representation, so I don't take the idea of such low sales figures seriously.  These big businesses want to take the power from the people by     How was not Mass Effect designed for PC? It played better, had better team AI management and a better inventory system than the console release.  Moreover the DLC got released for it too.

" Is there any way to check how many concurrent Xbox Live players there are for a certain game? Because that way we can compare it to Steam's statistics and get a rough indication of the sales on each.  "

" @Geno said:

" Is there any way to check how many concurrent Xbox Live players there are for a certain game? Because that way we can compare it to Steam's statistics and get a rough indication of the sales on each.  "

If by rough you mean "wildly inaccurate" sure.  Steam is one delivery method for games and there are a few of those like it. Then there are still brick and mortar retailers and mail order services too, let alone the roaring trade of selling new games on eBay etc. "

Because of digital distribution it's hard to get proper numbers for sales on the PC nowadays.
So as long as games are getting released for the PC, I'm taking it as a hint from developers that the effort invested is still worth the money received.

Mass Effect was indeed a Xbox 360 game, but what would you classify Mass Effect 2 as? 
Both versions are being developed by BioWare, and the PC version has it's own control scheme / graphics level compared to the Xbox version.

And the biggest problem with Mass Effect is that it's a sci-fi shooter. Unlike gaming nowadays, it's still not 'cool' to like things sci-fi.

Why would they want a market where they can get 100% of the proceeds from their own game sales to die?

" @SeriouslyNow said:

" @Geno said:

" Is there any way to check how many concurrent Xbox Live players there are for a certain game? Because that way we can compare it to Steam's statistics and get a rough indication of the sales on each.  "

If by rough you mean "wildly inaccurate" sure.  Steam is one delivery method for games and there are a few of those like it. Then there are still brick and mortar retailers and mail order services too, let alone the roaring trade of selling new games on eBay etc. "

It's a known fact that Steam is used by roughly 70% of the PC gamer audience, especially when it comes to AAA titles. We can just multiply by 1.5 after the calculation. If we take the proportion of concurrent users for a AAA title on 360 such as Modern Warfare 2 or Borderlands and compare it to the concurrent users on Steam (which is readily available), then we can get an idea of the sales figures based on info from VGChartz. It wouldn't be exact but it certainly wouldn't be "wildly inaccurate" either.  "

It'll sell as badly as Borderlands, hey pachter?

I think Pachter will make good calls most of the times but I think we he goes infront of cameras he just goes crazy and starts making bold predictions. He turns into Nostradamus I guess... make enough crazy predictions and one of them will come true.

I can't find any hard numbers for PC sales of the original, but Mass Effect sold over 2 million on the Xbox.  I think Mass Effect 2 will sell that again.  There is a much stronger marketing push this time so I think people will get over not having played the original just as some folks got over not having played Assassin's Creed 1 and Uncharted: Drake's Fortune.  I think the game will be a "hit" but not a Modern Warfare/Halo/Guitar Hero level hit.  Comparing it to any other RPG in a Western market, I believe it will do very well.  Look at Dragon Age: Origins on the console alone.  It's sold around 2 million, as well.  So, if a new IP can do that well, I am certain that a highly regarded sequel will do even better.  Finally, I really don't know how anyone can comment on the PC sales since the brick-and-mortar sales are so inefficient for the platform in comparison to the digital download sales.  No one talks about them, so maybe it will sell 200,000 units or maybe Steam will have another crazy sale in 6 months and the numbers will go through the roof.  Either way, Pachter is only good for starting discussions on forums.  Don't take any of his predictions seriously.  By the way, Pachter said 2-1/2 to 3 million units on the Xbox, not 1-2 million. He did say a couple of hundred thousand on the PC.

It's a known fact that Steam is used by roughly 70% of the PC gamer audience, especially when it comes to AAA titles. We can just multiply by 1.5 after the calculation. If we take the proportion of concurrent users for a AAA title on 360 such as Modern Warfare 2 or Borderlands and compare it to the concurrent users on Steam (which is readily available)

If Pachter is right, that's 10 million dollars in revenue? I'm not too worried. Anyway, as long as I get my copy I'm happy.

How does selling 2 million not qualify you as a big hit? You only need half that to get a game of the year edition.

@atomic_dumpling: If developers want PC gone they can simply choose to not develop on it.  When you see how poorly tech support is done, that's really not costing them that much money.  Sure developing a PC version of a game costs more than a console version, but if the market was comparable they wouldn't cut PC out. "

• Gears of War 2
  
• Alan Wake
• Halo 3
  
• Super Street Fighter IV

There's such a wide birth for speculation there. Obviously 47% is an estimate, it could be significantly less or more depending on the game. You can't look at that number than just presume ME2 will sell double its projection.