Pachter: "I don't know why Iwata is still employed"

Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter spoke at the Game Monetization USA Summit in San Francisco, and once again made some bold predictions about the future of the game industry. He pulled no punches as he evaluated the current state of affairs in the business, and he had some hard advice for a number of companies.

Pachter noted that more people are playing games on more devices than ever before, but he doesn't think the console market will be growing. "I don't think you're ever going to see 500 million consoles out there," Pachter said. For lifetime sales, Pachter expects the Wii U will ultimately sell 30 million "or fewer" units, the PS4 will sell 100 to 120 million units, and the Xbox One will sell 90 to 110 million units.

"The reason Sony beats Microsoft is solely the price," Pachter noted. "Microsoft loses the next generation unless they cut price. If Microsoft drops its price to $399, I expect the sales to be equal to the PS4."

The lifetime sales Pachter predicts compare to current sales of the PS3 and the Xbox 360 at about 80 million units apiece, but it's far below some estimates of hundreds of millions of next-gen consoles. "I don't know where they get those numbers," Pachter said. He feels that at several hundred dollars, with games costing $60 or more, consoles are just too pricey to ever sell hundreds of millions of units.

The Wii U's performance so far Pachter characterized as "underwhelming," but noted it's possible "but unlikely" that exciting new titles will reinvigorate growth. He believes that Nintendo is missing a huge opportunity to bring new gamers into their brands: Nintendo should put old GameBoy Advance content on phones and tablets for free, and charge $3 to $5 for more recent titles from the DS. Pachter feels this would generate enormous revenue for Nintendo and bring millions of new fans into their brands, and give them a strong way to sell newer titles on the 3DS and Wii U that use those brands.

"I don't know why Iwata is still employed," Pachter said, given that he refuses to take advantage of this opportunity while the handheld market continues to shrink and the Wii U has failed so far to catch on in a big way.

Pachter is more positive on the PlayStation 4 - "Sony thrives, Nintendo doesn't" - saying it's impressive as a game playing device. "The graphics are phenomenal, and the huge RAM makes future innovation likely," Pachter pointed out. He noted that the multimedia features remain unclear, but the CPU power of the PS4 allows the potential for huge improvement in the future. As for the Xbox One, Pachter noted it's impressive as a multimedia device, and the added features of Kinect and Skype give it additional value. "We're sticking with our prediction of a built-in TV tuner" for the Xbox One, Pachter said, which would simplify the ability of the Xbox One to control your television viewing.

"The next generation of consoles is probably the last," Pachter said. "We expect frequent model updates instead of new consoles." Moreover, there's going to be renewed interest in the PC, he predicted. "I think the PC is going to make a comeback, the PC will be the hub of all this stuff," he stated. He feels Smart TVs are a dumb idea, noting that you don't have a smart monitor connected to your computer. He envisions there will be a number of screens around the home, perhaps controlled by a tablet, being driven by a supercomputer in your pocket that we call a smartphone.

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