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How much of the Japanese market did the PC Engine control

Started by LINK398, 01/11/2015, 02:15 PM

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LINK398

At its most popular of course. As far as the Japanese market goes a lot of publications always talk about how Nintendo had such a strong hold on the market that it was almost the only choice after a while and how the Mega Drive for example had such a small percentage of that market. Well its been stated that the Sega Mega Drive had around a 15% of the market and while that certainly isnt good it certainly isnt horrible either. A lot better than the TurboGrafx 16 or even the Sega Saturn had in the NA market. So with the Mega Drive 15% and the PC Engine much better maybe 25% how much control did Nintendo really have

SamIAm

There was a big ol' thread about this last year

https://www.pcengine-fx.com/forums/index.php?topic=16829.0

In Japan:
Famicom: 19.3 million
Super Famicom: 17.1 million

Mega Drive: 3.5 million
Mega CD: 400 thousand

PCE: 3.9 million
PCE-CD: 1 million
PCE-Duo: 1 million

Most of the PCE's base system sales came in the late 80s and 1990, when everyone had a Famicom already and before the Super Famicom was out. The Duo did all right in 1992, but it's still hard to compare the PCE directly with the NES or the SNES because their peak years were different, and they weren't exactly in direct competition. In Japan, anyway.

IMG

LINK398

So according to that chart sales of both turbo chips and CD-ROM's were better as the system was around longer so why does it suddenly stop.

Also it doesnt seem like the Mega Drive and the PC Engine were that far apart....yes CD unit sales were a lot more for the PC Engine but still....if Sega had 15% of the market at its best than NEC might have had 18% and these are of course not actual numbers but still

A Black Falcon

Quote from: LINK398 on 01/12/2015, 03:15 PMSo according to that chart sales of both turbo chips and CD-ROM's were better as the system was around longer so why does it suddenly stop.
Huh?  As the lines show, HuCard game sales decline significantly in 1992, because the format was fading out in favor of the SNES and PCE CD.

QuoteAlso it doesnt seem like the Mega Drive and the PC Engine were that far apart....yes CD unit sales were a lot more for the PC Engine but still....if Sega had 15% of the market at its best than NEC might have had 18% and these are of course not actual numbers but still
Remember that all PCE Duos can play HuCard games, so for systems that can play the base games, the TG16 beat the Genesis in Japan by 1.4 million systems.  Their overall market share for the generation is going to be a good bit above Sega's.

In terms of market share overall in the market year-to-year, though, the TG16 was #1 overall from '87 to '89, and was at its peak, as that chart shows, from '88 to '90.  Because of its later release and slower sales, Sega was never #1; I think its peak of popularity in Japan was after the SNES's release, not before it like NEC's.  (As for the PCE CD, it was the #1 selling addon in Japan that generation, so it won addons, but of course with only 2 million sold was no match for the SNES.)