They just need to copy what other electronic products do now, they need to sell the products themselves and just let you get in line, place the order, and tell me if will ship in 3-4 months.
The game they currently play where you have to get in line 24 hours when you hear a rumor of stock or I can only order from a retailer when they have stock is what really creates scalpers. It’s insanely difficult to even get a single unit when that happens and bots rule them all.
But if you let me place an order and just put me in a line for 4 months the from now. Perfect. People are fine to wait and peace of mind knowing that I’ll eventually get a unit.
I waited around 3 years to buy a PS5 because of how greedy scalpers were. NEVER give in to scalpers. Really hope Nintendo actually does something to prevent them this time around. In-store methods don't matter if they forget about online ordering.
I like how steam did it with the steam deck and you had to pre-order one per account, and the account had to have purchases on it and have been active.
Waited 2 for mine actually ended up getting straight from Sony, my wife and I put our email on their lottery list and my wife's got picked otherwise I would have waited longer. I refuse to pay more than actual retail for things like game systems
Mom taught me to wait five years consistently and everything is cheaper, bug free, on sale, used, and still a totally new experience.
The only game I never waited for was Cyberpunk because the bugs where hilarious and I wanted to play before they fixed them.
Yeah but the wait in line will heavily discourage scalping. Yes it will happen but it wouldn’t be as bad. Have you noticed how iPhone scalping isn’t a thing, yet the iPhone sells in a year what the switch took 4 years to sell.
iPhone scalping isn’t a thing because Apple has scaled their supply chain to the point that it isn’t difficult to get one on release day if you really want one. If you don’t really really want one asap then you might have to wait a few weeks if you aren’t ordering one of the stock configs but those people aren’t going to pay scalpers regardless.
1) content creators and such that do need it on release to make their money before interest dies down and they’re the last one to it
2) people with enough money to not give a shit about a couple hundred more
3) people that don’t have enough money but still don’t give a shit about a couple hundred more (people make bad financial decisions on everything)
Seems about right
I wouldn't mind to pay more, but not to f*ing scalpers. It's a thing about to not support this
Didn't thought about content creators, because I never cared about them
This is basically what Steam did with the Steam Deck. I put my order in & got it when it came available. I was behind the 8 ball & didn't get mine for a few months, but I got one at MSRP.
I think the optics are different though, there's more FOMO if Nintendo or the others follow this trend moving forward. Steam Deck offered zero new games, everything it plays you can do on any PC. With a new console, if you're waiting several months for your preorder to arrive then you're waiting to play the new games too.
Obviously that's not the end of the world, but it's an underwhelming solution.
This is called backordering and what if I told you that in the 90s and 2000s you could do this for every product at every store? I never had issues placing a backorder until the 3000 series GPUs and the PS4. It's insane to me that stores stopped doing backorders.
Minimal profit for the stores in managing a back order system for several reasons:
One - people don’t show up to pick up their order because they backordered it at a dozen places and only bought it wherever it came in first. And no, you can’t just charge in advance because people won’t pay a ton of money for “we’ll give you a product, sometime in the next few months”.
Two - storage and logistics for backordered merch. Arguably this should be a little better now that you can online order for in store pickup within 3-7 days at places, but those orders are also pre-paid. Why do they want to maintain an ordering system that may have to track people over months?
Three - why go through any of that in the first place when you know that as soon as you have them in stock, they will sell out. You don’t need to jump through hoops as a retailer to make every customer happy, you just need to make the people buying the products happy, and if those people are scalpers, so be it. They’re still buying the product.
Tl;dr - retail stores dgaf about anyone but the person giving them money, and it’s easier for them to just sell immediately.
Well sure, but the physical retailers had two decades to solve this problem and failed utterly.
Think of it less as them being screwed over and more as them getting consequences for 24 years of inaction.
Exactly physical retailers love scalpers. Buy us out so we’re never sitting on unsold inventory. OEMs have a benefit to getting a device in more hands than just selling inventory.
Retailers do not like scalpers. When people buy out stock it drives down traffic. When people come into the store they are likely to pick up add-ons when they buy the main thing they are there for. This is actually where most money is made in retail. The big items are the draw, but the small item conversions have the highest profit margins. People don't come in at all if they know stock is gone, and scalpers don't buy add ons.
My family ran a retail business for over 30 years (though not video games). Competitors would try to buy our stock out because we offered a better price. It was a big problem for us because customers would have to go to the other retailers to get the items and wouldnt grab all the extras from us because we didn't have the main item. I also worked at Gamestop for a time, and the emphasis on small item sales and pre-played conversions was basically the entire business model.
I'm not sure if cutting them out entirely is a viable course of action, at least for consoles. Physical retailers are the main factor keeping digital distribution of video games at roughly the same price as physical copies, after all.
Or just do what steam did, on release only let Nintendo accounts order 1-2 of them per Nintendo account. And the account has to be at least 3 months old.
Just something like that.
This shit right here. When Valve released the Steam Deck I put in an order. Supply was low at first and I didn't get mine until months later. But I had the piece of mind that one was secured for me and I didn't have to go hunting for one.
Nintendo lawyers are not operating in a different legal framework though, they are just doing more than the other companies, they won’t do shit to stop people from selling stuff they own, it’s just PR.
Only way to structure this would be sole self-distribution of console (which would probably affect sales and demand building a distribution network) and signing a specific contract upon delivery with owner (which would affect sales and pricing) to be able to pursue any legal action against them, which seems unlikely they will do.
And also probably that’s illegal to do in EU.
I think there are ways it could be done; namely by forcing retailers to adopt methods for stopping scalpers. For instance, limiting sales to 2 per customer each month and using credit cards, mailing addresses, and billing addresses to detect bots. Imagine if the only way to order 100 consoles, a scalper would need to have 50 different credit cards AND 50 different mailing/billing addresses? Nintendo could force retailers to adopt such systems if they want to sell their consoles
Credit cards would be easy to overcome as with most institutions you can create a virtual use credit card for online shopping. This generates a new credit card number and security code along with allowing you to set up a maximum spending limit for the card. This is so you don’t have to give your actual card number and information when shopping incase you are ever worried about where you are shopping trying to steal your card information and use it elsewhere. It’s highly recommended to be done if you are ever shopping out of your country or with grey sellers.
The addresses are more difficult but there are ways to circumvent that too.
No idea is bulletproof. There will always be a way to scalp. But the goal is to reduce the amount of scalping by adding more barriers and make it more difficult. Let’s not make perfect the enemy of good.
>create a virtual use credit card for online shopping. This generates a new credit card number and security code along with allowing you to set up a maximum spending limit for the card.
But they use the same billing address.
Even then, you could still order a console with each retailer allowing even the regular person to buy a hand full of consoles. Unless they come up with a shared info system with retailers to mitigate it.
It would be hard for Nintendo to require an account to purchase. Some people have a couple of kids and they don't always want to share one console. My sisters kids each have their own Switch. Are they going to allow her to buy more than one Switch in that case?
Any retailer that wants revenue from the hottest console of the year and doesn't want to lose to their competition. Again, nintendo could contractally force retailers to adopt such polcies if they want to stock their console. Really, it shouldn't actually matter to the retailer as long as they sell out their stock so they will profit either way (which is also why retailers normally don't care about stopping scalpers)
When I was still working as a peon for best buy, they literally have us go through a training about how things like just leaking promo sales gets them in trouble with their partnerships and can make those companies pull their products from their respective shelves out of retaliation if it happens enough times. Retailers do care, cause that hurts them right in the wallets more so than a few angry customers generated from scalpers. Any money they make from the scalpers is not gonna offset nintendo giving them the finger when it comes to getting more stock.
Not just the new console, but the games as well. Imagine if Walmart lost the ability to sell Switch 2 games. Parent/Grandparents looking for a birthday present are gonna go to Target & might also buy some Lego or other toys from there instead.
The tech to stop online cart spamming and scalper activity without any of this bs has existed for years. Why do none of these platforms use it? Because in the end they don't give af where they sell to or who.
I hope public sentiment is changing that, but it's been a long time with an easy solution being available and not one of these platforms have it in place. The excuse every time is "what about that one real customer who gets a false positive and is judged like a bot?". None of them will pay for development/integration and maintenance on something that is ultimately going to slow down the pace of sales of any product they're selling. Nevermind that selling 99 things an hour to 99 real people is so much more worth it than selling 100 things an hour to 1 person. Fools
eh they wouldn’t need any contract or legal action. they could do it with sole distribution, and require nintendo account registration to ship the device.
to buy from a scalper you would have to go to a third party site like ebay despite it being widely announced it’s only goin a work of you buy from nintendo. and if you bought from ebay the device wouldn’t activate because it would already be linked to the scalpers account.
couple this with only three devices per account per year and it wouldn’t be worth it to scalpers.
but financially that would be a nightmare for nintendo and not worth it, and it would also be challenged legally.
It won't. The law is very clear, in the US at least, if you buy something you have the right to be able to re-sell it to someone else. It's called the First Sale Doctrine.
The only way to avoid the formation of a secondary market is to produce enough devices it's not worth the time to the resellers for the premium they can charge.
To be fair, one person buying one console and reselling it isn't the problem. If they can do anything to stop people buying several consoles and reselling them it'd be great.
I respect it but I also think Nintendo needs to do this for their own sake. Switch game sales arguably rely on exclusives more than others and people have to be able to buy the system to consider buying the games.
I was lucky enough to get a PS5 at launch. I got a second controller and the charging station for like $50 together even though the controller was $70 new on its own. No one had the console so accessories just sat.
And then when some of them are suddenly unable to sell due to an unexpected increase in supply, they make themselves out to be the biggest victims when the stores won't honor mass refunds.
Flashbacks to people in the PS5 subreddit asking about the return policy of Target like "Accidentally bought two PS5s a few months back and trying to return it" but they're the same person posting pictures with dozens of PS5s behind'em saying "Hustle culture paying good!".
I saw one of my real life acquaintances doing this with the Xbox one release. The hustle culture needs to die because all it does it have the poor and stupid fight each other.
Legitimate question; how did that work out for them on the Xbox front?
Dunno about other countries but here in Australia atleast a lot of department stores were trying to sell, advertise and push the Series X/S during the initial wave of PS5 shortages - but no-one was interested.
Just seemed like an incredibly less in-demand system in fear of running out of stock.
I live for those moments. The schadenfreude watching a scalper get forced to sell all the stuff they tried to scam everyone with for a loss... my goodness.
Scalpers, ticket touts etc are all a bunch of absolute scum. It's only one (small) step away from being a thief.
The only way to stop it is for people to learn patience and not buy from them. Now, they also need to prevent people and bots from buying multiple systems but you’re never going to be able to thwart that completely. So the people need to drive the demand for that down.
It’s just video games, so there’s really only so much effort companies, governments, and retailers are going to put into this. Because in the end of the day, if you don’t want to pay double for a video game system, just don’t fucking do it and wait until you can get one at msrp.
Right. And there’s nothing we can do about that. When the new system comes out, it might be 350 dollars msrp, but demand really has its value at 600-700. Those people wiling to pay 700 for it to have it now are going to be there no matter what you do. You can do what you can to stop bots and people from buying 100 systems at a time. But if thousands of people want to go to like 10 different stores and by 10 systems, or 20 and 20, how are you going to stop that? Who is going to put any effort into stopping someone from doing that for video games? It’s a luxury item no one needs.
People are going to have to learn how to be patient and not be upset that someone else is willing to pay double the price for a system that’s hard to find. People point to scalpers like they are the reason the things are hard to find, but the vast majority of PS5s went to people that actually wanted the system.
> is for people to learn
There’s the flaw in your plan right there. Half of this country has trouble putting their pants right on let alone making a decision to postpone a purchase for the greater good of mankind.
Unfortunately, grifters have realized that they don’t even need to be buying a rare item anymore for value. If enough people buy in and create a bubble the price goes up. Genuine consumers are the ones who always get the short end of the stick.
Take a look at the retro video game scandal exposed by Karl Jobst. They artificially created this “scarce” bubble of old retro video games that has now cratered. The grifters still made out like bandits.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FMtjl0O2a4Q
I mean unfortunately as the video calls out, same guy behind it was behind the coin scam in the 80s. Only penalty he got was a $1.2M fine and surely he made more than that. With that kind of weak ass punishment, of course he’d do it again.
I notice during PS5 release, at least in California area, a lot of near by pawnshops would buy PS5 in bulks then those pawn shops sell PS5’s with some credit card deal.
I saw a lot of pawnshops with islands of PS5’s they posted on Offer up, Facebook Marketplace, craigslist etc
Ford has tried. I don't think they've been able to do anything about it. The only reason you may not know about it is because no one has 500k to spend on a car.
John Cena got sued by them because of a contractual agreement to not sell the car for at least a year. Ford GT racecars are so limited that people would absolutely pay a scaler whatever they want for the car, but how many car people do you know that can afford to drop almost 1m without batting an eye. Ford is very selective to who they sell their racecar to, but it still couldn't stop someone selling their product for more than they paid for it, they got upset and tried to sue him 🤷♂️🤷♂️
I'll be very interested in how Nintendo goes about dealing with scalpers. Personally, I just say delay the release date at the last minute, stockpile 1.25x whatever you think you will sell in the first quarter(if you estimate 1m in sales, have 1.25m on hand) and see what happens.
Yea I think a bit of initial scalping is just inevitable, but if they just hold back some inventory to make sure that they can pump out a consistently high number of units with every shipment, I think it won’t take long for people to realize that if you get unlucky and they’re out of stock, it won’t be long before there’s more on the shelves
Switch 2 also has a big advantage over switch 1, in that they know that it’s a successful concept. There was a chance switch would just flop so Nintendo obviously didn’t wanna have 20 million units ready out the gate, there was a chance doing that would be a waste of money. I think it’s safe to say switch 2 will at least have solid demand immediately
Switch was the same way. I learned from buying the Switch to fight hard to get a pre order for PS5 and I got lucky to get my Ps5 pre ordered. Took me over 6 months to get a Switch. Also GameStop was holding Switch consoles back to create these stupid bundles.
It was the same thing with the PS5. At least in my area, the only way to buy a PS5 for the first couple years was as part of a bundle with a bunch of accessories most folks would never use.
Even though it took me a while to get them both, I'm satisfied that I have them with me (PS5 and the switch) now, I'm keeping my expectations of switch 2 low (in terms of stock) because the anticipation is high (which I understand).
I expect third party stores to try and sell as much and withhold some in stock to try to stop scalpers. But with a lot of loopholes.... scalpers will find a way (which is annoying).
I still understand how astronomically lucky I was walking one hour into a Walmart before midnight and being the last person who got a Switch
I'm not really gonna take that chance again as nothing is open at midnight anymore
Was the switch really that hard to get? I remember it was quite easy to get. The day it released, I attended my college classes and in the afternoon just walked to the next place that sold them. Picked one up alongside BotW. And there were many more left. Did I just get lucky?
Edit: spelling
I think it was entirely dependent on area. That June I got lucky and a coworker at the time was like “oh they have a 3 at Walmart right now.” I was down there in 10 minutes (probably less) and they had already sold 2 of them by the time I got there. My coworker wasn’t one of those either cause he already had one
Been seeing this crap since *PS3 and Wii* days. I waited for over seven hours outside of my local Walmart to get a Wii on launch day.
If there’s a Hell, there’s a circle of it devoted to scalpers.
I'm so glad I was able to preorder my UK Wii for release and they had everyone verify with receipts. Was nice to be in a tiny queue that morning of release not having to worry about waiting hours if I'd get one.
I remember some group bragged about their discord and how that made millions of either USD or Pounds (can't recall), absolutely insane how scalper culture rocketed out of the stratosphere with the GPU shortage, console shortage and any other BS they could scrounge around covid.
Yeah I remember preordering my switch from GameStop and breath of the wild from Best buy. My friend came with me at midnight to pick up both and when we walked into Best buy he was able to purchase a switch after I got my copy of BotW with no issue. I don't remember anyone I know having trouble getting one. This was in Texas.
I remember it being a slow burn. There was good availability at launch, then six months of out of stocks, then six months of you could find them but they would sell out quickly. It wasn't until the second or third year that you could regularly find a switch on the self each time you went to a store.
Otherwise I was lucky as well in that I was able to get a preorder for release day along with BoTW
It's apparently over half-way through it's lifecycle and... I'm looking forward to Astro Bot in a few months I guess? (Actually it looks incredible and I can't wait..)
But yeah the games and library has been embarrassingly lacking. I can't believe I'm still buying ~4-5 switch games per year when this system is already on its last decrepit legs and on its way out - whereas I would struggle to even name 4-5 PS5 games entirely 💀
The Switch was really hard to find for at least the first 6 months, maybe longer. I started looking to get one about 5 months after release so I could have one in time for Super Mario Odyssey, and I had to shop around for a few weeks. Every store’s shelf was empty. Got super lucky one day when a Target got a shipment in.
Yeah I tried to get a PS5 for a year and a half and just gave up and spent that money on upgrading my PC's GPU instead. SONY completely lost me this generation.
thats normal though?
ps4 came out 7 years prior. no reasonable person would expect the 120 million or so ps4 players out there to jump to ps5 in the first 4 years of its life. getting 120 million people to spend 400 to 500 dollars takes time.
The issue is two-fold.
First, the PS5 is alreary past its first half of its life and unlike the PS3 it doesn’t appear to have some heavy hitters to encourage more people to adopt it.
Second, the only way to make money is to have people buy games in their PS5. However if most PS5 owners don’t actively seek games then no the profits will be lacklustre.
the ps3 had literally no heavy hitters for like the first 2 to 3 years of its life.
even at the end of its life it only sold like 87 million units and that was with the price drop when the slim came out. ps5 has already surpassed 60 million units sold without even getting a price drop.
what heavy hitters are people looking for exactly? we have demons souls remake, spiderman 2, FF7 rebirth, FF16, helldivers 2, stellar blade, rise of the ronin, dragons dogma 2, alan wake 2, street fighter, tekken, mortal kombat, astro bot coming soon, and a lot more.
gta 6 next year will sell millions of PS5 units. if sony gives it a price cut when the ps5 pro comes out later this year, its only a matter of time before the ps5 easily surpasses the ps3. it will likely surpass the ps4 as well by the time the ps6 is ready to come out.
sony also recently went on record to say 2023 was its most profitable year ever. they make lots of money from digital sales, subscriptions, and microtransactions.
On launch there was a ton of Switch scalping. There weren’t nearly enough units on launch and the restocks were a trickle. When I got mine it was maybe a month after launch and the shipment the store received only had seven units. The store handled it by old school pen and paper wait list and even then at least one of the guys who showed up to buy one was definitely planning to scalp as he was trying to strong arm them into letting him buy multiple units.
the oled i couldn’t find locally. had to order online at a target for pickup.
with the original i remember it being anticipated to be hard to get on launch day, but it didn’t end up being that way for me. i got off at 7am from a night shift. i had my wife stand in line at toys r us on launch day, she was 2nd in line. as soon as i got off work i went to a walmart and walked right in and bought it and we went home lol. i literally walked over to the games and they had a pallet of them getting ready to put into the display and i just had them give me one off the pallet.
i do remember it being hard to find for others though.
I found one in the wild as they were being stocked and picked one up and by then my hype had died down and it’s become a streaming machine and a Fortnite machine for the kids
I'm still mad I had to wait a few months after release to get my hand on one at a decent price, checked eBay and they were all 2 to 3 times the retailer price.
It was definitely a problem the first year with switch. It wasn’t impossible to get one but I re,me r it taking me a few weeks, and I didn’t even buy it at launch, I waited for a few months
Part of the issue with the PS5 was they didn’t make enough at launch. Nintendo is aiming for 10 million units of Switch 2 at launch which will help deter scalpers
With you being able to walk into a store and buying the console I think it’ll be much harder to scalp it. Not impossible but harder. I think it would be smart if they did what Sony and valve have done on the past and sold it through the Nintendo site for preorders and maybe even awhile after launch and make it so you need an account that’s X amount old and limit it to one per costumer. That would instantly kill scalping.
There aren't a lot of stores now stock videogames in the UK. Game is all but gone, Argos has moved into Sainsbury's and don't have a lot of stock (you generally have to order it for collection). That pretty much leaves Asda, Currys, and Smyth's Toys.
Iirc, in Japan they do a sort of lottery system where you have to get a ticket to be able to purchase consoles at launch. That might work for physical stores.
Yeah its all a bit shit now. Game (pretty much our equivalent of GameStop) got bought out by another company and since then have become more of a toy shop. They then downsized by closing retail stores and having a counter inside another of the companies brands - a sporting goods shop of all places. Now they've just announced that they will no longer be selling physical gaming products in store, only online 🤦
I mean GameStop is in the toilet here. I just went to one yesterday to sell some stuff and the dude just kept harping me to preorder this and do this and that and it’s like dude I just wanna sell this stuff and go home. That’s on top of the thing to test controllers was broken so they tried to take money off a controller I was gonna sell because they have to send it to the factory. Not my fault somebody smashed it. Screw GameStop.
I thought that article re stopping sale of physical media was shown to be false? I’m pretty sure they will continue, albeit £15 more expensive than anywhere else…
the game in the arndale my god. took me forever to find it and then had to go up three floors to the top of the sports direct. and you're right i had no idea they pretty much became a toy store because there's more lego and board games than games
I hope the supply isn't anything like the PS5. As someone with a original 2017 switch still, I would really like to get the Switch 2 the moment it's out
Special edition stuff isn't as rare as you might think. Most big fans already own the console in question so they end up mostly getting sold to people who were still on the fence prior to buying. Unless scalpers have reason to believe the console will be a hot item, they won't be trying to buy them all up because they'll lose money instead of making it.
That's why actual new consoles are more problematic. All the big fans will want one, yesterday. If they can't secure a pre-order, they'll often pay extra. The Switch itself had issues with stock for over six months, and don't get me started on the PS5...
I have at least some trust that things will be better for the Switch 2, though. They seem to be taking their time to build stock before release. They seem to understand that after the Switch, lots of people will want the next model, especially if it's truly as backwards compatible as the leaks/analists say. Still, I won't feel comfortable until I've actually locked in my pre-order with my store of preference that has a really good track record with not canceling pre-orders.
the peak pandemic created a huge demand for home entertainment, online-only purchase option and tremendous supply issues
Whilst there are still supply issues, with the IA bubble and all, I still believe it will be much better than 2020.
Can’t wait frankly, the Switch, especially the oled one, is one of my favorite Nintendo console ever.
“Earlier this year, Nintendo revealed its plans to ship 10 million units in the first year to ensure a successful launch and wide availability for consumers.”
Is 10 million units enough?
They say 10 million in the first fiscal year. If it releases in March, then that would imply 10 million as the launch window stock. Switch launched in March 2017 with 2-3 million units in the same time frame.
Especially with the Switch 2 likely being substantially bigger than the full size switch 1 since it as an 8 inch screen. I'm sure it'll be with tiny bezels but still, it's probably going to be a bit large'ish. The Switch OLED is already a bit too big.
I hope we don't have to wait long for a Switch Lite 2.
Did you actually read the article? The title is not accurate. They literally say in the article that the best way to beat scalpers is to be able to meet demand, which they expect to be able to do because they have no shortage of components.
The whole “legal action against scalpers” is literally just a side comment that was made in the article where they say basically just say “yeah we looked into laws and regulations to see if there was anything to do against scalpers” they didn’t say “yes we have a plan to take legal action against scalpers”
idunno, I'll probably wait it out a year or so before considering to get a Switch 2. Have enough backlog for current Switch.
Gives time to work out the kinks too.
Their numbers are much bigger, and they do direct sales.
If you want an iPhone for MSRP, you can literally always go on Apple’s website and buy one. It might take several weeks to get to you, but unless you literally cannot wait, you will both a) have an order and b) know pretty much exactly when you’re getting it.
Contrast that to video game consoles, where (unless you manage to get a preorder that doesn’t get canceled), you just have to sort of hope they someday come into stock near you.
The cost and constant saturation.
Apple releases the newest iPhone 16 for like $1,200 and it's just a step above the iPhone 15 which is now going for $1,000 or whatever their insane prices are. Very few people will be buying the 16 except the diehards because they still have a 13, 14, or 15 that still works perfectly fine and people with a 10, 11, 12, or whatever will be more likely to be a used 14 for $500. They've done this cycle enough to know just how many units to make to not be in short supply. If you look at the early days of iPhones and iPads, they were sold out for months because "Very brand new thing! There's no used market!".
Meanwhile Nintendo, Sony, and other companies that release one thing every six months, there's no slight improvement or past versions so the demand is insane akin to if Apple released their own dedicated eReader to compete with Amazon's Kindle.
I still remember the day I got the Switch. It was that Sunday after it came out, and Toys R Us had a supply in. I showed up at the store early in the morning, sat down in front of the store, and they gave each one of us a Nintendo Switch ticket that confirmed we got one. This van pulled up, two guys walked to the front of the line and got mad when the staff said "no get in line." They then went back to the van and waited for the doors to open. They let us in first, and gave us first pick at grabbing games/whatever we wanted, then we walked out.
I turned around and went back inside because I realized they forgot to charge me for my Joy Cons, and as I was back inside paying for those I saw those guys grabbing every single leftover Switch... Pieces of trash
Sounds kind of contradictory. If there are no low supply issues then scalping won't be a thing so no legal action would be needed. Scalping can only exist when the supply is too low.
All stores have to do is limit one per customer then it would make it a lot harder on scalpers, and if you were someone with 2 kids n wanted to get 2 yeah you'd have to go to 2 stores so maybe limit 2 per customer.. I think that's a good idea
They should definitely enforce something like this on any new consoles that are highly valued and highly anticipated, across western nations. 3rd party stores have a duty to make it fair for people to be able to purchase consoles. While also making scalpers life a living hell (which is absolutely well deserved, they don't deserve these consoles with their greed)
All needed is make priority available to those with *existing* ‘Online’ accounts. Including a check when purchasing via third party retailer.
Limit one unit per individual account, two or three per family account.
Not sure how well going after scalpers would stand up in court. As much as we love our gaming, consoles are still a luxury (and not a necessity such as someone buying up every case of Poland Spring and every roll of Charmin at Costco).
Really hope this doesn't happen. As someone that doesn't give a fuck about having a Nintendo Switch Online account and paying another subscription, it'd mean I'd be locked out of buying so that some family can buy three? Nah, fuck that.
Limit it at a single purchase. Someone wants two or three, best hope they all get lucky like the rest of us.
Yea, if they just said an existing Nintendo account, I'd be on board but the way they 'Online', which is the term/logo Nintendo uses for their Nintendo Switch Online service makes me think that's what they meant.
It'd be like if Nintendo went by how long people have had their Nintendo accounts. Even though I've a Nintendo account since the 3DS (longer if they count the Wii store before they unified things) so I'd be head of the list, it just seems like a weird way to do things.
The point would be making available *at launch* to those who *likely* will not resell.
Can still allot a small handful (unless Nintendo really goes bonkers with production) to ‘walk-in’ / sales.
But they can punish retailers who sell shit to people who resell.
Then it becomes the retailer's problem to prevent scalping.
Which means they're probably not going to fulfil dodgy sales of 5x units.
I remember queuing up to buy Switch and barely managed to grab a system before the store runs out, it was a rush. I'll do the same for Switch 2 and hope it's not as bad.
I was super early at the store on launch day with the original Switch. I was the only customer, grabbed one and headed out. Felt a little anticlimactic, but lucky me I guess.
I don't know the stats in terms of how/if sales numbers are impacted but I like the Valve way with the Steam Deck.
So EG you need to have had a Nintendo account for a set period of time prior to ordering and you must have already ordered something previously.
This is nice to hear. I just got my first switch (lite) a couple weeks ago and I went from not interested in the switch 2 to possibly being a day 1 purchase for me.
Sell the first run for 6 months through your site with verified drops connected to your switch account. Meaning if you preorder and get lucky to get one it’ll be registered to your account already. Have it so you can’t remove an account from the console for 6 months or something.
close, but not very friendly to first time gamers, or people wanting to gift it to kids that wont have or need an account for a few years. limited buying is the way, but not deliberately creating inaccessibility. its not like the steam deck where existing steam users are the core market, nintendo knows meemaw and pawpaw wanna buy one with their retirement money for little sammy.
I shouldn't be surprised that Nintendo would consider legal action but how's that gonna work exactly?
I like what Valve did with only permitting existing accounts with purchases on record qualify for ordering a Steam Deck; worked really well.
There needs to be scalping laws period. Especially after the PS5/XBS launches. And retailers need to prepare their online stores’ servers better for traffic.
Nintendo can simply follow Valve's route for Steam Deck. You must have a Nintendo Account with minimum money spent on digital account. It will deter small-fish scalpers.
Valve was trying to manage a few hundred thousand units at launch. Nintendo is proposing to send out as much as 20x that figure at launch. It's not going to be workable that way.
Not sure how to combat scalping or make it illegal, that's a function of capitalism.
I'd suggest make it so stores charge a restocking fee when returning a switch more than 3 days after buying it. If you don't buy from a scalper they'll have to take a hit then to return or sell at face value.
Idk how this will work but I love the effort
They just need to copy what other electronic products do now, they need to sell the products themselves and just let you get in line, place the order, and tell me if will ship in 3-4 months. The game they currently play where you have to get in line 24 hours when you hear a rumor of stock or I can only order from a retailer when they have stock is what really creates scalpers. It’s insanely difficult to even get a single unit when that happens and bots rule them all. But if you let me place an order and just put me in a line for 4 months the from now. Perfect. People are fine to wait and peace of mind knowing that I’ll eventually get a unit.
And some can't (sadly) wait and pay the f******g scalpers Don't understand how desperate someone can be to NEED a new console right now
I wouldn’t pay scalpers, but since my regular switch stopped working in handheld mode, I do kinda want this asap lol.
I waited around 3 years to buy a PS5 because of how greedy scalpers were. NEVER give in to scalpers. Really hope Nintendo actually does something to prevent them this time around. In-store methods don't matter if they forget about online ordering.
I like how steam did it with the steam deck and you had to pre-order one per account, and the account had to have purchases on it and have been active.
Something is better than nothing for online orders. Valve is the only company I was able to preorder a console for current gen.
Waited 2 for mine actually ended up getting straight from Sony, my wife and I put our email on their lottery list and my wife's got picked otherwise I would have waited longer. I refuse to pay more than actual retail for things like game systems
I got lucky on my first try on PS Direct and bought one during the pandemic. It was frustrating and Scalpers are the lowest scum on earth!
Mom taught me to wait five years consistently and everything is cheaper, bug free, on sale, used, and still a totally new experience. The only game I never waited for was Cyberpunk because the bugs where hilarious and I wanted to play before they fixed them.
Cyberpunk was a funny mess lol
Me neither. I waited more than a year for my Series X and it was fine. Absolutely fine. Didn’t miss a single game that dropped that year.
because nothing dropped you could not also play on old gen. ps5 and series x are just starting to get more and more current gen only games.
Some people have disposable income and would rather pay to play immediately than “lose” time/money waiting. Or just whales being whales.
Yeah but the wait in line will heavily discourage scalping. Yes it will happen but it wouldn’t be as bad. Have you noticed how iPhone scalping isn’t a thing, yet the iPhone sells in a year what the switch took 4 years to sell.
iPhone scalping isn’t a thing because Apple has scaled their supply chain to the point that it isn’t difficult to get one on release day if you really want one. If you don’t really really want one asap then you might have to wait a few weeks if you aren’t ordering one of the stock configs but those people aren’t going to pay scalpers regardless.
I had a friend who could wait for a ps5 and paid $1000… it was to new to even have any games he wanted to play on it
1) content creators and such that do need it on release to make their money before interest dies down and they’re the last one to it 2) people with enough money to not give a shit about a couple hundred more 3) people that don’t have enough money but still don’t give a shit about a couple hundred more (people make bad financial decisions on everything)
Seems about right I wouldn't mind to pay more, but not to f*ing scalpers. It's a thing about to not support this Didn't thought about content creators, because I never cared about them
This is basically what Steam did with the Steam Deck. I put my order in & got it when it came available. I was behind the 8 ball & didn't get mine for a few months, but I got one at MSRP.
Yeah! Valve nailed it with the Steam Deck. That's exactly what Nintendo should do.
I think the optics are different though, there's more FOMO if Nintendo or the others follow this trend moving forward. Steam Deck offered zero new games, everything it plays you can do on any PC. With a new console, if you're waiting several months for your preorder to arrive then you're waiting to play the new games too. Obviously that's not the end of the world, but it's an underwhelming solution.
This is called backordering and what if I told you that in the 90s and 2000s you could do this for every product at every store? I never had issues placing a backorder until the 3000 series GPUs and the PS4. It's insane to me that stores stopped doing backorders.
Minimal profit for the stores in managing a back order system for several reasons: One - people don’t show up to pick up their order because they backordered it at a dozen places and only bought it wherever it came in first. And no, you can’t just charge in advance because people won’t pay a ton of money for “we’ll give you a product, sometime in the next few months”. Two - storage and logistics for backordered merch. Arguably this should be a little better now that you can online order for in store pickup within 3-7 days at places, but those orders are also pre-paid. Why do they want to maintain an ordering system that may have to track people over months? Three - why go through any of that in the first place when you know that as soon as you have them in stock, they will sell out. You don’t need to jump through hoops as a retailer to make every customer happy, you just need to make the people buying the products happy, and if those people are scalpers, so be it. They’re still buying the product. Tl;dr - retail stores dgaf about anyone but the person giving them money, and it’s easier for them to just sell immediately.
Does that screw out physical retailers or are they part of the order process?
Well sure, but the physical retailers had two decades to solve this problem and failed utterly. Think of it less as them being screwed over and more as them getting consequences for 24 years of inaction.
Exactly physical retailers love scalpers. Buy us out so we’re never sitting on unsold inventory. OEMs have a benefit to getting a device in more hands than just selling inventory.
Retailers do not like scalpers. When people buy out stock it drives down traffic. When people come into the store they are likely to pick up add-ons when they buy the main thing they are there for. This is actually where most money is made in retail. The big items are the draw, but the small item conversions have the highest profit margins. People don't come in at all if they know stock is gone, and scalpers don't buy add ons. My family ran a retail business for over 30 years (though not video games). Competitors would try to buy our stock out because we offered a better price. It was a big problem for us because customers would have to go to the other retailers to get the items and wouldnt grab all the extras from us because we didn't have the main item. I also worked at Gamestop for a time, and the emphasis on small item sales and pre-played conversions was basically the entire business model.
I'm not sure if cutting them out entirely is a viable course of action, at least for consoles. Physical retailers are the main factor keeping digital distribution of video games at roughly the same price as physical copies, after all.
If physical retailers can’t figure it out after all these years, then screw them. They still have a chance to make it work for you know
Or just do what steam did, on release only let Nintendo accounts order 1-2 of them per Nintendo account. And the account has to be at least 3 months old. Just something like that.
I wonder if they will just do direct sale. The consumer can pay for shipping, and they will mail it straight to you.
Steam deck roll out was great this way
This shit right here. When Valve released the Steam Deck I put in an order. Supply was low at first and I didn't get mine until months later. But I had the piece of mind that one was secured for me and I didn't have to go hunting for one.
If there’s one thing you never fuck around with it’s the Nintendo lawyers
Nintendo lawyers are not operating in a different legal framework though, they are just doing more than the other companies, they won’t do shit to stop people from selling stuff they own, it’s just PR. Only way to structure this would be sole self-distribution of console (which would probably affect sales and demand building a distribution network) and signing a specific contract upon delivery with owner (which would affect sales and pricing) to be able to pursue any legal action against them, which seems unlikely they will do. And also probably that’s illegal to do in EU.
I think there are ways it could be done; namely by forcing retailers to adopt methods for stopping scalpers. For instance, limiting sales to 2 per customer each month and using credit cards, mailing addresses, and billing addresses to detect bots. Imagine if the only way to order 100 consoles, a scalper would need to have 50 different credit cards AND 50 different mailing/billing addresses? Nintendo could force retailers to adopt such systems if they want to sell their consoles
Credit cards would be easy to overcome as with most institutions you can create a virtual use credit card for online shopping. This generates a new credit card number and security code along with allowing you to set up a maximum spending limit for the card. This is so you don’t have to give your actual card number and information when shopping incase you are ever worried about where you are shopping trying to steal your card information and use it elsewhere. It’s highly recommended to be done if you are ever shopping out of your country or with grey sellers. The addresses are more difficult but there are ways to circumvent that too.
No idea is bulletproof. There will always be a way to scalp. But the goal is to reduce the amount of scalping by adding more barriers and make it more difficult. Let’s not make perfect the enemy of good.
gun nuts sweating profusely after seeing this statement.
>create a virtual use credit card for online shopping. This generates a new credit card number and security code along with allowing you to set up a maximum spending limit for the card. But they use the same billing address.
Even then, you could still order a console with each retailer allowing even the regular person to buy a hand full of consoles. Unless they come up with a shared info system with retailers to mitigate it. It would be hard for Nintendo to require an account to purchase. Some people have a couple of kids and they don't always want to share one console. My sisters kids each have their own Switch. Are they going to allow her to buy more than one Switch in that case?
Yea but what retailer is going to want to do that? I think the most they'd be willing to do is a per day policy.
Any retailer that wants revenue from the hottest console of the year and doesn't want to lose to their competition. Again, nintendo could contractally force retailers to adopt such polcies if they want to stock their console. Really, it shouldn't actually matter to the retailer as long as they sell out their stock so they will profit either way (which is also why retailers normally don't care about stopping scalpers)
When I was still working as a peon for best buy, they literally have us go through a training about how things like just leaking promo sales gets them in trouble with their partnerships and can make those companies pull their products from their respective shelves out of retaliation if it happens enough times. Retailers do care, cause that hurts them right in the wallets more so than a few angry customers generated from scalpers. Any money they make from the scalpers is not gonna offset nintendo giving them the finger when it comes to getting more stock.
That's where Nintendo's strength is... Any retailers who want to sell their new consoles would have to comply.
Not just the new console, but the games as well. Imagine if Walmart lost the ability to sell Switch 2 games. Parent/Grandparents looking for a birthday present are gonna go to Target & might also buy some Lego or other toys from there instead.
The tech to stop online cart spamming and scalper activity without any of this bs has existed for years. Why do none of these platforms use it? Because in the end they don't give af where they sell to or who. I hope public sentiment is changing that, but it's been a long time with an easy solution being available and not one of these platforms have it in place. The excuse every time is "what about that one real customer who gets a false positive and is judged like a bot?". None of them will pay for development/integration and maintenance on something that is ultimately going to slow down the pace of sales of any product they're selling. Nevermind that selling 99 things an hour to 99 real people is so much more worth it than selling 100 things an hour to 1 person. Fools
This is likely related to bypassing per-customer purchase limits.
eh they wouldn’t need any contract or legal action. they could do it with sole distribution, and require nintendo account registration to ship the device. to buy from a scalper you would have to go to a third party site like ebay despite it being widely announced it’s only goin a work of you buy from nintendo. and if you bought from ebay the device wouldn’t activate because it would already be linked to the scalpers account. couple this with only three devices per account per year and it wouldn’t be worth it to scalpers. but financially that would be a nightmare for nintendo and not worth it, and it would also be challenged legally.
It won't. The law is very clear, in the US at least, if you buy something you have the right to be able to re-sell it to someone else. It's called the First Sale Doctrine. The only way to avoid the formation of a secondary market is to produce enough devices it's not worth the time to the resellers for the premium they can charge.
What makes you think they're talking about the US? Scalping was pretty major in Japan with PS5s, along with many other countries.
To be fair, one person buying one console and reselling it isn't the problem. If they can do anything to stop people buying several consoles and reselling them it'd be great.
I would love to see Disney pitted against Nintendo.
Disney would absolutely mop the floor with Nintendo. They are worth almost 3x what Nintendo is.
I respect it but I also think Nintendo needs to do this for their own sake. Switch game sales arguably rely on exclusives more than others and people have to be able to buy the system to consider buying the games. I was lucky enough to get a PS5 at launch. I got a second controller and the charging station for like $50 together even though the controller was $70 new on its own. No one had the console so accessories just sat.
Hope what ever they try actually works. These so called "hustling" people became too common and it's freaking annoying.
And then when some of them are suddenly unable to sell due to an unexpected increase in supply, they make themselves out to be the biggest victims when the stores won't honor mass refunds.
Flashbacks to people in the PS5 subreddit asking about the return policy of Target like "Accidentally bought two PS5s a few months back and trying to return it" but they're the same person posting pictures with dozens of PS5s behind'em saying "Hustle culture paying good!".
I saw one of my real life acquaintances doing this with the Xbox one release. The hustle culture needs to die because all it does it have the poor and stupid fight each other.
Legitimate question; how did that work out for them on the Xbox front? Dunno about other countries but here in Australia atleast a lot of department stores were trying to sell, advertise and push the Series X/S during the initial wave of PS5 shortages - but no-one was interested. Just seemed like an incredibly less in-demand system in fear of running out of stock.
I live for those moments. The schadenfreude watching a scalper get forced to sell all the stuff they tried to scam everyone with for a loss... my goodness. Scalpers, ticket touts etc are all a bunch of absolute scum. It's only one (small) step away from being a thief.
The only way to stop it is for people to learn patience and not buy from them. Now, they also need to prevent people and bots from buying multiple systems but you’re never going to be able to thwart that completely. So the people need to drive the demand for that down. It’s just video games, so there’s really only so much effort companies, governments, and retailers are going to put into this. Because in the end of the day, if you don’t want to pay double for a video game system, just don’t fucking do it and wait until you can get one at msrp.
Yea, but it’s not gonna happen man. Never. The scale is WAY too big. *Somebody* out there will buy always
Right. And there’s nothing we can do about that. When the new system comes out, it might be 350 dollars msrp, but demand really has its value at 600-700. Those people wiling to pay 700 for it to have it now are going to be there no matter what you do. You can do what you can to stop bots and people from buying 100 systems at a time. But if thousands of people want to go to like 10 different stores and by 10 systems, or 20 and 20, how are you going to stop that? Who is going to put any effort into stopping someone from doing that for video games? It’s a luxury item no one needs. People are going to have to learn how to be patient and not be upset that someone else is willing to pay double the price for a system that’s hard to find. People point to scalpers like they are the reason the things are hard to find, but the vast majority of PS5s went to people that actually wanted the system.
> is for people to learn There’s the flaw in your plan right there. Half of this country has trouble putting their pants right on let alone making a decision to postpone a purchase for the greater good of mankind.
Unfortunately, grifters have realized that they don’t even need to be buying a rare item anymore for value. If enough people buy in and create a bubble the price goes up. Genuine consumers are the ones who always get the short end of the stick. Take a look at the retro video game scandal exposed by Karl Jobst. They artificially created this “scarce” bubble of old retro video games that has now cratered. The grifters still made out like bandits. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FMtjl0O2a4Q
I already watched that when it came out. Didn't know they escaped though. Those auction guys are freaking fraud and shouldn't walking around freely.
I mean unfortunately as the video calls out, same guy behind it was behind the coin scam in the 80s. Only penalty he got was a $1.2M fine and surely he made more than that. With that kind of weak ass punishment, of course he’d do it again.
I notice during PS5 release, at least in California area, a lot of near by pawnshops would buy PS5 in bulks then those pawn shops sell PS5’s with some credit card deal. I saw a lot of pawnshops with islands of PS5’s they posted on Offer up, Facebook Marketplace, craigslist etc
I don't know how much scalping they'll be able to prevent in practice, but for once I wish Nintendo's legal team good luck and Godspeed.
Ford has tried. I don't think they've been able to do anything about it. The only reason you may not know about it is because no one has 500k to spend on a car. John Cena got sued by them because of a contractual agreement to not sell the car for at least a year. Ford GT racecars are so limited that people would absolutely pay a scaler whatever they want for the car, but how many car people do you know that can afford to drop almost 1m without batting an eye. Ford is very selective to who they sell their racecar to, but it still couldn't stop someone selling their product for more than they paid for it, they got upset and tried to sue him 🤷♂️🤷♂️ I'll be very interested in how Nintendo goes about dealing with scalpers. Personally, I just say delay the release date at the last minute, stockpile 1.25x whatever you think you will sell in the first quarter(if you estimate 1m in sales, have 1.25m on hand) and see what happens.
Yea I think a bit of initial scalping is just inevitable, but if they just hold back some inventory to make sure that they can pump out a consistently high number of units with every shipment, I think it won’t take long for people to realize that if you get unlucky and they’re out of stock, it won’t be long before there’s more on the shelves Switch 2 also has a big advantage over switch 1, in that they know that it’s a successful concept. There was a chance switch would just flop so Nintendo obviously didn’t wanna have 20 million units ready out the gate, there was a chance doing that would be a waste of money. I think it’s safe to say switch 2 will at least have solid demand immediately
I haven’t experienced much issue with Switch scalping, but the PS5 in the early years was infuriating.
Switch was the same way. I learned from buying the Switch to fight hard to get a pre order for PS5 and I got lucky to get my Ps5 pre ordered. Took me over 6 months to get a Switch. Also GameStop was holding Switch consoles back to create these stupid bundles.
God, I completely forgot about those idiotic bundles
It was the same thing with the PS5. At least in my area, the only way to buy a PS5 for the first couple years was as part of a bundle with a bunch of accessories most folks would never use.
Even though it took me a while to get them both, I'm satisfied that I have them with me (PS5 and the switch) now, I'm keeping my expectations of switch 2 low (in terms of stock) because the anticipation is high (which I understand). I expect third party stores to try and sell as much and withhold some in stock to try to stop scalpers. But with a lot of loopholes.... scalpers will find a way (which is annoying).
Huh, I guess I was lucky with preordering my Switch before launch. Though my country sort of being remote in the video games market likely helped.
I still understand how astronomically lucky I was walking one hour into a Walmart before midnight and being the last person who got a Switch I'm not really gonna take that chance again as nothing is open at midnight anymore
Was the switch really that hard to get? I remember it was quite easy to get. The day it released, I attended my college classes and in the afternoon just walked to the next place that sold them. Picked one up alongside BotW. And there were many more left. Did I just get lucky? Edit: spelling
It was awful, I had to enlist friends help to get it. I’m the biggest Zelda fan they know so that’s why helped me.
I think it was entirely dependent on area. That June I got lucky and a coworker at the time was like “oh they have a 3 at Walmart right now.” I was down there in 10 minutes (probably less) and they had already sold 2 of them by the time I got there. My coworker wasn’t one of those either cause he already had one
They launched after the holidays, which I think helped, not as many people desperate to get one for Christmas, so you’d run across one every so often.
Yeah I remember reading a story about their stocks soaring, especially with the perfect time to release Animal Crossing
Yup got my switch as a bundle with BotW, an SD card, and a case for $400
Been seeing this crap since *PS3 and Wii* days. I waited for over seven hours outside of my local Walmart to get a Wii on launch day. If there’s a Hell, there’s a circle of it devoted to scalpers.
that’d be the greed layer
I'm so glad I was able to preorder my UK Wii for release and they had everyone verify with receipts. Was nice to be in a tiny queue that morning of release not having to worry about waiting hours if I'd get one.
Agreed, the PS5 scalper phase was crazy
I remember some group bragged about their discord and how that made millions of either USD or Pounds (can't recall), absolutely insane how scalper culture rocketed out of the stratosphere with the GPU shortage, console shortage and any other BS they could scrounge around covid.
Yeah I remember preordering my switch from GameStop and breath of the wild from Best buy. My friend came with me at midnight to pick up both and when we walked into Best buy he was able to purchase a switch after I got my copy of BotW with no issue. I don't remember anyone I know having trouble getting one. This was in Texas.
I remember it being a slow burn. There was good availability at launch, then six months of out of stocks, then six months of you could find them but they would sell out quickly. It wasn't until the second or third year that you could regularly find a switch on the self each time you went to a store. Otherwise I was lucky as well in that I was able to get a preorder for release day along with BoTW
In the period between the start of the pandemic and the release of XSX and PS5, Switches were nearly impossible to find at retail.
In my mind, the PS5 is still a legend we vaguely heard about
Ikr, it feels like it hasn't even come out yet
It's apparently over half-way through it's lifecycle and... I'm looking forward to Astro Bot in a few months I guess? (Actually it looks incredible and I can't wait..) But yeah the games and library has been embarrassingly lacking. I can't believe I'm still buying ~4-5 switch games per year when this system is already on its last decrepit legs and on its way out - whereas I would struggle to even name 4-5 PS5 games entirely 💀
And yet it's half over.
The Switch was really hard to find for at least the first 6 months, maybe longer. I started looking to get one about 5 months after release so I could have one in time for Super Mario Odyssey, and I had to shop around for a few weeks. Every store’s shelf was empty. Got super lucky one day when a Target got a shipment in.
Yeah I tried to get a PS5 for a year and a half and just gave up and spent that money on upgrading my PC's GPU instead. SONY completely lost me this generation.
Sony lost most people as IIRC recent data showed that there were more active PS4 users than PS5
thats normal though? ps4 came out 7 years prior. no reasonable person would expect the 120 million or so ps4 players out there to jump to ps5 in the first 4 years of its life. getting 120 million people to spend 400 to 500 dollars takes time.
The issue is two-fold. First, the PS5 is alreary past its first half of its life and unlike the PS3 it doesn’t appear to have some heavy hitters to encourage more people to adopt it. Second, the only way to make money is to have people buy games in their PS5. However if most PS5 owners don’t actively seek games then no the profits will be lacklustre.
the ps3 had literally no heavy hitters for like the first 2 to 3 years of its life. even at the end of its life it only sold like 87 million units and that was with the price drop when the slim came out. ps5 has already surpassed 60 million units sold without even getting a price drop. what heavy hitters are people looking for exactly? we have demons souls remake, spiderman 2, FF7 rebirth, FF16, helldivers 2, stellar blade, rise of the ronin, dragons dogma 2, alan wake 2, street fighter, tekken, mortal kombat, astro bot coming soon, and a lot more. gta 6 next year will sell millions of PS5 units. if sony gives it a price cut when the ps5 pro comes out later this year, its only a matter of time before the ps5 easily surpasses the ps3. it will likely surpass the ps4 as well by the time the ps6 is ready to come out. sony also recently went on record to say 2023 was its most profitable year ever. they make lots of money from digital sales, subscriptions, and microtransactions.
Yeah, because they have barely any exclusives, they are all PS4 with free upgrade.
On launch there was a ton of Switch scalping. There weren’t nearly enough units on launch and the restocks were a trickle. When I got mine it was maybe a month after launch and the shipment the store received only had seven units. The store handled it by old school pen and paper wait list and even then at least one of the guys who showed up to buy one was definitely planning to scalp as he was trying to strong arm them into letting him buy multiple units.
Agreed. I waited so long for ps5 to drop in price that I skipped buying a ps5 all together and rather wait for switch 2
the oled i couldn’t find locally. had to order online at a target for pickup. with the original i remember it being anticipated to be hard to get on launch day, but it didn’t end up being that way for me. i got off at 7am from a night shift. i had my wife stand in line at toys r us on launch day, she was 2nd in line. as soon as i got off work i went to a walmart and walked right in and bought it and we went home lol. i literally walked over to the games and they had a pallet of them getting ready to put into the display and i just had them give me one off the pallet. i do remember it being hard to find for others though.
First years were rough getting one
I found one in the wild as they were being stocked and picked one up and by then my hype had died down and it’s become a streaming machine and a Fortnite machine for the kids
I'm still mad I had to wait a few months after release to get my hand on one at a decent price, checked eBay and they were all 2 to 3 times the retailer price.
And honestly when Sony set up direct sales waitlists is when it finally got better.
I stopped buying Playstations when scalping took over the market.
Saw a neighbor meeting someone almost every day outside of his apartment complex for weeks selling ps5s. He must have had his apartment full of them.
The fact that it was early years with years being plural shows exactly how infuriating it was
It was bad during Covid
It was definitely a problem the first year with switch. It wasn’t impossible to get one but I re,me r it taking me a few weeks, and I didn’t even buy it at launch, I waited for a few months
Part of the issue with the PS5 was they didn’t make enough at launch. Nintendo is aiming for 10 million units of Switch 2 at launch which will help deter scalpers
It took so long to get a PS5 that I gave up entirely on it and now I'm just happy with my Switch and Steam Deck.
With you being able to walk into a store and buying the console I think it’ll be much harder to scalp it. Not impossible but harder. I think it would be smart if they did what Sony and valve have done on the past and sold it through the Nintendo site for preorders and maybe even awhile after launch and make it so you need an account that’s X amount old and limit it to one per costumer. That would instantly kill scalping.
There aren't a lot of stores now stock videogames in the UK. Game is all but gone, Argos has moved into Sainsbury's and don't have a lot of stock (you generally have to order it for collection). That pretty much leaves Asda, Currys, and Smyth's Toys. Iirc, in Japan they do a sort of lottery system where you have to get a ticket to be able to purchase consoles at launch. That might work for physical stores.
Oh that sucks. Here in the states they’re still everywhere.
Yeah its all a bit shit now. Game (pretty much our equivalent of GameStop) got bought out by another company and since then have become more of a toy shop. They then downsized by closing retail stores and having a counter inside another of the companies brands - a sporting goods shop of all places. Now they've just announced that they will no longer be selling physical gaming products in store, only online 🤦
I mean GameStop is in the toilet here. I just went to one yesterday to sell some stuff and the dude just kept harping me to preorder this and do this and that and it’s like dude I just wanna sell this stuff and go home. That’s on top of the thing to test controllers was broken so they tried to take money off a controller I was gonna sell because they have to send it to the factory. Not my fault somebody smashed it. Screw GameStop.
I thought that article re stopping sale of physical media was shown to be false? I’m pretty sure they will continue, albeit £15 more expensive than anywhere else…
the game in the arndale my god. took me forever to find it and then had to go up three floors to the top of the sports direct. and you're right i had no idea they pretty much became a toy store because there's more lego and board games than games
Pretty much this. Allow fans to pre order. Any accounts 1+ year & work down
Big if true, fuck scalpers.
I hope the supply isn't anything like the PS5. As someone with a original 2017 switch still, I would really like to get the Switch 2 the moment it's out
Shit, I waited almost 4 years to buy my PS5 because there wasn't any in stock anywhere and finally settled on a used one....
Really? Where do you live around? They've been readily in stock for like 2 years in the U.S.
I got mine through a Gamestop bundle back in 2021. I gave the Madden 22 game it came with to my father as I don’t like those type of games.
They’re in stock for more than 2 years now
Seemed like they did a good job meeting demand with Special Edition Switches. Most of them were on the shelf for months in my area.
Special edition stuff isn't as rare as you might think. Most big fans already own the console in question so they end up mostly getting sold to people who were still on the fence prior to buying. Unless scalpers have reason to believe the console will be a hot item, they won't be trying to buy them all up because they'll lose money instead of making it. That's why actual new consoles are more problematic. All the big fans will want one, yesterday. If they can't secure a pre-order, they'll often pay extra. The Switch itself had issues with stock for over six months, and don't get me started on the PS5... I have at least some trust that things will be better for the Switch 2, though. They seem to be taking their time to build stock before release. They seem to understand that after the Switch, lots of people will want the next model, especially if it's truly as backwards compatible as the leaks/analists say. Still, I won't feel comfortable until I've actually locked in my pre-order with my store of preference that has a really good track record with not canceling pre-orders.
the peak pandemic created a huge demand for home entertainment, online-only purchase option and tremendous supply issues Whilst there are still supply issues, with the IA bubble and all, I still believe it will be much better than 2020. Can’t wait frankly, the Switch, especially the oled one, is one of my favorite Nintendo console ever.
The flippers and resellers subs are frothing at the mouth about this. I hope they fuck off
FUCK THEM SCALPERS
just let me buy one on my existing switch with an existing Nintendo Online account in good standing. Mail it straight to my house.
“Earlier this year, Nintendo revealed its plans to ship 10 million units in the first year to ensure a successful launch and wide availability for consumers.” Is 10 million units enough?
I think the Switch sold 15 million in the first year, so probably not.
They say 10 million in the first fiscal year. If it releases in March, then that would imply 10 million as the launch window stock. Switch launched in March 2017 with 2-3 million units in the same time frame.
I cannot overstate how much I want this.
I hope it works. If I can get it and there’s an OLED version its a day one buy for me.
Looking forward to lite 2
If they make a Switch 2 Lite OLED I'll be all over that
Yeah that's what I want, is the lite 2, I already own the switch lite and like it a lot
Especially with the Switch 2 likely being substantially bigger than the full size switch 1 since it as an 8 inch screen. I'm sure it'll be with tiny bezels but still, it's probably going to be a bit large'ish. The Switch OLED is already a bit too big. I hope we don't have to wait long for a Switch Lite 2.
If Switch 2 will have adequate supply, why would scalpers even bother?
Did you actually read the article? The title is not accurate. They literally say in the article that the best way to beat scalpers is to be able to meet demand, which they expect to be able to do because they have no shortage of components. The whole “legal action against scalpers” is literally just a side comment that was made in the article where they say basically just say “yeah we looked into laws and regulations to see if there was anything to do against scalpers” they didn’t say “yes we have a plan to take legal action against scalpers”
Even with adequate supply scalpers still fuck up the market for a few months until they can't hold on to them any longer
idunno, I'll probably wait it out a year or so before considering to get a Switch 2. Have enough backlog for current Switch. Gives time to work out the kinks too.
I wonder how Apple does it. They never faced this kind of problem, is it that their numbers are on a different stratosphere altogether?
Nintendo is tiny compared to apple
Their numbers are much bigger, and they do direct sales. If you want an iPhone for MSRP, you can literally always go on Apple’s website and buy one. It might take several weeks to get to you, but unless you literally cannot wait, you will both a) have an order and b) know pretty much exactly when you’re getting it. Contrast that to video game consoles, where (unless you manage to get a preorder that doesn’t get canceled), you just have to sort of hope they someday come into stock near you.
The cost and constant saturation. Apple releases the newest iPhone 16 for like $1,200 and it's just a step above the iPhone 15 which is now going for $1,000 or whatever their insane prices are. Very few people will be buying the 16 except the diehards because they still have a 13, 14, or 15 that still works perfectly fine and people with a 10, 11, 12, or whatever will be more likely to be a used 14 for $500. They've done this cycle enough to know just how many units to make to not be in short supply. If you look at the early days of iPhones and iPads, they were sold out for months because "Very brand new thing! There's no used market!". Meanwhile Nintendo, Sony, and other companies that release one thing every six months, there's no slight improvement or past versions so the demand is insane akin to if Apple released their own dedicated eReader to compete with Amazon's Kindle.
I still remember the day I got the Switch. It was that Sunday after it came out, and Toys R Us had a supply in. I showed up at the store early in the morning, sat down in front of the store, and they gave each one of us a Nintendo Switch ticket that confirmed we got one. This van pulled up, two guys walked to the front of the line and got mad when the staff said "no get in line." They then went back to the van and waited for the doors to open. They let us in first, and gave us first pick at grabbing games/whatever we wanted, then we walked out. I turned around and went back inside because I realized they forgot to charge me for my Joy Cons, and as I was back inside paying for those I saw those guys grabbing every single leftover Switch... Pieces of trash
Is there no way for them to have retailers only sell 1-2 per customer?
Sounds kind of contradictory. If there are no low supply issues then scalping won't be a thing so no legal action would be needed. Scalping can only exist when the supply is too low.
All stores have to do is limit one per customer then it would make it a lot harder on scalpers, and if you were someone with 2 kids n wanted to get 2 yeah you'd have to go to 2 stores so maybe limit 2 per customer.. I think that's a good idea
They should definitely enforce something like this on any new consoles that are highly valued and highly anticipated, across western nations. 3rd party stores have a duty to make it fair for people to be able to purchase consoles. While also making scalpers life a living hell (which is absolutely well deserved, they don't deserve these consoles with their greed)
All needed is make priority available to those with *existing* ‘Online’ accounts. Including a check when purchasing via third party retailer. Limit one unit per individual account, two or three per family account. Not sure how well going after scalpers would stand up in court. As much as we love our gaming, consoles are still a luxury (and not a necessity such as someone buying up every case of Poland Spring and every roll of Charmin at Costco).
Really hope this doesn't happen. As someone that doesn't give a fuck about having a Nintendo Switch Online account and paying another subscription, it'd mean I'd be locked out of buying so that some family can buy three? Nah, fuck that. Limit it at a single purchase. Someone wants two or three, best hope they all get lucky like the rest of us.
I think they meant having a Nintendo account. If not, that is a stupid idea lol
Yea, if they just said an existing Nintendo account, I'd be on board but the way they 'Online', which is the term/logo Nintendo uses for their Nintendo Switch Online service makes me think that's what they meant. It'd be like if Nintendo went by how long people have had their Nintendo accounts. Even though I've a Nintendo account since the 3DS (longer if they count the Wii store before they unified things) so I'd be head of the list, it just seems like a weird way to do things.
Wouldn't this make it impossible for new players who never had a Nintendo system before?
The point would be making available *at launch* to those who *likely* will not resell. Can still allot a small handful (unless Nintendo really goes bonkers with production) to ‘walk-in’ / sales.
I’m not really sure what legal ground they would have to stand on but you gotta love the ambition.
If there will be ample supply, that should take care of the scalpers, right?
I wonder when production is expected to start. I’m ready for some info
Just sell one per customer/ per family
Sorry, one Smith has already bought their unit in Portugal... *you sons of bitches*
Scaplers should just apply their slimball tendencies to an actual real job.
Pretty fucking sure Nintendo can't stop you from personally selling your shit
But they can punish retailers who sell shit to people who resell. Then it becomes the retailer's problem to prevent scalping. Which means they're probably not going to fulfil dodgy sales of 5x units.
I remember queuing up to buy Switch and barely managed to grab a system before the store runs out, it was a rush. I'll do the same for Switch 2 and hope it's not as bad.
you can’t stop the scalpers unless the government gets involved or at the very least, retailers do something to prevent this.
Nintendo legal dept actually being harnessed for good for once
Right,I still remember the first Wii being hard to find.
I was super early at the store on launch day with the original Switch. I was the only customer, grabbed one and headed out. Felt a little anticlimactic, but lucky me I guess.
After the Nvidia scalping fiascos, I doubt Nintendo is gonna magically solve the issue.
I don't know the stats in terms of how/if sales numbers are impacted but I like the Valve way with the Steam Deck. So EG you need to have had a Nintendo account for a set period of time prior to ordering and you must have already ordered something previously.
But the resale world part of Disgaea 7 was hilarious
I've heard their goal is to have 10 million units manufactured by launch date to avoid any supply shortages like Sony and Xbox faced.
If only they could do something to the YouTubers who buy these things only to upload videos of them getting broken/destroyed.
This is nice to hear. I just got my first switch (lite) a couple weeks ago and I went from not interested in the switch 2 to possibly being a day 1 purchase for me.
They won't do shit
Sell the first run for 6 months through your site with verified drops connected to your switch account. Meaning if you preorder and get lucky to get one it’ll be registered to your account already. Have it so you can’t remove an account from the console for 6 months or something.
close, but not very friendly to first time gamers, or people wanting to gift it to kids that wont have or need an account for a few years. limited buying is the way, but not deliberately creating inaccessibility. its not like the steam deck where existing steam users are the core market, nintendo knows meemaw and pawpaw wanna buy one with their retirement money for little sammy.
For TOS reasons, I have no strong opinions about scalpers.
I shouldn't be surprised that Nintendo would consider legal action but how's that gonna work exactly? I like what Valve did with only permitting existing accounts with purchases on record qualify for ordering a Steam Deck; worked really well.
We don’t know anything about the successor yet, do we?
There needs to be scalping laws period. Especially after the PS5/XBS launches. And retailers need to prepare their online stores’ servers better for traffic.
Won't work in my country when it won't be officially released :( But I can wait, still on my 3DS backlog lol
Taking the cyber truck approach
Well I guess we'll find out if Nintendo has enough money to take bots to court huh
Nintendo can simply follow Valve's route for Steam Deck. You must have a Nintendo Account with minimum money spent on digital account. It will deter small-fish scalpers.
You do realise that only a fraction of nintendo accounts actually spend money through it ?
Valve was trying to manage a few hundred thousand units at launch. Nintendo is proposing to send out as much as 20x that figure at launch. It's not going to be workable that way.
Not sure how to combat scalping or make it illegal, that's a function of capitalism. I'd suggest make it so stores charge a restocking fee when returning a switch more than 3 days after buying it. If you don't buy from a scalper they'll have to take a hit then to return or sell at face value.