Console Exclusives May Not Motivate Buyers

19 May 2010 at 21:24:43 by Peter Parrish

A new Nielsen Games report suggests that exclusive titles may not be a high priority for people planning a console purchase.

Nielsen used the PS3-specific title God of War III to help them explore the motivating factors behind a PS3 purchase. Over a three week period (before, during and after God of War III's release), Nielsen interviewed 700 "active gamers" who also expressed an interest in acquiring a PS3.

The top two motivating factors to emerge from these interviews were (perhaps surprisingly) the console's Blu-ray capabilities (with 65% citing this as a motivation) and, less surprisingly, the PS3 price cut (63%.)

"I am looking forward to a specific game" ranked 10th, with only 12% of interviewees suggesting this as a motivation. God of War III was "the clear winner" in terms of which specific game players were interested in.

This study would appear to suggest that system-exclusive titles are not a key motivating factor in the purchase of a console.

However, a couple of things stand out. Firstly, the 3rd placed priority for purchase (at 62%) was "I like the library of games available." This response could well include a number of people for whom system-specific titles are still a factor, but simply as part of an overall gaming library. If that is the case, making any definitive statements about exclusive titles based on these numbers is rather difficult.

It's also no surprise that God of War III was "the clear winner" in titles people were interested in, as the interviews were conducted during the period at which hype for the game was at its peak.

What does remain interesting is that the number one purchase motivator amongst the interview subjects was not even a game-related one; Blu-ray. "I am interested in PS3’s other multimedia capabilities" also fared pretty well, playing a role in 49% of responses.

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