Activision has said previously that it expects Ghosts sales to be down on last year's Black Ops 2 due to the upset of the console transition and they were; November sales showed a drop of 19 per cent year-on-year. But Cowen analyst Doug Creutz has warned investors that the declines could be notably worse than the reported 19 per cent dip would suggest.
"Upon further reflection, we think the [Call of Duty] numbers are a bit more troubling than they first appeared," said Creutz, reports VentureBeat.
He went on to note that the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Ghosts released almost two weeks earlier in November than Black Ops 2 (November 3 versus November 12 respectively), offsetting a portion of the sales drop which would have otherwise been far worse.
"While the year-over-year gap is only 19 percent thus far, that includes two extra weeks of sales for the 360 and PS3 versions [versus Black Ops II]. Against 2011′s [Modern Warfare 3], where the difference is only one week, the title is down 32 percent life-to-date," said Creutz.
The PS4 and Xbox One versions arrived later in the month, but failed to make up the sales deficit.
"We don't think it is out of the question that the title could wind up comparing down 20 percent to 25 percent year-over-year [to Black Ops II], which is appreciably worse than the down 10 to 15 percent that we think is baked in to guidance," predicted Creutz.
Despite its declines, Activision's FPS series is still in good health; Call of Duty: Ghosts was still the top-selling game in North America in November, according to NPD Figures. It's main rival, EA's Battlefield 4, came in second in the all-format software charts.
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Source: http://www.computerandvideogames.com/442762/call-of-duty-ghosts-sales-decline-troubling-says-analyst/
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