Quote from: KoltarThese ranks are based on actual sales in unit numbers and trends as reported by Game Stores across North America and in the U.K. and Europe.

It's a fine data point and definitely better than nothing, but this isn't a random sample.

Seanchai

Quote from: SeanchaiIt's a fine data point and definitely better than nothing, but this isn't a random sample.

Seanchai

 TRUE - but theoretically any store manager or owner who cares enough to fill out the form and send it back in also cares about his business enough that those stores will stay around for all of us to shop at..

 In theory at least....


- Ed C.

Judging by their Booth at Comic-Con...Privateer press is doing VERY well for themselves. Only Wizards and WizKids (Barely) had a bigger presence.

Quote from: KrakaJakJudging by their Booth at Comic-Con...Privateer press is doing VERY well for themselves. Only Wizards and WizKids (Barely) had a bigger presence.

Privateer's booth is always swamped.  I know they've made some serious inroads here in Indy with Warmachine, and I'm happy to see it.  They seem like really nice folks that have their act together.

Quote from: KoltarTRUE - but theoretically any store manager or owner who cares enough to fill out the form and send it back in also cares about his business enough that those stores will stay around for all of us to shop at..

In theory at least....

I was the first (and to this day, AFAIK, the only) German retailer to participate in the statistics section of C&GR. For two or three years I sent both data and a Market Beat report (a snapshot of what happened in the store during the month in question; I liked that section more than the dry numbers because it told me more about the store level happenings and "vibes").

Alas, my shop doesn't exist anymore, so your theory is flawed...

The numbers section has also be taken with a grain of salt. In addition to being a self selected sample, any retailer is only asked for the numbers of the 12 best-selling game lines of any given month. The problem is that at lines 9 to 20 you are likely to find games that have sold equal amounts of copies, and you have pick which ones get entered into the data pool.

Plus, I don't think that all participating retailers use merchandise management software that gives you the data at a mouse click. I did, and I learned that the hard numbers were sometimes way off from my gut feeling whether Shadowrun or Vampire had sold more copies.

Those margins of error can add up quite considerably.

(But then, obviousy I also considered this kind of data collection more useful than not having it at all, or else I wouldn't have bothered participating.)

While interesting, it doesn't really take into account mail order and (more importantly) online orders nor convention sales.

In the case of, say, White Wolf games, this makes up a sizable percentage of their sales from what I understand. The last time they mentioned sales statistics (in the last six months) Exalted was well ahead of the new World of Darkness material, which makes me think that their products aren't too accurately assessed just looking at game store sales.

I'm unsurprised to see GURPS working its way back up; they're getting bread and butter supplements out now, and those are always popular.

Warhammer Fantasy is a little slower than I'd suspect, but that may just be a monthly thing.

The BESM numbers make me a bit sad; it's a pity that GoO went under.

Quote from: KoltarTRUE - but theoretically any store manager or owner who cares enough to fill out the form and send it back in also cares about his business enough that those stores will stay around for all of us to shop at..

 In theory at least....

But caring doesn't make them a representative sample. If we got data from random stores, we'd have a representative sample. This data is definitely interesting, etc., but...

Seanchai