NCAA Football 11 Sales Rise Over Last Year

by pastapadre
Posted August 14th, 2010 at 3:16 pm

NCAA Football 10, along with MLB 2K9, were only two franchises last year that saw sales drops. This year though we’ve seen that become a trend with stunningly significant skids hitting UFC Undisputed 2010 and Tiger Woods 11. The next in line that could have been threatened was NCAA Football 11. Positive word-of-mouth from both gamers and reviewers though would seem to be the primary factor in NCAA Football 11 not only holding off a drop-off but actually seeing overall sales growth.

For the opening month of July NCAA Football 11 sold 368K copies on the 360 and 298.8K on the PS3. In total that represents a move up of 8% compared to NCAA Football 10.

The breakdown by console shows that sales on the PS3 rose and accounted for all of the growth. The PS3 version jumped 20% while the 360 version fell by 2%. That can probably be attributed to marketing that focused on the PS3 version and continued pick-ups of former PS2 players finally making their way to the PS3.

While EA Sports is likely pleased with the 8% rise in sales for NCAA 11 it continues to bring into question whether there is potential to expand beyond those consumers who seem to buy it on a year-to-year basis. Despite console sales numbers increasing at a rapid pace the NCAA franchise has been largely stagnant throughout this generation. NCAA 11 numbers are up only 4% compared to NCAA 09. At least though it is back on an upward trend.

Tags: latest news, sales analysis

Kosten!

Good news. This should show EA that when they put effort into the games sales will go up. None of that Season Showdown type crap instead which they probably learned from.
Adembroski

Good news… improved sim = improved sales, I’d like to see this continue.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Donovan-Marston/509292428 Donovan Marston

Depth = Sales. Learn it EA
Greg

unrelated, but they really need to fix the pumpfakes in the game now
Anonymous

Hey Pasta: Hasn’t EA switched over to the PS3 now as the lead development console. If that is the case that could also be the case since many dual console owners may have switched as well.
Anonymous

Obviously they have Marsten since EA makes NCAA.
juan de leon

i agree, that season showdown was major bs
KA1Z3R

think he means with other games like Madden and NBA Live/Elite
Anonymous

I think EA did a good job from an advertising stand point. I think that whole package help boost sales. The visuals along with the strong demo showed that this game was for real. EA finally implemented many of the great things that help propel this series year after year.

Although the game isn’t perfect (NO GAME IS), it is fun as hell and the graphics, as well as the animation engine, are absolutely incredible.

Then to have the quick online support with live tuning and a patch is what keeps gamers happy. I hate to say it but I almost can’t wait to see how EA builds on this product. As far as I am concerned they can use this engine but the game needs a major presentation overhaul from a commentary standpoint. Would like to see scores from around the conference brought up on the screen with the commentators mentioning those games….

Oh, and dynamic weather….Not asking for much…hahaha….
jusmegamer

Better than Madden and has been for a while, bottom line
Anonymous

They still have Season Showdown in the game. It’s just not a focal point this year.
Anonymous

Well I’m glad they are doing well because this has been the first year where I’ve enjoyed NCAA more than I have enjoyed Madden. It’s not perfect but you can tell that they put a lot of effort and thought process when making the game. I’m somewhat disapointed with Madden but I guess EA can’t please everybody. I’m actually have fun playing this NCAA 11 alot!
Anonymous

It will be interesting to see if the spike in NCAA sales means there will be a drop in Madden sales percentage wise. Obviously Madden will sell more copies, but it will be interesting to see if more people buying NCAA means less will buy Madden.
Redmond485

I would really like to see a new camera angle in the next patch. Is that a possibility? What the hell happened to the mini games?
http://www.facebook.com/people/Donovan-Marston/509292428 Donovan Marston

I’m saying learn from history. Give the fans what they want, they will spread good word of mouth. And did you just spell my name wrong when it’s clearly written above my post?
philly

Thinking about it, I think that’s probably why the team loved the Strat. Pad so much. I’m sure with the PS3 it’s better (since the D-Pad is better on the controller); it just sucks with the 360. They’ve realized with Blu-Ray finally hitting it’s stride and all the 360 is somewhat aging. I mean I own a 360 but if I could afford both I’d have both.
philly

I’m glad to hear this about NCAA. Haven’t played a a full game of the series since 08 because it’s really needed a facelift, and I could tell from the demo it had gotten one. Next year hopefully they’ll stay in the right direction (build on presentation, have more animations/physic based gameplay?)
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Dannyhappyfeet

bad news!!! the game is still broken as hell and still getting basic football 101 stuff wrong!! this tells the EA top brass that the development team is doing at least ok… compared to FIFA and NHL, NCAA is the freaking EA stepchild as far as progress and advancement in the quality of gameplay…we need the EA monopoly broken and some competition for this game to grow.
Anonymous

They did address it with the patch but the backward pump fake glitch is now in full effect. If you haven’t seen it, go to YouTube…And online cheesers are abusing the shit out of it…
Anonymous

I don’t mind season showdown. However, I would rather the points be allocated to your profile to unlock things such as classic jerseys, classic teams, maybe a coach’s office (ala The Crib from 2K5) that can be decked out with team pennants, signs, posters, etc.

To have the points add up to show which school is most popular does not add replay value.
Anonymous

Really? whats so wrong about it. Try being specific. If you have nothing constructive to say then shut your dicktrap
Prince Oochi

I was kind of hoping for NCAA Football 11 to fail miserably in the sales department with this supposedly being EA’s last year with the NCAA Football license. Even with that being said, I hope collegiate football opens up its license to other devs. Not that this game is bad by any means. I just feel that this is the closest football video game fans will come to receiving legitimate competition in the world of football video gaming.
dirtybirds233

i loved NCAA and even though madden changed gameplay which i think is much better than last year, the game still gets boring after one season of franchise partly due to the fact that its presentation is still identical to last years. NCAA has much more depth therefor making it a better game imo.
Sean

Better game than last year=better sales…I hope NCAA builds on the improvements and does not take a step backwards next year like Madden did this year…Madden could have been special this year had they not tried to get ‘cute’ and ‘fix’ what was not broken!!! Example: Strgy pad and playing friends in ranked matches.
Mc979007

One of the reasons I think sales are up is service after the sale! I hope the same thing happens with M11. It’s okay to make mistakes, just make sure you correct them, and just qhat the NCAA dev team did. Great work, now go help out the Madden Team (lol)
Cheez

Waiting on the Backbreaker sales report.
Cheez

FIFA, NHL, MVP Baseball, Tiger Woods (before his umm…issues) say “hi”
http://twitter.com/TreyIM2 T-Ski Love

I have to admit, this is the FIRST year that I continue to play NCAA. I am currently heading into my 4th season of my dynasty which is unprecedented for me. Madden is my usual game of choice but NCAA 11 has things more right than Madden 11 does, to me, from locomotion to blocking to no robo QBs. This is definitely a case of getting core things fixed which creates a love of the game which leads to word of mouth and such…but at the same time, I wonder how much having ESPN presentation and the new lighting which affects the graphical look of the game has an effect on people’s subconscious, as well? Hmm.
At any rate, I LOVE NCAA 11 like never, ever before.
http://pastapadre.com/ pastapadre

Sales numbers were not even close enough to registering. We will never know how much it actually sold. I don’t think it will have been enough to justify a sequel but we’ll see.
IIII 47 IIII

Its good to see NCAA 2011 get improved sales considering how much of an improvement the game is over the horribly stale NCAA 2010. Hopefully Madden 2011′s sales will fall, letting the dev’s know that we dont want casual gameplay garbage in our sports simulations.
Josephmerwin

hey pasta, do you know if theres any new updated and accurate rosters out?
Cheez

wow. surprised not making more headlines.
NoFro904

Great Game.
greg

i know, thats what im referring to
Quan

I heard 1.5 Million was sold on the i-phone somewhere. I’m not sure about the consoles at all.
But Backbreaker 2 has already been confimed for next year. http://www.operationsports.com/newspost.php?id=415231.
Quan

Well not really an official confirmation, but it looks like a big possibility.
Fluff E Bunny

Pasta, your breakdown of the numbers is somewhat disingenuous. You exclude the PS2 sales figures. If you include those, the sales for NCAA11 are down 11% overall compared to NCAA10, against a larger console install base (resulting in an even greater disparity of sales from an attach rate standpoint).

Further, it is clear from the numbers that the ‘growth’ in the PS3 sales is due entirely to remnant PS2 gamers finally upgrading, and even in that case, the losses in PS2 version sales are not made up entirely by gains in PS3 version sales.

Here are the hard numbers, courtesy of VGChartz:

Sales after 4 weeks (1st month)

Platform NCAA 10 NCAA 11 Difference % Difference
360 431,168 368,023 (63,145) (14.6)
PS3 272,454 294,121 21,667 8
PS2 71,780 28,252 (43,528) (60.6)
—————————————————————————-
Total 775,402 690,396 (85,006) (11)
Anonymous

Hopefully Madden loses sales and sparks some innovation
Fluff E Bunny

Backbreaker has so far sold 38,431 copies on 360, 27,014 copies on PS3.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Joe-Burnett/100000005863812 Joe Burnett

You’ve taken steps in the right direction, however the ridiculous nature of player ratings needs to be fixed. DeMarco Murray an 82 speed? Ryan Broyles an 83? The entire OU roster is this way. Guys are either really fast with terrible acceleration, or slow with great acceleration. & every LBing core in the game is slow as hell. Adjust your ratings so speed doesn’t factor in the overall so much. The only reason I can see you making Murray & Broyles so slow is so they wouldn’t be 99s overall. Re as well as tarded.