PlayStation Move has shipped 8.3 million

By Robert Purchese Published 13 October, 2011

But what does that mean?

Sony has shipped 8.3 million units of PlayStation Move worldwide.

That's according to a GDC Online talk given by Sony America developer support engineer Gabe Ahn, reported by GameSpot.

Six months ago, in April, Sony said more than 8 million Move units had been shipped worldwide.

That's a meagre difference of 300,000 units. If the two numbers are different, that is. Perhaps Ahn was simply being more specific, but using the same numbers Sony had back in April.

But what does 8.3 million shipped units of Move mean?

Shipped means units sold to shops, not units sold to consumers. So how many of those 8.3 million Move units have actually been sold?

And what constitutes a unit of PlayStation Move? Each PlayStation Move Motion Controller? Each PlayStation Move Navigation (nunchuk) Controller as well?

And how many households own more than one PlayStation Move Controller? The actual installed-base of PlayStation Move - number of households with Move hardware - may be far lower than the shipped figure suggests.

Gabe Ahn went on to make a few other noteworthy remarks during his GDC Online talk. He showed a "future of gaming" video that featured a man wearing a headset and sporting two Move controllers. He walked through a real-life car park seeing digital projections of Chimera enemies from the Resistance series of games, and shot them down.

"It could be Resistance 4," Ahn said. "It's a very cool concept."

Could Sony's new visor work with Move like this?

Ahn also showed a game called Johann Sebastian Joust, a Move duelling game set to music. You need to barge each other's controllers any way you can. But you must do this to the tempo of the game. Move too fast and you'll be eliminated.

PlayStation Move launched in September 2010.

Child of Eden for PlayStation Move.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds. @Clert on Twitter.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (62) Latest comment 7 months ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Psychotext #1 7 months ago

    "But what does it mean?"

    Pretty much nothing until next gen. Neither Kinect nor Move were ever going to change anything significant as mere addons. The question will be if they're packed in by default in the next xbox / playstation.

  • lcmnick #2 7 months ago

    Post deleted at 12:48:44 14-04-2012

  • bladdard #3 7 months ago

    This is a very negative article and I don't really understand why anyone would take issue with PS move, Sony aren't trying to shove it down anyones throat and it's a cool bit of tech for those who want to use it. Personally I like it and I'd love more higher quality dedicated software for it.

  • HyperTails #4 7 months ago

    I like my Move, but there's a lack of games for me to use it with. It worked brilliantly on Killzone 3 and Resistance 3, and I play the SP with Move on both of them as its better than a DualShock IMO (I use a controller for online though). I have heard Child of Eden is better with a controller than a Move as well, which sounds strange.

    Anyway, I think the point of Move was to just get motion controls established with Sony's fanbase. Get their foot in the door, as it were. Then with PS4, have motion controls and normal controller right out of the gate.

  • RawNinjaKid #5 7 months ago

    I like move better than Kinect. Although why Sony had to make the move look like a mini dido; I have no idea!

    But the move, move and Kinect stuff are experiments that will be improved in the next gen. I am kinda shocked these "accessories" have sold/shipped so much!





    Edited by RawNinjaKid at 13/10/11 @ 14:06

  • bad09 #6 7 months ago

    Notice how EG actually question how many are actually in homes yet when they talk of Kinect it's always "10 million selling" even though thats a shipped number to.

    Personally I don't care about either but just found that funny as EG are always accused of being "Xbots" :)

  • Bertie Verified Senior Staff Writer, Eurogamer.net #7 7 months ago

    I have no issue with Move. I like Move - I am one of the households with two Move controllers. I was very excited by the technology. There hasn't been much Move software stoking that fire recently, but I'm intrigued to see where Sony can take it from here.

    All I hope for is that Sony drop the smoke and mirrors, forget about Kinect, and talk more openly about PlayStation Move.

  • Dave52 #8 7 months ago

    "It means Kinect won?"

    Well, although I'm sure that MS sold more Kinects than Sony did Moves, we don't actually know the number of Kinects that were sold through either. And MS isn't saying.

    On the flip side, Sony never actually pitched the Move as anything other than an Add-On to use if you want. MS on the other hand spent so much money on the Kinect, it's nearly too big to fail.

  • Paulie_P #9 7 months ago

    It means there are 8.3 million Playstation Move's gathering dust as we speak.

  • wizlon #10 7 months ago

    Resistance 3 with Move is incredible, I just wish more games supported the controller.

  • bioreit #11 7 months ago

    @bladdard

    I think it's more negative towards the use of shipped vs sold and what constitutes a unit, rather than negativity towards the PS Move itself. Seeing as Sony announced in April that they had shipped 8 million units and are now announcing 8.3 million units, either Sony only shipped 300,000 units of PS Move in 6 months, or are using different definitions of shipped and unit between the two announcements, which is hardly helpful.

    Which I believe is the point Rob was driving at.

    Have to confess though that I haven't seen any other articles on EG questioning this kind of thing to such an extent, mind.

  • Bertie Verified Senior Staff Writer, Eurogamer.net #12 7 months ago

    Kinect broke the 10 million *sales* barrier in March.

    http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-0...

  • RodHull #13 7 months ago

    I like the accuracy of Move, it's just a shame it still doesn't have a killer app, and most Move-only games have been utter bobbins (Move Heroes and Sports Champions spring to mind in their awfulness). Dance Central and Kinect Sports never fail to get every person in front of the sensor, none of Sony's efforts so far have managed that (for some reason the mrs and her mates aren't interested in Killzone).

  • systems #14 7 months ago

    I bought it on release day. Not touched it again since a fortnight after that. I did enjoy Archery in Sports Champions though.

  • Murton #15 7 months ago

    The Move controller is a fantastic piece of kit but I think it's a bit under-used. So far only a couple of games really make good use of it. Tumble is without a doubt it's best implementation so far and in conjunction with the SharpShooter it makes FPS a hell of a lot more immersive and more fun to boot, but the most obvious use for it where it would get the best reception is as a substitute for a mouse to allow the sort of games we love from the PC to be played on PS3 such as point and click or RTS.

    I'm playing a load of TellTale stuff at the moment and every time I fire it up I find myself wishing that it could be played with the Move. Playing something like Monkey Island or Sam and Max with the Move in one hand and a beer in the other would make for a fantastic experience, but the interest just doesn't seem to be there.

  • Paulie_P #16 7 months ago

    It seems to me that Sony have been the complete opposite to Microsoft with respect to the Move. Whereas Microsoft are shoving Kinect down people's throats, Sony isn't promoting the Move at all. You'd think there would be a happy medium.

  • RawNinjaKid #17 7 months ago

    meanwhile aren't N going in a totally different direction, next gen......? ;)

  • bad09 #18 7 months ago

    @Bertie

    MS used shipped figures, everyone knows that! :)

    Although to be fair some data does suggest over 6 million have actually been sold at retail now.

  • geoneo123 #19 7 months ago

    I did enjoy playing Killzone 3 with move but I didn’t feel that I could complete the whole game using it so I stopped.

    Don’t forget that Move sales are different then kinect's because a person with move could buy 2 or 4 controllers for a multiplayer experience on one console whereas only one kinect unit can only be used on one console.

    I don’t have either now because they were just gathering dust and the games on my wanted list are fast approaching there release dates.

  • DrStrangelove #20 7 months ago

    It means most of them are on the Rena, close to New Zealand. But of course, they have been shipped.

  • jetsetwillie #21 7 months ago

    i like to move it move it, it like to move it move it...

    i don't really, but still great new for all

  • Dave52 #22 7 months ago

    @Bertie - [link url=http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/isuppli_kinect_sales_exceed_expectations
    ]http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/is...[/link]

    "The sell-through to consumers was 6.35 million units"

  • Bertie Verified Senior Staff Writer, Eurogamer.net #23 7 months ago

    Lots of companies use shipped sales to inflate their figures. It's a way of making results look better than they are. But it's quite transparent.

    In a year, Sony hasn't once revealed Move sales. And I wanted to explain these shipped figures so you weren't misled into thinking they directly equalled Move sales.


    I believe it is apparent that Kinect has had stronger sales. I don't see why Sony need hide behind shipped figures any longer. Won't it only become harder to reveal real sales numbers the longer Sony keeps up the pretence that Move is on a level pegging with Kinect?

    I'm not sure who Sony is trying to convince. Press? Punters? The developers I talk to are very critical of the Move shipped figures - it's not convincing them.

    The longer Sony insists on touting shipped figures, the more suspicious people become. I'm sure the truth is far more positive than all of this waffle suggests.

  • Bertie Verified Senior Staff Writer, Eurogamer.net #24 7 months ago

    @Dave52

    Isn't that story from January? Or talking about January figures? What about those ones from March I linked above?

    I've got to jump on another story, but I'll check back here later.

  • Dave52 #25 7 months ago

    I look forward to an identicle article outlining the Shipped v Sold Through figures of the Kinect.

    Can you show actual Kinect sales figures...?
    Edited by Dave52 at 13/10/11 @ 14:31

  • Murton #26 7 months ago

    I think you doth protest too much Rob.

    You say that the longer Sony keeps up the "pretence" of level pegging with Kinect the more suspicious people become, I'd say that the same applies to a writers claim of being impartial.

  • carrotcake #27 7 months ago

    Well they know exactly the numbers they have shipped to retailers. Tracking how many are sold from all those retailers globally is probably harder to be precise. But it's not like there are 4 million sitting on shelves. Surely the shipped number is close to actual sell through. The more they sell, the more they ship.

  • rob_of_the_robots #28 7 months ago

    I can see how Move would be better suited to more mainstream games than Kinect as it incorporates a controller as well as motion control so can just use the motion sensor as the right analogue stick. I think it would be good for the next generation to incorporate some sort of motion controller from the start as it would be pretty interesting to see what devs could come up with.

  • manowar71 #29 7 months ago

    It means that PS MOVE is horrible for shooters, and that was the most fault of Sony.
    Edited by manowar71 at 13/10/11 @ 14:44

  • coolbritannia #30 7 months ago

    Move lost. Game over.

  • byakuya83 #31 7 months ago

    Post deleted at 10:03:41 30-03-2012

  • suhawk75 #32 7 months ago

    Surely shipped figures are the only ones that Sony (or any other manufacturer) can keep an accurate eye on?
    Sony don't know if Game have 100K move controllers sitting in a warehouse or 200K (or 50).

    Regarding the willy waving contest with Kinect, surely we'd expect MS to ship/ sell significantly more Kinect systems than Sony would ship Move's?

    MS spent an absolute ton of cash advertising Kinect whereas Sony spent £3.50 or thereabouts. One system is proclaimed, from the off,as a game-changer (so much so that many wondered where the traditional 360 owner fitted in with this new dawn) while Sony made quite a few statements downplaying their expectations.

    We could do with more SW though but FPS's seem to work pretty well with Move.

    And Flight Control HD is brilliant with Move it's just a shame that PvZ isn't Move compatible :(
    Edited by suhawk75 at 13/10/11 @ 14:49

  • TopKatt #33 7 months ago

    I'm happy to declare kinect a winner of the motion control war as long as that means it's over.

  • Dave52 #34 7 months ago

    According to IGN, MS clarified that the figure was SHIPPED and not SOLD. The MS Press Release was misleading.

    [link url=http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/115/1154530p1.html
    ]http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/115/1154...[/link]

  • Toplinkar #35 7 months ago

    I've got two move motion controllers, one navigation controller and a PS Eye. I wonder how Sony counts me. :p

  • steoconnell #36 7 months ago

    "And what constitutes a unit of PlayStation Move? Each PlayStation Move Motion Controller? Each PlayStation Move Navigation (nunchuk) Controller as well?

    And how many households own more than one PlayStation Move Controller? The actual installed-base of PlayStation Move - number of households with Move hardware - may be far lower than the shipped figure suggests. "

    And how many Xboxes, PS3s, etc have been sold to the same household with multiple children. Or how many Xboxes have been sold to the same person because of the rrod.

    Really Eurogamer.

  • Dave52 #37 7 months ago

    Channel Inventory = The amount of inventory that is in the process of being made available for delivery to the end customer.

    But the End Customer in this case is the Retailer. Shops, Amazon etc.

  • Arwin #38 7 months ago

    Personally think Move is fantastic, and for a long while I just didn't want to go back to DS3 games at all. And I still don't, really, unless it uses a racing wheel, but I guess I'll play Uncharted 3 anyway. ;)

    So yea, more games ... I wish every game had Move support by default.

  • Bradach #39 7 months ago

    i prefer using move for fps over DS3. i'm a competent DS3 fps player but move controls in KZ3 and R3 (post 1.04 patch) are just more fun to play. its really that simple for me.
    I've very much looking forward to Bioshock Infinite. Irrational Games are going to do something exceptional with move, i'm sure.

  • FogHeart #40 7 months ago

    It's certainly the best way to play a console FPS, but third party developers aren't putting it in. Wasn't there for Portal 2 (remember we all got excited and it turned out to be a false rumour?) Hasn't been in for FPS titles like OpFlash or Bulletstorm, and not catered for by Modern Warfare or Battlefield 3. Probably the reason for that is not enough user penetration for it to be considered worthwhile to invest development time in, despite the fact that it's apparently pretty quick to get it up and running.

    As first post states, we really need it to be part of the console package. But not at the expense of the DS3, so it's a trcky proposition.

  • Dave52 #41 7 months ago

    @lollage, yes I googled it. But the fact remains - MS had to clarify to IGN that the figure was shipped not sold. My point still stands.

    I don't actually care how many Kinects or Moves have sold. I know that MS have sold a shitload, it is not in doubt. But I do have a problem with EG running this story. It seems like an unecesary pop at Sony.

  • ToonMonkey #42 7 months ago

    Bought one. Enjoyed tumble. Realised normal pads are much better for non-novelty games. Sold it.

  • effinjamie #43 7 months ago

    I like Move. Pity that only KZ3 has nailed the controller.

  • tinyspark #44 7 months ago

    Despite being impressed by what Move can potentially do I'm so far underwhelmed by the software available so far. RE5 was horrible with move. As for FPS games, whilst a fun novelty in the short term, I invariably revert to the more accurate joypad. Come on Sony, whelm me.

  • Paulie_P #45 7 months ago

    @Arwin

    Does Uncharted 3 have Move support?

  • Sonic_D #46 7 months ago

    I bought a Move starter pack for £22.50 along with Child of Eden for £13.50, which is total bargain really. Controls are not ideal, but once you calibrate it to suit you and use the non-waggle control option it works pretty well.

  • Ryze #47 7 months ago

    "It could be Resistance 4," Ahn said. "It's a very cool concept."

    ONLY IF RESISTANCE 4 IS ON RAILS, AS THE MOVE HAS NO DIRECTIONAL CONTROLS.

    FOOLS.

  • MikeRox #48 7 months ago

    Seems to be a lot of hostility to Move over Kinect on here. But when you think about it, neither of them have set the world on fire. Sure Kinect had amazing sales in the first 3 months, but they've slowed to a trickle lately. More concerning though is how non existent sales of Move/Kinect exclusive stuff is.

    It makes the Wii's 3rd party performances look comparibly incredible.

    As much as I love motion controls, I don't see them ever becoming the sole control input for gaming on consoles.

  • weebl #49 7 months ago

    Aside from Tumble, there is nothing of any interest for me I'm afraid.

  • TheBusterMan #50 7 months ago

    Hate it or love it Resi 5 worked nicely with the Move.

  • suhawk75 #51 7 months ago

    @lollage -

    " I saw plenty of adverts for Move as well as Kinect too."

    Yes well if you saw adverts for both then they must have spent the same on advertisment. And all those reports from MS about spending $1 billion on ads must have been exaggerated.

  • suhawk75 #52 7 months ago

    @Ryze

    If you look along your keyboard a little to the left hand side you should find a key next to the "A"

    Please press it (but just once). If it's fallen off you'll need to call an engineer.

    Thanks

  • Alphathon #53 7 months ago

    Here's a quick question: how come it's 8.3 million shipped now when according to Sony it was 8.8 million sold back in June?

    Here's a quote from one of your own articles, dated 07/06/11: "Sony has announced that 8.8m Move controllers have been sold worldwide. The announcement came during the company's ongoing E3 press conference in LA." Here is a link to the original article.

  • Machiavellian #54 7 months ago

    @ lollage -

    " I saw plenty of adverts for Move as well as Kinect too."

    Yes well if you saw adverts for both then they must have spent the same on advertisment. And all those reports from MS about spending $1 billion on ads must have been exaggerated.

    The Difference is MS stated they budged 500 million for Kinect Advertisement. The word budged should be understood as not spent like a lot of people seem to assume. It would be pretty stupid to believe a company would spend their entire fiscal budget in one gigantic launch promotion. The other thing is that you nor anyone else has a clue how much Sony spent because Sony did not want to show their commitment to the Move like MS.

    Here is what I call Silly Fanboy logic. "MS spent 500 million dollars to promote Kinect. Of course they sold more because they spent a lot of money".

    Here is what MS thinks. We are going to budget 500 million dollars to promote Kinect because we want it to be successful. Developers think, damn MS must be serious about Kinect because they are willing to put in such a huge investment. Gamers who purchase Kinect think. Damn MS sure is putting a lot of money into Kinect, maybe its worth getting because they are serious about it.

    People keep wondering why developers do not include Move support in their games. It's because move support is an investment. It add cost to produce their games and if Move is not going to gain more sales, then the investment is a waste. Sony not showing any real investment in move and sales not showing any significant install base definitely not helping.

  • St-Caerdydd #55 7 months ago

    Move and Kinect are 2 halves of one potentially amazing piece of gaming tech. Just imagine what could be done if they were one system.

  • suhawk75 #56 7 months ago

    @Machiavellian - "It would be pretty stupid to believe a company would spend their entire fiscal budget in one gigantic launch promotion."

    Err Microsoft turned over $70 billion (FY 2011) with profit of $23 billion so when did $500-1000 million become their entire fiscal budget (it's about 1% of their asset value)? I didn't make the figures up Steve Balmer stated as much in the run up to launch

    [link url=http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/18/microsoft-to-spend-one-billion-dollars-advertising-kinect-and-wi/
    ]http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/18/micro...[/link]

    We don't know what Sony spent but my central point was that we can be pretty sure that MS outspent Sony by some distance. If Sony were ready to make such an investment in Move you can bet your last dollar they'd have been shouting it from the rooftops too.

    And advertisment generates higher sales. Exactly how much is open to debate but there is a reason why 4% of the US GDP goes on advertisment.

    I don't see how that's fanboy logic.

  • dadrester #57 7 months ago

    If you have a move you owe it to yourself to get LBP2 and the move pack that was released a couple of weeks back. There's already a wealth of decent move enabled/move only levels coming out and as with all LBP2 levels there will be genius stuff coming soon.

  • Machiavellian #58 7 months ago

    Err Microsoft turned over $70 billion (FY 2011) with profit of $23 billion so when did $500-1000 million become their entire fiscal budget (it's about 1% of their asset value)? I didn't make the figures up Steve Balmer stated as much in the run up to launch

    Fiscal budget for Kinect. I am saying that MS budgeted 500 million to advertise kinect and I am sure they did not spend it all in one lump sum like most people state. That budget will be spread across the entire fiscal year and it doesn't mean that it all goes to just TV and print ads. That money can be spent on a host of different things to promote Kinect like giving devs a few dollars to support Kinect. This might be the reason you see Mass Effect 3 support voice or Ghost Recon support kinect.

    We don't know what Sony spent but my central point was that we can be pretty sure that MS outspent Sony by some distance. If Sony were ready to make such an investment in Move you can bet your last dollar they'd have been shouting it from the rooftops too.

    And advertisment generates higher sales. Exactly how much is open to debate but there is a reason why 4% of the US GDP goes on advertisment.

    I don't see how that's fanboy logic.

    Fanboy logic meaning that a fanboy see it as a negative. Every time I see someone mention the ad budget for kinect, it's always used as some negative situation. If MS outspent Sony on advertising Kinect and sales is the results well it look like MS put their money where their mouth is. One key issue why some products fail is because they are not advertise enough. This is stated many times for games, where the game get great reviews but does not have enough hype or visibility to garner the sales it deserves. The same situations occurs for products like Kinect and Move.

    MS want kinect to succeed and they are willing to put in the money to make it happen. Sony is more low key which could mean they are not as bullish on move. At this point in time, who knows which company has spent the most on Ads since I see just as many Move ads as I do Kinect

  • Machiavellian #59 7 months ago

    @Machiavellian: So what you're saying is that everyone are positive towards kinect because of the advertisement money.

    No, what I am saying is that MS is willing to spend money to make Kinect a success. They are willing to take a big risk and put the money behind it to show their commitment. MS is also signalling to investors, publishers and devs that this is a serious focus for their business not something just throw together and forgotten.

    My mindset when I heard MS was spending 500 million to promote Kinect was that MS must be damn serious about Kinect and where it is positioned within their business. Weather Kinect succeed or not, it will not be because it was underfunded.

  • suhawk75 #60 7 months ago

    @Mac - No I see your point and agree that MS would certainly not have spent all of their Kinect budget at launch but I can't believe they haven't outspent Sony.

    My point was more that I'm not surprised that Kinect has outsold Move given what we believe were the respective budgets for advertisment (pre and post launch)

  • Machiavellian #61 7 months ago

    But again.. anyone can look at the line-up of titles and actual features the Kinect comes with. Or even test how the games that have been released actually play. And then make up their mind about how broad the appeal really is. So other than the advertisement money, and a very.. expensive stream of extremely fake "live" performances - what is there?

    @nipsen
    I am not viewing Kinect like a gamer. Gamers only live in the moment so their view is very narrow. I am looking at how MS has positioned Kinect and the type of investment they are putting into it. I am looking at more the stragety of both MS and Sony and not how well each product makes a certain gamer happy. Your statement above sounds like a moment perspective of a gamer. Look at Kinect now. Look at the current games I know about. This is fine but it's not party of the arugument I was making.

    Anyone can also see what the budget will go towards as well. The Katamari prototype didn't pan out with the retail model, for example. Instead we get a bunch of neat videos, along with little to no actual use of the depth-sensor.

    Actually I have no clue where the budget will go. For all we know, the new dashboard is funded by that budget because of Kinect Integration. What a lot of people do not understand about a budget is that it doesn't have to be the obvious ads that you see. It could be demos, integrations of software traveling of personal, you name it. With a company as large as MS, different departments have their budget and if they are doing something for another department well they want to get paid. It's a much more complex process than what the general person on the street expects.

    I'm just amazed at the entire set of reasoning. The product doesn't even remotely offer what it has to to compete with the other products in the areas MS promised. It pans out as an add-on for very limited uses, with extremely few and very lightly varied gameplay. But the promise of advertisment money somehow makes it a good product.

    My personal opinion is that we have not scratch the surface yet. From my experience the product does exactly what MS expected and is positioned correctly for it's current lifespan on the market. It's a device that I see improvements from each generations of games that have come out and are coming out. As developers get their head around the tech and what they can and cannot do not to mention what works best, I believe we will see better games including those for the core. I am in no hurry to judge.

    The problem with Kinect is that developers cannot rely on gameplay mechanics based on previous control methods. This is untested waters and finding what is fun and not fun is a real challenge. So far the games we have seen is devs trying to translate current games we play for Kinect and thus we get this hybrid systems that can be great but also falls short because it doesn't match the same fidelity we are use to. A lot of testing and prototyping will be needed for Kinect in order to get the right balance and such things take time.

    I see a future where you will have something like Sony 3DVR helmet, Kinect, and some type of gloves that give tactile feedback and now griping that sword in your RPG and interacting with objects within the environment would be so immersive that you will be ducking in your living room and looking like a complete idiot.

  • Machiavellian #62 7 months ago

    @suhawk75
    I probably got all religious on the subject but I always see people stating the 500 mill budget as if all of it was spent in one lump sum. MS probably has spent more money on Kinect than Sony on move but I am not sure its on the stuff we actually see like TV ads, print or road shows and convents. Instead I believe MS is lining devs and pubs pockets to provide Kinect support, store placement and promotion in shops and probably discounts come this holiday season.