Michael Pachter: Nostradamus, Or A Cunt?

A Things Cunts Say Special

When Wetbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter makes a prediction, it’s reported as if it were scratched into a granite tablet by the fingertip of God. But how often do these sage-like reports from the future actually fly? To celebrate our five years of blighting the industry, let’s find out.

EA will buy Take Two

So said Pachter on Gamespot, and then went on about how it was virtually certain that EA would win its buyout bid to GameDaily.

Over two years later, EA still haven’t bought Take Two.

Score: WRONG x1

PS3 will outsell Xbox 360 by the end of 2008

So he said on VG247. As you can see from the figures for 2008 and 2009, it didn’t.

Pachter has a real hard on for predicting the PS3 will outsell the 360, so really we should multiply his “wrong” score by the number of times he’s got it wrong. We’ll be generous, though.

Score: WRONG x1

The iPhone isn’t “a viable gaming platform”

Here’s the full quote from next-gen, as it’s a winner:

“I don’t see it as a viable gaming platform, due to the cost of owning one. The iPhone costs $400 plus an AT&T wireless subscription for voice and data, I’m guessing this is $80 a month, so the addressable market doesn’t really fit the core gamer demographic. To the extent that hip, rich people are an interesting gaming audience, iPhone games will work. My guess is that this group is only interested in the most rudimentary games, and that the market will be small.”

Here’s a graphic demonstrating how iPhone gaming has eaten some of the DS’s share, and eclipsed the PSP:

Score: WRONG x1

GTA IV to sell 6 million copies in week one

And that’s how much it sold. Slightly less impressive is that every man and his dog made a similar prediction, such as the less publicity-hungry analyst Mike Hickey. But we’ll still give him a point for it.

Score: CORRECT x1

Xbox 360 & PS3 price cuts in 2008

According to Kotaku. Xbox 360 dropped, as it was widely expected to, but the extortionate PS3 price stayed exactly where it was.

Score: CORRECT x1, WRONG x1

E3 “headed for extinction”

“In our view, E3 is headed for extinction, unless the publishers and console manufacturers wake up to the fact that nobody cares about the show anymore,” he said to VG247 in 2008.

E3 2010 is coming up in a couple of months.

Score: WRONG x1

New DS by the end of 2008

So he said to MCV. The DSi was announced shortly afterwards, which almost makes up for his iPhone faux pas. Almost.

Score: CORRECT x1

Pachter’s estimated 2008 sales wrong

As reported on VG247. Technically, he’s speaking accurately. But speaking accurately about the fact that you were wrong still makes you wrong, no matter how much backpedalling you do. Especially when it’s the serious stuff that people rely on to make themselves the big money. There are loads of faield predictions like this, but they don’t exactly make for entertaining reading, so this’ll be the only one he scores for.

Score: WRONG x1

Wii HD is coming

"A Wii HD would really position Nintendo well, which is why I'm absolutely convinced there is a Wii HD coming,” he said here.

18 months later, still no sign…

Score: WRONG x1

Assassin’s Creed 2 to be set in the 1700s

And during the French Revolution too, apparently, according to what he told GiantBomb.  But in the real world, it was set in the 1400s during the Italian Renaissance.

Score: WRONG x1

PS3 price cut for April 2009

According to a report on VG247. Wrong – it happened in August.

Score: WRONG x1

Assassin’s Creed 2 & Splinter Cell Conviction out before March 2010

Despite setting up the calendar equivalent of a barn door on MTV, he still managed to miss it with Splinter Cell. AC2 was within his gargantuan 14 month area of prediction, so well fucking done for that.

Score: CORRECT x1, WRONG x1

Sony PSP Go is a rip off

Here's the full quote from GameTrailers:

“$249 is too much, period. The $169 PSP-3000 is a profitable device – the disc assembly, for a UMD, costs more than 16 gigs of flash does. So this new device doesn’t cost them as much to make as the PSP-3000 and they jack the price up $80. I’m sorry to say it. I don’t want to get bad fan mail from the Sony fanboys, but… They’re ripping off the consumer.”

Amen to that. Only Sony could take a handheld that’s sorely in need of a second analogue thumbstick and re-release it with less functionality for UMD owners, added internal storage that nobody wanted or asked for, and still no second thumbstick. Thankfully, there are people in the industry with influence who have the balls to call them on stuff like this.

Score: CORRECT x1000

But… hang on, what’s this?

“I sincerely regret the choice of words in my response to Geoff Keighley’s question in last week’s Bonus Round, where I said that Sony is ‘ripping off’ the consumer by pricing the PSP Go at $249.99. I made a poor choice of words, and I do NOT think that Sony is doing anything nefarious in choosing their pricing strategy.” (Via IndustryGamers)

That’s right – the one thing that man has ever said that’s been honest and relevant was retracted within a day. So…

Score: CORRECT -1000, WRONG x1

Borderlands is being “sent to die”

Over to Gamasutra reporting Randy Pitchford from Gearbox:

“It was tough for Pitchford to hear Wedbush Morgan's prominent industry analyst Michael Pachter declare, prior to Borderlands' release, that the game had been ‘sent to die’ amid big competition from Bungie's Halo 3: ODST, Infinity Ward's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, and other major holiday titles. Pachter argued Borderlands had little chance of competing. We were sandwiched between the two biggest first-person shooter franchises ever. And the guys at BioWare, who walk on water, were releasing Dragon Age around the same time.

“But Borderlands sold around 3 million units, Gearbox continues to invest in the franchise through new downloadable content, and the title became the best-selling new property of 2009. "It was tough for me, because it's Mike’s job to analyze these things. You know what, Mike? I knew you were wrong."

Score: WRONG x1

Final Score: CORRECT x4, WRONG x12

Now, we’re no analysts, but… oh, you get the picture.