Market Analyst, NPD, has released preliminary estimates for sales of Gen-Next video gaming consoles through the 2006 holiday season.
As per these estimates, Microsoft's Xbox 360 was the best selling game console in the US - through the holiday shopping season from November till December 25, 2006.
Nearly 2 million Xbox 360 consoles were sold in North America during this period.
Coming in a close second was Nintendo's Wii, which sold around 1.8 million units through the holiday season.
This is especially significant, considering that the Wii was launched not before November 19, which means that the sales figures are quite impressive for Nintendo.
Sony's PlayStation 3, which launched on November 17, came in a distant third, with approximately only 750,000 units sold from November through Christmas day.
While lack of supply is being cited as the primary reason for Sony's poor performance, it would be well to point out that both the Wii and the PS3 were difficult to find through the holiday season.
And, Microsoft more than made up for these shortfalls. At any given point of time, there were more Xbox 360 consoles on store shelves than there were Wiis or PS3s available.
So, while shoppers scrambled to get the consoles of their choice, they opted for the next best thing when they could not find what they were looking for.
Complete Sales figures for the 2006 holiday season would be released by NPD sometime later this month.
Xbox 360 came out a year ago, had a good supply on hand, is moderately priced, has a good variety of games for it and has the excellent Xbox Live service included.
Sony PS3 came out 1 month ago, but with no major performance advantages over the 360. It came out in very few numbers and before it was street ready. Therefore it contained unresolved bugs and glitches, a small and terrible selection of games (many of which were PS2 and X360 ports) a internet service that is in its infancy and all for the price of buying a X360 AND a Wii.
Not hard to figure out when Sony did badly. The real winner is Nintendo. Nintendo has always been a niche market, but with 750,000 consoles sold thats a impressive number. Nintendo biggest problem was because its a Niche market it underestimated the demand, resulting in a huge backorder. there was also the strap issue, but thats minor...
I got one for my cousin, but I am told he won't get it until Febuary-March. Its still on preorder...
UPDATE
Wired Magazine just gave its predictions for 2007. Among them, HD-TV will win the HDDVD format war (PS3 uses Blue-Ray) and that the PS3 will be a total bust. Ouch!
Last edited by mmarsh; January 3rd, 2007 at 14:22.
which is why i'll stick with my ps2 for the time being. and the whole thing with the 360 outselling the other consoles, that was a nobrainer. i don't mean to repeat here, but a console with a year on the market to fix bugs and prove itself will do better than a new console that has yet to prove itself.
which is why i'll stick with my ps2 for the time being. and the whole thing with the 360 outselling the other consoles, that was a nobrainer. i don't mean to repeat here, but a console with a year on the market to fix bugs and prove itself will do better than a new console that has yet to prove itself.
We just got one not to long ago the Xbox360 that is and my boys and my husband are having a blast with it. I haven't had a chance to play it yet. My husband seems to really like the game Halo and plays it online quite a bit.
Tater, what is it about husbands and sons hogging the game systems?! It's just not fair. Heck, I even paid for ours, and I still haven't been able to play it yet!
I gotta say, I am very impressed with the Xbox 360, although some people haven't been as lucky as me. I hear lots of reports of the system overheating, but I think that is more due to the fact that people aren't taking care of them like they should. But I guess we will see who really wins in the end.
I purchased a Xbox 360 about a month ago. My Girlfriend bought a 52 inch HDTV so I figured what the hell and picked up the Xbox. Tiger woods golf is freakin incredible, Oblivion looks pretty damn good too. My only gripe with it is when using the HDTV wires the colors are off. Red is brown and green is yellow but other then that I am happy.
Yeah, I heard that even in Europe the sales were above expectations. Some people were able to pre-order 2 somehow and then they re-sold it for at least $1000 more than its regular price because of the high demand.
The price is definatley the main factor, that is when you compare it to the 360 which will get a lot of the same titles as the ps3 plus better ones. I don't think the ps3 will even have a head tart with the gta game that's going to come out because I beleive it's coming out on the same day as the 360 version, instead of waiting a while for the xbox version like previous installments
The timing was just off. XBOX was already established in the last generation and they got a 1 year head start. So most people already owned a 360 and there wasn't really a convincing reason to buy a PS3, plus with such a high price I think people were skeptical. If I get one ill use it as a blu ray player for now and use my 360 for all the newest games.
It's just not fair. Heck, I even paid for ours, and I still haven't been able to play it yet!
