This, BHR-3 is pretty sound at making predictions.

Hard, with the ps4 coming in frebuary on europe... i go with less than 200K too.

Iunno... maybe 200k? 50k a week average sounds reasonable to me. I don't anticipate a big boost from Wii Fit U and I don't think there are any other major releases out next month.

I think it will come close to january 2013 sales maybe a bit lower. Its not coming off of a strong launch this time but it now comes bundled with 2 games for the same price as the basic was and has a better exclusive line up and it seems to be picking up some steam lately.

January might be a weak month but I think Feb-Dec will be up YoY

I said nothing about how the system will sell in the US.

For one thing, in Japan, sales tend to be better in January than in November. Indeed, I could see it making 200k in Japan in January, based on recent sales patterns (even if it sold about the same in Japan for the remainder of December as it did in the most recent week of data, it would end up selling 280k, not counting the final week of December, and if we suppose a roughly linear ramp-up, it comes to about 350k; Japan doesn't have the huge holiday peak that America has, so 200k for January isn't unreasonable, in my opinion)

In the US, I'd expect somewhere around 200k, as well - placing it below November, but not dramatically lower. I would attribute this to a shift in momentum - the Wii U was competing with the PS4 and XBO launches, with all of the associated advertising, etc... and Nintendo weren't even advertising the Wii U at that time. They've since ramped up advertising, increasing awareness. I expect sales to be stronger into 2014.

In Europe, 70k would be a reasonable estimate. To put this into perspective, the Wii sold 150k in January 2013. I do see the Wii U managing to get somewhere around half of that number in January 2014 (considering that the Wii U is selling roughly half as well in November/December 2013 as the Wii did in November/December 2012 in Europe, it seems a reasonable prediction, to me). And then, of course, there's the "Others", which I can see making up the remaining 30k.

The path to 500k isn't implausible at all, from what I can see. But then, it's a prediction, not a known fact. I could be wrong. It could sell less. Or it could sell more. We're just going to have to wait and see.

Yeah, it's not going up 300% YOY and on par with November with Black Friday. No console in history has ever done that. The numbers are just unrealistic full stop. You're expect January to be bigger than November.

WiiU has little to no momentum. the 220k in US (and likely less in Europe) are terrible results and suggest that it's going to crater again in January like it did this year. Japan is doing well, but still think you're aiming too high there.

Last January WiiU sold 283k, with 125k in the first week and a 37-43k average the following weeks. I think WiiU will do 75% as well as last year with 80k in the first week, and 32-38k weekly following.

However I don't think WiiU will drop as much as it did last year in the following months. So while January might be down YoY, I expect February to be up (with Donkey Kong) and the following months to be up as well. Once Mario Kart releases, weekly sales could be double what they were in 2013.

So ~200k is my vote.

@bold:  Way up I'd wager, despite the new competition.

I agree, 2013 total will be around 3m or so and I believe 2014 will be 5m minimum

No system has ever been up 300% YOY in January? Maybe. But in other months, it has certainly happened. June 2007 to June 2008, PS3 saw an increase in the US from 100k to nearly 360k. The DS in the US saw sales of around 140-190k each year in January for 2005-2007... and then jumped to 460k in January 2008. So it's certainly not unheard of for sudden and dramatic changes in numbers like that.

As for November vs January, we turn to the PS3's second holidays in the US, where, in November 2007, it sold 367k, and then in January 2008, it sold 296k - certainly in the same ballpark. Indeed, it's a drop of about 20%. 20% less than the Wii U's november according to NPD places it at roughly 180k. Given that I'm treating "America" as including Canada, which adds about 10%, that brings the number up to about 200k. So on both the YOY and November->January measures, my prediction has precedent.

As for momentum, here are the numbers for weekly sales changes in the US in the last six weeks of data (not including PS4/XBO, since they're in launch mode, sales will be in decline week-on-week after launch):

PS3: +18%, +41%, 0%, +35%, +375%, -69% --> 231% (average of +22%)
360: +14%, +65%, +3%, +36%, +454%, -74% --> 280% (average of +25%)
3DS: -1%, +4%, +3%, +19%, +274%, -56% --> 108% (average of +13%)
PSV: +3%, +11%, +34%, +22%, +313%, -66% --> 162% (average of +17%)
Wii: +20%, +21%, +26%, +16%, +235%, -55% --> 220% (average of +21%)
WiiU: +27%, +29%, +30%, +61%, +230%, -56% --> 498% (average of 35%)

The Wii U weekly sales numbers have gone up by nearly 500% since the end of October. Of the other platforms, the best seen is 360, with a 280% increase. There can be no doubt that the Wii U has been gaining momentum.