Yeah, Pachter expected the x1 to sell a lot better in the USA than it has. I still remeber though,  a year or so leading up the X1 and PS4 release a lot of posters here thought the X1 would dominate the US. Posters here had the same belief the the Wii U would dominate the US like the Wii did. The assumption was simple, that sales patterns would be similar gen to gen. The PS4 doing as well as it has caught me with my pants down and I am happy for it, but I never thought the X1 would completely dominate the US again.

I wish they would focus on profitability now - safe 2nd place is an absolute given, and that's a fact.
Then they can just recover and have a better chance next gen :)

Also hopefully this will shut everyone up about the "money MS is losing". Because this just reaffirms they're hardly losing anything, if they're even losing anything.

I do agree. They did well in Xbox 360 era. But its long gone.

"I could be wrong, but I think of this much the way I think of people who have historically voted Democratic always voting for Democrats and people who have historically voted Republican voting for Republicans. I think that you just kind of own your console of choice and you will stick with that unless they do something really bad."

This is the main flaw in his thinking. Most people I know have little loyalty to a brand of console. Two generations ago Sony utterly dominated Sega, Nintendo and Microsoft. Last generation Sony struggled to just reach parity with Microsoft and is still behind Nintendo. Is it really any surprise this generation was open for movement among all three again?

Woah, woah, woah! You never know what could happen in Japan.

Glad to see Microsoft isn't going concede at all! However, I am not too sure Microsoft can keep winning the holidays like their last season; especially since Sony will be more prepared this time around.

"So I think the answer to your question is, Microsoft desperately wants to win. Winning matters more to them than short term profit"

I could have sworn I was told "It doesn't matter if they're in first place or not. They're doing good, PS4 is just doing better. As long as they make money, they'll be happy"

Sure, Phil Spencer may have said they want to win the gen and Pachter is echoing that here, but pfft, what do they know? Experts on VGC told me that 80k a week was good and acceptable sales to reach their goals.

If they wanted to win they seriously should have spent some money on market research pre xbox reveal. They would hae quickly realised that nobody wanted their original vision. That one cost them dearly.

“The Wii U is a terrible alternative for someone who can only get one console because it’s got such limited software, and I think that Sony’s just winning that audience."

That's an interesting point, Mr. Pachter. Could the PS4 really be winning more gamers who started with the Wii than the Wii U?