| Takashii360 said: I do agree since last holiday Xbox 360 was already on the market and the Wii and PS3 was starting to launch...This holiday season looks pretty exciting considering the Wii is in high demand and Halo 3 is releasing for the Xbox 360...Also PS3 might be in for a shocker considering Sony is bringing out a healthy dose of exclusives....such as Ratchet and Clank, Lair, Heavenly Sword and many others...so this Christmas its going to be a close war.....O_O |
The most difficut think to gauge is the extent of demand for Halo there will be by non-360 owners. Obviously, the 360s sold for Gears will have affected this demand to some extent. Further, the 360 failure rate will affect this demand. The price will affect this demand, and the availability of the Wii (if it's available) as well as the PS3's possible Christmas price of $499 or inclusion of games/controllers as a bundle around Christmas may affect it as well.
One of Microsoft's biggest issues thus far is that their audience tends to be among the core gamers who are a little more 'plugged in' regarding the goings on in the game industry. A larger portion of them are willing to buy a console for one game, but a larger portion is also aware of the 360's reliability issues. Last year MS was very successful in no small part due to $100 rebates and other good deals offered around the Christmas season.
So there are a lot of factors here. Last year is no indicator of Microsoft's success this year because too many things have changed. If I were going to make a prediction -- and because we don't know how MS will play its cards this is a half-blind prediction -- I think they may break a million units sold in December, but I don't think it will be by much and I strongly doubt they'll find any magic formula to break a million in November as well. World Wide.
