Outline of the console war

[Erik Aston]

•Wii catches AND *SURPASSES* XBox 360 in Americas sales THIS SUMMER—ALSO specifically within the month of July (July 1-July 31) Honestly, that's retarded. Nintendo won't ship that many units. My predictions... XBox360 will be passed by Wii in Europe in 2007, but keep the crown in North America until 2008, due to slightly besting Wii over the period Sept-Dec07(though there will be Wii shortages in that time). However, it will also become clear in 2008 that North America will be the only area 360 will sell 20million units, as it didn't gain momentum quickly enough before the Wii storm in Europe. 360 produces nice profits in spurts, but MS keeps needing to drop hardware price, drop XBL subscription price, shell out cash to 2nd and 3rd party devs for key exclusives, etc., which means it moves back into the red repeatedly. The console gets a good 7 year run, as Moore stops trying to compete and just focuses on profitability over the last 2 years of the cycle, to buy himself a shot at XBox3. After studying Nintendo, a more feature-lite XBox3 is launched with the intent to achieve and sustain profitability within 6 months. Wii will keep selling above PS2 rates for its entire lifetime, due to its lower price, higher appeal, and a library that eclipses 4,000 games, thanks to the VC. The system continues to have spot shortages right into 2008, until Nintendo approach the staggering rate of 30 million systems a year. In Japan, Wii won't quite match the DS explosion, but it will still move across the 30 million mark, and in NA, just as PSone was the first system to hit 40m sales and PS2 looks poised to hit 50m sometime in 2008, Wii will be the first system to hit 60m in NA alone. Wii will also become the best-selling system of all time in Europe, but won't really tap the territory as much as possible. Though it will pass end PS2 sales during its 7 year run, its attach rate of physical media will be substantially lower... Including VC games, it will be higher. PS3 will find it can't sell 20m even in NA. It will only sell well in Japan during major game releases, but even games like MGS4 and FF13 will end up with shockingly low sales. The high price of the system will kill Sony's continued attempts to broaden the gaming market into Eastern Europe, Russia, the Middle East, South America and Africa, as well as stunting the system in Western Europe significantly. The system constantly has a hard time developing any momentum, as 360 and Wii beat it to price cuts and strip it of practically all major franchises by 2009. Sony keeps increasing its internal software R&D, keeps shelling out more and more money for lesser and lesser exclusives, and keeps lowering the price dangerously fast. They bleed billions for the whole generation. Heads. Roll. Most significantly, Ken Kutaragi resigns, taking his seat next to Bushnell and Yamauchi. Sony goes headhunting to rebuild their videogame division from scratch, and they come back with a new system—with a new name! Final sales (I revise these numbers all the time... They are merely my best guess at this exact second…) #3. PlayStation3 Japan- 6 million North America- 16 million Europe/Others- 12 million Total- 34 million #2. XBox 360 Japan- 1 million North America- 28 million Europe/Others- 17 million Total- 46 million #1. Wii Japan- 32 million North America- 63 million Europe/Others- 55 million Total- 150 million