At current rate, PS3 may sell less than GameCube

[albionus]

I'm a bit confused about the OP's point. It was either that the PS3 would sell worse than the Gamecube WW (which is what most are debating) or that it will sell worse than Gamecube in the US. The argument itself is somewhat invalid, you can't look at first year PS3 vs GCN sales in the US and then say the PS3 will do likewise over 5 years worldwide. Seeing as the story is from Gamepro (booo) I will blame them for the faulty logic and not the OP.

So anyways, on to the two points. I would be shocked if the PS3 did as badly as the Gamecube WW for 2 basic reasons. 1) Nintendo only fell from 50 million to 35 million going from their second to third system. While Sony has much more room to fall I doubt it'll be 80%+. 2) The PS3 sells more evenly around the world than the GCN did (65% of Gamecubes were sold in NA compared with 44% of PS3's).

That last line though indicates one reason why I think it's possible, though not necessarily likely, that the PS3 will be outsold by the Gamecube in NA. It is possible that say the PS3 sells 40million WW but less than a third are in NA. Essentially in that scenario the Wii takes the PS2's casual, budget, and niche gamers while the 360 takes the more hardcore gamers leaving the PS3 with only the Sony fanboys. Due to the 360's struggles outside of NA it is likely the PS3 will sell much better due to what I suspect is a larger Sony fanbase and by holding on to the hardcore Euro/Japanese gamers.

So essentially it comes down to the PS3 will outsell the Gamecube WW but narrowing it down to NA is debatable, though I do think that it is very likely the PS3 will outsell the Gamecube in NA (the Xbox is more 50/50).