By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
W29 on 15 October 2007
Edit Thread
HappySqurriel said:
Steve 3.2 said:
While it was briefly mentioned, NEC and Sega kicked off the fourth console generation early (in 1987 and 1988 respectively). Both consoles reached the US in 1989. Nintendo would not release the SNES until 1990 in Japan and 1991 in the US. And while the SNES quickly took the sales lead in Japan, it took years for Nintendo to catch up to the Genesis. So Nintendo has gone from third to first before.

And @ madskillz - The one thing the 360 does not have is the same sales curve. I don't think the system will reach the 22M the PS2 did after it's 2nd full holiday on store shelves. So while MS may have borrowed the PS2's play book, they didn't know that the industry isn't playing the same game this time around.

Can the PS3 go from last to first? It probably won't happen. It's going to be the Wii in front with the PS3 and 360 fighting for second place over the long haul.

The console war has far less to do with sales and far more to do with momentium. From day 1 the SNES sold more than the Genesis and it became obvious that it would eventually outsell it.

As for Final Fantasy ... Square choose to release Final Fantasy games to the Wonderswan Color rather than to the Gameboy Advance because (at the time) they had a very poor relationship with Nintendo and wanted to see the Gameboy Advance fail; eventually, after the wonderswan failed, Square ported those Final Fantasy games to the GBA.

Individual games (and a small set of games) really do not have that much of an impact on sales to actually determine the outcome of the console war. The XBox 360 had Bioshock and Halo 3 (along with the superior versions of Madden football, NHL hockey and NBA basketball) in a little over one month, both games are contenders for game of the year, and sales spiked yet the system's rate of sales will not be dramatically impacted by this; certainly 500,000 systems may have been sold because of these factors, but in order to maintain sales like this Microsoft would have to continue having a game of the year contender every month and the best version of most multiplatform games which probably won't happen.

Final Fantasy, Metal Gear Solid and Gran Turismo (along with the other big 2008 releases) will probably boost sales by 2 to 3 million for the PS3 but being that it is already 8 Million units behind and is losing ground every day these games will not make the difference.


HappySquirrel I couldn't agree with you more. The only word that I caught in that whole good and excellent post was momentum. And currently the PS3 doesn't have it. Especially in Japan, now one can prove those numbers. No console can keep brining out countless AAA games a month. But if its previous games or features on the console are awesome than the console will still have the momentum. If we look at the Wii its selling and its momentum is extremely high. In Japan I don't know what happened, its just fell from 80k to 20k. Thats not good, showing that Nintendo is now lacking in software. The Xbox 360 in Japan is doing way better than the original, considering it still has more momentum than the original Xbox. The Xbox brand in Japan is making a name and is fixing what otherwise left a bad taste in for the Japanese from last generation.

Again momentum is the key to when a console war and if you have countless pieces of software coming out then the console will live on and on. But if you bombed the first year and can't build up then there is a problem. I don't think the PS3 can rebound back to second or first. Due to the PS3 left an really awful taste to consumers at the begining. So good luck PS3 with your 2008 lineup. It will do something and gain some momentum, but then Sony has to worry about after 2008 whats next? What can they do to keep the momentum on top. Look at the PSP, it had a extreme lack of momentum compared to the DS. DS just had countless software being bought out every single week or month, whereas the PSP would get good software every so month. PSP just didn't have enough momentum to carry itself and we can see that, the sales are explaining that. But momentum is what the PS3, PSP and the Xbox 360 needs in Japan to keep it afloat. And its just not doing anything. And how many times are people saying just wait till 2008 or wait till 40GB version of the PS3 to come out. I mean I do have some faith that it might help Sony but not gain enough momentum though. We will see, action speaks louder than words!