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Sales - Lifespan of the Wii? - View Post

HappySqurriel on 22 April 2007
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Shane said:

While the difference between $300 and $600 is huge, the difference between $250 and $150 is not so much.

It really depends on the system ... With a home console a $100 difference is probably not going to phase too many consumers (as has been demonstrated with the Dreamcast vs. PS2 and Gamecube vs. XBox/PS2); with a portable I think it is a much larger factor.

With the PS3 I anticipate that it will take 3 price cuts for the PS3 to hit $300 which means that it will be $99-$129 Wii VS. $149-$199 XBox 360 vs. $299 PS3; a $150 price difference will have an impact on its sales later in its life.

 

Shane said:

PS3 is fighting an uphill battle (moreso in the US than in Europe and Japan), but it's hardly impossible. They sold in excess of 40 million units here the past two times.

We don't know about Europe, but in Japan the PS3 has been outsold 3 to 1 by the Wii and is being outsold 4 to 1 by the Wii on a weekly basis; on top of that the PS3 is only outselling consoles which have failed in Japan (Dreamcast, XBox, and XBox 360). If this isn't their worst market that says a lot ...

 

Shane said:

Sony still has the support they gained during the first two consoles. We're seeing this in terms of both developers and current PS2 sales.

When GTA3 launched, it had a userbase of 4 million to work with. It went on to sell 6 million copies.

First off, GTA 3 was released in October of 2001 ... In September 2001 the PS2 had sold 19.57 Million units world wide, of which 8.24 Million were in North America and 4.48 were in PAL regions, and by March 2002 the number of systems sold jumped to 28 Million worldwide. No matter how you look at it the userbase of the PS2 was far greater than 4 million units.
The fact that you make up numbers rather than use numbers which are readily available is what really hurts your argument. There has never been a system that has been as dominant as the Wii that wasn't the market leader, and there has never been a system that has performed as poorly as the PS3 (with decent competition) that has ever survived. I'm not saying the PS3 is doomed, but Sony has their work cut out for them simply to "Weather the Storm"