They had a huge improvement over last gen and are *currently* beating Sony. If you would have asked last gen that they could ever be in a position other than last, I bet you would have said "no" as well. Never count them out. MS has the money and they listen. They know what they have to do to break through in other countries and I would be surprised if they were not already looking into ways to accomplish that. It will take a while (a long, long while) but I would never say it is "impossible".