Nick said:
Mummelmann said:
I got a NES for christmas in 1989 I think, but it debuted in 84 or 85, right? 70 million seems like such a smal number, every single friend had one!
Another factor would be economy, late eighties saw an increase in consumers' ability to purchase, which was bound to benefit the PS when it came out a few years later.
My point about casual buyers/consumers is that most of their possessions matter little to them since it's not a wholehearted interest on their account, so they tire easily. This is why cellphone makers, clothes designers and other manufacturers have to update or relieve their products with new models/versions all the time.
And casuals tire most of all of things that do only one thing, especially in electronics. When the first MP3 playback stereo sets became affordable, sales practically exploded, the same is true with TV's sporting features such as i-in-i. Casuals love products that handle multiple tasks, so for most of them a 360 or a PS3 would probably also be cool for a while (perhaps several months...), but the prices are too steep and the hardware itself has a "geek" status in the market somehow, so the only affordable console left would be the Wii.
I see lifetime sales of approx 90-95 million for the Wii, which is nowhere near a fad as many claim, but my experience is that the casual market saturates and tires very quickly, and I fear this can be Nintendo's undoing (not really undoing, they'll still do great, but not by the standards and expectation of many posters here).
It's more than likely that the Wii will "win" this gen, but not so much that it'll sell 250-500 million.
I also believe that Sony will take "2nd place" this gen, which is fine by any standards given the high price and steep competition.
The 360? I have little faith in that product tbh, as did I in the X-box. |
This is very true. In fact, I can think of at least one manufacturer that's been relying on this technique for sales.  Sorry, I couldn't resist. It won't happen again. |
Lol, it's quite allright Nick, there's a ridiculous amount of PS3 and 360 models around for my taste... 
