Wii will probably beat DS & PS2 in the USA. Could see it nearly matching PS2 ( /- 10% ltd) in Western Europe. But it will be well behind PS2 throughout the rest of the world. DS is going to top 60m in Nintendo's Other region, maybe even 70m, so Wii probably won't match that. I actually think Wii could have a bigger base than PS2 in developed video game markets - Western Europe, Canada, USA, Australia, Japan - but it won't match PS2 worldwide.
In developed markets (Western Europe, Canada, USA, Japan, Australia) we have:
DS Wii PS2
W.Europe & Australia 35m 22.5m 40.6m
Japan 31m 10.6m 23.1m
USA Canada 46.2m 32.8m 49.6m
Developed Total 114m 65.9m 113.3m
Now for some math.
Wii launched in 2006. PS2 launched in 2000. DS launched in 2004/2005. Using these values for per year basis for the three developed regions (DS = 5.5 / 6 / 6, PS2 = 9.75 / 10.5 / 9.75, Wii = 3.75 / 3.75 / 3.75) we can see how the systems are doing in the regions to date.
Developed Sales / Year DS Wii PS2
W. Europe & Australia 6.4m 6.0m 4.2m
Japan 5.2m 2.8m 2.2m
USA Canada 7.7m 8.7m 5.1m
Developed Total 19.3m 17.5m 11.5m
Obviously the DS and especially Wii rates will erode a bit with time as sales fall but Wii still has more than a 50% per year margin on PS2 in the USA Canada and is even beating DS here rather easily.If you look at the math, Wii is trending ahead of DS in Western regions, particularly in North America. Since Wii is a console, the attach rates are higher than DS as well. That means Wii is going to remain attractive to Western developers for a seriously long time.
The 81m Western DS base is only buying about one game per year right now, but the 55m Western Wii base is still buying 2-2.5 games per year. In the West, the Wii base may still be buying 1.2-1.5 games per year in the West with 80m units sold (Wii should reach 80m in developed western markets by the end of 2012) - so I'd expect Western developers to keep pushing the system fairly hard for at least two more years.
Lifetime, I think we end up with shipments at something like this:
Americas / Japan / EMEAA / Total
DS 65m 35m 70m** 170m
PS2 56m 24m 75m* 155m
Wii 63m 16m 50m* 129m
GB 44.1m 32.5m 42.2m 119m
PS1 40.8m 21.6m 40.1m 102.5m
* Probably about 40-45m for both in Western Europe - but PS2 is available in 99 countries last time I looked.
** 53m shipped as of June 2010 - still selling 100k / week in normal weeks.
Essentially, we'll end up with DS / GB in a league of their own in Japan (30m ), Wii / DS / PS2 as the all-stars of the Americas (50m ), with DS / PS2 way out in front in EMEAA.
Software wise, I think DS limps to over 1b games shipped lifetime while Wii probably gets much higher even with a lower base as Wii owners buy more games than DS owners do, particularly in the West where the systems will see similar sales long term. So SW sales over the long haul should end up at something like this for machines currently available:
PS2 >>> Wii >> DS and PS1 roughly the same >>> X360 or PS3 >> NES and GB and so on.
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