Microsoft Ships over 15m consoles in 2011

[Jay520]

RolStoppable said:

Jay520 said:

 How were they lucky?

Microsoft's inability to break into the Japanese market, Microsoft's RRoD issue that made people opt for a PS3 instead of the cheaper 360 in the West and third parties despising Nintendo's Wii were all factors out of Sony's control, but helped them to maintain third party support instead of getting abandoned. Without major third party support the PS3 would have never gotten out of the hole that Sony dug for it.

Most of your points seem sound. However one could make the case that Sony's third party support was partially the result of their own actions. Of course, the reasons you listed definitely aided the PS3's 3rd party support, but Sony's own actions were definitely a contributing factor. By making their console so similar to the Xbox 360, they gave 3rd parties a doubled market by selling games on the X360 and their console. This probably caused the PS3+360 market to seem much more viable than the Wii's.

And I really don't think RRoD was that big of an issue. I'd say it only effected maybe 1% of consumer decisions back when it was the most prevalent.