American sales - WII + PS3 --- just WOW

[Sullla]

Bodhesatva said:

Wii isn't really surprising to me. It jumps up and down as inventory comes in waves.

But the PS3 really is still astonishing, isn't it? Look at this time last year: the PS3 sales up 200 percent. 200 percent! This exceeds even the most optimistic projections for the year, I believe, and really is flying in the face of predictions made by people like me and Sullla.

We'll see if it can keep it up!

I know, I know. It's the one thing that has me baffled, because all the other consoles are selling at pretty much the rate I expected in 2008. PS3 sales in Europe and Japan are also tracking right about where I thought they would be. Yet for no apparent reason, PS3 sales have gone up hugely in America. Why? This console still has largely the same library as the 360. The PS3-exclusive games from last year sold decently, but didn't set the world on fire. Ratchet, Heavenly Sword, Uncharted - all solid titles, not much sales impact. I can't possibly believe that THAT many people care about Blu-Ray, when clearly they didn't last year. What's going on? *confused*

I wonder if 360 shortages have something to do with this (?) as rocketpig has been explaining in this thread. That kind of makes sense, although there has to be more going on than just that. If you can think of non-fanboyish reasons why the PS3 seems to have surged in popularity in America, without releasing any new exlusives of note, please let me know!