It's not that simple.  The PS3 needs good software sales yesterday.  Nintendo is rolling in money based on what they make from the Wii hardware alone.  Sony needs that software money.  Killer apps are all well and good, but 4 titles will not save a system.

The PS3 needs an influx of R&C quality games and a community that will buy them.

 shams = ars never listen to him

VGChartz says total R&C sales hit 180K or so (http://www.vgchartz.com/aweekly.php). That's pretty good for a three week period, considering the US install base of 2.3 million PS3s, about one quarter the size of the 360 base -- i.e. one in every eleven PS3 owners have already picked up a copy, and we're not even through the holidays yet.

Is it now 3 types of games that do well in the world? Shooters, Racers, and Casual?

On the 360 even, all the games I like bomb as well. 

I seriously hope the NPD is just being run but a bunch of idiots right now. I went on a 14 hour car ride for a friend of my dad's motorcycle between Florida and mid-south carolina. We stopped at about 15 different WalMarts (bathroom breaks and looking for the rumored leaked Uncharted that I heard on another forum. None has EOJ or R&C (took this trip on the 8th.) I think they under tracked how many games WalMart has sold (who is also the largest distributer of games in the WORLD, which honestly I think even Halo 3 is a bit low at least by 200k as all the Walmarts only has like 3 - 7 copies)

Even though I'm skeptical about your story, you have to remember that even though it is (virtually) impossible to win the lottery several people do it every week; there are dozens of reasons why a walmart may not have stock for a particular game/item and even though the probability is bad you may have picked 15 stores that all didn't have supply for some reason or another.

Likely (with Eye of Judgement) no one stocked the game because in the past similar products have sold poorly on systems with small userbases like the PS3 currently has; Ratchet and Clank could be a combination of undersupply, lost/late shipments, bad management, damaged goods, put in the wrong location, etc.

I said I thought it would struggle.

Sales of a lot of titles seem to be much worse than I expected. What I think is happening, is the "big brands" are becoming condensed to even less titles (partial result with SO MANY big games out this Xmas). R&C just isn't considered a big brand by the public. GH & Halo are.

I genuinely did think it would do 200k week#1 - and was shocked when it was reported to have done 110k in the first week (Oct 23rd-30th). Then came the reports that it wasn't advertised, yadda yadda. No worries.

...

Now we find it didn't do 110k in week#1 - but closer to 80k in the first 10 days. Ouch.

...

A simple (possible) answer for all of this:

 - retailers have finite shelf space

 - retailers have 2-3x as many games this year available, than ever before. They might also be trying to flog off old PS2 games, or 2nd-hand games

 - retailers end up ordering a lot less units / title (on average) 

 - games get close to selling out. Gamers can't find a game. Try and wait for it. Lose interest quickly, with so many MORE / new games also arriving

...

This could just be the beginning of the "downturn" I have been expecting/predicting for a while. First sign - big/middle level titles to significantly undersell. 

 I know this has nothing to do with this topic but did you know you hav a better chance of being struck by lightning twice then winning the lottery? 

The exact same things were said about Zack & Wiki. I don't see Z&W at most stores I visit. While it may be a valid excuse, the sales were still poor regardless whatever the explanation.