Maybe 50% is marginal to the OP?

Snes, Genesis = 77.64

Ps1, N64, Saturn = 144.23
PS2, GC, xbox, Dreamcast = 197.57

Growth between Snes era and PS1 era = 86%

Growth between PS1 and Ps2 eras = 37%

Edit: Lol @ your maths Dr grass

You rounded up PS2, Xbox, GC, Dreamcast, Saturn and rounded down Ps1, N64

So, what kind of explosion are you talking about?

A butterfly explosion!

It would be amazing if next gen is powerful enough to do flocking algorithms of millions of actors. Next gens flower.

Not me. I'll be in Vault 101.

Beuli2 said:

So, what kind of explosion are you talking about?

Market expansion.

To whoever is saying that PS2 was a bigger explosion than PS1, check the European sales:

SNES Gen: 17.23 million

PS1 N64 Saturn: 48.02 million
178% growth

PS2 GC XBox DC: 78.44 million
63% growth

The 7th gen expansion will be least apparant in the hardware numbers, unless you count handheld sales where it is very apparant. But when you consider the sales of a game like Wii Fit, it is clear that gaming had to explode into new markets just to tread water this gen. And had Nintendo not abandoned their plan of audience expansion in roughly 2008, 7th gen would crush 6th gen. That said, about 18 months before the first 8th gen home console launches, sales stand at:

PS2 GC XBox DC: 197.57 million

Wii XBox 360 PS3: 189.41 million

Not including Dreamcast, it's actually already a tie.

And the other thing to check is what kinds of games are selling. Based on the types of games that led each generation, it's clear that the 2nd, 3rd, 5th and 7th gens had the most dramatic departures in terms of content and gameplay, which led to selling to different groups of people. 4th and 6th gens still saw what looked like healthy growth, but based on PS1's explosion into Europe and Wii's explosion into women and lapsed gamers, things weren't as healthy as they appeared.

And anyways, 2, 3, 5 and 7 are the prime numbers through 7. Listen, this is pretty much indisputable fact.

Issue is, this gen will likely be well over 300mil when all is said and done, and that's a lot more, even if not percentage wise.

But gen 6 was massive, so you're wrong there I'm afraid

Are you talking to me? I'm saying it was massive.

Those figures are rough at best.

And you're wrong on two accounts:

I rounded down the Dreamcast

The PS2 was the exact number given by Wikipedia

Also, I started off with the fifth gen and was maybe a little too exaggerated with my rounding. If you look at the numbers the various consoles are close to then you could hardly blame me. 100, 30 and 10 are quite appealing and round numbers. Jumping back and forth between wiki and a thread late at night is prone to not be the most exact method. The whole purpose was just a rough estimation.

Even if growth was 'only' around 40%, then that's still MASSIVE. Sure, growth this gen has been more, but the Wii disrupted the market. I guarantee that any console manufacturer would be happy with a 40% growth for gen 8.

Also, I'm actually a Mathematician so your comment hurts  :(

:P

@ Bolded - that is then your problem. The Wikipedia number is the shipped figure provided by Sony, which, up untill some time around 2007 was actually the manufactured figure. Ie the figure you have includes all units manufactured to give to people for free, wether as demo models for shops, or more significantly, any units provided to customers under warranty.

@ Dreamcast comments - I used VGChartz numbers, but maybe you are right on that one, dunno.

And I meant no offense