For starters, I don't think the PS3 will beat the Wii in 2007, I think going forward from that it is completely possible, but I just think Wii is on too much of a high wave with too many games coming for the rest of the year for that wave to stop this year.  I believe the PS3 will surpass the 360 during 2008 but not 2007.



I don't know what you are looking at compared to me, but I don't know how you can say that it is doing well in ANY region so far.  Gundam moved a few units but not enough to call it a bit jump.  I don't believe there will be a jump in numbers for the USA in march.  I hate to say it but I believe you will be disappointed with the March NPD no's.



I think of course it is a game war, but fundamentally there are SOME games that control which direction a lot of people go.

Your comment that the PS3 will sell 5 million WW in Nov/Dec is pretty massive... care to give me a breakdown on that?  I think it is a little optimistic, but we'll see.



Price cut is coming, of course a price cut is coming at some stage, it is corporate suicide to keep the price up for all of the consoles life, but I don't think the price cut is going to be during 2007, honestly I can't see Sony sustaining the extra losses.  Think about the differences with the current hardware cost (even being lenient).

Currently say $130 loss per console (it's probably higher but we'll give them the benefit of the doubt and that they can lower costs this year).

Roughly 3 million sold WW currently that is a total lost of $390,000,000 and going by what your estimates are I would say you believe them to sell roughly 15 million total at the end of 2007.  Total loss of $1,950,000,000 of console cost at the current price.  Lets say what you say about 5 million sales in nov/dec comes true and they have dropped the price by $100 then, so they are making $190 loss per console (being fair that price of the hardware to produce will have gone down at least $40 over the year - remember i'm still being lenient).

The total cost of the first 10 mil is $1,300,000,000 and then total cost of the next 5 mil is $950,000,000 that's a total of $2,250,000,000 LOSS with a total sales base of 15 million units.

Current attach rate WW is roughly 2.6 which is a fairly accurate (historically) attachment rate, and allowing for 3 - 3.5 attach rate being REALLY generous for these 15 million units that gives a total games sale amount of 52,500,000 worldwide this year.  Sony makes about $10 per game and therefore $525,000,000 in profit from the games that are sold.  Leaving with total worldwide gaming sales for that year a loss of $1,725,000,000 with a price drop.  Honestly I can't see Sony wearing that amount of money and I'm being HUGELY generous on total game sales AND the amount that Sony is wearing per unit.

Secondly , I think Home will also be a huge deal, but I don't believe it will be a 3d youtube or myspace, it will simply take TOO MUCH time to penetrate to those levels.

Lair, Heavinly Sword, Warhawk, Killzone, Ratchet and Clank, Uncharted, GTA4 and Assassins Creed are the games you claim to be huge and massive for the PS3 this year.  I beg to differ about the majority of these games.

Aside from GTA4 NOTHING in this list is proven as a big seller especially at the current install of the console, and NONE of these are system pushing games that people who don't already own the console will buy.  I'm sure most of them will be lapped up by PS3 owners, but those games aren't big enough or good enough to push hardware... GTA4 is an exception and I Assassins Creed is also an exception, HOWEVER they are multi platform and the 360 has a MUCH bigger user base and will chomp a big portion of those games total sales numbers.  I can individually break down the sales expectations of these and then break that down even further on a history basis with hardware volume and attachment ratio of similar games in history, also taking into account percentage increase in sales.

Historically looking at the PS2 sales data and the speed and momentum of the console, it really started to pick up with the advent of three games, Gran Turismo, GTA3 and Final Fantasy (on a WW front).  Two of those games are 2008 games which I have NO DOUBT will be the real beginning of the PS3's push for the top.  But I think you're overly optimistic about 2007, those games are 'fill in games'.



This is the year of the PS3, sales will REALLY ramp up in 2008, it really is just getting started at the moment, and when these big games hit then I also agree that thing will be looking up for the PS3, more exclusives will start to hit and more 1st party games will be coming, big titles and a price drop during 2008 will be the cleancher - hell what does 360 have after Halo 3 as a MASSIVE HUGE title? Nothing - PS3 has a huge bunch - FF13, MGS4, GT5 they are the killers and as long as they stay PS3 exclusives then the PS3 is not going anywhere.

All i'm really showing in this post is that PS3 is not going to control 2007, it's got nothing this year.  Absolutely nothing - you'll see what I mean when you see the NPD data on Thursday.  But 2008 is a different story, and the great thing about PS3 is the potential, which is why it's not selling great right now, but it WILL when the potential starts to be realised (which is 2008).

People who say that PS3 can't do better graphics than 360 (really the only thing that will set them apart) are kidding themselves, PS3 hasn't been taken advantage of yet and the Cell Processor and development structure allows for longtime optimisation, it was the same situation with the PS2, HUGELY powerful but took time for developers to get used to it, this meant that constantly BETTER looking games appeared as the life of the PS2 progressed, I'm sure Sony want a similar occurrence for the PS3 (rather than all games looking great and the same like on 360 and with GC and Xbox last gen).

The biggest problem for PS3 is not competing with 360, it's that it isn't directly fighting for the Wii market, and I don't think they can without a HUGELY lower price.

5 mill - 1 in Japan, 2/2.5 in NA and rest in rest of the world give or take, remember Nov and Dec.

Sonys loses are a bitch to say, do profits form Br offset PS3 costs?... does anything Cell is used for be a part of PS3 cost offset ?.... then there is the PSP and the PS2.

 Sony is a big ass company recovering well this year, they will be able to eat Ps3 costs.  Price drop should be capable this year, Br prices down, 65nano chips, no emotion engine.

 Games - what no faith in sony games ?

Lair - a show pieace for the PS3, pretty graphics.  (could bePS3s Gears) F5 knows how to make flying games.

Uncharted -  look at naughty dogs history, full $$$ backing form Sony themselfs.  This game has the making of becoming the next big thing.

Heavenly Sword - basicly god of war with a chick, as long as they dont mess it up.

Killzone - who knows... can be a huge hit, got to wait for E3

Rachat and Clank - lots of good hype from the game sites, devs know what they are doing.  Establiched franchise.

LittleBigPlanet - lots of hype, can be a massive hit.

Warhawk - price will be a big part of success. 

 and remember these are Sony games which will get full backing by Sony marketing.

 

Well, there are cases of a console comming from behind but it usually the console that was in the lead was released earlier and had slow sales through out its life; the SNES passed the Genesis at roughly 10 Million units, the Playstation and Saturn battled it out until they Playstation sold about 5 Million units and took off, and the PS2 passed the Dreamcast at 8 Million units.

Currently, the Wii is selling about as quickly as a system can and the PS3 is selling nearly as slowly as a living console can; in order for the PS3 to pass the Wii in 2009 they would have to switch sales sometime in 2008 which seems unlikely.

Such a comeback has never happened (SNES was only behind due to Genesis' headstart - it made up ground quickly WW thanks to Japan, PS1 started relatively slowly but better WW than the Saturn and had gained a huge lead by the time the N64 was released) but just like the myth of the PS2's slow start, some prefer to stick their heads into the sand instead of facing reality.

why not just sit and wait, and see? =)

there is a lot of nuances, which you people can`t know.

Too much.

Will sony drop ps3 price or not? will M$ drop? will live! become free? will home and psn surpass Live! ? will MGS4 be as good as TGS05, will killzone2 be as good as e3 2k5, will ffxiii be as good as e3 2k6, will mgs4 and ffxiii stay exclusive? will Halo3 be as good as e3 2k6, will mass effect imrpove graphics, will lost odyssey successful in japan and other countries? will xbox360 sell better in japan after cry on, LO, ES? will GT5 be realistic? how many people will by killzone2 because of it`s awesome graphics? how many new 3rd party exclusives will get x360/ps3? and etc. =)

  

 

 

I think that untimately the ps3 and the 360 are going to be fighting for 2nd place..  but in the long term they will both overtake the wii... its hard to say whether which console will win. but you never know when they might release a xbox 720 or ps4 even though i do believe the new xbox system will come out before the new sony system and around the same time as the new nintendo system just do to the fact that sony keeps statin reapetedly that they wanna have one of the longest lifespans with their system.. which could be one of the reasons everyone says they will be no. 1 in the longterm.. but who knows???

There are a couple very simple things going against the PS3 reclaiming #1.

 1.  No console in a given generation that was the most expensive never took the first spot against cheaper competitiors.  Look at Saturn, 3DO, Turbo Grafx 16, and Neo Geo for great examples.

 2.  This one is kind of superstitious but no console in the past 20 years has ever dominated for more than two generations straight. 

Add to the fact that Wii is outselling it by a large margin and Microsoft is formidable competitor makes a Sony "comeback" extrememly hard but not impossible.  I believe Nintendo will be the #1 for this gen. (Just look at vg charts on how fast they are catching up and either PS3 or 360 will be at #2.   Its harder to determine that one.)

 

Unless PS3 goes to $300 in 2008 or earlier, it will have no chance in this gen. There is no reason why MS and Sony can both have multiple SKUs and Nintendo can only have one. I think that Nintendo will have an HD enabled Wii SKU by 2009 (when the format war settles or the multiformat reader becomes competitively priced (as in <$100 wholesale). So, if Sony doesn't drop to $300 by 2008, when Nintendo comes out with an HD SKU, the game will be over. It will have the install base, support for HD for those interested, and maintain low price and form factor.

As a consumer, Wii is just the best choice now. It's got an interesting interface, buzz, and low price. It can easily tide me over until it somehow (magically) have no games coming out for it and I have to buy a 360 or a ps3, but by then they will be $300 or less, so I would have paid less overall than getting them now and wait for the games while it depreciates.  By then, I might opt for the Wii HD anyway

for 360 and PS3 gamers, it doesn't really matter if the Wii ends up as number 1. Most likely, the 360 and PS3 will combine for more sales than the Wii. As a result you'll still see 3rd parties mostly supporting PS3/360 in the form of multiplatform games b/c the PS360 install base is bigger than the Wii. A lot of people are also saying exclusives are gonna shift to the 360, which I think is gonna be false. Sony may lose exclusivity, but they'll still get the game (like DMC4). The only way MS steals exclusivity from Sony franchises is if MS pays for it, or the XBOX pulls away from the PS3 at a brisk pace. With Sony's momentum in Europe and clear advantage in Japan, this second possibility seems unlikely. Basically, I'm in the camp that thinks 3rd party exclusives are dying and will be pretty much dead by some point in 2008/9.