I think Microsoft has an amazing line up this holiday season which other then Unreal Sony is completely lacking. Seece pointed out last year Sony's Q4 actually underperformed the rest of the year combined while Microsoft did far better. This indicates that Microsoft is way more successful and powerful at Christmas then Sony has been lately.

Another big console shipper is Kinect. Sure the device's sales have slumped since launch but if Microsoft can renew interest in the device it could shift a lot of hardware. At PAX it was apparent Microsoft is really planning to drive Kinect to the bank this holiday season and if they can succeed in reviving its performance at launch it could be an ace in their hat.

Another big factor is Black Friday and Boxing Day. In the past Wii and 360 have seen massive I mean massive hardware sales on BlackFriday, in fact the Wii flourished so well Black Friday's in the past without even being significantly on sale until last year. If Microsoft gets some retailer support and offers some unmissable deals they could be in for a lot of profits. Boxing day coming at the very end of Q4 but it has the ability to ship tons of hardware making it a very important day as well.

Lastly advertising is dismal from Sony, Microsoft has so many big strong titles this winter with a good ad campaign they could probably secure far larger sales of both hardware and software.

In the end I think it will be close considering Sony's lead. But Microsoft has a real chance of giving them a run for there money. If Kinect succeeds, the software pushes hardware, blackfriday/boxingday are smashing successes and of course Microsoft can use advertising to make the 360 appear under Christmas trees everywhere then they could very well trounce Sony!

With that awesome looking star wars bundle delayed, I'd say things are a lot harder for xbox.

The holiday bundle contains Forza 3 (again) and a Crysis-2-Token and a 3 Month-Gold-Membership



 Maybe this is not  good enough.

It's not, that's a pretty crap bundle IMO

Why the hell are they bundling Forza 3 and not Forza 4? That's probably going to take away sales from F4.

ofcourse not! =p

Perhaps they will release anothter better holiday-bundle, too.

But this one will be released this Friday, so I think there will not be another bundle (except a Kinect Bundle)

i dont think it will. japan is not as big as US as a gaming market but it has no sales for xbox360 and US has few for PS3 but they have some... while PS3 will sell 50% of what XB sells in US, in japan XB will sell only 5 to 10% of PS3 numbers. EMEAA is more or less a tie! in raw numbers this give the advantage to XB but in my opinion will only get XB a shorter distance... not an overcome! i say more than half a million between them!

Last year PS3 had a 1,3M lead over X360 early Oktober and won 2011 with a lead of 0,8M. This year PS3 has a 1M lead wich is less than last year but still too big for MS to win 2011.

MS has a great holiday lineup and Kinect, but it was the same last year. A pricecut won't work either. It didn't work for Wii, it didn't work for PS3, why should it work for X360?

also if PS3 sells in EMEAA'S can equal 360 Americas sells and Japan sells help even out PS3 sells in the Americas then sony could hold its million unit lead.

its a long shot, and doubtful but hey any things possible not that it matters.

have a nice day!