No. Sold=sold to Sony, shipped games do not go back to Sony, thats why when a game sells like shit it gets pricecuts. And yes, shipped IS relevant becoz those are the only official numbers we get. Eventough not all shipped games are actually sold, the shipped numbers still increase becoz of new games, wich means actual sold to customer increase aswell.

I think so, depends on PS3 outlasting the 360 though...

Both consoles are gonna get pretty much the same support from 3rd parties, other than rare occasions. These games are starting to sell similarly too. It's gonna come down to 1st Party support. Sony pump out more exclusives, so logic would dictate that the PS3 will slowly but surely catch the 360 number.

there are a couple of issues with you logic that I need to point out ( including your previous post to):

-360 games are undertracked, but by that logic some PS3 games are harder to track outside of the US, and Sony is also offering DD. SO I dont see how thats an advantage for MS.

- big japanese games often pass the million mark WW, while they struggle to pass the half million mark on the 360.

- Sony has no big seller as Halo, but it has far more games lined up that could cross the million mark.

- some western games sell far more on the 360... that doesnt stop the PS3 version to push over a million sales ( ME, Borderlands, Skyrim etc.).

- Halo 4 will sell less then the next CoD on the 360 alone, like it or not. Also, sales will be cannibalized by eachother...

So overall (except my halo argument) IMO all signs point that the PS3 will easily pass the # off million sellers the 360 will have LT, and worst case Im seeing the LT software sales to be in the 50 million mark LT from eachother, but I wouldent be surprised if when all is said and done theer will be a virtual tie ( just as Im expecting on the HW front).

I guess you never worked in retail.  Unsold invetory like games and movies will eventually be send back to manufactures if all unsold games would be heavily discounded as soon as they are not sold then their would be no incentive for consumers to buy new merchandise.  Trust me a lot of unsold inventory gets send back to manufactures which then send it to none mainstream retailers and outlet chains that sell it at a heavily discounted price.  Or if a game really bombs like ET on the Atari 2600 it will just get destoyed and dumbed somewhere.

yeah, but games never go back to Sony or publishers. Sold=sold

Shipped does not mean sold.  I worked in retail before and unsold inventory does get send back to manufactures all the time don't believe me ask some people that work in retail about it.  Did you even read my response.  Also I guess you never heard about ET on the Atari 2600 million of unsold copies got destroyed and buried in a New Mexico landfill.  Unsold merchandise gets send back, dumbed or destroyed all the time the only think that doesn't apply to is big pieces of merchandise like automobiles.  Also like I said before their would be no incentive for customers to buy new merchandise if all they had to do is wait a couple of weeks for every unsold piece of merchandise to be heavily discounted.

O god those PSP numbers.

I knew it was bad but, holy jeebus.

I miss the time when PS3 only had 5 million sellers after one year and that people made predictions that PS3 will never come close 'with total million sellers' as Wii and for sure X360...

What? How? Even I see it and I'm one of those Nintendo Zombies.