Let's face it, most people bought more than one DS (some people bought 3 or 4) The difference between the fat DS and the DS light was huge. Many people that bought the DS fat bought a second DS eventually. The 3DS does not have a notable upgrade. Everyone who buys a 3DS keeps it and is satisfied with it. the 2DS is for people who just want to play a few games for as cheap as possible. I'd say actual unique playes that own the DS is somewhere around 100 million not 150 million.

The DS fat also had a hinge problems. Many of the older design had split into two. MANY people bought a second DS because of this hardware failure. We should look at popular software sales to determine how many unique players there are. Pokemon is the best example because every pokemon fan that owns a handheld WILL buy a pokemon main series game. What we do know is Pokemon X and Y is heavily outselling diamond and peal if you align the launches.

-The Vita is failing so hard that it gives Nintendo pretty much a monopoly in the dedicated handheld market

-The 3DS is single handedly crushing every console even the PS4 just like the DS crushed every console on the market

-Nintendo realizes that the Wii U may never profit so they are going all out trying to make handheld sales the best they can be

-The only reason the 3DS appears to sell slower than the DS is because of the horrible start it had

-Software sales on 3DS appear a lot smaller than the DS because a lot of games, especially in Japan, sell very well digitally

A sale is a sale. No matter the reason they had to buy a new. I'm sure a couple million of those 360s that were sold got the RROD but it still counts.

It really is. The industry has changed, smartphones and tablets are getting better and better and children are having access to those quite early these days. We haven't seen the last of it.

A toastboy thread that is defending Nintendo? Wow, I never thought that this day would come!

OP: Yes, you do have a very good point. I do believe ds would have still outsold 3ds by a good margin though.

The DS was an amazing device, and at the time was only rivaled by the PSP. Tablet and phone games are making an impact in sales and will ultimately lead the 3DS to probably sell less than the DS, but will still maintain great sales through it's lifetime.

Software sales are significantly lower for the 3DS than the DS. Even if we assume that 10-20% of games are downloaded, 3DS still falls way short. We can therefore assume that the 3DS has sold better.

homie you be tweakin

The DS also had a slow start, though. Just look at the DS numbers on 2005:

http://www.vgchartz.com/yearly/2005/Global/

10.9 million. That's less than the 3DS on 2011.

Before this turns into another "hurrdurr itz cuz of da tablitz nd smartfones. handheldz r d00med. consolez r d00med. gming is ded" type of thing, I think a big reason the 3DS is lacking is because its name at first confused the market (a lot of people I know just recently realized the 3DS is not a DS [those poor souls bought X/Y for their DS XD]), also it had negative criticism for the first part of its life. Many unaware of console sales still think of the device as a "failure" (first impressions are important), so it definitely got rid of any possible lead the 3DS had over the DS in the same life span.

1.) that's what I'm saying, 3DS has a monoploy so it should be selling even better than the DS

3.) No. Smash bros is coming to 3DS, more zeldas on 3ds than Wii U. It has pokemon the Wii U doesn't. It has just as many mario games as the Wii U.

5.) It's not fair to compare TOTAL software sales because the DS had a bunch of hits such as brain training, nintendawgs etc that arent as big anymore. It's more fair to compare specific comparable games.