what on earth are you talking about, the  PS3 did die at $599, how do you think the 360 won the USA against it by such a wide margin if not for those intitial missteps made by Sony; price, games, and price. Maybe you'd like to rethink your argument because the PS3 didn't stay at $599 very long and the only reason it came back to beat the 360 world wide is because it lowered it's price. that's it.

if you're going to revise history, at least do it with  a modicum of objectivity and veiled deciet... this way people don't quite catch on to what you're doing.

"Not the PS3 though".... lol

Well damn, I must have imagined the dozens of Japanese games I own on PS3. Gonna go see if I can get my money back.

Decent enough upgrade from the PS3/360 + not getting caught up in stupid controller gimmicks (understanding that that the casual market's heart now belongs to iOS/Android) + offering the machine at a relatively affordable price.

It is simply a case of Sony having the most general popularity, at this point in time.

The success of the Xbox 360 was due to the launch timing and price, coupled with the slightly higher spec and more solid game lineup.
The success of the Wii was in getting non-gamers to buy in, even if they had no intention of staying, beyond these two instances Ninteno consoles generally have a relatively compact but dedicated following, Microsoft also has a compact but dedicated following, though their last console snagged a lot of "general" gamers.
Playstation has a decent chunk larger of a dedicated following but it's also better at attracting the "general" audience, just people that buy consoles for games and don't necessarilly care what brand that console is.

With that in mind the end of life sales for the current three consoles is dependant on which of the three do the best job of setting up and maintaining a solid framework to attract general gamers the best, it would seem, at this moment in time, that this accolade belongs to Playstation, but anyone making a call, right now, as to who will definitely come out on top is simply making estimations based on their own personal desires.

In short, we can say who is on top at any given point in time, but at a point where we are not even a year in to the lifetime of two of the three consoles, it's nieve to make grand assumptions.

The brand had nothing to do with it. Sony had to blow so much money to turn things around. I think the numbers are in the billions, and I believe they were never close to recovering those losses  back.

http://forum.videohelp.com/threads/291299-Sony-has-lost-over-3-billion-on-the-PS3

A little outdated, but it should paint a good picture on what a financial disaster the ps3 was, 2010 was the year the ps3 becam profitable.

http://kotaku.com/5575994/after-nearly-four-years-the-ps3-finally-turns-a-profit

They won because of the old "we don't kill as many baby seals as the next leading competitor" marketing tactic. A real classic.

3 reasons why:

1. Hype
2. Nintendo and Microsoft screwed themselves over
3. Priced better than Xbox One

The biggest reason is price. Most console gamers are casual gamers, this is why the install base is so much larger than PC gaming. People booed MS for pricing the Xbox 1 at $500.00, but a PC gamer has no problem dropping $500+ on a graphics card alone. I spent around $750 for my 7970 and EK waterblock. That is also why not alot of people game on PC's.

When I was in the military on one of my deployments they had the PS3, and 360 on pallets. the 360 outsold it much like the scene now with the Xbox1 and PS4. biggest reason was people did not want to spend $600 on the PS3. Everybody loved their PS2 especially me (Did not even own an original xbox until recently just so I could turn it into a MAME machine). But that price point for the PS3 was ridiculous for a casual gamer. It was crazy that the PS3 just sat there because when you're in the middle east the money you make is tax free, and you make extra incentive pay on top of your regular pay, i.e. per diem, danger pay, etc and still no one would buy it. When the PS3 dropped in price it started to sell but they also removed all the features that made it so cool to own in the first place, then removed them completely in updates.
When parents go out to buy a system for a kid they are looking at cost, A saleman will tell them the PS4 is $100.00 cheaper it comes with free games, and with the extra $100, they can buy another controller or a game. What do you think they are going to buy? Bang for the buck wins everytime.

The other thing is 3rd console curse it bites everyone in the booboo. Curse is real y'all

I think the OP is right on the money. Also though, a lot of the early sales would be from people who enjoyed the late PS3 Sony: The generous PS+ games and frequent releases of exclusives. It's cheeky of them to charge for online gaming though. Especially for the usual P2P systems that most games still use with matchmaking via third party servers anyway. I can't see myself ever buying a PS4 as a result. They would need some amazing singleplayer exclusives for that to happen.

Nintendo and MS are fumbling like crazy.
People really don't seem to care much about MS exclusives anymore.
You're getting a better console for the same or lower price.
That's why it's winning currently.