February- june 2015

It's hard to say. We'll certainly know more when they both drop to the $299 range (maybe fall 2015ish imho is likely). That's when a good number of 7th gen holdouts will start coming to join the party. Remember that a lot of people only recently bought 7th gen consoles, and there are a huge number of people who like to play games that don't have a lot of discretionary income at all.

Anyway, back to your Q, I'd estimate 95-115M PS4, with XB1 running about 40% of that total, plus or minus a few million. It could turn out worse for both of them. The ratios appear pretty locked in though, so it's severely unlikely that anything will change the gap. Europe is dead to XB1, so is Japan/China for various reasons (ditto PS4 to be honest, that's a mobile world for Japan and a PC/pirate world for China). So that leaves the US/UK. Even IF (and that's a HUGE HUGE HUGE "IF") the XB1 magically manages to pull close to the PS4 in the US/UK, it won't be enough to get anywhere in the same universe of closing the gap globally.

Install bases snowball, as people want to play with their friends, and the lead in Europe is so huge that XB1 may start to suffer from stores not even stocking them within a year or two, or at the very least severely limited shelf space, merchandising, advertising.

Right now people are still living in a partial fantasy land because 360 was so popular in the US last gen. But if you look at the numbers, XB1 had a great Nov/Dec, and has been in a tailspin ever since. It was front-loaded to their most dedicated fanbase, but isn't capturing the attention of the wider market at all. If they can't change that, they're as good as dead. Their business model isn't built like Nintendo where they can fly under the radar a bit, their operations are immensely expensive and built on mass adoption.

Right now the Playstation 4 white Destiny bundle is already in the top 20 of Amazon of june. Already higher as both Xbox One SKU's. While they had like a 8 days headstart.

Edited... read it wrong :)

Because I do believe that it will. I think a lot of XB1 sales will come towards the latter part of the gen when it's cheaper. A lot of PS4-only players will pick one up as second systems to play the great exclusives they missed out on. A lot of the casuals that make respectable targets for XB1 customers also won't leap until the thing is $249/$199 kind of price as well (keep in mind MILLIONS of these 7th gen consoles were sold in the past 12-24 months alone, and likely these 'value/casual' customers aren't jumping to 8G for a good while yet).

So yeah : PS4 heavy advantage through 2015, but then I think the PS4 will decel a bit and the monthly gaps will get smaller, especially in the US. With the right moneyhatted exclusives and hyped stuff, they might even take a month or two here and there in the scrappy mid to late years of the gen.

Once the most dedicated gamers already have their console of choice (which so far has been nearly 2:1 in favor of PS4), as time goes by these very same poeple are more and more likely to have a few hundred bucks burning a hole in their pockets wanting to grab another console for an instant backlog of great titles. This could potentially be a silver lining for the XB1 in my opinion.

For me, Sony and MS have reversed positions... the PS4 is easy to use, has a great online system with PS+... you can see all your friends with it... these early adopters then start to filter down to their friends.

It's actually quite crazy how Sony have been able to (with MS's help) flip it over. The big benefit that MS had previously was that it had a years headstart on Sony in the previous gen... which gave it a massive gap and that "my friends are playing" issue for Sony... it didnt help that MS were able to price cut whenever Sony were able to reduce the price, so they were always on the back foot. Now without the year gap and Sony being initially cheaper... it's MS that is on the backfoot.

People are also forgetting about Europe/Rest of the world... the gap over there is worse for MS and even with a console that has price parity, sony is going to be selling more.. I mean they did even last gen. So even if USA starts to even out, Europe and Japan (if they start to like consoles again)... will give Sony that bigger worldwide gap.

As a footnote to the gap situation, and why I believe the doubling will be soon :

Amazon Current charting :

#1 : Mario Kart U
#2, #3, #4, #5 : PS Gift Cards
#6 : Persona Q for 3DS
#7 : Destiny PS4
#8 : Xbox $10 Card
#9 : PS4 Bare Console
#10 : Halo MCC
#11 : PS4 Destiny Console
#18 : Destiny XB1
#23 : Playstation TV
#39 : XB1 Bare Console
#43 : PS4 Camera
#51 : XB1 Titanfall Bundle
#59 : WiiU 32GB

Notice that the XB1 stuff has plummeted and only benefitted from the E3/$399 timing for a couple of days. It's already back to the lower tiers on the charts (and never breached the PS4 console levels, or honestly even came close).

Yes I absolutely do in terms of primary consoles for online players, the kind of people who talk about games, who spend $399 on a flagship console, and who are the first couple years of buyers in sizable numbers. Those kinds of people are definitely influenced to a fair degree by what the consensus is of where they should jump first.

But those very same people can be brought back to the market eventually to pick up a companion console. Tons of people that were 360 only bought PS3s late this gen to play desired exclusives. And I personally know a number of PS3 and/or Wii only folks who jumped to 360 when a favorite title emerged there.

The two are not mutually exclusive. Essentially installed base snowballing = 1st tier, second console buyers = overflow for people ready for a new set of experiences in addition to their mainline platform.

The weeks after the release of Fifa 15 are PS4's best chance this year.

dont think it will double it honestly.