I see a lot of gloom and doom over everything being under 100k, so I thought I'd try to give some perspective to the situation. Here's generation-over-generation sales in North America from the 8-bit era to the seventh generation:

Now here's combined annual sales in the U.S. from 1995 to 2013, as well as my personal projections for this year and next year (next year's assume a 50% year-over-year increase in PS4 and XBO sales from my 2014 estimate, a decrease of about 15% in YoY Wii U sales, and a 50% YoY drop for the 360 and PS3):

(Note: There are no readily available N64 and PS1 sales figures past 2001 despite both systems remaining on the market well past then, so 2002, 2003, and possibly 2004 are likely smaller than they really were)

The market may be "contracting" compared to last generation, but there may be no reason to get all gloom-and-doom about it. While I don't think the Wii was driven primarily by "casuals" and non-gamers, I do think it was an anomaly. It was by far the fastest-selling system of all time, and I also believe it resulted in a considerably larger number of multi-system households due to its unique nature and low price relative to the others. With the Wii U failing to replicate that success, the market appears to be correcting back towards a more "normal" cycle. If you'll notice, despite the fact that the sixth generation was considerably larger than the fifth, combined yearly sales of all platforms result in the sixth-gen curve from 2000 to 2005 not being too dissimilar from the one from 1996 to 2000. Had the Wii ended up selling only as well as the GameCube, with each year from 2007 to 2013 averaging only about 25% of what it actually did, we would also have seen a curve with peaks and troughs that don't differ greatly from the two preceding curves. Assuming that A) my projections for 2014 & 2015 are accurate to within 10%, B) 2015 is the peak for the PS4 and XBO (the second full calendar year is the normal peak), C) the ninth generation has a more normal duration (as opposed to the abnormal length of the seventh generation), and D) the PS4 and XBO have decent sales legs, then the cycle in the years from 2013 to circa 2020 may follow a curve more or less like those of the late 90s & early 2000s. Even if the current cycle and the total number of current-gen consoles sold isn't as large as last time, it's still health. Perhaps the market already hit saturation in the early 2000s and is now only growing as a function of population growth and the gradual increase of the average age of gamers.

It's also worth pointing out that in launch-aligned terms, the PS4, XBO, and Wii U sold a combined 1,828,000 units during their respective first winter quarters (Q1 of this year for the PS4 & XBO, Q1 '13 for the Wii U). For the 360, PS3, and Wii, the total was 2,134,000 while for the PS2, Xbox, and GC it was 1,682,000. Not too shabby for the current generation considering the Wii was hot, hot, hot! The current quarter isn't looking too hot for the current quarter compared to the others, however, but combined aligned first Q1+Q2 sales don't look too bad.

If you want to just go by non-aligned years, it favors the current generation even more. The PS2 and Dreamcast were the only sixth-gen systems on the market in the first half of 2001. The Dreamcast sold somewhere between 350k to 400k in the first quarter of that year while the PS2 pulled about 1028k according to the only source of Q1 '01 sales I could find. That's a total of around 1400k, give or take. Q2 was even worse, as they sold somewhere around 1100k to 1200k combined. The 360 was the only new seventh-gen system on the market for the first three quarters of 2006, yet it pulled 603k in Q1 2006 and 793k in Q2. Meanwhile, in Q1 of this year ninth-gen systems sold a combined 1839k, and as mentioned they appear to be on track to pull upwards of 1100k for Q2, putting the tally of ninth-gen systems sold in the U.S in the first half of 2014 at nearly 3 million.

In any case, uptake of new systems is at a higher rate than before, with record launches in Q4 last year and a strong Q1 this year. In fact, last time around uptake of new systems was incredibly slow except for the Wii. The 360's sluggish launch (607k in Q4 2005) plus the 1396k it sold in the first half of 2006 showed that there was a decent but not huge rush to buy a shiny new next-gen system. The PS3 and 360 sold a combined 2011k in the first half of 2007, further reinforcing that view. Had the Wii only pulled GameCube-level sales (which a lot of analysts considered a distinct possibility before the system launched), the first half of 2007 might have seen only 2600-2700k units sold. Of course, there are other confounding factors to take into consideration. There's games, pricing, release timing, buzz/marketing, system shortages, etc., which can all affect a system's performance quarter to quarter, month to month.

Yes, the current spring quarter is considerably down from the winter quarter, but not only is the spring quarter almost always the weakest for any system, when you put everything into a historical context and understand all the things that can influence sales (e.g., the current generation had a huge launch and thus the likelihood of some considerable front-loading, the PS4 was supply limited during Q1 of this year, the XBO was overpriced and had little to distinguish it from the PS4 besides an accessory few wanted, the XBO also had a value-priced bundle containing a game that had a lot of hype and excitement surrounding it, and many games both multiplat and exclusive have been pushed back to 2015), you'll see that current sales aren't anything to be worried about. Sales of "conventional" systems (i.e., the PS4 and XBO) are in fact quite strong compared to the sales of other such systems (i.e., everything except the Wii) in the last three generations before this one.

It's also worth pointing out that in launch-aligned terms, the PS4, XBO, and Wii U sold a combined 1,828,000 units during their respective first winter quarters (Q1 of this year for the PS4 & XBO, Q1 '13 for the Wii U). For the 360, PS3, and Wii, the total was 2,134,000 while for the PS2, Xbox, and GC it was 1,682,000. Not too shabby for the current generation considering the Wii was hot, hot, hot! The current quarter isn't looking too good compared to the others, however, but combined aligned first Q1+Q2 sales don't look too bad.

If you want to just go by non-aligned years, it favors the current generation even more. The PS2 and Dreamcast were the only sixth-gen systems on the market in the first half of 2001. The Dreamcast sold somewhere between 350k to 400k in the first quarter of that year while the PS2 pulled about 1028k according to the only source of Q1 '01 sales I could find. That's a total of around 1400k, give or take. Q2 was even worse, as they sold somewhere around 1100k to 1200k combined. The 360 was the only new seventh-gen system on the market for the first three quarters of 2006, yet it pulled 603k in Q1 2006 and 793k in Q2. Meanwhile, in Q1 of this year ninth-gen systems sold a combined 1839k, and as mentioned they appear to be on track to pull upwards of 1100k for Q2, putting the tally of ninth-gen systems sold in the U.S in the first half of 2014 at nearly 3 million.

In any case, uptake of new systems is at a higher rate than before, with record launches in Q4 last year and a strong Q1 this year. In fact, last time around uptake of new systems was incredibly slow except for the Wii. The 360's sluggish launch (607k in Q4 2005) plus the 1396k it sold in the first half of 2006 showed that there was a decent but not huge rush to buy a shiny new next-gen system. The PS3 and 360 sold a combined 2011k in the first half of 2007, further reinforcing that view. Had the Wii only pulled GameCube-level sales (which a lot of analysts considered a distinct possibility before the system launched), the first half of 2007 might have seen only 2600-2700k units sold. Of course, there are other confounding factors to take into consideration. There's games, pricing, release timing, buzz/marketing, system shortages, etc., which can all affect a system's performance quarter to quarter, month to month.

Yes, the current spring quarter is considerably down from the winter quarter, but not only is the spring quarter almost always the weakest for any system, when you put everything into a historical context and understand all the things that can influence sales (e.g., the current generation had a huge launch and thus the likelihood of some considerable front-loading, the PS4 was supply limited during Q1 of this year, the XBO was overpriced and had little to distinguish it from the PS4 besides an accessory few wanted, the XBO also had a value-priced bundle containing a game that had a lot of hype and excitement surrounding it, and many games both multiplat and exclusive have been pushed back to 2015), you'll see that current sales aren't anything to be worried about. Sales of "conventional" systems (i.e., the PS4 and XBO) are in fact quite strong compared to the sales of other such systems (i.e., everything except the Wii) in the last three generations before this one.

It's also worth pointing out that in launch-aligned terms, the PS4, XBO, and Wii U sold a combined 1,828,000 units during their respective first winter quarters (Q1 of this year for the PS4 & XBO, Q1 '13 for the Wii U). For the 360, PS3, and Wii, the total was 2,134,000 while for the PS2, Xbox, and GC it was 1,682,000. Not too shabby for the current generation considering the Wii was hot, hot, hot! The current quarter isn't looking too good compared to the others, however, but combined aligned first Q1+Q2 sales don't look too bad.

If you want to just go by non-aligned years, it favors the current generation even more. The PS2 and Dreamcast were the only sixth-gen systems on the market in the first half of 2001. The Dreamcast sold somewhere between 350k to 400k in the first quarter of that year while the PS2 pulled about 1028k according to the only source of Q1 '01 sales I could find. That's a total of around 1400k, give or take. Q2 was even worse, as they sold somewhere around 1100k to 1200k combined. The 360 was the only new seventh-gen system on the market for the first three quarters of 2006, yet it pulled 603k in Q1 2006 and 793k in Q2. Meanwhile, in Q1 of this year ninth-gen systems sold a combined 1839k, and as mentioned they appear to be on track to pull upwards of 1100k for Q2, putting the tally of ninth-gen systems sold in the U.S in the first half of 2014 at nearly 3 million.

In any case, uptake of new systems is at a higher rate than before, with record launches in Q4 last year and a strong Q1 this year. In fact, last time around uptake of new systems was incredibly slow except for the Wii. The 360's sluggish launch (607k in Q4 2005) plus the 1396k it sold in the first half of 2006 showed that there was a decent but not huge rush to buy a shiny new next-gen system. The PS3 and 360 sold a combined 2011k in the first half of 2007, further reinforcing that view. Had the Wii only pulled GameCube-level sales (which a lot of analysts considered a distinct possibility before the system launched), the first half of 2007 might have seen only 2600-2700k units sold. Of course, there are other confounding factors to take into consideration. There's games, pricing, release timing, buzz/marketing, system shortages, etc., which can all affect a system's performance quarter to quarter, month to month.

Yes, the current spring quarter is considerably down from the winter quarter, but not only is the spring quarter almost always the weakest for any system, when you put everything into a historical context and understand all the things that can influence sales (e.g., the current generation had a huge launch and thus the likelihood of some considerable front-loading, the PS4 was supply limited during Q1 of this year, the XBO was overpriced and had little to distinguish it from the PS4 besides an accessory few wanted, the XBO also had a value-priced bundle containing a game that had a lot of hype and excitement surrounding it, and many games both multiplat and exclusive have been pushed back to 2015), you'll see that current sales aren't anything to be worried about. Sales of "conventional" systems (i.e., the PS4 and XBO) are in fact quite strong compared to the sales of other such systems (i.e., everything except the Wii) in the last three generations before this one.

Someone tl;dr this please?!

I see a lot of gloom and doom over everything being under 100k, so I thought I'd try to give some perspective to the situation. Here's generation-over-generation sales in North America from the 8-bit era to the seventh generation:

Now here's combined annual sales in the U.S. from 1995 to 2013, as well as my personal projections for this year and next year (next year's assume a 50% year-over-year increase in PS4 and XBO sales from my 2014 estimate, a decrease of about 15% in YoY Wii U sales, and a 50% YoY drop for the 360 and PS3):

(Note: There are no readily available N64 and PS1 sales figures past 2001 despite both systems remaining on the market well past then, so 2002, 2003, and possibly 2004 are likely smaller than they really were)

The market may be "contracting" (in the sense of fewer hardware units being sold, which is distinct from the number of customers) compared to last generation, but there may be no reason to get all gloom-and-doom about it. While I don't think the Wii was driven primarily by "casuals" and non-gamers, I do think it was an anomaly. It was by far the fastest-selling system of all time, and I also believe it resulted in a considerably larger number of multi-system households due to its unique nature and low price relative to the others. With the Wii U failing to replicate that success, the market appears to be correcting back towards a more "normal" cycle. If you'll notice, despite the fact that the sixth generation was considerably larger than the fifth, combined yearly sales of all platforms result in the sixth-gen curve from 2000 to 2005 not being too dissimilar from the one from 1996 to 2000. Had the Wii ended up selling only as well as the GameCube, with each year from 2007 to 2013 averaging only about 25% of what it actually did, we would also have seen a curve with peaks and troughs that don't differ greatly from the two preceding curves. Assuming that A) my projections for 2014 & 2015 are accurate to within 10%, B) 2015 is the peak for the PS4 and XBO (the second full calendar year is the normal peak), C) the ninth generation has a more normal duration (as opposed to the abnormal length of the seventh generation), and D) the PS4 and XBO have decent sales legs, then the cycle in the years from 2013 to circa 2020 may follow a curve more or less like those of the late 90s & early 2000s. Even if the current cycle and the total number of current-gen consoles sold isn't as large as last time, it's still health. Perhaps the market already hit saturation in the early 2000s and is now only growing as a function of population growth and the gradual increase of the average age of gamers.

EDIT: I also forgot to mention that each consecutive trough in the console cycle has been higher than the preceding one. Less than five million consoles were sold in 1995. In 2000 is was about 8 million. In 2005 it was just over 10 million. Last year it was about 11.3 million. The maket actually stays healthier during each subsequent contraction, and it really makes the gloom-and-doom arguments from around 2011 to 2013 when the cycle was on the downwards-trending part sound really ridiculous. Not only did most of them fail to recognize that 2011 and 2012 were respectively the fifth and ninth biggest years since 1995, many failed to notice that there was an actual console cycle to begin with.

It's also worth pointing out that in launch-aligned terms, the PS4, XBO, and Wii U sold a combined 1,828,000 units during their respective first winter quarters (Q1 of this year for the PS4 & XBO, Q1 '13 for the Wii U). For the 360, PS3, and Wii, the total was 2,134,000 while for the PS2, Xbox, and GC it was 1,682,000. Not too shabby for the current generation considering the Wii was hot, hot, hot! The current quarter isn't looking too good compared to the others, however, but combined aligned first Q1+Q2 sales don't look too bad.

If you want to just go by non-aligned years, it favors the current generation even more. The PS2 and Dreamcast were the only sixth-gen systems on the market in the first half of 2001. The Dreamcast sold somewhere between 350k to 400k in the first quarter of that year while the PS2 pulled about 1028k according to the only source of Q1 '01 sales I could find. That's a total of around 1400k, give or take. Q2 was even worse, as they sold somewhere around 1100k to 1200k combined. The 360 was the only new seventh-gen system on the market for the first three quarters of 2006, yet it pulled 603k in Q1 2006 and 793k in Q2. Meanwhile, in Q1 of this year ninth-gen systems sold a combined 1839k, and as mentioned they appear to be on track to pull upwards of 1100k for Q2, putting the tally of ninth-gen systems sold in the U.S in the first half of 2014 at nearly 3 million.

In any case, uptake of new systems is at a higher rate than before, with record launches in Q4 last year and a strong Q1 this year. In fact, last time around uptake of new systems was incredibly slow except for the Wii. The 360's sluggish launch (607k in Q4 2005) plus the 1396k it sold in the first half of 2006 showed that there was a decent but not huge rush to buy a shiny new next-gen system. The PS3 and 360 sold a combined 2011k in the first half of 2007, further reinforcing that view. Had the Wii only pulled GameCube-level sales (which a lot of analysts considered a distinct possibility before the system launched), the first half of 2007 might have seen only 2600-2700k units sold. Of course, there are other confounding factors to take into consideration. There's games, pricing, release timing, buzz/marketing, system shortages, etc., which can all affect a system's performance quarter to quarter, month to month.

Yes, the current spring quarter is considerably down from the winter quarter, but not only is the spring quarter almost always the weakest for any system, when you put everything into a historical context and understand all the things that can influence sales (e.g., the current generation had a huge launch and thus the likelihood of some considerable front-loading, the PS4 was supply limited during Q1 of this year, the XBO was overpriced and had little to distinguish it from the PS4 besides an accessory few wanted, the XBO also had a value-priced bundle containing a game that had a lot of hype and excitement surrounding it, and many games both multiplat and exclusive have been pushed back to 2015), you'll see that current sales aren't anything to be worried about. Sales of "conventional" systems (i.e., the PS4 and XBO) are in fact quite strong compared to the sales of other such systems (i.e., everything except the Wii) in the last three generations before this one.

U

You should read it, it's excellent.

But fine. Long story short; consoles are just fine, they ain't going anywhere. Stop worrying.