==> PS3 outselling Xbox360 in NA is the best evidence of Recession.

Why people dont jump on the cheap Arcade if price is so important ?

That's because not every American is hurting yet.  

@starcraft: Yeah, my reply was more for libellule and Sqrl's posts than yours.

@libellule: That comes down to the question of whether and how the recession could affect gaming... Recession doesn't mean that everyone turns into a money-saving maniac, it just means that overall spending is down, which often causes further job losses (starting a vicious circle).

The "Recession" (large ecconomic downturn of some form) is comming because a large portion of all ecconomic growth over the last 10 years was caused by a combination of increased home prices and people being able to pull the equity out of their home; in other words, the growth of the US ecconomy has been dependant on borrowed money which is no longer available. Whether you face Stagflation, a Recession, or (potentially) something new there are hard times comming up.

With all ecconomic downturns people will be less likely to make large purchases either because they're worried about their job or the increased cost of living (higher oil prices as an example) eat away at their extra money; at the same time people tend to spend more money on inexpensive entertainment (like videogames) and cut back on larger entertainment spending.

""at the same time people tend to spend more money on inexpensive entertainment (like videogames) and cut back on larger entertainment spending.""

==> video games are inexpensive entertainement ?

u mean compared to a car ? a house ?

so u expect video games sales to stay high ?

During the great Recession of th 30s the movie industry flurshed. I expect the video game industry to stay strong. It is far cheaper for me to stay home and play video games than it is to go out all the time.

a recession hit at the end of the clinton administration, the world didn't end, video games continued doing just fine, A recession isn't as bad as people think, it just means that the gdp of a country decreases for 2 quarters in a row, in fact since 1980 they're have only been 4 recessions, and if this is indeed a recession, it will only be the 5 in 28 years,

It probably will lower the sales a bit, but not by a lot. People have less money, but they also want something to have fun with. Consoles aren't that high-priced - I've done a test with myself as bunny, and I found out that on my Wii, I have used less money pr hour than I would have by watching a movie with 2 others (price split in 3).

Small companies might get frightened by making games to a possibly declining market, so perhaps we will see more Japan-style games (O.K, that's maybe just wishful thinking)

I dont think anyone will notice the effects of a recession via game sales, unless its a very big recession it only hits a certain small % of the population in a meaningful way, in other words the majority of people still have plenty of cash, you might see a small % of people buying less games but as big hit titles affect game and console sales a lot more then a few % you will barely notice the difference if at all.

Even if people cant depend on their house value they usualy still have a job so those people are still likely to buy their entertainment, its only the people who loose their jobs or who were already pinching for pennies before that would be less likely to buy video games.