High price? Shortages? Or that it has only been in the market for half a year and has seen no Christmas season yet?

Today I learned that the United States is a continent, 2 million is equal to 2.6 million, and that there's no reason for consoles to sell fewer units in 8 months than in 48 months.

I mean I guess you could say all those are reasons, but the bigger issue is that nearly half of the Switch's market is in Japan, which means that a ton of Switch's are going into Japan and not America. 2 million Switch's have been sold in Japan, 2.6 have been sold in America. 

It's like being a native to Japan and asking why are PS4 sales so low if it's breaking so many records? (the analogy isn't perfect because the U.S. is one of Nintendo's biggest markets, but the point is that having nearly equal holding in two territories makes a limited console seem less impressive in one territory)...It just does not make a whole lot of sense. 

But I think Nintendo and the companies regard the USA together with Canada and Mexico as a market, "the Americas".

And the headlin of thread says 2.6 million but ppl inside the thread are quoting 2 million.

What do you mean by 8 months versus 48 months? Who in recent history sold only 2.6 million consoles in the USA in 48 months?

I never knew the US was a whole continent.

Jokes aside, once you include Canada, Mexico, and all those other NA counties, the total for North America is most likely at 3 million. And yeah, only been 8 months, 8 months that didnt include a holiday season.

Bold: funnily that's actually something I've scratched by head over all the time since I've started following console sales ten years ago. Why are the Japan sales numbers for Sony and others so small for a country with 127 million people and a population supposedly so crazy about video games?

It's purpose from day 1 was to make Sony more money. They didn't push the hardware limits at all, but they noticed a market for a mid gen upgrade and so they pulled the trigger a year ahead of the XB1X. The XB1X on the other hand, as far as I can tell barely breaks even. MS wants a better XB brand and good faith from consumers, thus XB1X. MS barely makes any money from HW anymore, so they aren't too worried about the XB1X.

Okay, have you read anything at all in this thread? I'm honestly confused at how you missed pretty much all of the relevant information.

From the OP:

"The total number of Nintendo Switch systems sold in the United States through the end of October now stands at more than 2.6 million."

Nintendo announced that Switch sales in the United States alone were over 2.6 million by the end of October. In this thread, we were also discussing their previous announcment that Switch had passed 2 million in the United States by the end of September.

If you want to hear about the Americas as a whole, Nintendo shipped 3.11 million Switch units by the end of September.

Finally, 8 months versus 48 months is about your comment that Switch sales are unimpressive because they're 10% (which isn't true, 2.6 / 20 is not 10%) of PS4 sales, when Switch has been out for 8 months with zero holiday seasons, and PS4 has been out for 48 months and 4 holiday seasons.

Because Japanese gamers care more about portability on average than a home experience. The 3DS outsold the PS2 over there. The PS2 sold 150 million and the 3DS sold 65+ million. Portability has just been progressively more important for Japanese consumers, or has become more attractive. And to be clear that's not a dig at the PS2, 20+ million sales is nothing to scaw at. 

Okay, sorry. It's good that you bring perspective to this and explain. I now realize that a few years from now, the Switch sales numbers will be several dozen million worldwide.

In my defense though, my reaction was quite similar to this Colin Moriarty guy, whoever that is:

"Colin Moriarty ✔ @notaxation