I don't think so.

There's no real benefit for companies to hit some arbitrary number either if it means having to devalue their product.

Install base isn't some arbitrary number.

Sony could hit 200 million if they really were hell bent on doing so for example, but it would mean dropping the PS4 to $99 and selling it for another 8-10 years ... they don't want to do that. Because ultimately it means f*ck all to them. They don't get some special cookie or award for hitting some LTD target.

Sony doesn't do it because MS would destroy them assuming they didn't destroy themselves first with unsustainable losses.

Edit - PS4 couldn't hit 200m without Nintendo matching or beating them on gfx and it's pretty obvious what will happen if that were to occur given that Switch is going to outsell PS4 and 5 without the gfx.

Selling 100 million systems at an average price point of $250 for example is more revenue/profit than selling 150 million but having an average price of $150. Withholding newer hardware just to hit some LTD total is also even dumber business, you're basically sitting on something that could be making your company massive more profit and instead content to watch some $149.99 system spend years doing a slow motion death crawl to some imaginary number. There is a such thing as opportunity cost. 

This is why companies don't do this. Because they don't care about LTD that much, it's a nice feather in the cap, but it doesn't make sense when you take into account any other business metric. 

I'm pretty sure console sales are directly related to software and subscription profits.

You also don't want consumers conditioned to expect hardware at rock bottom prices. You *want* $300 to become the normal in their mind and hold there for as long as possible. A lot of people here just have no clue as to the business side of things. 

Switch is already at a rock bottom price. When was the last time you could pick up a handheld and a home console for $300? The 80s?

I don't think you can really accurately know anything about this until at least about a year from now. You don't really see decline in popular platforms in year 3. The Wii and 3DS started to show notable decline in year 4.

But year 3 is really not going to tell you much. Year 3 should be a high point in brand momentum for any successful system.

It's like trying to predict an athlete's longevity when you are seeing them at age 25 ... you really need to come back and look again at age 30/31/32, that will give you a better idea, you can't tell anything at age 25 because there shouldn't be age related decline evident by then. 

Nintendo will release a Switch 2 but actually will not name it 2. Its sales numbers will be added to the old Switch models. That way, they will take the 150 mil. in a breeze. I really think they will do that (they have done the same with the Game Boy Color - let's face it, it was a real successor). Although, profit is much more important for companies than sales numbers, the announcement of having the best selling console ever will positively affect the stock market and will be a prestige for years to come with effect of lets name it indirect revenue. Nintendo Switch is the words best selling console lifetime! A slogan they would then be able to bank on for years (maybe for eternity).

It's not difficult to guestimate what Switch could do to beat 3DS by 50 million.

This is the first time ever a Nintendo home console is going to beat their handheld.

You should strap yourself in.

Zuh? Switch is a successor to the 3DS as much as it to the Wii U. 

The GBC was not a whole new console, that's why Nintendo counts the GB and GBC as the same system. Nintendo's launch titles for the GBC were DX versions of Tetris and Link's Awakening which is just about the weakest and laziest launch lineup you could have for a new system; the reason why Nintendo's GBC launch titles were such low effort games is because the GBC wasn't considered a new system, but merely a hardware revision.

Likewise, GBC exclusives (transparent cartridges with different shape that made them unable to be inserted in a GB) were not present at launch. The hardware revision GBC eventually transformed into a quasi-new system over time because color was so much of a selling point that both Nintendo and third parties considered it worth it to leave out the userbase of the original GB eventually. But before then, black cartridges (compatible with both GB and GBC, enhancements when played on a GBC) were the norm for new releases, making the GBC the same thing as the New 3DS: A revision of the original hardware, not a next generation platform.

A classic example of cherry-picking. By now it should be clear that Switch is most comparable to the DS because Switch is on track to have higher sales in year 4 than in any of its first three years. It should be clear even to you who listed the numbers. The Wii and 3DS had declines in year 3 while Switch does not, so Switch isn't following the same pattern. Switch won't reach the ~30m per year heights of the DS, but its sales trajectory is pointing to a later peak followed by a plateau like the DS experienced. Hardly a coincidence when third party support is so similar between the DS and Switch: Next to no AAA third party games, but a wealth of everything below that helps to sustain sales even during periods where Nintendo's first party is lacking.

The DS's major advantage over Switch is the much lower price for the time being; the DS's major disadvantage is the declining strength of first party software in the second half of its life. The DS and Switch might very well end up with very similar lifetime sales, albeit with different sales curves. The DS started slow, had huge sales in the middle and then collapsed fast late because the steep price cut for the backwards compatible 3DS turned potential late adopters of the DS into early adopters of the 3DS. Switch started fast, won't reach the heights of the DS, but is likely to have a longer tail than the DS because Nintendo's one console strategy requires a big adjustment; just like the 3DS was kept around as affordable Nintendo console because Switch launched at $300, so will Switch see extended support because its successor won't launch at a low price either. Switch can pull off DS lifetime sales; it will take more time, but it can get there nonetheless.

Must be a scary thought for you that Switch is on pace to sell more than the PS4 lifetime. If that happens, it would be the final nail in the coffin of everything you believed in. Not only did Switch succeed against your predictions, but it looks like it turns out to be a superior strategy to what you've been championing for the past decade.

You still don't understand that "like the Wii" doesn't mean exactly like the Wii. One key point of being "like the Wii" is being an alternative to the AAA rubbish the industry churns out and Switch certainly fulfills that criterion. Your premise has been that Nintendo must please AAA third parties if they ever want to have a successful console again because "casuals and gimmicks" aren't going to cut it. Also, the Wii was selling primarily off traditional Nintendo IPs too. Switch's portable aspect certainly qualifies as gimmick. Switch's standard controller (Joy-Cons) is also a motion controller. Switch is very much like the Wii, but there's one big difference: The industry hasn't been able to think up anything to put it down, so the industry has mostly remained quiet about it.

The closing paragraph of my post wasn't about what Sony thinks, but what you think. You try to laugh off my post, but it doesn't reflect well on you that you didn't address the majority of my post.

It is ironic that you said in an earlier post in this thread that most people don't understand business and then here you are talking about revenue in order to claim superiority of Sony's console business.