I say SONY: http://www.korexz.com/2007/02/02/sonys-2nd-biggest-competition-is-itself/ I dare you to diagree! But I also think that this generation's ship has sailed. It seems early, but it is already too late for a Sony comeback. Sony has to : Kill the PS2 Match the Wii "fun factor" Squash online competition from the 360 Prove Blu-Ray can beat HD-DVD and replace DVD Find an outlet for digital distribution of music and movies, knocking off Apple This is just too much cake to swallow. I still say that by January 1, 2008 Sony will close their video game operations: http://www.korexz.com/2006/11/28/here-wii-go/

Even without the PS2 Sony has shot themselves in the feet so many times with the PS3 that I swear that console walks on peg legs. ;)

Forgive me but I do not understand your logic. If Sony's biggest competitor is sony themselves how are they hurting themselves? By making pure profit off of the PS2 and its titles until the PS3 grows a decent library I do not think they are hurting themselves. I guess you haven't seen the reviews on the "majority" of wii games? On my wii I actually enjoy 2 titles. Using the previous consoles as a base to make my judgements I feel a few more good games will come out on the wii but the PS2 library pretty much kills the competition in "Fun Factor" and if the PS3 follows suit then I highly doubt sony has much to worry about. Online is a spurious point of contention. Out of all of the games I have seriously enjoyed on the PS2 , there are not many I would agree would have been better because of online capabilities. I embrace more co-op but it seems as if the fans of xbox feels something is missing if they cant have a deathmatch or a ladder to climb. Competition and pride drives live and most of these people can play games with horrible stories and no real point but as long as the graphics and competitive gameplay is there the game is amazing. People like me and most of my friends love games with good stories and great driving motivations. I really cannot get engrossed in a game if I cannot fell like I empathise with the characters. http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Industry_Trends/Disc_Sales/Finally:_VideoScan_Releases_High-Def_Disc_Sales_Numbers_/456 As last reported an average of 6 blu ray discs were sold per PS3 owners. Ever since the PS3 came out BR has been steadily outselling HD-DVD and now Has seem to climb to an average of 3 BR disc sold for every 1 of HD-DVD. The instaled base is already more than 3 times that of HD-DVD and is only going to grow larger. With releases on VC-1(MPEG-4) (such as Blazing Saddles, Firewall, Lethal Weapon), MPEG-2, and AVC the arguements about quality has been squashed and it has reverted back to the original sticking point... space. In the end both were storage formats and the quality was subject to the encodes. It is only looking better and better for blu-ray. Why would Sony Knock of apple when apple are one of Sony's most influential partners? It seems like your sales estimates are already off for your second link and thinking that sony will back down after only one year is pretty laughable. Are you being serious or is this some sort of heavy handed satire?

Microsoft can roughly match Wii sales in N.A. I think. Wii and PS3 wrestle market away from the 360 by doing much better in Japan. PS3 sells less than 360 in first year in the West despite a better two month launch. Look at it like this (rounded to quarter million to make it easier): 360 - near 8.75 million Wii - 4.25 million PS3 - 1.75 million If Wii is 4.5 million behind, it would need to sell 400,000+ more units than 360/per the 11 remaining months of 2007 to catch up by the end of the year. Is that feasible? I don't think it is. I think Wii outsells 360 by around 300k in Japan per month, but settles within 50k+ or -50k of 360 sales in North America. Europe will be infatuated by the PS3 for at least a little while, so I don't see Wii outselling 360 by the needed 100k+ per month. Some months it will, others it won't. End of the year looks like this: Wii 10-13 million total (2006+2007) userbase 360 12-16 million total (2005+2006+2007) userbase PS3 7-11 million total (2006+2007) user base I'd call it 14-12-8. 360 selling around 5.5 million this year (3.5 million N.A., 1.8 others, .2 Japan). Wii selling around 9 million this year. (3.5 million N.A, 4 million Japan, 1.5 million others) PS3 selling around 6.5 million this year. (2 million N.A. 2.5 million Japan 2 million others) At those rates, it took Wii 11 months to make up 2.5 million (14-12 million instead of 8.75 to 4.25 million) of the 4.5 million defecit to 360 at the end of 2007. That would mean the leadership transition worldwide would be in late 2008, around October 1. In contrast, I have the PS3 losing .5 million sales ground to the 360 in 11 months. I think Sony will have one ridiculous year this generation and catch up alot that year, but not ever reach the top, somewhat like the Nintendo 64 in 1997. I think that year will be 2008 or 2009. Eventually, each console sells over 30 million. Wii as 1st in Japan, 2nd in the west, 360 as 1st in the west, last in Japan, PS3 as 2nd in Japan, 3rd in the West, but supported the longest by its hardware manufacturer....

Interesting statements, TheSource, but I got some quibbles.

Uhm... for the next few months at least, I don't see the Wii doing less than double 360's sales numbers, and that's my estimate being conservative (income tax season = 360's on shelves, wii still sold out). Right now, the Wii is still constantly selling out in all 3 regions, and the 360's sales, from what we have seen, have returned to "normal", and the only thing that will affect 360 console sales for the next 3 months are only taxes, some good games are coming out, but no console sellers from what I can remember off of the list. So you think the 360 is going to do at least 500k sales each month for January and Febuary, if not longer (however long the Wii keeps selling out? Why would the Wii sell so badly in Europe/Australia/Other regions? I have my doubts they'd only ship 1.5 million there for the whole year, and I'm doubting the PS3 will have THAT much of an impact on Wii sales there, especially considering the jacked up prices.....

Korexz : I disagree ! What you say is nonsense. Games are what you buy a console for. Well, most of people buy a console for games. As soon as the games that everyone wants start going out for the PS3 instead of for the PS2, you can bet the PS3 will sell. That is one thing needed, plus a price cut, and you will see the PS3 sales going up. StaticNeuron : the Wii is not even 3 months old, and you are complaining ? There are already several good games announced for march ! And I still strongly think that most developers' house were taken by surprise by the love behind the Wii in 2006, which was far too late to launch development of good games. I can tell, that if any of these games are good (Sonic, DQ Sword), they will fly off the shelves. I know Mario Party will sell, so I don't even mention it. I don't know if lots of japanese people passed on the Fire Emblem GC because they left the console alone, or because they don't like it. I think it's the former, which would mean this one have a chance to sell far better than its GCN prequel. I know I bought the Wii mostly for this game. And I know lots of people will buy the PS3 for the big games (FFXIII, MGS4). I also think XB360 fanboys are delusional. Online is seen as a super feature by them, because all this console has (way, most of the games) is racers and shooters. These are not even good games. They're so lacking that the single player experience is boring ... fast (yes, even in GoW) ! So of course they need online, it's well suited for these kind of games, and allows them to believe they've got a good game. This console is perfect for shooters lovers. These people are also delusional in their graphics whoring. Notice they will bash the PS3 on graphics again and again. They will compare the graphics of Forza and GT, and won't realise that GT is better, but not because of its graphics. From the XB360 fanboys reaction, I know quite well this console is not for me at all : I have no fun looking at graphics and killing endless people online. TheSource: The Wii outsold the XB360 by 350k in january in Japan. So there's a mere 50k console to sell more elsewhere to catch up. But you know what ? I have this crazy feeling that the Wii will sell 600k in the USA in january. Wii is sold out in the USA, and even if it sold at its max capacity (I think it can't be lower than Japan, so I say 400k minimum), that would mean the XB360 would have to sell as much, in one of the slowest month of the year. I just don't believe that. But we'll know soon enough. My lowest estimate for january in the USA is 200k for XB360, and 400k for the Wii. That would put a huge dent in MS lead. Remember that several games that should be at least good, are to be released all the way through march on the Wii. This generation sure is interesting, as it's impossible to predict anything right for now. I'm waiting eagerly to see the NPD numbers. Anyway, I agree that the Wii better sell a lot in 2007 and start of 2008. Because I think when the good games arrive on the PS3, the juggernauth will be launched for real. And we europeans still have the PS3 launch in march.

Oh don't get me wrong. I have no fears about the future about the Wii. I just really believe that the amount of amazing titles might be skew towards the PS3 this time around. Granted alot more ground taken up by Nintendo and MS but the Playstation line does have an awesome library at its disposal.

I wouldn't disagree that Sony has majorly fouled up the entire PS3 project, but thinking they are just going to close shop by the end of the year is laughable. Like someone said, it sounds like satire; like a spoof of Ninty fanboys (who probably don't understand why Wii will win anyways). They'll fire some people and hire some people from the outside, they'll find ways to cut costs, they'll fire the marketing firms they've used for the last 12 years, they'll imitate the Wiimote and XBox Live in every way they can, they'll increase their own internal software R&D to try and increase their list of exclusives, they'll do absolutely everything they can. It is true that a company with so many divisions is not going to support a division which costs them billions of dollars, but that is a long term problem. That is PlayStation4's problem. "Using the previous consoles as a base to make my judgements I feel a few more good games will come out on the wii but the PS2 library pretty much kills the competition in "Fun Factor" and if the PS3 follows suit then I highly doubt sony has much to worry about." Has the PS3 followed the PS2 in any other area? You can't use the previous consoles to judge anything. The name on the box in the long run means little.

I just realized that the Japanese data I was using was through January 28. If you split the hardware data for this week's data in half (January 29-January 31), Wii does just about outsell the 360 by 400,000 in Japan. That may not seem like alot, but another 50k a month for 11 months would knock the difference at the end of the year down another 500,000 units+. That would mean the Wii is 1.5 million instead of 2 million behind at the end of the year. If that is sustainable, and the two consoles sell at about the same rates in the West (or if the Wii sells alot more than 360 in Europe/Americas/both), the Wii could realistically catch up by the end of the end 2007. Still, the range of time for Wii catching up to the 360 appears to be August 2007 to October 2008. I just don't think it will be this year because Halo 3 alone will probably guarentee a huge spike in sales in America. Final worldwide sales: Likelihood of position: 1st 360: 45% Wii 35% PS3 20% 2nd 360: 30% Wii 45% PS3 25% 3rd 360: 25% Wii 20% PS3 55%

The only title that Nintendo has that could cause a dent against Halo 3 would be SSBB, but i think it would be smarter to launch SSBB a few months before Halo3, then launch Mario Galaxy around the same time, since Halo 3 and Mario Galaxy don't share as significant of a fanbase as Halo/SSBB.