Well I think the term system seller is misplaced because the vast majority of gamers don't buy a system just to play one game, they buy a system because there are at least few and maybe many different games they're interested in. GTA 3 and Vice City (and San Andreas to some extent) are often refered to as the biggest PS2 system sellers, but really what they were is games that pushed a lot of gamers over the edge to get a PS2 as they were already interested in other games for the system.

Look at the DS, is there really anything on that system that's the big system seller. No. Nintendogs, NSMB, Brain Age, Pokemon, Mario Kart, and Animal Crossing combine to make it one hell of an attractive system. Same goes for the PS1. There was no big selling game on the level of Mario 64 on that system, but Gran Turismo, plus Final Fantasy, plus Resident Evil, plus Crash Bandicoot, plus Driver, plus other games added up to an undeniably attractive lineup for millions upon millions of gamers at the time. We'll see a bump for 360 sales when Halo 3 comes, but not because people are buying the system just to play that game; I think 95% of people who do a buy a system to play Halo 3 are also interested in previously released 360 titles as well.

I can't understand the notion that the Wii will die off. It doesn't make any sense -- many of the people buying the Wii now would be just as likely to buy it in 5 years. Wishful thinking, perhaps, but it just looks foolish.

The PS3 started life at twice the price of the PS2 and more than twice the cost. The PS3 will likely never approach the cost that the PS2 attained at this point while it's still being sold. Technology gets cheaper, but it is within limits. It still costs a lot to run fabrication plants, etc. Sony's hope is that the Cell will become popular for imbedded applications and in many other areas so that fabrication costs are significantly lower for them. This is a longshot.  There already exist cheaper, better processors for most embedded applications.  And there already exist cheaper ways to generate a lot more floating point power than the Cell.

The PS3 is simply a more expensive architecture than the PS2. The PS2 didn't even come with spinning storage. Perhaps the PS3 will drop to $250 or maybe even $200 by it's 6th or 7th year on the market, when it is obsolete and everyone is clamoring about the PS4.

This brings me to an interesting observation: if Sony decides to get their costs out of the stratosphere when engineering the PS4 (a very likely scenario) and the PS3's costs still haven't come down to earth, it is possible that the newer, faster, better console would cost approximately the same to manufacture as the older one. Making one wonder how it would last ten years in the market.

TheBigFatJ: You're absolutely right...and not only will PS3 have a hard time ever reaching PS2-level pricing, but a lot of people seem to ignore the possibility that, given PS3's poor sales, it will lose a lot of third party support over the next few years making it less attractive to consumers.  Heck, that's already happening, just not to the point where third parties are abandoning PS3 altogether.