Agreed. I guess people are being silly, and not actually trying.

Say the 360 gets to 20m - and never sells another unit. And say someone has it at 10%.

10% = 20m, hence 100% = 200m.

Wii = 110m, PS3 = 70m, 360 = 20m???

Yeah - I don't think so. 

OMFG I just checked the posts and there was exactly one [edit: two] prediction such as you describe: and it was made by RolStoppable [edit: and ItsaMii]!

Wii: 70 - 85 %
360: 8 - 17 %
PS3: 7 - 13 %

[edit: Wii - 80%
[PS3 - 12%
[Xbox 360 - 8%]

So the best case scenario for the Wii has it selling over five times as much as the PS3 and 360 combined! That seems pretty ridiculous.

It should be noted, however, that the best-case scenario for the PS3/360 isn't as outrageous as one might think. In fact, they are predicted to do slightly better than the GC and Xbox did. I would say that is a reasonable guess -- but not as a maximum range!

Agreed. I think the 360 will cap out (best case scenario) at 40m. The PS3 has a higher cap space (if Sony can get its price in line and deliver games) but ultimately, I think it will fall just short of the 360. The 360 is just too strong in NA and Halo hasn't even released yet while the Wii will continue to dominate every market.

I don't like the percent. Why don't we stay with predicting millions? My prediction of the day is

Wii - 100 m
PS3- 40 m
360 - 35 m

That would mean

Wii - 57 %
PS3 - 23 %
360 - 20 %

It's kind of confusing to guess the percent, because the winning console's numbers (and thereby percentage) will keep growing 1 or 2 years after the losing consoles have been replaced.

I will respectfully disagree about the PS3/360 finish lines. 

The 360 has more consoles sold only because it has been selling them longer, and MGS is nearly or just as strong for the PS3 as Halo is for 360 -- although I will say I doubt it will have the same hype -- and that doesn't even count Final Fantasy!  The 360 may have NA but it DOESN'T have Japan; and Europe may well end up preferring the PS3 to the 360 as well. 

The main advantage the 360 has now is that its blockbusters all hit (in the US at least) before this Christmas, while the PS3's hit after; this is a strong advantage, and I'm surprised you don't mention it, but I don't think it'll be any sort of devastating blow to Sony in the long run, since it looks as if 2008 will be their playground.  

As for terminal numbers, I would say that the 360 won't break 30 million.  In two years it's sold 10 million; 4 more getting them 20 more sounds reasonable.  35 million tops.  I agree that the PS3 has a higher upper limit, depending on price drops (I am confident that the games are coming) -- 45 million tops, and that's if it keeps selling past the 5-6 year mark. 

So why is it less confusing to guess numbers that keep growing vs. percentages that keep growing? 

The reason I think percentages are simpler is that raw numbers are also guessing the amount that the market will expand.  It WILL expand, "Blue Ocean" or no, because it has EVERY hardware generation.  The question is how much it will grow.  So percentages are one prediction, but numbers sold are really 2 predictions.   

Why do I get the feeling that you fully understand that this will in no way change your enjoyment of the 360? Sorry just had to point out that some people seem to think if the Wii does well it will make it less fun to own/play a PS3 or 360. Glad to see some people can understand the situation and also realize it doesn't change anything for them personally. Fun is fun, regardless of how you are having it.

Thats not to say that scenario is a certainty, but it is the most likely scenario right now.

PS - I am actually not convinced 40m is the cap for the 360, I think it could go as high as 55m depending on how much the market grows this generation. One thing is certain, there is a lot more media attention on the games this time around. Part of that is the Wii but part of it is how close games are getting to playable photorealism. There are people interested in both aspects and they will be attracted to gaming as a result. In what kind of numbers? well that is sort of the point of the thread =)

Edit: Just to do the math on my percentage prediction with the upper limit I just mentioned, it would put each consoles range like this....

Wii - 48-56% - 105.6m-123.2m
PS3 - 23-27% - 50.6m-59.4m
360 - 21-25% - 46.2m-55m

Although to be honest my percentages were more just off the top of the head guesses than actual analysis so I wouldn't exactly call these my ultimate predictions. Just doing the math to see how it pans out.

The last MGS sold 3.7 million copies worldwide -- the last Halo sold 8 million worldwide, and on a console with a much smaller marketshare than what MGS enjoyed on the PS2.  MGS will be strong, but it's not the seller that Halo is. And Halo is not the seller that many of Nintendo's first party games are.

I would be truly surprised if this generation ends up anything other than:

Wii: 50%
360: 25%
PS3: 25%

I predict:

Wii: 0 - 100%
360: 0 - 100%
PS3: 0 - 100%