The article won't make global comparisons for the PS3 because that is not the purpose for that particular article. The article is only showing the revenue in the U.S. for Q3 for the console manufacturers. In summary it was mentioned the PS brand LOST 1.3 bn. in revenue in that market. We can speculate all we want, whether PS3 made a loss WW in that quarter but i think that is kinda missing the point that has been argued for 21 pages in this thread. It is a FACT that PS3 revenue is down 1.3bn in by far the world's largest market.

In conclusion no-one at the moment knows if the PS brand has made a profit last quarter yet but judging by what is in front of us in this thread, i would have to say things don't look too good.......

" It is a FACT that PS3 revenue is down 1.3bn in by far the world's largest market."

Which doesn't matter that much if it's profitable worldwide. Which we don't know. Hence it's meaningless as an analysis.

The fact that PS2 revenue is dropping is not a surprise at all, the console is more than 10 year old. It's a surprise to nobody, I doubt Sony is surprised either.

The business model was always to let the PS3 profit take over... which it'll do soon since PS3 sells more and more (breaking news : it even outsold 360 in its own territory last week).

My 2 cents.

How can an analysis be meaningless when it's concerning the BIGGEST market WW? Just because it doesn't paint a pretty picture of your console of choice, this certainly doesn't mean it's worthless.

It's ok as a purely US-centric analysis... As long as you don't conclude anything global about Sony and the PS3, I guess it has some value... Now let's analyze 360 situation in Japan. Just kidding.

^^it has significant value since America is where PS3 sold most of its software.

And this is a very interesting article indeed.

Get accurate figures like this thread for the 360 in Japan and lets do that analysis, nobody would have an issue doing so.  The thread is analysing performance in the US, it says as much in the title (NPD), if you didn't like that idea then you shouldn't have entered the thread. 

The Japan markets are important for Microsoft given the number of quality developers still based there, the sales performance of the 360 is terrible compared to the PS3 and Wii its a simple fact not worth arguing.  The only positive you can get from the situation is they've done better than last gen and managed to win over Japanese developers, so in some ways it hasn't been a complete disaster.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Sony has sold a huge amount of hardware in the last quarter of 2009, but because they are still losing $10-$15 on every PS3, it is offseting any software profits they have made. The poor sales of the PS2 (which is a profitable system) and the PSP & PSP Go is going to keep Sony in red when the yearly reports are released in a few months. Sony's had a couple of positives (finally) last year. 1) Sold lots of PS3. 2) Released FF XIII in Japan which seems to have jump-started that region.

The big question now is. Will the PS3 catch the XBox 360? Probably. Will it matter 2-3yrs from now. Not in the least. It won't matter because 1) The next-gen of systems will be out by then and last gens race will be over. 2) The Wii is easily going to win this generations race. Only #1 position really matters anyways and it won't be Sony or Microsoft.

You can be "outselling 360" and still doing badly.  GameCube was outselling Xbox by a similar margin, how would you describe it's Japanese performance?

Japan is easily PS3's worst market still.  Only 30k this week is awful (but at least up from the 20k they did last year).

Without knowing how much costs decreased this information is useless. That is the only clear thing here. That was my point to those who were so quick to shout doom from the begining

Yeah and 3k a week by the 360 is awful-awful-awful then ? We need a new word for 360 performance. lol

Outselling its competitor more than 10:1 while being more expansive is bad now. Thanks for the laugh, now I read it all on the net I guess.

Or is it 360 best market ? Nice spin anyway, MS should hire you.

(Or Saddam Hussein for PR during the Iraqi - US war : "There are no PS3 tanks in Bagdad, the 360 is fine".)