Stan Beer
Monday, 25 September 2006 18:51
Opinion and Analysis
Page 2 of 3
So far, with no competition and at a very reasonable
price, in the space of nearly one year, Microsoft has managed to move a
bit more than 5 million of its new generation consoles worldwide and about
160,000 in Japan.
That Xbox 360 has been a complete flop in
Japan, the second largest games market in the world, is beyond
question. Since it went on sale in 2000, PS2 has averaged almost 4
million consoles a year in Japan alone and more than 16 million a year
globally.
Despite the track record of PS2, the PS3 detractors grumbled at the
“outrageously high” price tag Sony placed on its next generation
console. At recent games shows, they pointed to considerably cheaper
Xbox 360 and of course the emergence of the half-priced Nintendo Wii.
On the Nintendo Wii, it would be fair to say that any comparison with
PS3 is spurious at best. You may be able to download Nintendo 64 and
Super Nintendo games and you may have a choice of 25 or 30 games at
launch. That one handed motion sensitive remote looks interesting.
