Xbox 360 outsells the PS3, Wii destroys both

http://www.vgchartz.com/news/news.php?id=889

Americas Sales for the Week Ending March 1, 2008


3/5/08

Jacob Mazel


In preparation for Nintendo’s latest big offering, Super Smash Brothers
Brawl, Wiis were in abundant stock this week, leading Nintendo’s
platforms, DS and Wii, to outsell all other platforms combined (371k to
349k). Unlike previous weeks where Wii had been outsold by Xbox 360 and
PS3, Wii outsold both combined, suggesting demand is still there. After
a brief spurt ahead of Xbox 360, PS3 sales dipped below Xbox 360 sales
again, which had been the trend for months before a recent PS3 uptick,
though both platforms remain within 15% of each other this week. In
fact with three platforms over 100,000 units this week, this week has
almost an early November feel to it in terms of volume, especially when
considering that last week only one platform sold over 100,000 units.
PSP was the worst selling platform for this week, with PS2 just ahead.
Still, no platform sold fewer than 75,000 units this week, and that is a
sign of a very healthy market. Compared to last week, Wii sales were up
over 170%, while every other platform but PS3 saw increased sales by 10%
to 40%. PS3 sales declined 5% from last week. The full breakdown of
hardware sales from last week to this week can be seen below:

1-Mar 23-Feb
Wii 218,189 78,975 +176%
DS 152,759 111,174 +37%
PS3 89,585 94,106 -5%
PSP 76,447 66,770 +14%
Xbox 360 102,622 87,569 +17%
PS2 80,039 64,932 +23%


Moving forward, it looks as though Wii sales in the Americas will help
Nintendo beat its forecast of 18.5 million shipped from April 1, 2007 to
March 31, 2008, as sales are very unlikely to decline after Smash
Brothers is released vs. before when it was released. Sony is going to
come very close to, or meet its shipment goal of 9.5 million from April
1, 2007 to March 31, 2008 if sales continue like this in the Americas.
Microsoft has not issued a public shipment goal, however, with rumors of
an Easter price cut for Europe, an Americas price cut will likely follow
soon, and that should push Xbox 360 weekly sales ahead of PS3 once
again. One other interesting thing to note is how high PS2 sales remain
despite the high adoption rate for the recently released machines.


There are some interesting trends developing year over year as well.
Take a look:

3/1/2008 3/3/2007 YoY Change
Wii 218,189 80,468 +171%
DS 152,759 151,537 +1%
PS3 89,585 32,064 +179%
PSP 76,447 44,890 +70%
Xbox 360 102,622 57,583 +78%
PS2 80,039 75,100 +7%


Believe it or not, every platform is actually selling better this year
than during the comparable week last year. While Wii and PS3 have seen
comparable percentage increases year over year, Wii sales are up nearly
140,000 units from last year, while PS3 sales are ‘only’ up about 60,000
units from last year. Wii sales increases year over year should grow as
Nintendo essentially ran out of product in late March of 2007, while
this year sales and supply should remain high after Smash’s debut. Xbox
360 sales, rather interestingly are up by 45,000 units from last year.
One way to look at this disparity is that PS3 is the newer machine;
another is to say Sony’s price drop last year has been 15,000 units more
effective than Microsoft’s price drop last year, at least this week, in
boosting sales over last year’s level. If Xbox 360 drops by another $50
in the coming weeks, it will be interesting to see next year whether it
is up by 45,000 units over this year’s level, or whether the flow of
console sales will result in a decline regardless of price cutting
measures. The large increase in PSP sales is worth noting as well.
Slow sales in March of 2007 are what triggered the first PSP price cut
in the Americas last April, so this current year over year boost should
decline fairly steadily in coming weeks as pricing comparisons become
tougher. DS and PS2 continue to remain very valuable devices given the
features and games offered, and have shown almost no change in sales
year over year.


Below you can see top software sales for the current consoles followed
by notes from the top 200 software chart.


Wii Xbox 360 PS3
1 Wii Play Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare Devil May Cry 4
2 Super Mario Galaxy Frontlines: Fuel of War Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
3 Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Devil May Cry 4 Turning Point: Fall
of Liberty
4 Link's Crossbow Training Lost Odyssey Lost Planet: Extreme Condition
5 Mario & Sonc at the Olympic Games Rockband Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
6 Mario Party 8 Turning Point: Fall of Liberty Dynasty Warrior 6
7 Carnival Games Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Guitar Hero III:
Legends of Rock
8 The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess Lost: The Videogame Rockband
9 Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga Halo 3 Burnout Paradise
10 Dragon Quest Swords Turok Lost: The Videogame


Notes:

- Wii Play hits 5.0 million in the Americas next week and it
continues to maintain close to a 50% attach ratio with Wii in the
Americas. There is really no reason Wii Play can’t 10 million in the
Americas…eventually.

- Solid debut (~50k) for Patapon. The game should eventually
pass 300,000 units in the Americas.

- Guitar Hero III sales now stand at 7.4+ million across PS2,
360, Wii and PS3.

- DS is still months away from selling more in the Americas than
in Japan.

- Lost Planet for PS3 bombed. The game is unlikely to top
100,000 units in the Americas.

- Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune passed 500,000 units this week.
The game will probably get to 650,000 to 750,000 units before dropping
off the top 200.

- Rockband passes 1 million units on Xbox 360 soon; it is over
1.3 million in the Americas including PS3 and PS2. The next battle
between Rock Band and Guitar Hero should be much closer.

- Nintendo and EA both sold over 500,000 units of software this
week.

- EA 500k Sellers: Two 500k sellers for Wii charted, three 500k
sellers for DS charted, 24 500k sellers for PS2 charted, four 500k
sellers for PSP charted, one 500k seller for PS3 charted, 11 500k
sellers for Xbox 360 charted. Next week: Activision breakdown.

- Charting games with 500k Lifetime Sales: Xbox 360 – 24, Wii –
19, PS3 – 7. In future weeks, million sellers will be chronicled.

- To date, 24,947,032 Xbox 360s, Wiis, and PS3s have been sold
in the Americas since the systems launched. Of those consoles sold Xbox
360 accounts for 44.5% market share, Wii accounts for 38.7% market
share, while PS3 accounts for 16.8% market share.


As a side note, expect an article comparing the worldwide trends behind
the first 50 million consoles sold this generation (Wii, 360, PS3) vs.
the first 50 million consoles sold last generation (PS2, Xbox, GC) by
11:00 PM EST 3/6/2008.