Comments on: Japanese hardware sales – PS3 drops to eye-watering low

By: Psychotext

Psychotext — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:00:08 +0000

Esha: I’m not sure how you’re coming to your conclusions regarding home consoles… The Wii is selling like the PS2 did, the PS3 is selling like the Gamecube did and the 360, well, it’s selling better than the original xbox.

Absolutely nothing has changed since the last gen in Japan other than brand preference.

By: g00nerz

g00nerz — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 13:53:17 +0000

*yawn*

By: G1GAHURTZ

G1GAHURTZ — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:05:09 +0000

and then the week after…

All the way up until 2010.

By: Blerk

Blerk — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 08:44:37 +0000

/produces bugle
/plays Last Post

80gb PS3 is out now in Japan. Let’s see what happens next week. And then the week after.

By: deftangel

deftangel — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 08:24:52 +0000

Until there is a PSThree style relaunch, the system will have a niche market at best in Japan. Even FFXIII will only be a temporary blip. It’s not like it can’t be done, see PSP (though software sales are still lacklustre, even over there).

Sony sold over 20m PS2′s so far in Japan, I’d hardly say a few hundred thousand extra units shipped, likely to be obliterated given the pricing differential over Christmas would be “making up” for a somewhat embarrassing failure on home turf.

Despite this popular “non-gaming device” meme, the Wii is still a home console.

By: Esha

Esha — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 07:56:40 +0000

I’ll never understand this.

When it comes to games consoles, Japan has one of the most flaccid games-related economies in the World right now, with most of their sales going to hand-helds and home consoles (bar the Wii, which is really more of a living-room toy than a console, these days) barely getting a look in. Just compare the sales of the PSP to the 360 to see what I mean.

It doesn’t really matter what happens in Japan, things are only going to get steadily worse there, to the point where they’re just going to stop bothering with home consoles all together. Even most of their game sales lately have been Wii/DS/PSP.

It’s like trying to show how well a certain fruit is doing in a market dominated by meat. It’s baffling.

However, there’s more than enough proof that Sony are making up for this with Western sales, wouldn’t you say?