Okay, honestly. What the (insert choice 4-letter word) is going on with the Nintendo Wii’s hardware sales? Who is still buying this thing and when is Nintendo going to stop with the “we’re low on supply” response? It’s completely mind bottling! The Wii continues to do it’s best Incredible Hulk impression by seriously crushing the competition in hardware sales. It doesn’t seem like it’s that hard to find to me. And I think it’s safe to say that 714,000 people feel the same.
This is madness! Someone needs to explain to me why everyone seems to be playing with their Wii. That’s a lot of Wii. Perhaps now is the time for that elusive Xbox 360 US price cut eh? I mean the economy isn’t exactly booming ya know.
Grand Theft Auto IV managed to highjack the top software spot from Mario Kart proving that the world would much rather engage in violence than play with plumbers in karts.
April 2008 Hardware Sales
Wii - 714,200
Nintendo DS - 414,800
PSP - 192,700
Xbox 360 - 188,000
PlayStation 3 - 187,100
PlayStation 2 - 124,400
April 2008 Software Sales
1. Grand Theft Auto IV (X360) - 1,850,000
2. Mario Kart Wii (Wii) - 1,120,000
3. Grand Theft Auto IV (PS3) - 1,000,000
4. Wii Play (Wii) - 360,000
5. Super Smash Bros. Brawl (Wii) - 326,000
6. Gran Turismo 5 Prologue (PS3) - 224,000
7. Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness (NDS) - 202,000
8. Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time (NDS) - 202,000
9. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (Wii) - 152,000
10. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (X360) - 141,000
While the supposed shortages continue, the Xbox 360 still manages to perform well in any other area beyond hardware. For the second consecutive month, the Xbox 360 remained last in consoles sold with 255,000 in February. However, that didn’t stop the software machine from dominating another Top 10 in software sales.
Microsoft also shared their take on February’s sales below which includes an impressive 9.6 million installed base here in North America that outshines the competition by a good margin. Check out the numbers and then read up on a few more tidbits concerning the Xbox 360.
February 2008 Hardware Sales
Nintendo DS- 587,600
Nintendo Wii- 432,000
PS2- 351,800
PS3- 280,800
Xbox 360- 254,600
PSP- 243,100
I was on the elevator heading to work and I saw a quick news splash on the “elevator news update” that Toshiba has pulled out of the HD DVD business. This is no shock considering all of the studios, retail outlets and online rental companies that suddenly decided to join Blu-ray.
“This was a very difficult decision to make … but when we thought about the trouble we would cause to consumers and our partners, we decided it was not right for us to keep going with such a small presence,” Toshiba Chief Executive Atsutoshi Nishida told a news conference.
It’s no surprise how I felt about a Blu-ray win after my article Format Wars was posted in Truth Serum. However, I hope that this leads to cheaper Blu-ray players outside of the PS3. And I’m also curious to see if Microsoft sticks to its statements of supporting the winning format no matter which was victorious. Could a Blu-ray add-on be in the near future for Xbox 360 owners?
Prepare for massive amounts of “what the hell” as January’s NPD numbers make their way around the interweb with a surprisingly last place finish for the Xbox 360. Yes that means that the PlayStation 3 outsold the Xbox 360 during the month of January by an amazing 41,000 units. As it turns out just about everything outsold the Xbox 360 last month.
Despite a slow hardware month, the Xbox 360 continues its impressive software performance.
January 2008 Hardware Sales
Nintendo Wii- 274,000
PS3- 270,000
PS2- 265,000
Nintendo DS- 252,000
PSP- 230,000
Xbox 360- 229,000
January 2008 Software Sales
1. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Xbox 360) - 330,900
2. Wii Play - 298,100
3. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (Wii) - 239,600
4. Rock Band (Xbox 360) - 183,800
5. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (Xbox 360) - 182,700
6. Super Mario Galaxy - 172,000
7. Burnout Paradise (Xbox 360) - 144,100
8. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PS3) - 140,000
9. Mario Party DS - 138,500
10. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (DS) 133,000
I got this email yesterday from a parent who happens to be from my city and I wanted to share it. This kid just saved enough $ to get himself an Xbox 360 and one week later it gets stolen. These kinds of things make me wish I could do something because certain cases deserve a helping hand. If I had an extra Xbox 360, I’d send it to the kid.
[Update] - The community has come together to try and help the situation with the U360 Care effort. I set up a service for that effort below. Donate what you can as we work to repair some of the damage done in this situation.
An Invasion of our Privacy
At 3 o’clock in the afternoon on Tuesday, Feb. 5th. I got a phone call from my mother. She tells me that the police are trying to get a hold of me because someone broke into our house. Before I leave I call the police and he tells me that the TV and the lap top are gone. (Those were the only big items I could think of right then.) I was crushed. I called my husband and we both take off to face the inevitable. We finally get home to find out that not only are the TV and laptop gone, but so is the digital camera, the video camera, the electric keyboard, my 8 year old’s PS2 and my 15 year old’s XBOX 360 plus all of his games and extra controllers!
Not to mention they went through the dresser drawers, took everything out from under the bed, knocked everything off the shelves in our closet. It was devastating. Not only do we work hard for what we have but my son worked hard in school and at home to earn money to save up to finally buy his own XBOX 360. He just recently got it last week and once he got it, it was his prize possession. And all in a matter of minutes all his hard work and XBOX is gone. The sad thing about all of this is that we thought our neighborhood was so safe and took it for granted therefore we never took the time out to get Renter’s Insurance. BIG MISTAKE! Now we know.
We are just grateful that no one was physically hurt and there was no real damage to what was left. Our privacy was definitely invaded and it will take all of us a while to feel like we’re “home” again.
Yes, we all like to pretend this isn’t a fanboy world that stirs all kinds of rumors about the “other consoles” to speculate about but we know that’s not true. That’s what ‘In Other News’ is all about. There is a world outside of the Xbox 360 and I feel obligated to keep you up to speed on the more interesting things that occur on the dark side of that world. The power of ‘In Other News’ compels you!
Word on the PS3 Fanboy street is that Best Buy has decided to discontinue the 80GB model of the PlayStation 3 and only carry the less-than-stellar 40GB model beginning Monday, January 28. Best Buy is a rather large chain and this begs the question of whether or not other retail outlets will follow suit. If you’ll remember, the 40GB model of the PS3 lacks backwards compatibility, has only 2 USB ports and lacks memory card readers.
Are there plans to introduce a price cut for the 80GB or even a more robust PlayStation 3? Who knows but if you were to believe additional rumors of a white PS3 coming to stores soon, then anything is possible. Yes, I said a white & black version of the PlayStation 3 is the latest news; both rumored to cost $299.
What say the world on this? What say you on this?
What’s life in gaming without fancy numbers and fuel for little fanboys to brag about their respective console of choice? Call of Duty 4 continues its domination on the sales charts and the Nintendo Wii continues its lead in hardware sales. And the PlayStation 3 continues its drought in games that matter. Perhaps it is indeed just a Blu-ray player right now.
December 2007 Hardware Sales
Nintendo Wii - 1,350,000
Xbox 360 - 1,260,000
PlayStation 3 - 798,000
December 2007 Software Sales
1. Call of Duty 4 (Xbox 360) - 1.47 million
2. Super Mario Galaxy - 1.40 million
3. Guitar Hero III (PS2) - 1.25 million
4. Wii Play - 1.08 million
5. Assassin’s Creed (Xbox 360) - 894,000
6. Halo 3 - 743,000
7. Brain Age 2 - 660,000
8. Madden NFL 08 (PS2) - 655,000
9. Guitar Hero III (Xbox 360) - 625,000
10. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games - 613,000
Who knew the Nintendo Wii had a trivia game on it? It was released a few weeks ago from EA’s Casual Entertainment label. Who knew EA had a casual entertainment label? You all might know I’m a trivia fanatic after reading my Scene It? review and joining in on my Scene It? party so there should be no surprise that I’m going to force my uncle or brother to buy this game. They both have a Wii so through them I shall put this game to the test.
It has 20,000 trivia questions in multiple categories all filtered by age which makes it easy for the kids to at least have a chance against me. And it has content that spans North America, UK, France, Germany, Spain and Italy. Yep, it has some trivia for seemingly all walks of life. You can take a quick Smarty Pants Trivia Challenge and find more media on the game at EA’s Smarty Pants site. I watched one of the videos and they have a spin-the-wheel mode that looks fun.
I know quite a few of you have Wii’s so I figured I’d toss this up in the ’In Other News’ feature of U360. I hope to display my smarts in Smarty Pants soon so I can give you guys and girls the 411.
Hello. My name is Deacon and welcome to ‘Why I Want Gears of War PC’ or at least why I want a computer that can run Gears of Wars PC. I know that it’s supposed to work with Windows XP (which I have) but that won’t give me the uber experience needed for this game. On top of the visual upgrade and the chance to battle different monsters, Gears of Wars for Games for Windows has a ridiculous level editor called Unreal Editor that gave me a goose bump or two.
I know you don’t believe me so that’s why I attached this video below. It was narrated by Epic Lead Designer Jim Brown. (no not the football player) Take a look at it and you’ll understand why I want to get my little hands on this design tool. Can someone say include this in Gears of War 2 Cliffy?
Video: Gears of War Unreal Editor (Games for Windows)
From time to time I like to dive into other news surrounding our favorite hobby. I like to stay diverse in my uberness ya know. It seems like the pricing merry-go-round continues as Sony brings another version of its PlayStation 3 console to the market. Equipped with a 40-gigabyte hard drive and no support for backward compatibility, the new PlayStation 3 will retail for $399. It will be available on November 2nd.
Yes, you heard that right. Those of you opting to pick this little gem up will have to do so knowing you will not be able to play that stack of PlayStation 2 games. Backward compatibility has never been an interest of mine but it was a strong selling point from Sony. I’m surprised they opted to go this route and even more surprised at the comments from Jack Tretton, president of Sony Computer Entertainment America.
“Backward compatibility is a nice secondary consideration, but it’s far from the number-one priority,” Tretton said.
Where are all the hecklers about Microsoft’s stance on backward compatibility now? I’ve just never been interested in it on my Xbox 360. I applaud both Sony and Microsoft for making it low priority. How appealing will this be to Sony fans?
