After Nintendo announced they sold 600,000 Wii’s in one week, Sony couldn’t be far behind making total counts. According to Sony the PS3 sold out fast, which isn’t surprising with such long PS3 waiting lines. Sony said the following about the PS3 sales:
“Sony Computer Entertainment America has been airlifting additional shipments of PlayStation 3 systems into the North American market since the launch on November 17. We were able to get a fresh supply of PS3s in the hands of retailers prior to Black Friday, along with games and peripherals. Feedback from our retail partners is that demand is still incredibly high and that PS3s put on store shelves were quickly snapped up by holiday shoppers. We will continue to utilize airfreight delivery for the PlayStation 3 to assure a steady stream of systems for North American consumers through the end of the year. Our goal remains to have one million units in the pipeline by December 31, 2006.”
Analyst PS3 launch shipping estimates range from as low as 150,000 to Sony’s promised 400,000.
1UP also mentions Sony still plans to ship 2 million units worldwide by the end of 2006, 1 million of those going to the U.S.
All the extra PlayStation press exposure also caused PSP hardware sales up over 280% and PS2 hardware sales up 116% in the week of November 26th versus the week before. First-party PSP software is up 167% and first-party PS2 software is up 120%.
I don’t think I’m the only one who hates these “sold out” and “percentage sales up” claims, it’s too vague and sounds more like Sony shipped very few PS3 and only sold some extra PS2’s & PSP’s because of Thanksgiving.