back to article Sony surges past 70 million PlayStation 3 sales

Sony is commemorating the shipment of 70 million PlayStation 3 consoles this week. Reaching the milestone essentially puts it neck and neck with Microsoft's Xbox 360 in terms of overall global lifetime sales. The figures relate to the number of consoles shipped to retailers rather to than customers, so we have little idea how …

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  1. I think so I am?
    Meh

    I want a

    "must be a slow news day" symbol

    1. Comments are attributed to your handle
      Gimp

      Re: I want a

      Seeing as though you've found yourself in the "Games" section of Reghardware, I say keep dreaming.

    2. RICHTO
      Mushroom

      Re: I want a

      Reaching the same total 2 months afterwards is not having "caught up" though is it. Sony are still third.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: I want a

        They reached 70 million quicker than the XBox 360 did.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: I want a

          Sony reached 70 million faster by loosing billions subsidising their hardware while Microsoft made the money.

          Likely the vast majority of PS3s languish doing nothing except playing the odd Blu Ray for those that still fund the copyright cartels...

          Certainly the Xbox is far more profitable both for Microsoft and the games companies than the PS3 is. the Xbox has an attach rate of about 11 games sold per console: http://www.mcvpacific.com/news/read/microsoft-reports-kinect-attach-rate-and-xbox-live-growth/087077 versus about only 4.5 for each PS3!

      2. cortezcortez

        Re: I want a

        Given that the 360 launched much earlier, has always been cheaper, and that the PS3 for its first three or four years had to fight against constant claims in the gaming and electronics media that it was a flop, I'd say Sony have a lot to shout about and MS must be pretty gutted.

        Oh, you forgot to mention that MS have to subtract at least a million of their figure for retail-replaced RRoDs (we don't know the true figure, which is probably higher, because MS have never been prepared to discuss how many consoles were taken back to stores after they broke down; the factory-replacement programme took a while to come remember). Given that, I'd say the PS3 is ahead in number of consoles bought.

  2. Rob

    Shame...

    ... there are no stats on how many of that 100 million Wii's are actually being used or traded in for a different console.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Shame...

      Yeah parents have a Wii it was bought second hand in May and is already in the spare room unused in the corner. Meanwhile are household has burnt through one PS3 and on to our second one, its used everyday, games, streaming movies, blu-ray etc. hardly watch any TV any more.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Shame...

        Same here. Wii gathers dust, PS3 is used most nights, either gaming, Blu-Ray, Loveflim or iPlayer...

    2. DrXym

      Re: Shame...

      I wonder how many owners of Wiis currently gathering dust intend to repeat the mistake with the Wii U.

    3. Lamont Cranston

      Re: Shame...

      Why let it gather dust when you can just hand it down? My in-laws bought a Wii - once they'd got bored with Bowling, they gave it to us for the kids to use. Free console (result) and small children really aren't that bothered about cutting edge technology (so long as I tune out their pleas for me to buy them and X-box with Kinect!).

      Nintendo Wii: shit for grown-ups (Wii-motes? Ugh!), but great for kids, so it's no wonder it sold so well.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    But hang on..

    Hasn't the Xbox360 been on sale 16 months longer?

    Aren't a vast majority of Xbox360 sales replacements for failed units?

    Surely this means that the PS3 ACTIVE userbase is substantially higher, and what with the virtually non-existant piracy rate on PS3 (compared to the rampant problems on Xbox and Wii), means that it's the preferred platform for development?

    1. Comments are attributed to your handle
      Coat

      Take a number...

      and then please check previous PS3/Xbox article comment forums for the answers (and corresponding rebuttals & follow-up arguments) to your questions.

      1. Comments are attributed to your handle

        Re: Take a number...

        It's not that I disagree with what AC said, but it's been said *so* many times already.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: But hang on..

      Aren't a vast majority of Xbox360 sales replacements for failed units?

      Doubt that the console could be sell for that long if that was the case. Word of mouth, amplified by the internet, would have killed sales already. If I'm shopping for a new console I'd choose one that is not going to break, and if the forums where full of people complaining I'd rather avoid the XBox.

      And yes, after my first console breaks when out of warranty I can get another one because I want to keep playing my games. But I can also dismiss the brand altogether and get a PS3.

    3. DrXym

      Re: But hang on..

      Yes the 360 was on sale longer though I doubt the replacement program accounted for enough boxes to significantly affect overall sales.

      I expect development for 360 and PS3 is virtually identical, mostly because the platforms reside on the same development tier being largely similar in broad terms for their performance - a game written for one platform may as well be written for the other and share the costs of development, testing, marketing etc.

      Nintendo probably hope that the Wii U is close enough to the PS3 and 360 too that it will reside in the same tier and therefore benefit and gain a lot more premium 3rd party titles than the Wii did. The Wii used to get lumped in with the PS2 while the PS2 was viable and thereafter it was increasingly ignored or reduced to selling shovelware by 3rd parties.

      1. RICHTO
        Mushroom

        Re: But hang on..

        Xboxes replaced under the 3 year warranty replacement program were not counted as sales....

        1. cortezcortez

          Re: But hang on..

          You seem to forget that early in the RRoD days many, many consoles were replaced at the point of sale. Therefore, for someone who suffered the failure, their single purchase was recorded as two shipments to retail. The figures discussed here are shipments to retail.

          Lots of gaming/tech journalists/analysts have tried to guess the retail-replaced figure, and none I've seen suggest it's lower than a million. Of course, MS could clear it all up now and tell us the figure, but they have never even been prepared to deal with the question (that tells you it ain't pretty). I remember Aaron Greenberg being asked for the figure in a video interview in the States, and he just blanked the journalist and silently waited for the next question.

    4. RICHTO
      Mushroom

      Re: But hang on..

      PS3 has a much higher piracy rate and the Xbox has a much higher attach rate than the PS3 (games sold per console)

      The PS3 piracy problem is because the Xbox requires tricky hardware mods whereas the PS3 can be completely hacked via software only. And the Xbox OS itself is unhacked, so you cant use hacked boxes on Xbox Live, etc. whereas you can use hacked PS3s on PSN and can cheat - which is a large reason why PSN sucks in comparison.

      Plus Microsoft make loads more off Xbox Live (40 million active subscribers) than Sony do from PSN. Plus it costs Sony more to sell each console.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: But hang on..

        And the Xbox OS itself is unhacked, so you cant use hacked boxes on Xbox Live, etc. whereas you can use hacked PS3s on PSN

        You are either a Microsoft troll or clueless. I was speaking to a colleague at work the other week about buying a Xbox and he told me he had never bought a legitimate game ever for it.

        How was he playing the latest FIFA I asked? He said he bought a copy of the game from some back up and restore site that trusts your good faith that you have an original. Total cost a fiver. He then said he could play it online by taking the ISO from the disc and then applying a patch I think he called it stealth patch and then burned a new disc and he was playing his mates and others on Xbox live just like he did with COD and Forza

        I will admit I've seen some hacks on PS3 online but it's all been limited to the COD games and I'm unaware of anyone who has managed to get snide games working but then I know about 3 Xbox users for every 1 PS3 users.

        I think both consoles are exploitable in some way or another but your post is just so pro Microsoft and anti Sony it's like you have some sort of loyalty to Microsoft. Are they paying you to worship them?

        1. RICHTO
          Mushroom

          Re: But hang on..

          You cant do that without modifying the hardware of the Xbox - soldering a board inside it, or hardware flashing the firware of the DVD drive with special equipment for instance. And THEN patching the disk image too.

          The statistics prove you are wrong - the Xbox has a MUCH higher attach rate (sold games per console) than the PS3.

          1. Fisher39

            Re: But hang on..

            Not really. Hacking the XBox is almost absurdly simple. Admittedly the new slims are more difficult but once you've extracted the key, the old elites and 60/20/Arcades are just about plugging into a SATA socket and running someting-flasher. Some of the new slims you do have to hack the mother board but GAME and CEX are flogging off the older ones for buttons, and if you can get a Benq drive rather than Lite-on it's absurdly simple.

            I have somewhere in the region of !20 original XBox 360 games and to be honest the difference between the PS3 and XBox for me is down to the quality of on-line, the interface and the controllers, all of which (in my opinion) are better on the XBox than PS3.

            Note the 'in my opnion' bit 'cos that's quite important: Fanbois of either side may disagree with whether the things that I think are important actually are but isn't that the point of having two consoles ont he market with different selling points?

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        lol, every myth in one post...

        www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.336755-TorrentFreak-Reveals-Top-Pirated-Games-of-2011?page=1

        Also who cares how much Microsoft make from idiot gamers to play on their laggy p2p network. For the same money PS3 owners are getting piles of free games.

        Who are the idiots??

        Finally, the Xbox warranty was only 3 years, it's been out and pathetically unreliable for 6 years. I know plenty of box users that have bought replacements, including several within the 3 years that were unaware.

        Microsoft are lucky if they have 30m active Xbox Live Gold subscribers online. (we know that 43 percent of Xbox owners are on the worthless offline silver)

  4. Ryan Clark

    Our PS3 get used as a DVD/ blu-ray player most of the time. I bought a Wii first and if it was a DVD player I never would have bought the PS3, which has never been used for gaming but does get used for media streaming. I see Nintendo are going to repeat this mistage with the Wii U

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      >Our PS3 get used as a DVD/ blu-ray player most of the time.

      Yep, that's exactly what Sony were going for when they sold it to you at a loss.

    2. RICHTO
      Mushroom

      Shame you can no longer use a PS3 as a media player thanks to Cinavia....

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hmmm

    I'm a PS3 owner, but all of my mates are on xbox live. They all bang on about how good it is and how I should join them to see what I'm missing, but the PS3 doubles as a Blu-ray player and also good for streaming TV in the UK and surfing the net (something Microsoft just cottoned on to with Xbox)

    I am tempted to get a Xbox slim for Christmas just so I can join them all on Black Ops II, but of all my mates on Xbox I don't know a single one who hasn't had to buy a second console. Only a couple were early enough adopters to get red ring of death, but they managed to get them swapped out then their replacement units developed faults after about 2 years. The most common fault seems to be faulty disc drives and not recognising the hard drive. I'm hoping they've refined the manufacturing process now though and ironed out these bugs for when I get mine

    1. MJI Silver badge

      Re: Hmmm

      You have to do the Uncharted method, opening of UC2

      Then you will have some friends on PSN

  6. asdf
    FAIL

    I wonder

    Do you think the PS3 will ever catch the PS2 in sales? Hahaha. Beating me too Microsoft is a nice moral victory but selling half as many consoles as the last generation is beyond embarrassing. It should never have been a close race.

    1. asdf

      Re: I wonder

      Haven't caught Micro$haft yet. Still have to say as the generation gets long in the tooth my PS3 launch fatty has held up remarkable well. Blueray does make it useful even after the PS4 gets released.

      http://www.vgchartz.com/

  7. Euripides Pants

    Wii, PS3

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNNFqqyt_TY

    1. MJI Silver badge

      Re: This backfired

      The fatter girl has bigger breasts!

      Nothing wrong with a larger lady

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