DS outsold the Gameboy... ?

[kicknhorse]

DS is more popular than the Game Boy. Yes, Nintendo's latest handheld has beaten the total lifetime sales of its original handheld console.

According to Edge, 129 million DS consoles have been sold since it launched in Japan and the US in 2004 (it was released in the UK in 2005), beating Game Boy's lifetime sales by 11 million units.

Meanwhile the lifetime sales of Wii currently stand at 71 million. Not bad, eh?

I was suprised, I thought the Gameboy was much higher. Maybe it is down to there also being a lot more people in the world 20 years later?

 

[JohnLoco]

People afford it easier now is my guess, kids atleast.

 

[Beats]

I'm not very surprised.

It seems very obvious why.

Maybe because there are more children into gaming then before?

 

[prowler]

What pisses me off is that they count Wii Sports as a single game when its boxed free with all Wiis and now that is the most selling game of all time rather than SMB.

 

[nutella]

globalisation my friend... globalisation...

 

[Maikel Steneker]

What pisses me off is that they count Wii Sports as a single game when its boxed free with all Wiis and now that is the most selling game of all time rather than SMB.

Super Mario Bros. was bundled with a lot of NES's as well. I believe the best selling game that wasn't bundled with any console is still Super Mario Bros. 3... And it will probably not be beaten for quite a while

 

[Destructobot]

DS is more popular than the Game Boy. Yes, Nintendo's latest handheld has beaten the total lifetime sales of its original handheld console.

According to Edge, 129 million DS consoles have been sold since it launched in Japan and the US in 2004 (it was released in the UK in 2005), beating Game Boy's lifetime sales by 11 million units.

I was suprised, I thought the Gameboy was much higher.

Someone left a 9 off the end of the Game Boy sales figure. It should be 119 million.


Edit: Never mind, it turns out I just don't know how to read.

 

[Joe88]

where is the ps2 sales wise?

last time I checked around dec, I think they were nearing 150mil

 

[Guild McCommunist]

What pisses me off is that they count Wii Sports as a single game when its boxed free with all Wiis and now that is the most selling game of all time rather than SMB.

Super Mario Bros. was bundled with a lot of NES's as well. I believe the best selling game that wasn't bundled with any console is still Super Mario Bros. 3... And it will probably not be beaten for quite a while

Actually it's Wii Play. Unbundled with another accessory is Nintendogs then (combining all the versions). Uncombined it's Mario Kart Wii (not counting the Wii Wheel) or, if you wanna count the Wii Wheel as an accessory, NSMB DS. In fact, out of the Top 20 highest selling games of all time, Nintendo has 19/20 of their games in there. The only one that isn't Nintendo is GTA: San Andreas.

 

[Infinite Zero]

that's not surprising anymore
before, kids went outside to play and focused games less
now, all they do is play ps3, xbox, ds, and the like

Spoiler

[titlekay...]that's my opinion

 

[DSGamer64]

Gaming is far more accessible then it was in the early 90's. A DS now is cheap in relative terms to how much a Gameboy sold for at release when you look at the dollar values. Most people have no trouble affording 150 dollars now, back in the early 90's that was still a good chunk of change. Now things really don't be looked at as expensive until you get into the 400+ dollar mark, especially with electronics sitting in the 4 figure range for TV's and computer parts.

 

[tbgtbg]

There's also people these days that will buy a new DS just because they came out in a new color or whatever. There may have been some people that did that back in the GB days, but it wasn't nearly as common. That's not even considering those that have gone from DS to the DSL to the DSi and maybe even to the DSiXL. Most people with the "brick" GB model didn't bother to get a GB Pocket.

On thing I wonder, do GB sales numbers include sales of the Super GameBoy and GameBoy Player, or just actual handheld units?

 

[Lily]

On thing I wonder, do GB sales numbers include sales of the Super GameBoy and GameBoy Player, or just actual handheld units?

No and no.

 

[playallday]

What pisses me off is that they count Wii Sports as a single game when its boxed free with all Wiis and now that is the most selling game of all time rather than SMB.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-...video_games#Wii

 

[Hadrian]

I was suprised, I thought the Gameboy was much higher. Maybe it is down to there also being a lot more people in the world 20 years later?

There was figures before but it included all of the Gameboy range so GB, GBC & GBA.

This is just the mono GB and the GBC as they stood at 118 worldwide which covers a lot longer period than the DS sales does. If you add GBA then its just under 200 million for the whole range which itself is impressive but they should be kept separate.

 

[Overlord Nadrian]

It's quite obvious why this happened: the GameBoy wasn't mainstream, whereas the DS is accessible for young and old, hardcore and party gamer alike. I'd call it the most successful console of all time.