When it comes to high-selling video game systems, what pops up in most people's minds are likely the PlayStation 2, the Nintendo DS, and of course, the Nintendo Wii. Now that the most recent financial results have been reported, we can see that Sony's PlayStation 4 is closing in on 100 million units sold, with the PS4 selling a grand total of 96.8 million since the system's launch in 2013. 17.8 mil PlayStation 4s were shipped throughout all of 2018, showing a slight decline in sales compared to last year as it reaches the end of its lifespan, while hype begins to build for the upcoming "PlayStation 5". As of April 2019, the PlayStation 4 is the sixth highest selling video game console of all time, sitting just below the Nintendo Wii's 101.6 million, and above its predecessor, the PlayStation 3, which reached 87.4 million. Sony's company analysts project that around 16 million more PS4s will be sold within 2019, and if that expectation is managed, then that'll put the PlayStation 4 above both the PS1 and the Wii, in terms of sales.

Do you expect the PlayStation 4 to surpass the Nintendo Wii's total sales? With such a successful console on their hands, Sony has a lot to live up to, as they plan for the future and their next home console.

Source

 

[eriol33]

Wii was a bad console. there were only few good games on that thing, the rest was a rubbish. I swear gamecube had more quality games than Wii. and yes, I bought a used wii so I could play gamecube with nintendont.

 

[FAST6191]

Nah, PS3 ultimately did amazing too, even though it stumbled out of the gate. But PS4 passed PS3 sales a long time ago.

Caught up maybe.
I would not call losing a clear and dominant position held for over a decade, becoming the last thing between PC, PS3 and 360 to be the lead platform in, missing out on a few key titles (as a player then between sequels and late stage ports it is not so bad but at the time...) and taking up until about the end to maybe be considered alongside the 360, and then still fraction of the wii, even with the old people wii sports bump accounted for, as amazing or dominant.

 

[whateverg1012]

Caught up maybe.
I would not call losing a clear and dominant position held for over a decade, becoming the last thing between PC, PS3 and 360 to be the lead platform in, missing out on a few key titles (as a player then between sequels and late stage ports it is not so bad but at the time...) and taking up until about the end to maybe be considered alongside the 360, and then still fraction of the wii, even with the old people wii sports bump accounted for, as amazing or dominant.

Well, it still beat out the 360 in terms of console sales, which is incredible considering the PS3's horrendous launch.

It's nice they learned from that failure. If the PS4 beats out the Wii, it'll be purely Sony consoles in the top 3 best selling home systems.

 

[FAST6191]

Did it beat out the 360 in the end? I know it was catching up at one point but the games were already well into the fizzling out bit by this point.

 

[whateverg1012]

Did it beat out the 360 in the end? I know it was catching up at one point but the games were already well into the fizzling out bit by this point.

Yeah by about 3 million.

 

[Obveron]

The attach rate on the PS4 is much higher than the Wii. For alot of Wii owners it was a Wii Sports box that collected dust 99% of the time.

 

[Frankbel]

False. Console gamers did not go from playing quality games on consoles to playing crappy mobile games on smart phones. Console gaming has shrunk in favour of pc gaming. Xbox did not sell well this generation because they had no exclusives, which meant instead of buying an Xbox people built/bought a pc. That's also why Sony won this generation, exclusives that can not be had else where. If Xbox has no exclusives next gen it will do just as bad as it did this gen. If PlayStation had no exclusives next gen, it too would to just as bad as Xbox did this gen. Why buy a console that has no exclusives and will only be supported for 5 years, when you can build a pc that'll be powerful enough to compete with 2 generations of consoles?

I do not agree, it's hard to guess real numbers in the PC market. In the past three years we had very expensive GPUs because of the mining of cryptocurrencies. What we can say is that more than 260M home consoles were sold in the Wii gen, and much less have been sold during the current gen.

 

[FAST6191]

The attach rate on the PS4 is much higher than the Wii. For alot of Wii owners it was a Wii Sports box that collected dust 99% of the time.

While attach rate is interesting (I had a whole thread contemplating things like it the other day https://gbatemp.net/threads/devisin...ion-equivalent-for-game-console-sales.537023/ ) I think the utter desert (we were way past drought) that was the wii releases for its last few years says more there.

Edit

I do not agree, it's hard to guess real numbers in the PC market. In the past three years we had very expensive GPUs because of the mining of cryptocurrencies. What we can say is that more than 260M home consoles were sold in the Wii gen, and much less have been sold during the current gen.

That Steam leaked numbers thing was fairly interesting and something I might base an estimation on
https://gbatemp.net/threads/steam-player-data-leak-reveals-detailed-pc-game-sales-data.510786/

 

[Bladexdsl]

Wii was a bad console. there were only few good games on that thing, the rest was a rubbish. I swear gamecube had more quality games than Wii. and yes, I bought a used wii so I could play gamecube with nintendont.

that's why it was so popular being the king of shovelware it appealed more to families and soccer mums. and at the time they loved that motion controls fad

 

[Ryccardo]

FINALLY, the only profitable division of $ony! Meanwhile anything else are still red on last fiscal year....

Just force them to start making Trinitrons again

it does not seem to have much in the way of "is also a DVD player" thing going for it either.

I remember that for quite a while it didn't play media, at least from USB - they didn't want another generation of "expensive but still the best value media center" for a product sold at a loss, depending on which conspiracy theory you subscribe to

 

[Purple_Shyguy]

Exaggeration of the day

It's literally not exaggerated actually.

Straight up actual numbers.

 

[pasc]

Since I owned both I feel somewhat responsible xD.

Sadly the PS4 is not hackable in a very usable manner. Shame. Real shame.

 

[sarkwalvein]

To be honest, there's nothing really wrong with the PS4.
Except perhaps the the DS4 battery life sucks.
And it has the worst analog sticks compared to xbone and switch.
And the triggers are painful to use compared to the ones on the xbone gamepad.
Or that visually it should win the equivalent to a golden raspberry award for design.
Or that you should wear noise cancelling headphones to hear something under its fan noises.
Or that the PRO version comes without a 4K Bluray drive and it wouldn't play Audio CDs.
Or that the online service subscription if the most expensive of the big three here in Europe.

But it is a great console and I love it, except when it stops accepting my credit card because it is a jerk (it also does that sometimes).

except when it stops accepting my credit card because it is a jerk (it also does that sometimes).

Might also be because I use a German credit card and I have it registered in Ireland.... but oh well, fuck German game censorship.

PS: The Xbone and Switch are also registered in Ireland and they do not complain.

 

[Justinde75]

They won't make it, not with their censorship policies.

hey it plays fortnite so people dont care

 

[mancasoko]

Almost 97 million sold and I still can't afford to buy one.

 

[Spider_Man]

Why does gbatemp always have to compare sony and Nintendo and vice versa.

We all know sony are in a completely different league to nintendo.

The wii sold very well, it was a dead cheap system, but it was one shit console for yet again ahovelware crap titles.

Also how can it be ps4 lifetime sales when its still their current console on the market and still selling.

If your going to pay editors to supply content at least get your shit right, nothing worse than a biased fanboy editor that wants to feed his nintendo loving monkey each morning and the tempers come here reading bullshit news.

Bullshit news is what kills visitor numbers.

 

[skanimal]

i'll buy one when the ps10 comes out, by then I should have enough money to what the price should've dropped to

 

[guisadop]

Nice! I personally really like the PS4 despite its various flaws.

 

[satel]

i'll buy one when the ps10 comes out, by then I should have enough money to what the price should've dropped to

by then it will join the emulated consoles scene

this news is impressive although Nintendo didn't make loss on Wii hardware like Sony did with Ps4's hardware !!

i may buy one if they release a super slim model

 

[mrgone]

i don't see how that comparison is valid:
ps4 had a pro version and hardcore gamers upgraded from regular to pro. so basically they bought 2 ps4's