The Financial Times reports (subscription required) that Nintendo's Wii has now outsold Microsoft's Xbox 360 - racking up more than 9 million sales against 8.9m for the Xbox 360. (Sony's PlayStation 3? 3.7m, it's claimed.)
The report is based on sales figures from Enterbrain in Japan, NPD Group in the US and GfK of Germany, which tracks European sales. Sales figures from each console's launch date through the end of July (and the end of August in Japan) were added up, with the Wii just barely edging out the 360: 9 million for the Wii, 8.9 million for the 360, and 3.7 million for the PlayStation 3.
What's remarkable is that (a) the Wii hasn't been out for a year yet (b) it's still not reached equity on the supply-demand side.
Of course, it does depend on who you listen to. Nexgenwars says that the Wii is still behind, at 10.7m vs 11.4m for the Xbox360 (and 4.5m for the PS3).
On the other hand, VGChartz.com puts the Wii well ahead - 11.45m vs 10.89m (PS3 4.57m). The hardware comparison page, showing the growth of sales, is very impressive - even if it's overstating the sales of the Wii, the takeoff is incredible, at about twice the rate of the other two. On that basis, had all three launched at the same time, the Wii would have 50% of the market.
We predicted that this was on the way in July, saying it would happen "within a few months". This is ahead of that schedule, though.
All of which is intriguing, but - what does it mean for games?
