After indicating that the video game industry would be breaking records in the holiday season of 2007, Michael Pachter has now forecasted that the Nintendo Wii and the Xbox 360 will have similar sales. However the Wii will still hold an edge over Microsoft’s next-generation console.
Pachter is an analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities. He explains in his latest report, “These figures imply that Microsoft will sell 1.5 million Xbox 360s in December in the U.S., that Nintendo will sell 1.7 million Wiis, and that Sony will sell around 800,000 PS3s. This is about double the number of consoles sold last December, and suggests that the holiday will be a good one for the U.S. publishers.”
What’s more, Pachter also analyzed numbers of other platforms such as the PS2 and the PC. For Sony’s console, the analyst noted that there will be better than expected PS2 software sales. He mentioned that the newly designed PS2 will do well in 2008 and feels that around four million units could be shifted. As for PC gaming, Pachter estimated that the PC software sales will be down by three percent.
He concluded by saying that the demand for the Nintendo Wii will outstrip supply well into 2008 but noted that the balance will be achieved in April. He pegged the sales of the Wii to be somewhere around six to six and a half million consoles per year in 2007 and 2008.