Is Sony the most successful home console maker in history?

PS4 is on pace to slaughter the PS3 in terms of sales. The PS3 would be Nintendo's 2nd best selling console.

PS1: 100M+ units sold

PS2: 150M+ units sold

PS3: 80M+ units sold

PS4: 50M+ units sold

Total: 380M+ consoles sold. 95M+ sold on average per console.

NES: 60M+ units sold

SNES: 50M units sold

N64: 30M+ units sold

NGC: 20M+ units sold

Wii: 100M+ units sold

Wii U: 12M+ units sold(lol)

Total: 272M+ consoles sold. 45M+ sold on average per console.

When I was a kid the word "Nintendo" was syonymous with a game console. Same way people use the term band-aid as a generic term for an adhesive bandage.

With that said Nintendo has only made one successful home console in the past 20 years. Sony has made 4.

Yea, but Nintendo make better games.

I think your definition of successful is a bit skewed.

Yes, they obviously are.

To add further to what I said, why did you create a rhetorical thread where the answer is included in the very premise and there's absolutely nothing to discuss about the topic?

You know the answer, I know the answer, literally everyone here knows the answer. You created a thread with a statement posed as a question, it's utterly pointless.

Going plainly on numbers, then yes. But numbers aren't everything...

What do we discuss? Sony hype train? Over promises and under delivering? What?

Nintendo basically created a monster that is now big enough to eat them.

Going by the numbers, then yes.

However, all three companies have been very successful.

@xdude85:

Vita was Sony's only flop.

Consoles sold? Yeah

Profit wise? Nintendo probably wins(I think)

What an idiot.

OP asks question in thread title.

OP answers his own question in thread.

Expects what exactly?

Funny how if I ranked those consoles, all the 100+mil sellers (PS1, PS2, and Wii) would not be anywhere near the top

To be entirely objective about things, I'd say that the answer is arguably a 'yes'.

In Nintendo's lifetime as a console maker, they made 3 commercially successful consoles - NES, SNES and Wii (3 out of 6, ignoring portable consoles)

In Sony's lifetime as a console maker, all 4 of their consoles were commercially successful - PS1, PS2, PS3 & PS4. Just because the PS3 wasn't the most sold console of the generation, it doesn't mean it wasn't commercially successful. It ended up tying with the 360. So the generation ended with one clear winner - the Wii, and two runner ups - 360 and PS3. Besides, the PS3 was perceived as a failure only because Sony's previous consoles achieved domination. It's a relative comparison and not an absolute one.

In Microsoft's lifetime as a console maker, only the first Xbox was less than satisfactory. If we count the X1 as a success, that's 2 out of 3.

Even if we exclude the PS3 from Sony's list of successful consoles, Sony still has 3 out of 4

From the above, I'll say that Sony has the best track record for making consoles which are in demand by consumers

They make very different games.... hard to compare their libraries

but we already know youre a huge PS hater.

Yes, of course.

Used to

His answer is irrelevant to this topic (because this topic is about hardware, not games), but your rebuttal is just inaccurate. Nintendo still make better games.

Well if we are to consider sales as success in this thread, and we go by your numbers in the OP.... sure looks like it.

If we're going by the numbers, then there isnt really an argument against Sony

Yes, Sony has always been successful on there Hardware ever since PlayStation arrival from PlayStation, PS2/3/4 and the only 2 Sony hardware flop was PSP Go and now Vita. Final answer is:

Why is this a question? Sony is as dominant as it gets.

Yes. Its that simple.

Your statement is inaccurate about Nintendo making better games. Your fanboy is showing.

@drummerdave9099:

A lem stating what you posted is just as "expected" as Wednesday coming after Tuesday.

His fanboy isn't showing and he ain't no hardcore Sheep unlike iandizion713. Nintendo does make cool games, it's there shitty hardware that's holding Nintendo back.

No

You can say no all you want but it is an inaccurate statement. But lets not add to the derailment of the thread. :)

K

I guess it depends on how you define success. Its pretty apparent that you are going strictly by units sold. However, there are other things to consider when making this topic (although all system wars talks about is units sold):

• Were these consoles all sold at a profit? Selling 100M units doesn't matter if a company is moving them at a loss
• Life cycle of each console (Nintendo's is typically shorter, resulting in less time for sales).
• Attach rate? Who cares if people are buying consoles if no one is buying games/using them. I have a PS Vita, but haven;t used it since I bought the damn thing. Would that be considered a successful handheld cause it sold units?
• Innovation?

There many ways to define a successful home console maker. The problem is, you clearly made chose the definition of success (units sold) and ruined your own topic on the first post.

In terms of the raw numbers and data, most definitely. But you have to consider the intangibles, like how the NES saved the video game industry, the dominance of Nintendo during the NES/SNES eras, and what your personal preferences are in terms of first party content.

For you , for me they are just okish and the fact that they playing safe rather than trying new stuff is another reason why they used to , not anymore.

I think what they really holding them back is that they are not trying new AAA caliber IPs like everyone else tries every generation. Whats saves the day for them everytime is how top notch of a platformer Mario is and how differently and solidly playing everytime.

Everything else its either worse than previous installments ( is what sheep saying for numerous of newer titles like Zelda SS for example ) or one of the same with some different touches here and there.

And then , yes , its their hardware that killing it.

Nintendo still the most successful console maker, TC only put the "home" in to justify their point. Nintendo still has sold more.

Where did I say anything about Xbox?

Good job taking nothing and twisting it into something. It'd be like if your girlfriend said she was going out with friends and you accused her of cheating on you.

I would say so, yes. :)

They have done great since the inception of the Playstation.

These kinds of threads are ridiculous. Do you think Sony and Nintendo are "ignoring handheld sales?" I can create threads to skew the conversation in a positive direction to my way of thinking too but that doesn't change the fact that Nintendo has sold 700 million consoles, more than any other company in the universe. I'm not a fanboy in any direction. I have all 3 home consoles and both handhelds. I'll continue to have them all as long as I'm playing video games. I like them all for a variety of reasons, and quite honestly don't care if the Wii U has laughable sales figures. I have one, and I've enjoyed a bunch of great games on it. That said, if I want to play a sick baseball game, my PS4 is the only place to do it. None of the 3 offer everything I want out of a console. We can all pretend that we don't want to play the next Zelda, but then we would be lying. I could also pretend that I don't care that all of my friends I play online with are on XBL and it wouldn't bother me to give up playing with them, but they are and it would.

Let's also take into consideration the production costs vs. retail pricing. Prior to the PS4, Sony notoriously lost money on each console sold. (Some reports had the PS2 as a $180US difference...granted that's launch figures, but even cut to a $50US loss average, that's over $7B in losses.) Nintendo, on the other hand, with their cheap, crappy, consoles, have generally sold at a profit. Take the GameCube for example; early launch figures reported a $50 profit per console for Nintendo. So while the console only sold 21 million-ish units, Nintendo enjoyed over $1B in profits, (and this isn't taking into consideration similar aforementioned averages I gave to Sony.) The Wii? Lots of reported figures have them making $90 per console. You do the math on that one.

And finally...the real kicker. The numbers that people in the business world actually care about. Those who don't care about patting themselves on the back because the console they have in their living rooms sold more than the other guys:

• Microsoft $90B
• Nintendo $18.4B
• Sony $17.7B

Net worth. I realize it's not console sales numbers, but it's numbers that the world outside of a forum where a bunch of us geeks are arguing over who is the system wars winner actually cares about.

While I love reading all of the ridiculous views, I just can't seem to get on board with getting on my knees for one console or another. Are all you guys who bend over for Sony really telling me you have ZERO interest Mario Galaxy 2, Skyward Sword, Smash Bros., etc.?

@drummerdave9099:

You didn't, however not only going by your post history, but the context that your post was presented in tells me that you're more of a "pro" xbox, "anti" playstation fan.

Your answer to his rebuttal is inaccurate. Nintendo once made better games.

http://www.forbes.com/companies/sony/

#192 Sony

• Market Cap As of May 2016
• $34.1 Billion

Industry

Consumer Electronics

Founded

1946

Country

Japan

Chief Executive Officer

Kazuo Hirai

Website

http://www.sony.net

Employees

14,487

Sales

$67.89 B

Headquarters

Tokyo

http://www.forbes.com/companies/nintendo/

#1,436 Nintendo

• Market Cap As of May 2016
• $21.7 Billion

Industry

Recreational Products

Founded

1947

Country

Japan

Chief Executive Officer

Satoru Iwata

Website

http://www.nintendo.co.jp

Employees

5,213

Sales

$4.4 B

Headquarters

Kyoto

http://www.forbes.com/companies/microsoft/

Microsoft

• Market Cap As of May 2016
• $407 Billion

Ticker

MSFT $63.26 $0.06 (0.001%)

Industry

Software & Programming

Founded

1975

Country

United States

Chief Executive Officer

Satya Nadella

Website

http://www.microsoft.com

Employees

118,000

Sales

$86.6 B

Headquarters

Redmond, Washington

There is some real world stats for you.

As far as home console numbers sony wins. However, we gotta think about how much money they made on first party games in each of these consoles. We also have to remember how Nintendo has dominated the handheld market since the original gameboy came out to right now. Nintendo also diving into the mobile market lately and I gotta say, all these factors considered....Nintendo still wins.

Yes! And the sky is blue!

Nah, PS3 is my third favorite system ever, only behind SNES and GC. I own an Xbox One this gen because it practically fell into my arms. It's got some great games though. I look forward to getting a PS4 someday, but don't feel I need to fork over all that cash just to play Uncharted 4, Bloodborne, and The Last Guardian.

@flyincloud1116: Fair enough. Real world numbers still say Sony is a crapstain on the underpants of MS. Congrats on "winning" to Sony.

The only real successful Sony console was the ps2

@itstotallymike: to be fair, I think you're overthinking the topic a bit.

The topic is "most successful home console maker". Handhelds are not the same market; excluding their sales might have an ulterior motive, but the topic seems perfectly valid to me... why can't one discuss the success of home console brands? Who says you can't have that specific conversation without going on about the other products from the companies?

As for how "success" is defined - I totally take your point, but for us, on the consumer end, it seems the most important number is indeed consumer adoption rate. That's the number that most closely affects us, by influencing how many of our friends we can play online with, swap games with, etc. That's also one of the numbers that is important for securing good 3rd party support and even exclusivity deals (but definitely isn't the only one). It's a very reasonable metric for us to banter over, IMO. The companies might worry more about profit-per-unit, but for me, as a consumer, I just want games for my system and other people using my system to play with. It's the debate over this that's the fun/merit of the thread I think.

Your rebuttal about net worths and handhelds and such seems like a knee jerk reaction... MS is filthy rich, but that 400bn isn't thanks to them being "the most successful home console maker" and Nintendo's runaway success with their handheld market has nothing to do with them being "the most successful home console maker" either. You could start a "who has the most successful company" thread and put MS on their pedestal (but that's not a great SW topic), or "who is the undisputed handheld king" thread and put Nintendo on theirs - but IMO those would be even less inspired/debate-worthy than this one (because there simply is no close second). But more importantly to my point: those are different topics. I don't see what's wrong with this one.

No because there might be other metrics Nintendo may have beaten Sony at we don't know about. Like who sold the most games on their home consoles, who generated the most profits etc. By strictly looking at sales, Sony has been more successful since they came on the market but sales isn't the sole factor and I was hoping people would bring in other metrics to the table.

you could potentially criticize his definition of most successful. Considering that selling consoles isn't what makes a console a success, its games. I think easily 360 was a more successful console over it's entire lifespan. Out of the 3 consoles that were out in their prime ps3 slogged behind badly. Ps2 I think was the only real champion they had when it was in it's prime. Ps4 is now just king of the dumpster fire. Games take so long to make its pretty thin pickings to distinguish itself from xbox one at this point.

The point in answering his own question is to start a debate on what most successful means. He seems pretty confident it means sales of a console. If it was who sold the most consoles its really not discussion material.

Fun fact for everyone here. Nintendo has sold the most hardware out of all companies if we count everything.

NES: 61.91 Million Units

SNES: 49.10 Million Units

Nintendo 64: 32.93 Million Units

Gamecube: 21.74 Million Units

Wii: 101.63 Million Units

Wii U: 13.36 Million Units

Game Boy/Game Boy Color: 118.69 million units

Game Boy Advance: 81.51 million Units

Nintendo DS: 154.02 Million Units

Nintendo 3DS: 60 Million Units

Total number of Nintendo systems sold since the NES launched is 694.89 million

It should be noted that the number could be higher given the 3DS numbers were from March of this year which was well before the Pokemon craze that boosted 3DS sales. At this point, Nintendo could have sold over 700 million hardware units over the years.

So, Sony leads in the home console market, but Nintendo is the overall leader in units sold. A record that will likely never be broken as long as they make systems.

consolewise? yes. only because nintendo made more money with the gameboys than they did with the NES.

so they split their resources every gen. if they concentrated on consoles like sony i suspect a different outcome.

anyway if you add all nintendo hardware and all of sony's. nintendo still comes up on top easily.

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oh..and about the ps3...that thing started at 600 and ended at 250 by the end of the gen. sony almost went bankrupt because of the ps3. those numbers is sony almost giving away a free blu-ray player. successful is not quite right.

and finally.. they have only released 4 consoles so i don't know why you say 5 consoles at the end.