The Nintendo Wii is still cleaning up in the next-generation gaming arena, stomping all over the Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3) and the Microsoft Xbox 360 in the US. The Wii has consistently outperformed both the other consoles in all territories, and it seems the trend is continuing.
The US market is always a good indicator of how things are going to shape up in Europe; they've had the consoles for longer and so strong sales at a certain point across the pond indicate that strong sales will continue over here.
Nintendo shifted 259,000 Wii consoles at $250 (£125) a pop, raising £32m in March alone. The Xbox 360 came in behind at second place, with Microsoft managing to flog 199,000 of them, with the PS3 again flagging at the rear with a lowly 130,000 units.
The aged PlayStation 2 console is also continuing to sell remarkably well. In the UK you can pick a brand new one for around £50 and in the US there are similar discounts in place. This has led to Sony selling 280,000 of the things, ironically making it the biggest seller of them all.
Handheld domination
The high-end console bazaar is not the only market where Nintendo is managing to thrash Sony. The Nintendo DS Lite is still the best selling handheld gaming device, shifting over half a million of them in March. That compares to the almost embarrassing figure of 180,000 - the number of PSP consoles that Sony managed to push.
In all, the games industry in the US is continuing to boom, with games and consoles combining to raise industry revenue to £414m in total in just one month.
In Europe, the PS3 has been making slightly more headway against the other two major next-gen consoles, although its astronomically high price and a big dip in recent sales probably means we can expect a similar sales pattern in the EU as in the United States.
