The Nintendo Wii could eventually outsell the Sony PlayStation 2 to become the greatest games console of all time. That's according to Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, who thinks that the Wii's new approach to gaming could change the industry.
"Sony's PS2 sales of 100 million units is an extraordinary number that our home game console business has not achieved," Iwata told the Reuters news agency .
"But if we can make our bid to expand the gaming population a continued success, we could exceed that."
The Wii still has a long way to go if it wants to overhaul sales of the ultra-popular PlayStation 2. Sony has shipped 120m PS2 consoles since its launch in 2000. The Wii on the other hand has shipped well under 15m.
Wii to overtake PS2?
Iwata has attributed the console's success on Nintendo's decision to target a completely new audience.
"I wouldn't say there is no overlap between the group of customers Sony is targeting and the group of users that Nintendo is targeting," he said. "But that overlap is quite small."
Nintendo's gaming hardware arm is making a profit from every Wii console it sells, meaning that the company is very cash rich at the moment. That contrasts with both Microsoft and Sony who are both making a big loss on every Xbox 360 and PS3 respectively that they sell.
