Wii and PS3 both sell out
Not entirely surprisingly.
Nintendo Wii and Sony's PlayStation 3 have predictably both sold out across the pond, with both companies trumpeting the fact this week.
Nintendo revealed on Monday that it sold 600,000 of its mould-breaking games consoles in North America, with flagship launch title The Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess reportedly selling 454,000 copies. Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime said "demand continues to exceed supply" and felt it was "a phenomenal launch".
Sony, meanwhile, has been keeping quiet about how many it sold, but said it had "sold out", and that the company had been "airlifting additional shipments of PlayStation 3 systems into the North American market since the launch". Wii has yet to launch in Japan, but PS3 did on 11th November, where it is widely thought to have exhausted an inventory of between 80,000 and just under 90,000 units on its first day.
Nintendo, whose console will launch in Japan on 2nd December and here in Europe on 8th December, has previously said it plans to ship four million units worldwide before the end of the year. Sony has pledged two million, with a further four million to be produced and shipped between January and March. "Our goal remains to have one million units in the [American] pipeline by December 31, 2006," SCEA said in its sell-out statement.