Tuesday 4-Dec-2001 12:00 AM Need it explained any clearer?. OK. How about 27 Gamecubes sold every minute? Make no mistake, we're witnessing one of the most titanic battles in videogame history. On par with the Mega Drive vs Super NES grapple-fest of the early 90s. Or touching cloth with the Atari Jaguar vs 3DO u-bend blocker of the mid 80s. When Nintendo chose to release Gamecube a mere three days after Xbox in the US, it seemed like immeasurable stupidity. But, according to independent sales figures, Nintendo's little purple block has toppled the Microsoft's mighty goliath. Who's laughing now, eh? Who's. Laughing. Now?
Want some numbers?. According to data analysed by super-posh investment-banking firm, Credit Suisse First Boston, Nintendo sold 469,000 Gamecubes in its US launch week (November 18-24) compared with just 186,000 Xbox consoles, over twice as many, and around 25 percent faster than the US launch of PlayStation 2. Further, Nintendo claims the total has reached nearly 600,000 in 15 days. Which breaks down to an average of 27 GameCubes sold every minute since launch.
Close your mouth.
Nintendo is confident it'll sell 1.3 million Gamecubes by the end of the year. Microsoft hasn't released Xbox sales figures yet, but says it also expects to sell between 1 and 1.5 million by the end of the year.
What else is there to say? Oh yeah, 810,000 units of US Game Cube software have been sold. With Luigi's Mansion clocking 257,000 copies alone, easily beating Mario 64 and making it the top-selling US launch game of all time.
Just goes to show, price your machine at Ł199 instead of Ł299 and they'll buy it. Of course, it'd help us if it was in pounds...
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