PlayStation 3 Outsells Wii in Japan

The Wii is universally loved, especially in its home country Japan. Month after month since launch, the Wii managed to outsell fellow Japanese rival PlayStation 3, but that all changed this month, as the final tally favors Sony’s console for November.

Citing information from Enterbrain, Reuters reports the PlayStation 3 outsold the Wii in the four weeks to November 25. Sony sold 183,217 PlayStation 3 and Nintendo sold 159,193 Wii in the period.

The PlayStation 3’s climb to the top of the Japanese sales charts has been one building up for months. The Wii was outselling the PlayStation 3 by six-to-one during summer, but by fall, the gap narrowed to three-to-one.

Despite the PS3’s success in November, some analysts feel that the console’s stay at the top may only be temporary.

"It's nice to see the system selling much better than six months ago. But is it a sustainable trend? Is it going to really escalate from here? I'm not so sure," KBC Securities analyst Hiroshi Kamide said. "Overseas, I don't really see the PS3 doing that much at Christmas time primarily because it's still more expensive than the other machines and has less software."

Sony told the media that sales of PlayStation 3 have tripled in the U.S. thanks to Black Friday sales, though early reports from Microsoft and Nintendo have placed sales of the two other consoles above that of the PS3.