I think its important to remember there is a world outside the US. Here are the worldwide console sales for December;

Nintendo DS - 6,638,408
Nintendo Wii - 3,569,138
Sony PSP - 2,340,850
Sony PS3 - 2,000,575
Xbox 360 - 1,945,393
Sony PS2 - 1,899,588

and here are the worldwide figures for the first 2 weeks of January;

Nintendo DS - 1,194,285
Nintendo Wii - 785,919
Sony PSP - 603,655
Sony PS3 - 421,129
Sony PS2 - 346,977
Xbox 360 - 339,928

People should also remember that most third party multi platform games on the 360 and PS3 sell better on the PS3 outside of the US. Pro Evo Soccer, Need For Speed, Assassins Creed, WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2008 and Fifa '08 for example.

"People should also remember that most third party multi platform games on the 360 and PS3 sell better on the PS3 outside of the US"

Are you having a laugh in the last year at retail never have I sold a single title that sells more on the PS3 than the 360. Working in one of the highstreets big name specialist stores we dont ever get as much stock in for PS3 as we do on 360 because we no it wont sell!

Lets not start flame wars, or childish fanboyistic comments lets agree overall this is good for the industry which in turn is good for us the consumer, because it means more games for 360, PS3, Wii, DS, PSP oh yeah and pc :)

Meh, don't encourage the anon asshat. They'll STFU and fade away on their own.

In response to his bullshit, I will note that the title of the article clearly states that it is reporting news of the US market, and I highly doubt that SPOnG can be accused of showing any kind of preferential treatment of the American market OR of neglecting the international one.

So "finding it useful to remember" is asinine, Mr. Anonymous twit. No one here is likely to forget in the first place.

I find your figures suspect, and perhaps less than useful in any event. I would find worldwide figures excluding Japan more relevant, considering that the Japaneese market is more unique unto itself.

Not that this would be an attempt to skew the results in any particular direction, just that theres not much point in including sales figures based on such a radically different market, if you're actually looking for a picture of whats happening in Western markets.

In a similar vein to what Mr GS said, the local video rental place is strongly considering pulling its PS3 catalog from the shelves, they are doing a masterful job of collecting dust, and even if the PS3 does eventually come into its own, no one is going to want to rent these games anyway.

Next time a forumite gives stats, would be good to reference a source / where they're drawn from.

What interested me about this article though was:
"All of this saw the US market for things video game related leap by 43% to $17.9 billion (just over £9-billion) during the year."
....there are obviously fears atm of a US recession....and that consumers may start saving rather than spending. It will be interesting to see if games buck that foreseen trend.
Or whether money saved on Bush's tax break gets spent on games moreso than lawn mowers. ^_^