Thursday 11 May 2006
Xbox 360 will outsell both PlayStation 3 and Wii to become the market leading console worldwide. This was the bold claim made today by Microsoft Games Studios general manager Shane Kim, who was speaking to GamesRadar at E3.
"Sony have said themselves that they will only produce four million PS3 units this year. We'll have already sold 10 million Xbox 360s by then. But I think we will be market leader this generation - period," he said.
If - and it's a big if - Microsoft can indeed manage such a feat, Halo 3 has a crucial role to play. "The mythical Halo 3: it does exist!" exclaimed Kim when asked about the game's debut at the Microsoft conference earlier this week. "I got goosebumps as it was being unveiled. It was a great way for us to end our briefing as compared to the way some other people ended theirs." Ouch.
As for a Halo 3 release date, Kim joked that he wants it "to hit somewhere between January and December 2007." He continued, "If we wanted to use Halo 3 as a pawn in our strategy then we would release it on PS3's launch date. But Halo 3 is not a pawn. It won't do anybody any good to have Halo 3 rushed out just to spoil someone else's console launch. I'm very confident it'll be launched at the right time, whenever it comes."
Kim also added, "The good thing for 360 owners is that they'll be able to play Halo 3, Gears of War and Grand Theft Auto IV on one platform, which is why I believe we have the best games line-up on the next-gen consoles.
"And now we have a pricing advantage over PlayStation 3 as well." Ooof!
