Xbox 360 to dominate 2006

Gamasutra reports on the Kagan forecast of an Xbox 360 flavoured hardware dominance for next year, finally muscling in on Sony's current North American advantage. The Kagan research presumes a PS3 launch in the US somewhere after Q2 2006. The forecast goes far enough to suggest a sale of 17.9 million units in 2008.

The 360 itself is expected to massively drum up the console sales in the US this year alone, with predictions reaching 1.6 million by January 2006. The 2008 picture looks heavily Sony weighted, with 54% of all next generation console sales going to the PS3. By comparison the Revolution looks set to have captured 22% which leaves Microsoft with an unimpressive 2% lead over Nintendo. After the speech from Mark Reign yesterday, many MS fans could be disappointed with the projected results.

Irina Mulvey, CFA, analyst for Kagan, has said that, "Console sales have declined for two years in a row, but in 2005, with the highly anticipated Xbox 360 slated to hit the market November 22, we expect to see unit sales start an upward climb with a 3% increase over 2004." Which is hardly surprising, the increase on 2005 will be the figure to watch.

More information here, but it all points to the same thing. The Xbox 360 will strangle 2006 but eventually be relegated to less than a quarter of the market by 2008. µ