The NES was 299$ Cdn when I bought it. Don't forget the US dollar was worth a lot more back then. It has seriously devalued over the years since 1980 in relation to gold/oil. How this fits into an inflation argument I'm not too sure, as I'm not an economist familiar with currencies.
I don't think disposable income has changed much however, but the amount people spend on electronics versus vacations, and other luxury items has clearly increased. I used music players and phones of examples of things that people who don't buy consoles would purchase. The PS3 is no different as its market has also grown astronomically since the 80s (along with music players and phones).
As for the Saturn, if you're comparing it to Sega's expectations of course it was a failure. It still had a loyal install base, and many successful exclusives. I think you may be confusing it with the SegaCD/32X and dreamcast. Those are spectacular failures. The Saturn still lasted 4 years, and has a large library of games an accessories (I know I own them all along with a huge library of quality imports). Doesn't sound like a failure to me compared to others in the industry.
I also note you didn't choose to debate the NeoGeo or 2600. Thats ok.
Again most of this has very little to do with the fact that people with HD tvs may choose the PS3 over Xbox and Wii as their home media center because of things like blu-ray and other features. I think these people will add at least a few hundred thousand lifetime sales to what we expect typically for a game like LBP. This combined with heavy marketing, and a strong platform (which the PS3 is shaping up to be) we could see 2-3 million easily, maybe more!
1
The NES was 299$ Cdn when I bought it. Don't forget the US dollar was worth a lot more back then. It has seriously devalued over the years since 1980 in relation to gold/oil. How this fits into an inflation argument I'm not too sure, as I'm not an economist familiar with currencies.
I don't think disposable income has changed much however, but the amount people spend on electronics versus vacations, and other luxury items has clearly increased. I used music players and phones of examples of things that people who don't buy consoles would purchase. The PS3 is no different as its market has also grown astronomically since the 80s (along with music players and phones).
As for the Saturn, if you're comparing it to Sega's expectations of course it was a failure. It still had a loyal install base, and many successful exclusives. I think you may be confusing it with the SegaCD/32X and dreamcast. Those are spectacular failures. The Saturn still lasted 4 years, and has a large library of games an accessories (I know I own them all along with a huge library of quality imports). Doesn't sound like a failure to me compared to others in the industry.
I also note you didn't choose to debate the NeoGeo or 2600. Thats ok.
Again most of this has very little to do with the fact that people with HD tvs may choose the PS3 over Xbox and Wii as their home media center because of things like blu-ray and other features. I think these people will add at least a few hundred thousand lifetime sales to what we expect typically for a game like LBP. This combined with heavy marketing, and a strong platform (which the PS3 is shaping up to be) we could see 2-3 million easily, maybe more!