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Revolution Interface, DS Chart-Toppers
Joystiq reports on the continued success of the DS in Japan, where the two-screened console is not only outselling the 360, but topping the charts as well. They're also showing off mock-ups of what the Revolution virtual console service might work like. As Doc Brown said, "Please excuse the crudity of this model." The virtual console will allow Revolution owners to buy and play classic Nintendo games. Includes a list of possible launch titles.
"where the two-screened console is not only outselling the 360,"
Come on, I'm sure even the old Bandai Playdia is still outselling the 360 in Japan. My grandmother can outsell the 360 in Japan. The meaningful comparison is how it's doing compared to the PSP, GCN, PS2, or (dare I say it) the GBA.
The DS is doing amazingly well in Japan. I got mine outside of Osaka in early December and boy am I glad - there are places selling used machines for $200 American dollars. Kids are using their New Year's money to snap up the machines (If I weren't so convinced that Nintendo will soon have a handle on production again, I'd buy a load of the machines in the U.S. and bring them over).
The only machine that has the shelf space in nearly all the consumer oriented video game stores (as opposed to the holes in the wall in Den Den Town which cater to more hardcore gamers) is the PS2. The DS is well on its way to being a ubiqutious platform just like the PS2.
There are shelves for the PSP, but the games are crap and there's not nearly as much advertising, compared to the brochures, banners, and boxes for Nintendogs, Brain Training, Mario Kart, and Animal Crossing.
The place to be is the DS.
"There is no time, sir, at which ties do not matter," Jeeves, (Jeeves and the Impending Doom)
The userbase of the DS and PSP in the U.S. are roughly even at this time, although Nintendo's had a good holiday season with multiple great games while the PSP only really had GTA.
But in Japan, the DS is smoking the PSP. In sales each month it comes in ahead of the PS2. And during several reporting periods, the DS has outsold all other consoles combined. And in the last reporting period (link only accurate to my statements temporarily, and may change soon in fact, the period I'm talking about is the week from Dec 26-Jan 1) eight of the ten top software titles on the list are DS games. The top-rated PS2 game, at #4, is Kingdom Hearts II, a very eagerly-awaited game in a nation that loves RPGs. #3 and #2, respectively, are Mario Kart DS and Animal Crossing! #1 and #5 are in the Brain Training series that has yet to make it to the U.S., but are supposed to be coming soon.
But why is this important to us U.S. players? For these reasons:
1. It proves the DS is no Virtual Boy. It's here to stay.
2. It is vindication for the DS' unorthodox design elements. The DS' success in Japan is so tremendous by this point that it can only be called an unqualified success, even if the rest of the world had never bought a single DS.
3. Most importantly, Japan is the first market for many video game systems. There is a feedback loop here: if a system is popular, it attracts many developers, which make the system even more popular, etcetera. But the market here is the one in which many of those developers live and work, and that's gotta have a strong influence. That's one of the reasons why relatively few Japanese publishers developed for the original X-box.
Last I checked, this term is reserved for those game systems that sit by your TV.
Actually no, you've never checked, because there is nothing relating to "games" anywhere in the definition of console. Computer consoles have existed long before Nintendo or even Atari had an electronic product.
The definition, btw: "The portion of a computer or peripheral that houses the apparatus used to operate the machine manually and provides a means of communication between the computer operator and the central processing unit"
Typically, ignoramuses who have never heard of any kind of console aside from a "game console" will make an unjustified abbreviation, which is similar to how people who've never heard of any kind of "emulator" besides a "hardware emulator" go and say "Wine Is Not An Emulator".