North American PS3 Sales Confirm Growth

Sony systems are starting to move off shelves at a much faster pace thanks to an early-November price cut.

Although Sony’s price cut on the PlayStation 3 had the intended effect in Japan, spurring on sales of the system, the outcome in North America was a question mark until Sony recently released its latest figures. The verdict: sales have “more than doubled.”

According to Macworld, Sony announced its latest numbers on Thursday, claiming a 192 percent boost in sales of the 40GB and 80GB system at the continent’s top-10 retailers. While this represents an enormous leap in sales for the company, it will have to do better to catch up with the Wii: In October, Nintendo shipped 519,000 Wii systems to Sony’s 121,000 PS3s.

Sony is fighting an uphill battle to establish the PS3 after a lackluster launch over a year ago. Hampered by a $599 price tag, the system failed to catch on and saw sales crawl along, while competitor Nintendo scored a surprise success with the Wii.