We've been talking about the battle of the pre-orders ever since they became available earlier this year for both the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4. After the initial opening for pre-orders, Amazon reported that both consoles were moving up to 2,500 units per minute. We've consistently reported that the PS4 has stood at the top of the charts on Amazon and Gamestop the world around. Today, Sony has confirmed that those numbers all equate to more than one million pre-orders for the PlayStation 4, worldwide.
For those of you keeping track of the PS4 news, the console has already been ranked as one of the top selling game consoles of 2013 on the Amazon top-sellers list. The console was also consistently coming out on top as the choice device amongst gamers, leading polls on average of about 75%, globally.
A lot of people pointed to “fanboy brigades” and the “Sony Defense Force” as the ones rigging polls and creating a lopsided view of how people reacted to and engaged both the Xbox One and the PS4.
Realistically, gamers were pissed at Microsoft. They tried to kill off gaming culture by moving the industry backwards with anti-consumer DRM that was commonly found in PC games circa 2005. You aren't moving forward by bringing up ancient digital-rights management policies that gamers have been fighting to get rid of in the PC community for almost a decade. You're moving out of the world backward with that kind of thinking and all the consumer polls reflected that.
In fact, it wasn't even “angry fanboys” or the SDF that had any bearing on the actual analytical reports that indicated that the PlayStation 4 would outsell the Xbox One by nearly 50%. Why? Because of the fact that Sony's message has been clear-cut and consistent from the start: They put gamers first.
During the reveal of the Sony PlayStation 4 release date for North America and Europe, Sony's Group CEO, Andrew House, made it perfectly clear that they had garnered more than a million pre-orders since they became available. As the IGN duo covering the live-stream noted, Sony has already sold a million PS4s before the console even launched. That's beyond impressive.
Given that Microsoft opted out of doing a conference or sharing vital details about the Xbox One, we can only take a guess at what their numbers might be like... but given the strength of the reputation management and the moderate amount of gamers suffering Stockholm Syndrome, I would wager that the Xbox One has, maybe... 360,000 pre-orders on hand. Maybe.
Time will tell which one of the two consoles from Sony and Microsoft will be strongly favored by consumers, when they launch this November, just before Black Friday in North America, and at the end of the month in Europe.
