Sony’s PlayStation 4 has reclaimed from Microsoft’s Xbox One the title of the top-selling video game console following the release of sales report for January 2015 showing the PS4 handily beating the Xbox One.
Since it was introduced late in 2013, the Xbox One has been trailing the PlayStation 4 in terms of sales.
But when Microsoft slashed the price of its next gen gaming console from $399 to $349 from November 2, 2014 to January 3, 2015, the Xbox One became at par with the PlayStation 4, price-wise.
Thus, when the Holiday sales reports were released early this year, the Xbox One showed a complete domination of the PlayStation for the first time in almost a year.
Xbox One was also the top selling gaming console during Black Friday sales after the US Thanksgiving Day celebration on November 28.
Microsoft’s next-gen gaming console captured 53% of the Black Friday market share. PlayStation 4 was a distant second with 31% share while the older Xbox 360 got 9% of the market share for 3rd place.
The Xbox One was also the No. 2 top selling product overall during Black Friday sales, behind only to the 16GB Apple iPad mini.
Losing steam
It’s just unfortunate that Microsoft decided to revert back to the original price of $399 for its next-gen gaming console on January 3 as that was most certainly a big blow to its marketing and sales strategy against the PlayStation 4.
With a higher price again compared to the PlayStation 4, the sales momentum of the Xbox One has considerably lost steam.
As a result, the Xbox One sales domination of PlayStation 4 in November and December 2014 proved to be shortlived as Sony’s latest gaming console took back the title it held for the most part of 2014 and reclaimed the lead for the top-gaming console as of end-January, reports BGR.
Not all bad news
PlayStation 4 beating the Xbox One in terms of sales was bad for Microsoft alright but the January sales figures also indicated that the Xbox One received more game sales per console than any other platform.
Microsoft VP for Xbox One Marketing Corporate Mike Nichols says that the sales results at least showed a silver lining for the company in terms of video game sales. Nevertheless, gaming experts believe that the reason why Xbox One had the edge on that area of video game sales is because Microsoft actually came up with an abundance of console and game bundles in November and December.
It was obviously a promo, and gamers took advantage of it. So when the promo ended, they started lying low once again.
The report also revealed that software sales in January 2015 were up compared to the same month last year. Warner Bros new survivor horror game “Dying Light” tops the competition by having the highest sales during the month.