PlayStation 4 announcement imminent as Wii U sales predictions revised

Tuesday, February 5, 2013 - 11:05 by Graham Miller

The market for home consoles has grown significantly over the past few years, largely thanks to Nintendo forcing its competitors to address a wider audience, with family-friendly motion controls becoming the norm.

However, it is now almost eight years since the Xbox 360 arrived to usher in the current generation of consoles and many in the media have been clamouring for a new wave of boxes to up the game in terms of graphics and multimedia functionality.

It looks like Sony might be first out of the gate with its announcement of a fresh console, since it made a splash at the end of last week, when it revealed that a big event at which it will outline the future of PlayStation, will be held on the 20th of February.

The PlayStation 3 was announced after the Xbox 360 and Sony is not keen to give Microsoft the same head start this time around.

Meanwhile, Nintendo's Wii U, which is the HD follow-up to the hugely successful Wii, is not performing as well as hoped. The sales have been so sluggish that the firm now estimates it will have sold four million units by the end of March, rather than the 5.5 million previously predicted.

Those hoping for a big Wii U price drop to help stimulate demand will be disappointed, since Nintendo says it is committed to the current strategy. Of course, if you buy a Wii U via safe shopping online, you will be able to get a better deal and save cash anyway.

The Wii U's main problem is that it lacks branding clarity, since many do not know the difference between it and the older Wii. That means people buying the console from a site offering safe shopping online might easily make a mistake when they purchase.