14 DAY TRIAL // A recent Nielsen study (basically measuring what people watch, listen to and buy) reveals a dramatic shift in the preference of console gamers this generation, showing that consumers are flocking to Sony's PS4 from both Microsoft and Nintendo platforms.
The survey offers us a glimpse into a slice of American living rooms deemed "statistically significant" by the reputable research company, showing a sizable consumer trend of shifting toward Sony's PlayStation 4 during the initial sales wave of the new generation of consoles.
Nielsen surveyed 1.2k active gamers and determined that a third of current PlayStation 4 owners didn't own a PS3, but they did own a last-generation console from either Microsoft or Nintendo.
The article posted by Re/code notes that the study does not take into account instances in which consumers may have sold or otherwise disposed of their PlayStation 3 consoles, but nonetheless, the information shows how beneficial the PlayStation 4's launch was for Sony.
The fact that the console was going for significantly lower than the Xbox One was one of the determining factors in the PS4's success. Following Sony's advantageous start, Microsoft also announced that it would cut the Kinect sensor from the base Xbox One package, lowering the next-gen console's price point to that of its main competitor.
The Redmond-based corporation revealed that after making the Kinect-less Xbox One available in June, the console showed a considerable increase in sales (double the amount sold in the previous month), but the PS4's initial momentum still kept building up.
Back in the day of the Xbox 360 rule, Microsoft's console was the preferred one, not because it was significantly better in any way, but simply because everyone had it and wanted to enjoy games with their friends, which is what is seemingly happening today with the PlayStation 4.
This also seems to be the case with the PlayStation 4, in addition to the fact that its hardware was proven to be slightly more powerful than the Xbox One's.
So far, Sony has revealed that it sold over 10 million units of its next-gen device, being pretty far ahead of Microsoft's last official reveal of 5 million units shipped, dating from back in April.
The American corporation's console is so far only launched in 13 countries, with 26 more markets lined up for September, including big ones like Japan, India, Korea and China, where the 14-year long ban on consoles of any kind has just been lifted.