2006 was a very unusual year for videogames. Things that everybody held for certain began to change, and the greatest surprises came from where no one would expect them (but then again, isn’t that the definition of surprises?)

Microsoft is doing rather good in the Western world

The Xbox360 is still the #1 7th-generation system! (for how long?)

Despite a great system, very strong games, the best online system ever offered to console players, an affordable price tag, and no competition in the next-gen market for most of the year, the XBOX 360 can’t claim to dominate the market. More worrying, they still haven’t managed to successfully enter the Japanese markets, despite great efforts. At the beginning of 2007, there are about 10 million Xbox 360 worldwide, more than three times the numbers of Wii and 10 times the number of PS3. Microsoft’s forté is definitely its Xbox Live service, with now much more features available to non-paying subscribers. The Xbox Live Arcade, where players can download games for a few dollars, hosts many endearing casual games developed specifically for the XBLA, as well as ageless classics such as Konami’s Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, or Capcom’s Street Fighter II. Microsoft’s christmas flagship title, Gears of Wars, did well and sold over a million units, among which some 35000 in Japan, a significant score for a game which is a) a shooter and b) an Xbox 360 title!

The wow factor of World of Warcraft

In 2002, Everquest publishers arrogantly felt they dominated the world with their ageing graphics and their some 500000 subscribers. 5 years later, this is approximately the number of players that World of Warcraft (WOW) attracts each month.

WOW’s success is hardly a surprise. Blizzard has a reputation of developing instant million-sellers, a curiosity in a PC world, and this online game is backed by a 10-years old franchise with a very solid community. But the scale of this success is nothing short of amazing. When Star Wars Galaxies (SWG) was released in 2003, everyone feared that with a license that big, and such an experienced team in charge, it would dominate the MMO world. But SWG never passed the 300,000 subscribers threshold.

In early 2005, WOW had already conquered the #1 spot among MMOs, topping both Lineage and Lineage II - that was when it had 2 million paying subscribers. But it was over 2006 that WOW really picked up, a period during which it went from some 4 million to 8 million subscribers. The day Blizzard released the long-awaited Burning Crusade extension, it sold 2.4 million copies in just first 24 hours.

The corollary is the decline of solo, offline gaming for PC. There has been a few exceptions in 2006 (NeverWinter Nights 2, The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, both million-sellers) as well as a few ports from big console hits. But solo gaming is becoming a minor genre on the PC. Will this trend affect console systems (which are all internet-enabled) in the near future?

Sony’s worries

The PS3 isn’t walking in the glorious steps of its predecessor

In comparison, 2006 wasn’t Sony’s most memorable year. Sony shocked the videogame world when they announced the PS3 price at the 2006 E3. Everyone thought they would keep it silent until the last moment so that people would wait until it was public to make a decision, which would have hurt Microsoft and Nintendo. By announcing such a high price, and with an otherwise uninspired showing, Sony disappointed the press and the public alike. To make matters worse, manufacturing difficulties hindered the launch of the PS3, and drastically reduced the number of units available at launch. Sony even had to postpone the European launch of the PS3 to March 2007. Admittedly, the PS3 launch was the most hysterical, due to the extreme rarity of the system in North America. Many pre-ordered machines were sold on ebay where the average price soon soared to $3000 for the 60Gb system (5x the retail price). After one chaotic christmas, Sony managed to sell one million PS3 worldwide - the amount of PS2 they sold in just 48 hours in Japan alone. The PS2 is still the world’s most common gaming system, with some 120m units in operation worldwide, and is still alive and kicking, as the release of Final Fantasy XII has proven. According to gaming intelligence specialists DFC, it’s in Sony’s interest to delay the demise of the PS2 as much as possible.

The PSP is a handheld to be reckoned with, but hasn’t beaten the DS

Meanwhile, the PSP is losing its fight against the DS. The UMD format didn’t really pick up. The PSP hoped to crush the rival handheld by brute technical force, but Sony was forced to conclude that this was not necessarily what the potential handheld players were interested in. Still, Sony managed to ship somewhere between 20 and 30 million PSPs, which is remarkable as they had no previous handheld experience.

Nintendo is on magical mushrooms

Everyone believes in the DS, now

So logically, 2006 was the year of Nintendo. The DS, which when announced was welcomed with puzzled looks, is today’s best-selling game system in the world, and especially in Japan and Europe. The DS sales are spearheaded by the "touch! generations" brand, which regroups games for a broader audience. Among them are bona fide games such as Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney or Trauma: Under the Knife, and more experimental forms of entertainment, such as the seminal Animal Crossing: Wild World, and the Brain Training series. Arguably, no one outside of Nintendo had the vision that close to 10 million people would be fascinated by the animals in a forest village going fishing, collecting bugs and decorating their houses with rare furniture. To make things worse for its handheld competitors, Nintendo also released an enhanced version of the DS, the smaller, brighter, iPod-er (let’s all agree that it’s in the dictionary, ok?) DS lite, and, 15 years after the classic Super Mario World, they published a new 2D Mario episode, New Super Mario Bros, who enjoyed both critical and commercial success.

Will the Wii revolution the game industry?

At the 2005 Tokyo Game Show, Nintendo intrigued the gaming world by unveiling the "revolution controller", now known as Wiimote, a very innovative take on the controller concept. When they unveiled the Wii at the 2006 E3, they literally stole the show, and for most of 2006, this machine has been the most anticipated piece of hardware. The launch, which took place in late November/early December in various places of the world, went smoothly. Nintendo failed to sell 4 million units as they forecast, but sold much more software than they anticipated, especially Zelda: Twilight Princess, which most see as the game of the year 2006. The average software to hardware ratio was a baffling 3:1. Nintendo claims this holiday season has been their finest ever.