Nintendo: DS is fastest-selling game console ever
The Nintendo DS series has become the fastest-selling home game console ever, Nintendo claims. Unit sales reached 100 million as of March 6, 2009, just four years and three months since its release on November 21, 2004.
Nintendo's original portable game console, the Game Boy, took 11 years and two months to achieve 100 million sales, according to the company.
I'm sure that the recent decision by the Board of Education in Osaka, Japan, to distribute Nintendo DS systems to 10 elementary and junior-high schools in the region will only help the numbers grow in Japan. Those systems contain educational applications and are subsidized by the government. They are rented to the schools rather than sold--which means that parents can buy kids their very own, when the time comes--seeding the next generation of addicts.
Check out CNET's coverage of the Nintendo DSi, coming to the United States in April.
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Dave Rosenberg dishes up "Software, Interrupted" with nearly 15 years of technology and marketing experience that spans from Bell Labs to multiple start-up IPOs to open-source enterprise software companies. He is co-founder of MuleSource and currently serves as the general manager of Hardy Way. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can contact Dave via e-mail at softwareinterrupted@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @daveofdoom. 
- by Brian March 16, 2009 10:27 AM PDT
- Having started video games back in the early 80's with the Atari 2600 VCS, I have seen allot of games, graphics, etc. in my years of wisdom to know that Nintendo has a winner!
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(5 Comments)I've had my Nintendo DS Lite for half a year now and I understand why it is successful.
Nintendo made some smart decisions to bring this product to market.
For starters, they decided on a folding design with brighter displays, double the capacity with the ability to plug in the older generation games for the Gameboy Advance SP and the rechargeable batteries, we have a winner.
Some criticize the graphic quality on this fantastic unit.
What I have come to realize is that the graphics are amazing (see Super Mario 64 DS for an excellent example).
In order to keep the price low, the screen resolution was designed at just the right level.
Not only did the lower resolution help keep the price down, it also requires less power, thus making each charge last longer.
I like the fact that I can play for hours on a single charge, all thanks to brilliant design of the DS Lite.
Some may suggest that raising the price to make the display higher resolution would have worked, from a business perspective, that would not have been a smart choice.