Speaking at the Reuters Media Summit in New York, Probst added that while he had expected numbers to be tight, “where they ended up was a bit or a surprise”.  Despite this, he also added that he does expect Sony to ship somewhere between 500,000 and 800,000 PS3 units by the end of the year.

Regarding Nintendo Wii, Probst stated that Nintendo had “a spectacular holiday”, adding that the overall outlook for the year was much more optimistic than many people had been expecting.

Nintendo is celebrating selling 600,000 Wii consoles in its opening week in North America. Whether this is a total sell-out or not is still unknown, but a Nintendo spokesperson told MCV that “you’d be hard pressed to find a console in the US at the moment”.

Meanwhile, Microsoft is still claiming that it is optimistic of selling 10 million Xbox 360 consoles by the end of the year in North America. Speaking at a Credit Suisse conference, Microsoft’s chief financial officer Chris Liddell said: “we’re very happy going into the holiday season.”

With all three format holders aiming for the maximum possible impact this Christmas, the onus is on Nintendo and Sony to provide the adequate stock to combat Microsoft’s marketing-heavy push. If Nintendo succeeds in supplying the four million consoles it has promised, it will leave Sony trailing very early on.