This past week saw the Playstation 4 climb to its highest Black Friday sales numbers since the console’s 2013 launch, but that wasn’t all that went well for Sony. Along with several Playstation exclusives flying off virtual shelves via Black Friday deals, the Playstation VR headset also saw a huge jump in sales, and experts who watched the numbers climb believe that VR is finally finding its place in the consumer market. In short, if you’re hoping for the fall of console-based VR, you might want to take a seat and wait this out.
Videos by ComicBook.com
Today, media research firm Canalys released a report stating that virtual reality headset shipments topped 1 million units for the first time ever within the third quarter of 2017. Leading the pack was Sony’s Playstation VR headset, with a massive 490,000 units shipped. This is over twice the amount of the well-marketed Oculus Rift headset, which shipped 210,000 units over Q3 2017 — and that’s after it cut it’s price in half to match the PSVR. Ultimately, the PSVR took nearly half of the market by storm this past quarter, selling 49% of all VR headsets. The device matched its launch day sales, as well as being on par with its total sales over the past 18 weeks, according to a report from Chart Track.
Meanwhile, overseas sales for the headset are doing extremely well overall, with Sony dominating the market in Japan thanks to a new slew of virtual reality gaming arcades that have sprung up over the past few years. Still, a chunk of this success can likely be credited to Sony’s strategy of bundling their products in themed packaging, according to the report.
Rightfully, Sony is reporting that it’s had its best Black Friday sales ever over the holiday weekend, with massive deals around Playstation consoles, games, and accessories sending gamers into a frenzy.
