Dark Souls II, Castlevania, and South Park aren't PS3 exclusives, and there are plenty of options to play them. God of War II is the PS2's 13th best selling game and did 4.5 million WW. What is coming exclusively to the PS3 this year or next that is going to do 4.5 million WW and be in the top 20 of best PS3 games sold? Mean while on a system that still costs 250 bucks.
Yes technically it is not impossible for the PS3 to sell another 21 million units before even Sony doesn't give a shit about it. It's just not very likely and to try and build an argument around this gen not being over because the PS3 is the little engine that can is just silly.
While those games don't have the punch of a console exclusive (though there's plenty of those for the niche circles coming out if nothing else) I actually wonder what REALLY sells a system at this point in time. Cheap sports game boxes? Or for people who want to comb an older library?
Still, I can't deny those games, while more effective than cross gen, aren't as effective as full exclusives, and you still need a massive price drop for a real chance at overtopping the Wii. If production really can not get any cheaper at all then yeah, the best it can hope for is being within a stone's throwing distance from the Wii.
The Wii left the Marathon in 2011 because he died of dehydration. And yet, in 2014 - 3 years later, the competition still hasn´t caught up. The race is over, the audience is already cheering for the new marathon and yet some diehard fans in denial are still watching their old champions crippling down the road. "You can do it!" "Just a couple more years!" "Please don´t die! - Keep going!, I bet my whole manlyhood on you!" The poor runner can´t hear it anymore. He is still miles behind, his legs are bleeding and the supporters have left the race. But he can do it! If he keeps crawling, maybe, maybe he will come as far as the Wii. It might take another 5 years but he can do it. For the Fans. He can make it. Believe.
Well, it honestly is kind of morbidly fascinating. If it was at half the sales this wouldn't be worth discussing as the Wii would've undoubtedly beat 360/PS3
combined, but not only did it fail to do that specifically but they're close enough that it's not far fetched a combo of massive price drops and continued support can close the gap fast.
Are you going to argue that the 6th gen of gaming was 14 years long simply because the ps2 remained in production as a FIFA birth mother.
It's not wholly without merit, it took the SNES 9 years I believe from its initial Japanese release to the final Japanese game, and many of those systems stay in production for around a decade if really successful. If anything there's a case to be made for measuring most active years, and years until it finally croaked. And for our sake only count licensed games, otherwise the Genesis, Dreamcast, and maybe even the NES are some sort of undead abominations.