Top 10 Gaming Consoles

Top 10 Gaming Consoles

Video games have been the favorite pass time of people of all ages ever since they became mainstream towards the 1970s. Over the years gaming has evolved considerably from something meant for casual fun to becoming a major worldwide sport or eSport. Gaming consoles have been in the midst of all this whirlwind change inside the gaming industry as the gaming consoles pushed the boundaries of what was thought to be possible in gaming.

10. Nintendo Entertainment System

At number 10 in Top 10 Gaming Consoles is Nintendo Entertainment System. This 8-bit console changed the entire gaming industry overnight and made a generation of kids into gamers. The original console to reach the dizzying heights of success, it is often credited as the greatest console ever made. It sold more than 60 million units back in the 80s and that’s a huge deal. An example of its success can be measured by the fact that market for Nintendo Cartridges was larger than that for all home computer software.

9. Gameboy Advance

At number 9 is Gameboy Advance. Gameboy Advance came after the extremely successful Gameboy and was under great expectations. Though it was not able to create the same dizzying success of predecessors, it was still a great device which improved upon its predecessor in every way. It was only able to sell 81 million units, a great figure but still very less than the original Gameboy mainly because of the tough competition from competitors.

8. PlayStation Portable

At number 8 is PlayStation Portable of PSP. Riding the wave of success of handheld gaming devices came the PSP that promised to revolutionize the handheld market with better graphics, internet capability and better overall features. It did manage to accomplish some of that and was successful device but by then the overall favor for handheld devices has decreased due to the new emerging mobile gaming. Still it was able to sell 82 million units worldwide.

7. PlayStation 3

At number 7 in Top 10 Gaming Consoles is PlayStation 3. PlayStation 3 belonged to the seventh generation of consoles which was among the most hotly fought period in console history. The reason was simple, because both Xbox 360 and PS3 were very much alike. Both delivered a social gaming experience, both acted as the media centre, both delivered gaming graphics on par with PCs and had enough horsepower to give a midrange PC a run for their money. In the end it came down to an inferior controller on PS3 and developers complaining that it was more difficult to develop a game on PS3 due to its complex OS than on Xbox 360. Despite these hiccups, it recovered towards the end of its run because of its exclusives like a certain “Last of Us”. Overall it managed to close the gap with its rival and sold 83.8 million units.

6. Xbox 360

At number 6 is Xbox 360. During the 7 generation of console wars, Xbox and PS3 were both trading blows with one another and both came at a time when the gaming industry as a whole was making a great transition towards more realistic graphics. So stakes were high to deliver a powerhouse console at affordable price and both Sony and Microsoft delivered. Despite that, Xbox 360 hit gold in that generation and the reason was simple, better controller. Xbox 360 controllers were so good that people even used it with their PCs. Apart from the better controllers, Xbox also enjoyed somewhat superior console exclusives especially Halo series, Gears of War and the Fable series. All these factors led to Xbox 360 selling 84 million units.

5. Wii

At number 5 in Top 10 Gaming Consoles is Wii. Wii has always been a criminally underrated gaming console. Not every gamer out there is a hardcore RPG specialist who will be into the micromanagement of the entire party, read the lore, do side quests etc, or is a FPS games specialist who can take out hordes and hordes of enemies with his precise aim. Most gamers just want to relax and play fun games which don’t require enough mental faculties and that’s where Wii scored. Though it also had its share of RPGs and action games, Wii was more famous for its classic platformers a la Mario. Despite tough competitions from Xbox 360 and PS3, the Wii was ahead of its competition selling 101 million units worldwide.

4. PlayStation

At number 4 in Top 10 Gaming Consoles is PlayStation. PlayStation was a revolutionary console at its time, not because of its extraordinary sales or great titles but because it was the first “computer entertainment platform” of its kind. What it meant was that it was a complete source of all entertainment apart from games as its CD Player can be used to play Music as well as videos. This whole concept was unheard of at that time and that boosted the sales for no longer will people have to buy a console to play games and a CD Player for other entertainment purposes. No wonder the console sold 102.49 million units worldwide. Series like the Metal Gear, Resident Evil and Final Fantasy made use of the extra features on PlayStation and lead to a new leap in gaming.

3. GameBoy

At number 3 in Top 10 Gaming Consoles is GameBoy. The GameBoy along with its Color variant have been one of the milestones in gaming industry especially in the handheld field. Despite having competitors who were technologically advanced like Neo Geo Pocket or WonderSwan, what made the GameBoy outsell them was its game library. Their superior game library led to historic sales of more than 118 million units which was a landmark of sorts when it came to handheld devices.

2. Nintendo DS

At number 2 in Top 10 Gaming Consoles is Nintendo DS. Despite the popularity of handheld gaming devices, they were still comparatively weaker than their larger counterparts and this hardware limitation somewhat reduced the scope of games that can be made on them. Initially released as a experimental product in Nintendo’s Handheld LineUp to complement the GameBoy and GameCube, the DS went on to become the most successful handheld gaming consoles in history and second most popular gaming consoles ever with more than 154 million units of its various variants having been sold over the years.

1. PlayStation 2

At number 1 in Top 10 Gaming Consoles is PlayStation 2. Even after more than 16 years after its launch, the PlayStation 2 is still the highest selling game consoles of all time with more than 155 million units sold. That huge number is because of its backward compatibility of games with earlier PlayStation and its controller. Ever since its launch there were various version of PS2 that were released for the various users and each got the cash registers ringing. With an impressive tally of 3874 game titles, a staggering 1.5 billion copes of PS2 games have been sold till now. Despite the release and popularity of its successor, the PS2 continued to be popular and its production recently ended in 2013. If a console is alive for 13 years, that itself speaks volumes about it.

These are the greatest and the most popular gaming consoles ever made.