Happy Anniversary PS2!
This week saw the 9th anniversary of the PS2's North American launch.Published 30/10/2009 at 14:00 by Watchful
This past Monday PS2 reached the ninth anniversary of its American release. It was way back on October 26th 2000 that the PlayStation2 first landed on, and started flying off, shop shelves throughout the US. To mark the occasion SCEA have released some up-to-date sales statistics.
Total worldwide sales for the PS2 have reached a staggering 140,000,000 units. That’s a total that no other console, home or handheld, has ever reached. The closest contenders are the Game Boy at 119m, the DS (in all its variants) with 113m and the original PlayStation which just made it into 9 digits with 102m sales.
Sales of the PlayStation 2 in the United States alone account for 44m consoles. Sony happily proclaims that to mean that “one in every three U.S. households” have one. Of course they have simply sold enough to be in 1-in-3 American homes, there being 128m of those according to 2007 census data, that is not likely to be literally true. The, now $99, PS2 is still selling too, posting figures of 146,000 US sales in September.
On the software front nearly 10,000 PS2 games have been released by an impressive total of 485 different developers. In the US more than 500 million copies of PlayStation 2 games have been sold. I will repeat that for effect, Americans have bought over half a billion PS2 games.
Top Ten PS2 Games
- Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (18m)
- Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec (15m)
- Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (14m)
- Grand Theft Auto III (12m)
- Gran Turismo 4 (10m)
- Final Fantasy X (8m)
- Need for Speed: Underground (6.5m)
- Need for Speed: Underground 2 (6.4m)
- Medal of Honor: Frontline (6.3m)
- Final Fantasy XII (5.7m)
Nine years into Sony’s much-vaunted ten year console life span the PS2 is still going strong. Its ninth anniversary here in Europe comes up next month and it reaches its tenth anniversary in Japan next March.
Personally, I have not bought a PS2 for several months when I saw PS2 Slims going for £30 in my local Tesco. I picked one up to take the pressure off my still-going-strong original PS2 Phat as there has been what analysts would call an uptick in my PS2 game playing lately.
Disillusionment with Guitar Hero has seen me back playing Amplitude; I have revisited Fahrenheit in preparation for Heavy Rain; I still cannot resist falling into the Rez experience from time to time and Team Ico’s two previous titles were due another play through.
How many of you have still got PS2’s? What do you play on them and how much?
Comments
Please note that all comments are the opinion of the individual author and not TheSixthAxis.
Person678 | 30/10/2009 14:04
BOOM! Headshot!
1794 TSA Points | Member since: Jan 2009
Still got my PS2, but my good old 60 gig is still going strong. Played a bit of Kingdom Hearts II yesterday, fantastic game.
BalramRules | 30/10/2009 20:57
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99 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
I had a PS2 Slim, and had about 20-25 games, and I gave ALL of em to my buddy, AND FORGOT TO REGISTER IT ALL TO ME PlayStation Network Account, I registered only my PS2, coz I then found out you can only register games on the US PlayStation Site with ONLY US PS3 Games =-(
wedgehog | 31/10/2009 12:35
Friendly
586 TSA Points | Member since: Mar 2009
? what is the advantage of registering games?
Gastos84 | 30/10/2009 14:05
Team TSA: Writer
3888 TSA Points | Member since: Apr 2009
Happy B’day PS2!! I no longer own a PS2 unfortunately but it is definitely the daddy of all consoles. Whilst the PS1 basically shaped the industry, the PS2 stepped up and knocked everything else out of the park.
Many fond memories of the PS2; one of which is sitting at the top of that sales chart.
The thing with the PS2 that I always got was that it was universally respected. PS3 has copious amounts of crtics, as does 360, but the PS2 just seemed to shut everyone up.
Great article Watchful.
BalramRules | 30/10/2009 21:00
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99 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
The PS1 was AMAZING!
It knocked Sega to its knees as it had its Megadrive, it KICKED Atari out PERMANTLY with its Atari Jaguar, it had a good boxing match with N64 both did well but PS1 had a slight edge, BEAT Apple TO THE SHIT OF THE EARTH! And Apple might butt back in, in the next generation console wars as devs were gathering support for an unannounced console, perhaps apple’s gotta a few moves on em = P
Although the PS2 was the King of All Consoles!! The PS1 was more like the Warrior of ALL Console but a REALLY REALLY GOOD ONE, say Kratos, hopefully the PS4 will be the God of the Console Wars!
ricey787 | 30/10/2009 14:05
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274 TSA Points | Member since: Dec 2008
Nice to see that every single one of the top 10 is a franchise game…I wish KH 1 or 2 was on there…loved those games. Or Ico? or God of War?
cc_star | 30/10/2009 14:06
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7874 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
Wow,
Loving no’s 2, 3 & 4… Medal of Honour:Frontline is the only game my Mrs has ever watched me play, she thought it was amazing, but it was around the same time as Shaving Ryan’s Privates.
Rez, is one of the best things to ever do on a console, I wish there was a PS3 version.
Looking at your earlier sales figures, the PS2 is still going pretty strong, I actually need to buy another one so I can play SSX 3 & Rez again.
cheekyMcB | 30/10/2009 16:02
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729 TSA Points | Member since: Feb 2009
Second a PS3 Rez, wish they’d hurry up and port the 360 HD version. SSX3 is still great, played it recenty.
Roynaldo | 30/10/2009 14:06
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2993 TSA Points | Member since: Nov 2008
Ive still got 2 PS2s, not that I use them coz I got BC on my PS3.
I play FFX to this very day, constantly trying to level up more and get to the point of being able to do those Dark Aeons and eventually (in a few years) be able to do Nemesis.
Kingdome Hearts 2 recently got a play through too, suprised it isnt on the list…..way to many racing games on the top ten!
Watchful | 30/10/2009 14:09
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I was amazed at the two Need for speed titles being in there. I expected a little more variety.
colossalblue | 30/10/2009 14:06
Team TSA: Editor
1399 TSA Points | Member since: Forever
My launch-day PS2 died with a disc read error after about 8 months but the replacement is still going strong. Currently it’s in my mum’s bedroom doing a bit of moonlighting as a DVD player!
Manorhowze | 30/10/2009 14:08
Driving God
2032 TSA Points | Member since: Dec 2008
My PS2 is on permanent loan at my cousins house so I dont really use it anymore. Occasionally I will pop round to play the original 3 games in the Guitar Hero series.
My 60gb ps3 still gets the odd PS2 game slung into it, usually Music 3000, GTA or Black.(which my mate always used to think was called Dark)
ZenTerrorist | 30/10/2009 14:13
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296 TSA Points | Member since: Aug 2008
My PS2 lives happily next to my PS3, although I dont switch it on all that much. I have recently re-played Shadow of the Collossus and just started GoW2 whilst going through a rather difficult period after an unexpected YLOD incident. I also re played Def Jam: Fight for New York for like the 8th time! I love that game, in all its silly, meat head glory!
matty | 30/10/2009 14:16
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1331 TSA Points | Member since: Dec 2008
Don’t have my PS2 any more when i moved i left it with my brother. I have a 60GB but don’t have a single PS2 game in the house, so its more for just being able to say mine has BC lol.
rSp8 | 30/10/2009 14:22
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186 TSA Points | Member since: Aug 2008
Don’t have my PS2 anymore but definitely the best console ever. in it’s generation it was the greatest!
Aero-R | 30/10/2009 14:22
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70 TSA Points | Member since: Dec 2008
Fat PS2 still working here. I still keep my PS1 too (!). Nice to see you still play Rez man, I do the same… I pray every night for a release in PlayStation Network.. but not the PlayStation one, I want the HD version that was released for the XBox. Only PixelJunk Eden / Encore or WipEout HD / Fury give me a bit of electronic music art emotion.. but of course not like the one from Rez.. Rez is a gem.
The lastest titles I played a lot were GT4 and FF XII with more than 240 hours in FF XII and with the PS2 turned on more than 30 hours non-stop for the GT4 24 hours endurance races.. I used to leave the console paused or on the B-Spec mode. What a machine.. it works like a charm.
iNsAnE_gAmInG | 30/10/2009 14:28
* Banned *
-1930 TSA Points | Member since: Jul 2009
I’ve got a working Slim, but no half-decent games for it left, you could argue PES 5 and PoP are good but they did not provide me with the happiest moments of my PS2 days. Surprised to see NFS in the Top 10, NFS Underground 2 was easily one of my favourite games, but Most Wanted owned it in my view.
My PS1 is still working fine, from near-enough release day and I have some good games to accompany it e.g. Gran Turismo, Crash Bash and Driver.
Bilbo_bobbins | 30/10/2009 14:40
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1406 TSA Points | Member since: Jun 2009
Not going to tempt fate I hope (touch wood) but I never had a PS1 or PS2 that broke. Fantastic build quality and I only just sold me PS2 for £30 at a boot sale. I have very fond memories of the PS2, Gran Turismo and Crash Bash being the mostly played games.
tantalus_blank | 30/10/2009 17:51
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crash bash was on the ps1 wasn’t it?
skibadee | 30/10/2009 14:40
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good going for a great system
colmshan1990 | 30/10/2009 14:41
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1107 TSA Points | Member since: Apr 2009
My fat PS2 has never given me any trouble, and sits next to my 40gb proudly. I still play the likes of Killzone 1, Burnout 3, Splinter Cell 3, Time Crisis 3 and GT3 regularly for the multiplayer. But my favourite PS2 game is, without doubt, Resi 4.