Xbox One, PS4 contribute to Amazon’s biggest pre-order week

It's been expected for a while now that the slumping video game industry would got a spark from next-gen consoles. If early pre-order results for the Xbox One and PS4 are any indication, those expectations could hold true.

Amazon Inc., on Friday, announced that its video game store had its biggest pre-order week ever thanks to the Xbox One and PS4. At "peak demand" — which Amazon did not clarify the timeframe — more than 2,500 Xbox One and PlayStation 4 consoles were being pre-ordered on Amazon every minute. Again, Amazon did not state how long this period was for, nor did they provide any total pre-order numbers for either console.

“E3 week pre-orders of [Xbox One and PlayStation 4] consoles brought a year-over-year increase in orders of more than 4,000%, compared to consoles ordered during E3 week last year,” the online retailer offered. Amazon also noted that first-day pre-orders for the Xbox One and PS4 were "nearly twice that of all video game sales on Black Friday."

Currently the Xbox One is listed as the top "best seller" in the video games category on Amazon; however, it's important to note that there are multiple PlayStation 4 bundles available for pre-order on the site, which could explain the discrepancy in positioning.

[Financial Post]