Sony’s PlayStation 4 may triumph over Xbox One on the strength of its launch title demand

Sony already struck a clear win against Microsoft in their next-gen console faceoff at E3, and now interest in the PlayStation 4’s launch title lineup appears to be stronger than that of the Xbox One, according to an online poll from Polar.

The site’s Console Wars poll has attracted over 13,000 votes, though that’s counting responses to each question, so the number of unique respondents is probably closer to 1,000. Votes skewed heavily toward the PlayStation 4, with roughly 73 percent going in favor of Sony on average.

The one poll question that Xbox even came close to competing with the PS4 was the one about motion controls. Sony still won narrowly at 51 percent, but it suggests that even Sony fans are willing to begrudgingly admit that Xbox is onto something with the Kinect.

Last week, Microsoft touted its Xbox One and 360 game lineup as beating out all other platforms in terms of awards at E3. Sony published its own post bragging about its own accolades, but its exclusive titles didn’t rack up as many wins. Granted, most of Microsoft’s nominations and awards were for Respawn’s Titanfall shooter, which brought in 101 nominations and 54 wins out of the 168 nominations and 68 wins for all Xbox exclusive titles.

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All those awards didn’t amount to much, though, when gamers weighed in on the poll. Titanfall lost out to Killzone, attracting just 28 percent of votes. Gamers were even more unenthusiastic about Ryse, choosing inFamous Second Son 81 percent of the time.

Sony has largely pursued a ‘gaming first’ strategy for the PS4, while Microsoft is billing the Xbox One as an all-in-one entertainment system. In the long term, those different approaches could appeal to two sets of consumers, but Microsoft is likely to stumble at launch if it fails to win over the early-adopting hardcore gaming crowd.

One possible explanation for this data is that Polar’s poll simply attracted more Sony fans than Xbox loyalists, but the fact that Sony fans are active enough to participate in polls and drop ASCII bombs on the Xbox Facebook page is still problematic for Microsoft.

The Xbox One is at least doing well on Amazon, currently ranking as number six on the site’s list of bestselling video game products. Amazon is sold out of Sony’s launch version, so that isn’t on the current list, but the PS 4 standard edition ranks 16th and two game bundles rank 22nd and 24th. The PS4 looks to be winning in year-to-date sales for the category, as the PS4: Launch Edition ranks third compared to the sixth-place Xbox One: Day One Edition.

Microsoft has about five months to try and get its marketing machine back on track, but so far it looks like Sony’s set to continue eating its lunch. Much of the battle is going to come down to the respective quality of each console’s exclusive lineup, but if Polar’s to be believed, even an award-winning Titan isn’t enough to turn the Xbox ship around.