When the PlayStation 2 launched in America in October 26, 2000, Sony sold 510,000 units within the first 24 hours.
When the PlayStation 2 launched in Japan in March 2000, Sony sold 980,000 units over the opening weekend.
Sony also advertised heavily as well and it had the advantage of being supported by Electronic Arts.
This led to further shortages, and the issue was compounded in Britain when a Russian oil tanker became stuck in the Suez Canal, blocking a ship from China carrying PS2s bound for the UK.
To this day, the PS2 holds the record for the most consoles sold in a single day as well as the record for most consoles sold in launch day in America.
As a result, although Sony and Nintendo both started out late and although both followed a decentralized model of online gaming where the responsibility is up to the developer to provide the servers, Sony's efforts made PS2 online gaming a big success.
When it was released, the PS2 had many advanced features that were not present in other contemporary video game consoles, including its DVD capabilities and USB and IEEE 1394 expansion ports.
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