Nintendo Says GameCube Shipments Are Outstripping Xbox By Wide Margin

According to Nintendo, in its first week of availability in North America, 740,000 units of the $199 GameCube were shipped. Of those, roughly 80% were destined for U.S. retail stores, and almost all of those units are now sold out. A spokesman for the company said that this sales pace is "nearly twice that of Microsoft's Xbox, and at least 25 percent faster than the launch of Sony's PlayStation 2 last year." Microsoft has not released its official Xbox sales figures yet.