Even if Xbox 360's sales were really high on Black Friday, that didn't help Microsoft close the sales gap with rival Nintendo in the gaming console market, according to another research by NPD. It looks like Nintendo's Wii system outsold the Xbox by almost 3-to-1 in November, as Wii's shipments in the month totaled 2.04 million, while Xbox's shipments came in at 836,000. Sony's PlayStation 3 ranked a distant third, with shipments of just 378,000 units. As for the portable market, the Nintendo DS ranked first, with 1.57 million shipments, as Sony's PSP sold in 421,000 units.

Xbox 360's middling performance certainly came as a shock to Microsoft, as its sales on Black Friday increased 25% compared with last year's post-Thanksgiving shopping binge. Microsoft reported that Xbox 360 shipments increased 22% year over-year to 2.2 million units. The company takes steps to reinvigorate the Xbox platform and position it as more than just a gaming device. Therefore, Microsoft launched New Xbox Experience, a services that combines the company's Xbox 360 gaming console and Xbox Live online network into a platform for streaming Netflix movies or holding chat sessions.

It's interesting to see the sales after this upgrade, as the Xbox 360 is currently the only gaming device capable of providing a direct link to Netflix. In addition, Microsoft also slashed the price of its video-game console by almost 30% for some models in September. As a results, the Xbox 360 Arcade system fell from $279 to $199 and the basic Xbox 360 model dropped from $349 to $299. Furthermore, the high-end Xbox 360 Elite, fell from $449 to $399.