In fact, during the week of the launch, which occured December 17, Sony sold over 240,000 PlayStation 3 units.

Final Fantasy XIII will be released in other territories on March 9, 2010, but in Japan the game remains a PS3-exclusive. Final Fantasy game launches are always big news in Japan, and undoubtedly Japanese consumers are snatching up Sony’s console in order to play the new game.

Adding up its second-quarter results, Sony reports 3.2 million sales, a 1.1 million increase over the same quarter a year earlier. The same period also saw a signficant increase in game sales for the PS3 console.

Meanwhile, Sony’s little-engine-that-could, the PlayStation 2, is finally showing signs of decline. The system has been selling comparably to the PS3, as well as other current-generation competitors, the Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii. Now, the PS2 has declined to 1.9 million in sales with only about half of the total games sold compared to the previous year.

The PSP also had a bit of a decline, dropping from 3.2 million to 3 million in sales, though game sales are up.

Sony bet heavily on the long-term adoption of its technically-superior PS3 console when it realased the device in November 2006. The console had to compete with the Xbox 360, which was out a year earlier, and Nintendo Wii–both of which had lower price-tags and comparable, or arguably superior, game libraries.

Adoption of the PS3 has been slower than Sony expected, but if sales continue to rise there’s hope for the PS3 yet.