Sony has revealed that it has sold 2.1 million PlayStation 4 consoles globally since its North American launch on 15 November. That includes a staggering 700,000 sold in Europe and Australasia in the four days since it was released in those regions on 29 November.

And those figures will rise dramatically yet again when the console is released in Sony's homeland of Japan in next February. It is currently available in 32 countries around the world, but in a strategical twist for the firm, it was decided that a Japanese release would follow rather than precede release activities elsewhere this time around.

READ: PlayStation 4 review

When you consider that the Nintendo Wii U is claimed to have shipped 3.91 million units in an entire year of release, Sony's PS4 sales in just two weeks signify an enormous success for the company. The console has broken all of its launch sales records for the PlayStation brand and although Microsoft is yet to release official figures for the Xbox One, it is widely believed to have beaten that competitor too.

That's not to say that the Xbox One has done badly, far from it. Chart Track, the UK's games industry tracking company, suggested that the Xbox One sold 150,000 units in the UK in just 48 hours. Although the same company also claimed that the PS4 sold 250,000 in the UK in the same time period.