Microsoft Corp. on Tuesday said that sales of its Xbox 360 video game console has set its new own record in terms of sales over Black Friday weekend in the U.S.. According to Microsoft, the company improved last year’s result by 25% and the console outsold its main rival Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.’s PlayStation 3 by 3:1 ratio, which may mean that sales of the PS3 declined year-over-year for the first time in 2008.

“We entered into the Black Friday sales period with cautious optimism, knowing that dollar for dollar, Xbox 360 offers more social entertainment value than any other console on the market. Record Black Friday sales in the U.S., coupled with our existing global install base of 25 million and an online community of more than 14 million Xbox Live members, have laid the groundwork for continued global sales momentum in 2009,” said Don Mattrick, senior vice president of the interactive entertainment business at Microsoft.

Sales of Xbox 360 video game console were 25% higher compared to Black Friday in 2007, according to Microsoft. The world’s largest software maker confirmed once that 310 thousand of X360s were sold for the week of Black Friday back in 2007, which means that sales of the console might reach approximately 387.5 thousand of units for the week.

According to Microsoft, the Xbox 360 outsold the PlayStation 3 by 3:1 ratio, which may mean that only about 129 thousand of PS3s were sold through over Black Friday week/weekend. Last year Microsoft revealed that the Xbox 360 outsold its arch-rival by 2:1 ratio, which would result in 155 thousand of PlayStation 3 consoles sold through over the Black Friday week.

According to NPD Group, about 770 thousand of Microsoft Xbox 360s were acquired by end-users in November ’07 in the USA, whereas Sony managed to sell-through 466 thousand of PS3s in America. The reason behind the skyrocketing sales of Sony’s console back last year was price-cut, whereas this year the company decided not to slash price on its console.

Sales of Sony PlayStation 3 game consoles have been increasing year-over-year every month in 2008 in the U.S., whereas sales of the Xbox 360 stagnated in certain months. Still, the latter has certain advantages at the moment: $199 price-point for the entry-level machine as well as strong popular titles, such as “Gears of War 2”, “Fable II” and “Lips”.

If, as last year, sales over Black Friday weekend represent 40% of Xbox 360 sales for November and Microsoft will be lucky enough, then sales of the console will hit about 970 thousand of units for the month in the USA.

Meanwhile, if the information about market performance of the PS3 spread by Microsoft is correct, then sales of the device may drop rather tangibly year-over-year. Still, this is unlikely to happen, considering overall market trends.

Market performance of Nintendo Wii, which has been outshipping the PS3 and X360 combined for months, over Black Friday weekend is unclear.

Tags: Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, Xbox, Playstation, Wii