Following the release of the January NPD video game sales data, Microsoft has once again acknowledged a shortage situation for its Xbox 360, which sold 230K units during the month.

"Our retailers are telling us that Xbox 360 is selling as fast as they can restock, but due to this high demand, Xbox 360 is experiencing temporary shortages. We are working as quickly as we can to replenish inventory," the company said in a statement.

Microsoft also outlined some of the Xbox 360 highlights for its business in the January period:

  • In January, $297 million was spent on the Xbox 360 platform (hardware, software and accessories combined), compared to $244 million on Wii and $219 million on PS3. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • $159 million was spent on Xbox 360 games alone in January compared to $131 million on Wii and $80 million for PS3. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • Total customer spending on Xbox 360 life-to-date now reaches nearly $8.6 billion; this is more than double PS3 and Wii combined. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • Six of the top 10 best selling games in January are on Xbox 360's platform. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • After five months on the market, Halo 3 continues to make the top 10 best selling games list according to NPD with 127,000 additional units sold in January. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on Xbox 360 was the number one selling game across all platforms for the third month in a row. In January, the fourth edition of Activision's acclaimed war game sold more than 331,000 copies on Xbox 360 and outsold the PS3 version by more than 2:1. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • Music fans love to jam on Rock Band and Guitar Hero III on Xbox 360! The Xbox 360 version of Rock Band sold more than 172,000 units in January and ranked fifth on the top 10 best selling games according to NPD. Rock Band on PS3 failed make it into the top 25 list for January. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • Third party publishers made 61 percent of their retail revenue, this generation, on Xbox 360 compared to 20 percent on Wii and 18 percent on PS3. (U.S. NPD, January)

  • Xbox 360 has 83 titles with a Metacritic review score of 80 or higher compared to just 42 for PS3 and 14 for Wii.

    • Note: Although Microsoft talks about top 10 best selling lists above, these do not seem to match the ranked-by-units list we have from The NPD Group. We're guessing they're looking at ranked-by-dollars charts. We've contacted MS for clarification.

    [UPDATE] Microsoft has been slow in getting back to us, but it's starting to look like they goofed. We checked with NPD who told us, "Halo 3 did sell 127 K putting it at #11 in unit sales and #12 in dollar sales... and whether ranked by units or dollars, the 360 platform had 4 out of the 10 best-selling games."

    [UPDATE 2] Ok, so it appears that Microsoft didn't goof, but they were selective in their data points. Here's the official explanation from an MS rep: "For background, each month NPD Group releases a list of top games which includes games from portable gaming devices such as the Nintendo DS. It is industry practice to remove these games and develop a console games Top 10 list. Microsoft is referring to the top ten console games this generation and as a result, Halo 3 is a Top 10 console game."

    [UPDATE 3] Just when we thought we were done with this story, NPD contacted us to let us know that not only did MS remove portables, but they also removed PS2. Their focus was only on "next-gen" games, but they didn't specify that in their media alert to us. Way to spin!