It's true the devs have become more comfortable develeoping games as the console matured but that's about it.
Xbox was always flop comparing to PS
For PS3 vs 360, the PS3 sold 87.40M units to the 360's 85.73M.
In this case, better to reduce early sales which are sold at a loss (production being expensive, significant R&D, scale being low), maximise at the end of the life when i assume they are maximising profits per console due to scale and R&D already being covered.
So, no -- it is never better to reduce early sales. You want to sell as many units as possible, as many games as possible, as many accessories as possible, as soon as possible.
(Also, as the same console does becomes cheaper to manufacture over the years, the price tends to go down as well.)