Sony remained upbeat in their response to the August NPD numbers, despite the Xbox 360 beating the PS3 this month.

Sony’s press release focused on strong PS3 sales: 185 353 PS3s sold in August and 92% year-to-date hardware sales growth with over 2 million PS3s sold in the US between January and August. Software sales for the PS3 were also up 92% from last year with 1.6 million PS3 copies sold.

Over 1.1 million copies of Madden NFL 09 were sold on PlayStation platforms, not including the Madden NLF 09 PSP Entertainment Pack. 643 000 units of the game were shifted for the PS3, showing a 90% increase from Madden NFL 08 in August 2007. Over 263 000 copies of the PS3 version of Soulcalibur IV have been sold in July and August, recording a 38% higher attach rate than the 360 version.

253 012 PSPs were sold in August, up 67% from last year, with sales driven by the Madden NFL 09 Entertainment Pack. Over 42.7 million PS2s have been sold in the US to date, with 144 096 units shifted in August. The PlayStation brand generated $365 million in August.

“We had yet another strong month for PlayStation in August, which validates that consumers are indeed recognizing the long-term value that PS3 offers as both a gaming and home entertainment device. We also began shipping the new 80GB PS3 model in late August to address any short term inventory transitions from the 40GB to 80GB model,” commented Jack Tretton, president and CEO of SCEA.

“We’re looking forward to a solid holiday season and are excited to offer a string of unmatched content to consumers in the coming months with LittleBigPlanet, SOCOM: Confrontation, Resistance 2, and MotorStorm: Pacific Rift.”

Check out the full NPD results for August here. You can also see how Nintendo and Microsoft responded.