by Playfuls Staff |
18th March 2006
Sony’s announcement concerning the postponing of PlayStation 3 until November, although its launch was expected this May after the E3 Expo, made that the whole controversy about who’s going to win the final battle in the console war [more] catch even more fire.
Xbox 360’s fans, along with Microsoft, don’t hesitate in considering the delay of PlayStation 3 as a unique opportunity to impose their favorite console, while the other side, consisting of PlayStation 3 fans, hopes that the Japanese console’s technologic performances will overcome the toy produced within the Redmond laboratories. Followers of PlayStation 3 try to emphasize the fact that nobody was actually expecting to see the console in the United States in May and that it has better chances of appearing on the American market in November.
Somehow caught in the middle of this fight, the game producers are the ones to lose the most due to this battle. Analysis companies report that game sells have decreased because nobody wants to risk by buying a game for Xbox that wouldn’t work on Xbox 360, and those faithful to PlayStation are willing to wait for the PlayStation 3 version before finally buying those long-awaited games.
In fact, the confrontation between PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 hasn’t got much to do with games anymore. Even if this statement may sound awkward, taking in consideration the fact that both are generically named next generation game consoles, in reality games have ended up somewhere at the conflict’s periphery.
Both Sony and Microsoft dwell on their consoles’ multimedia characteristics, their family home entertainment centre, which is clearly pointed out by the fact that caused PlayStation’s 3 delay: the Blu-Ray standard hasn’t been finished.
On the other hand, Microsoft announced a few months ago that it will make available a HD-DVD external unit, an add-on for Xbox 360.
Second of all, online communities became one of the game’s stakes. Sony is ready to respond to Xbox Live community – one of the initiatives that boosted Microsoft on the console market’s second place – by coming up PlayStation Network Platform, a service to be launched in the same time with PlayStation 3.
Therefore, games aren’t a stake for the two companies anymore or, better said, the only stake, allowing the confrontation to jump to the next level: entertainment, in all its shapes.
Even though all displays of PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 still include information about games, the speech’s emphasis moves towards movies, music and online entertainment.
In these conditions, the game industry - that already has enough problems to deal with - shouldn’t put its hopes in a revitalization eased by the re-launched battle between PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
The risk that both Sony and Microsoft seem to ignore because of this focus on entertainment is the loss of fanatic gamers communities’ support, who consider a console to be a device built for games, and not necessarily a source of entertainment.
They could start looking towards Nintendo Revolution, the only next generation console that seems preoccupied only by games. After all, it isn’t obligatory to have a winner when two opponents fight.
