by Playfuls Staff |
20th July 2006
An expression invented in the famous American marketing system says that “no news is bad news”. For PS3, it seems any news is bad news lately.[more]
Sony Chief Executive Howard Stringer has been battling with the media but especially with PS fans since March 2006 to convince them that PS3’s price and delays are only in the benefit of the end-user. He did a lousy job if we were to consider the comments that game-sites are hosting concerning the future of PS3.
Most of the analysts agree with the fact that the initial shipment of PS3 will sell very well, since it comes out in November 2006, before the thriving shopping season of Christmas. But afterwards, gamers will begin to understand that a costlier console doesn’t necessarily mean a better performance, and a larger investment, especially since the software package that comes with PS3 is not very impressive. Sony officials on the other side have boasted with the fact that PS3 will possess a backwards compatibility with games for PS2, a thing which makes some gamers happy, but saddens others.
Besides the repeated delays, PS3 also threatens its future customers with a price which attracts criticism- between $499 and $599, which means an X BOX 360 + a Nintendo Wii. It also threatens the PC, according to company officials, since it will deliver high quality DVD images, with its integrated Blu-Ray drive. Moreover, PS3 will offer support for unseen graphics effects, with the powerful IBM-produced "CELL" processor, and almost realistic in-game physics.
These facts are not enough to scary X BOX 360 (which has a serious advantage on PS3, being on the market since November 2005 and gathering a lot of fans on XBOXLive.com) or Nintendo Wii.
For example, a post-E3 poll organized by Famitsu, the ultimate gaming magazine in Japan revealed something no one would suspect: Nintendo Wii tops Sony Playstation 3 and XBOX 360 in customers' preferences. The big question was, "What gaming hardware are you looking forward to the most?" The Nintendo Wii did three times better than its closest competition. Wii: 68.8%, PS3: 21%, Xbox 360: 7.2%, and NDS: 3%.
As for the price of the future PS3, 88.4% said the price is too high, 10.9% said the price is appropriate and only 0.7% said the console is inexpensive. And just think that this is a poll from one of the world's richest countries and the traditional dominant market for Sony Playstation... Not to mention that the popular PlayStation Portable didn't even managed to appear in the top.
Not later than last week a British game guru even accused PS3 of being…”arrogant”. Jeff Minter, a game industry veteran, was accusing gaming industry giant Sony of being “incredibly arrogant” concerning their console PlayStation3, adding that "Nobody likes smug."
He wrote the accusations in the gaming British gaming magazine Edge. Minter said that Sony seems "absolutely certain that even when they say that it's going to be considerably more expensive than existing consoles, and that maybe there won't be that many titles actually available at launch, nonetheless us eager customers will rush out in droves to buy it because, hey, it's a new PlayStation."
Minter continued: “"Just making the shiniest, most expensive hardware doesn't cut it these days", highlighting the fact that Sony’s approach to the sells-target is wrong.
"Sure the PSP was beautiful, shining, pretty and posh, whereas the DS was definitely the ugly sister. But hey, the ugly sister is better in the sack."
Minter pointed out the weak spot for Sony and the thing that every console fan and PlayStation owner is expecting: a high quality software for PS3. "We need games, not smugness, games that will make me want to get hold of the PS3 rather than a bunch of stuff either identical or broadly similar to what I'll be playing on my 360," he wrote.
"I want sweet Feisar temptation, not a bit of snotty attitude."
He ended his editorial by warning Sony: "Yeah, you've got the lion's share of the current market, but don't get smug... Nobody likes smug, and it's not an attitude that has served companies well in the videogames industry."
"People in gaming and game publishing are drastically less excited about PlayStation 3 than they were a year ago, and also a few months back, and competition is looking much stronger," says David Cole, a market analyst at DFC Intelligence, a San Diego market-research firm focused on the videogame industry. "There is a lot of anticipation about PS3, but not a lot of software coming out over the next few months that would excite consumers. And the price point is staggering."
The interesting thing here is that the outsider (considered to be Nintendo) might actually be the winner.
A brief history tells us that the Japanese entertainment company has managed to stay on top because of the originality of its products and its global strategy of easy-to-play games. Nintendo did not sell childish games; it sold "playable" games. Their declared purpose is to build a world community of fun. Although one might think this is also the competitors’ purpose, Nintendo's approach to it has unique features. First of all, they sell products (games, consoles) for all categories of age. Ok, so where does GameBoy Advance fit into? Well, despite the masculine name, time has proven that girls don't feel neglected when they play Pokemon or Mario Brothers. Satoru Iwata, CEO for Nintendo and also implied in the "name-choosing business" for the Japanese company, said that it's all about branding in Nintendo's case: people buy the product for what it does, not only for what it's called.
And just think that Nintendo Wii, despite its simplicity and low price, has attracted more interest at E3 in May than its more famous competitors.
The public just went crazy at that time and waited for hours just to get a glimpse at how Wii will look like and how Will it entertain its buyers. They saw that the revolutionary controller (by the way, Wii's code-name was Nintendo Revolution) will allow them to play for instance sports games almost like in real life. "It's a great story, and it's something different," commented Geoff Keighley, co-chairman of the Game Critics Awards, an independent group of journalists from 37 North American media outlets that cover the videogame industry. "It proves that you don't necessarily have to spend $20bn on a big blockbuster game to stay competitive and get attention," he said, pinpointing at the rapidly rising cost of developing games for Sony's upcoming PlayStation 3 and Microsoft's Xbox 360.
Wii also won at E3 the title for 'Best Hardware', while Nintendo Wii Sports title took home the prize for 'Best Sports Game'. The irony comes from the fact that, to everyone's surprise, Nintendo's CEO Satoru Iwata announced in June that the company's gaming console, which is due to make its public appearance sometime in September 2006, is not a next-gen console and that it does not compete with the PS3 and X BOX 360!!!!
On the other side, Microsoft is confident that its successful X BOX 360 will not face a serious competition from PS3, since they are not thinking at reducing the price for their console. John Porcaro, group manager of PR and communications for Microsoft US, has clearly stated that a price drop for Microsoft’s gaming product is out of the question: "As you’re all aware, there have been rumors of a price drop for the Xbox 360 coming along later this year. The official word from folks in the know is that there are currently no plans for a price drop this fall."
As an argument to sustain both X BOX’s attractiveness and its stable price he reminded the up-coming titles for X BOX 360, among which Halo 3, Mass Effect, Gears of War or Splinter Cell Double Agent are the most famous.
Sony officials counter-attacked and accused the Redmond giant of being a pain in the ass with their persistence for copying Sony’s breakthroughs. This is what Sony Computer Entertainment America president Kaz Hirai said at the end of June: “Every time we go down a path, we look behind and they're right there - we just can't shake these guys. I wish that they would come up with some strategies of their own, but they seem to be going down the path of everything we do. If you look at their strategy in other business areas as well, they tend to do that."
To be honest, Sony is a not really a record breaking inventor: the Dual Shock controller for PS2 is quite similar to Nintendo’s N64, and a new tilt sensor said to be integrated into PS3 also resembles the one Nintendo plans to offer for its future Wii gaming console.
Moreover, Japanese website Tech-On is reporting that a new patent filed by Sony Computer Entertainment could potentially be used for a Wii-like control interface on the PlayStation 3.
A typically confusing diagram attached to the patent seems to suggest that the device allows a game system to view a pen-like controller on a 2-dimensional camera image, and map its position in 3D space. Essentially, this means the camera could be used for Wii-like motion-sensing gameplay.
According to Chinese-language newspaper Commercial Times, Sony Corp. is already receiving the first pieces of the long expected PS3 from Asustek. That would be a good news…
Both Apple Daily and Commercial Times have spoken in this week’s articles about the fact that Asustek Computer has already begun shipping PlayStation3 to Sony. Apparently this initial shipment debuted at the beginning of July, in a small volume for now, but expected to rise until November 11, PS3’s (still) official launch date.
The publications were speaking about an actual monthly shipment of 200,000 units, which should gradually increase up to 2 million pieces by October 2006. The total amount of PlayStation3 consoles established by contract is 4 million pieces for 2006. They are all to be delivered in due time to meet customers’ demand for the Christmas shopping season.
What is important with this news is the fact that if the PS3 consoles are being manufactured, that means that the hardware specifications have been finalized and the launch will take place in mid-November.
Sony promised to have 2 million PlayStation 3 consoles available during the launch window and ship 4 million PS3s worldwide by the end of 2006. By March 2007 the company plans to supply 6 million game consoles to the market.
After the first batch of PS3 shipments from Asustek, Foxconn Electronics (the registered trade name of Hon Hai Precision Industry) will also supply Sony's PS3 game consoles when demand rises, indicated the Apple Daily.
A Sony spokesman said "pricing for PlayStation 3 is entirely appropriate, given all that it has to offer, including the Cell chip and Blu-ray." The company argues that game developers are embracing the PS3.
