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Sony's PS3 Strategy Brilliant or Insane? 189

Posted by Zonk from the i'm-hedging-towards-crazy dept.
1up's Jeremy Parish has a piece wondering out loud about the sanity of Sony's PS3 strategy. From the article: "The veil of mystery surrounding the PS3 is downright maddening, and a little worrying. Consider that by March 2000, the company had already set the PlayStation 2's October 26th release date in stone. Yet here in March 2006, Sony has only been willing to commit to a 'spring 2006' launch for its latest console. Less than ten days from winter's end and gamers are left scraping together scraps of conflicting information trickling from the company's various divisions to try and get a sense of the bigger picture." We may find out which side of the coin they're on tomorrow; The current rumour is there will be some sort of big announcement about Sony's next-gen console on the 15th.
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Sony's PS3 Strategy Brilliant or Insane? More

Sony's PS3 Strategy Brilliant or Insane?

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  • It's... (Score:3, Funny)

    by gEvil (beta) ( 945888 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:02AM (#14915675)
    It's brilliantly insane! Or is that insanely brilliant? It's one of the two...

  • I vote for "Non-existant" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by elrous0 ( 869638 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:05AM (#14915689)
    So far their "strategy" has been about as vague as their hardware. I'll comment when I can actually SEE either.

    -Eric

  • Both! (Score:5, Funny)

    by zenmojodaddy ( 754377 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:10AM (#14915731)
    I call it INSILLIANT!
  • Insane? Brilliant?

    Maybe they're just confused and trying to cover for a botched launch.
    • I would hope they are delaying to make a better system now that XBox 360 has screwed the pooch, so to speak, with its launch. I tried AGAIN this weekend to get one of the damn things. No dice. Every store told me to come back in 2-8 weeks. They can potty in their collective hats - now I am on wait and see what Sony finally produces.

      Oh and the vagueness and deception? Totally Japanese, very Sun Szu and typical of Sony.

  • Days are Numbered (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Nerdfest ( 867930 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:15AM (#14915781)
    No matter how brilliant they may be, or how badly they screw up, I wouldnt expect this to be the end of the PS. Fanboy support alone should get them near at least a break even point. I think their biggest threat these days would be the hype over the xbox360. If MS can get a major hardware volume release, combined with a couple of good games just before Sony deploys they should be able to slap down the Sony marketing a bit.

    In any case, it should be interesting.
    • Microsoft's sales since launch here have been mediocre at best here in the U.S.A. and negligible in japan.

      http://www.craxtion.com/content/view/133/2/ [craxtion.com]

      They will have to release at least 3 AAA Japanese Style rpgs among other thigns to get the japanese to switch brands and they just need to churn out more quality titles here in the U.S.
    • It's current strategy allows it to run a free speculative marketing engines at no cost, whilst leaving microsoft with no marketing target.

      Microsoft can throw out some speculative marketing to try to target the PS3 but when it gets it wrong it leaves itself looking foolish and it already looks foolish as a result of engineering flaws in it's console.

      It is fairly obvious the Sony marketing has gained control of microsoft marketing and has left them floudering.

  • Problem = BluRay (Score:5, Insightful)

    by the computer guy nex ( 916959 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:16AM (#14915797)
    The BR drive is slowly killing the PS3. Sony chose to push their new format rather than do what is good for the gamer.

    This "poor man's blu-ray" will not fit into any market. Home theater enthusiasts will buy a professional HD player and the average gamer could care less.

    What is making this decision so horrible is the fact that these Blu-Ray drives will push the PS3 to around double the price of the 360 even when selling at a considerable loss. The Cell processor, while powerful, in the real world doesn't have much on 3 3.2 ghz processors (besides a lot of $$$). Sony has an advantage over Microsoft in terms of "branding," but Sony has made a ton of poor architectural decisions.
    • how about you actually wait and see the ps3 in action.

      wait... let me see. we dont have the absolute final specifications for the ps3, blu ray, or the cell either. they could very well have thrown in another 3 cell chips into the final console. fact is, we dont know yet. thats partially the point of TFA, why dont you calm down and wait to see how "poorly" the ps3 will be before you condemn it.

      launching after the x360, im sure r&d at sony has sat down and ripped open and performed some testing against 360
      • "wait... let me see. we dont have the absolute final specifications for the ps3, blu ray, or the cell either."

        That's a *plus* ?

        Boy are some gamers easily satiated.
        • no, im just pointing out that you cant complain about something you dont have yet; you cant complain about something that may arrive in a completely different form from what was expected.

          for better or worse... we dont know yet. until we know which, how can everyone blindly assume its worse? from track record? sonys trackrecord has been hit and miss i admit. who knows? they could have a strikeout or a homerun, we wont know until release day for sure.
          • "for better or worse... we dont know yet. until we know which, how can everyone blindly assume its worse? from track record? sonys trackrecord has been hit and miss i admit. who knows? they could have a strikeout or a homerun, we wont know until release day for sure."

            I don't blindly assume it'll be worse, but "smoke and mirrors" marketing in lieu of hard information doesn't instill me with trust, optimism, and high expectations.
    • Don't underestimate the nationalism of Japan. They've snubbed 2 generations of Xbox now and will gobble up the PS3 even if it's the same price as a computer. PS2 is perhaps the sole reason the DVD platform took off worldwide as the console was the cheapest player on the market at the time. Even if Sony takes a loss per unit on its consoles they can chalk it up as an investment in licensing of their new distribution medium.

      I'm not saying Sony can do no wrong (duh.. rootkits) but I think you're underest
      • Don't underestimate the nationalism of Japan.

        Are you talking about the same Japan that loves the iPod?

        It's got nothing to do with nationalism. The US market is different to the Japanese one. Microsoft didn't get that at all with the XBox, they're understanding it but still not succeeding with the 360.
        • Touche on the Ipod, but that's what I've read about their loyalty to Sony.
          • The whole Sony loyalty thing has been blown out of proportion. Even the PlayStation brand is not golden in Japan. The PSX failed utterly, and the PSP is being blown away. Sure, Sony has name recognition, but if their crap ain't up to snuff... and come in 93 different colors, Japanese are going to choose a competitor.

      • Re:Problem = BluRay (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Rydia ( 556444 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @11:12AM (#14916321)
        And even if you go with the nationalism aspect, you still have a little Japanese called Nintendo. What is absolutely insane is that people are discounting the #2 worldwide company in their strongest market for... why? I can't think of any reason why this should be considered MS v. Sony, despite all the marketing and everyone's dogged insistence that it is because everyone says so.
        • Short term memory, perhaps. Even Nintendo has given up on their Gamecube so we see them in a handheld battle with Sony if not the console battle. I don't know if it's fair to call Nintendo #2 in the console wars since Xbox and Sony outsold them big time. Many see the Revolution, a very risky endeavour, as Nintendo's possible last gasp in the console biz.
          • in a handheld battle with Sony if not the console battle

            Not much of a battle. The DS is decimating the PSP right now, espsecially with all the new colors. I'm at work and can't get to the sites that have the stats (therefore no link), but I know the PSP has been way outsold right now and game for game the DS has a massive lead.

          • Re:Problem = BluRay (Score:3, Interesting)

            by Miraba ( 846588 )
            I don't know if it's fair to call Nintendo #2 in the console wars since Xbox and Sony outsold them big time.

            In the USA. Overall, Nintendo actually sold slightly more consoles than MS. Don't discount how well they do in Japan.

    • "What is making this decision so horrible is the fact that these Blu-Ray drives will push the PS3 to around double the price of the 360 even when selling at a considerable loss."

      I somewhat agree. I think if Sony merely had a way of loading regular DVDs faster (IE low to non-existent load times) then they'd have something. Perhaps two lasers. Speeding up the spin seems to do suprisingly little these days.

    • What is making this decision so horrible is the fact that these Blu-Ray drives will push the PS3 to around double the price of the 360 even when selling at a considerable loss.

      I think that what you're going to find is that the reason BluRay players are so expensive is that many of them will have a Cell in them. Since the PS3 already has all that equipment in it, the BluRay won't add much to the cost, and the PS3 will be cheaper than everybody predicted.

      Regardless of how much it costs to build, there's no wa

      • Regardless of how much it costs to build, there's no way the PS3 ships at a higher price than the 360. Sony just isn't that stupid.

        Really? That's odd....because the launch prices of their first two consoles were dramatically higher than any of the competing products available at the time. The Dreamcast cost less than half what a PS2 cost on the PS2 launch date. Are you suggesting that Sony was "stupid" in their launch plans for the two most successful consoles in history? And that they've gotten smarter

        • That's odd....because the launch prices of their first two consoles were dramatically higher than any of the competing products available at the time.

          I wonder how old you are...

          Sony undercut Saturn by $100, and there were all sorts of accusations of dumping, etc.. when the playstation came out.

          Check your history. You're wrong.
          • Oh, right, Saturn. Doesn't fit the category of "competing products" if only 4 people had one. I'm not counting Neo-Geo either. I've seen one of each of those, and since you asked, I was in my mid-teens when the PSX came out. I didn't get one, but I bought the PS2 at launch when I was in college.

            But ok, I'll admit that I shouldn't have said "any" of the competition. The important issue is that they were significantly higher priced than their *primary* competitors. And the Dreamcast parallel is really the one
            • Oh, right, Saturn. Doesn't fit the category of "competing products" if only 4 people had one.

              What?

              Saturn was the competetor until the N64 came out (two years later). There wasn't anything else in the market. I don't know how you can count the Dreamcast as competition to the PS2 if you don't count the Saturn as competition to the Playstation. At least the Saturn outsold the Playstation for a little while after the Playstation was released. The Dreamcast was practically DOA.

    • You're right - the PS3 isn't about games. It's Sony's attempt to use their current market lead in the console market to force Blu-Ray players out into the public.

      The PS3 is an attempt to get Blu-Ray players into people's houses, disguised as game consoles. Everything in their business plan seems to be based on "winning" the next media war. If they "win" with the PS3, they suddenly have an install base of Blu-Ray players. From there, they can start selling licenses to produce Blu-Ray content.

      I've hea

      • You're right - the PS3 isn't about games. It's Sony's attempt to use their current market lead in the console market to force Blu-Ray players out into the public.

        Right.....Sony's going to cannibalise their most profitable business (selling video games) just to get a tiny lead in a commodity market (selling video players) where they could, maybe, if they play their cards right, make a tenth as much money. Sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

        • Where did I say they were planning on cannibalizing anything?

          Sony has no intention of cannibalizing their game market. From their view, they already own it, and it's a fore-gone conclusion that they'll sell millions of PS3s. So their plan is to continue to dominate the console market, and use that dominance to force Blu-Ray players out into the public.

          It's the same strategy Microsoft has been using to try and make Windows Media the perferred media format - use their current OS dominance to make sure e

    • Ugh, your exaggerating the cost of the blu-ray... The actual pure drive components cost will be bumped down to probably around $30 bucks after Sony ships off their first million or two since it's their factories and their own tech no licensing required for the technology to other companies.

      All the expensive chips required to decode the hd stream and convert the video is already there. Sony can probably just design some software to run on their cell to decode whatever mpeg stream blu-ray runs on and they'v
    • The BR drive is slowly killing the PS3. Sony chose to push their new format rather than do what is good for the gamer.

      You say that, but if they can pull it off, they are uniquely positioned to make a killing from all of the HD screens that people in Japan, Europe & America are in the process of buying. They'll kill HD DVD in the process and make money from the royalties of a standard that they control, as well as the console that supports that standard unlike its main rival.

  • Neither Brilliant nor Insane (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Microlith ( 54737 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:17AM (#14915803)
    It is simply inevitable.

    All Sony has to do is turn out a powerful console equivalent to the xbox360 and sell it at the same price the xbox360 was at during release (make no mistake, this was on average $800+ after the console plus all the force-bundled crap) and they're set. Sony has 2 generations of backwards compatibility to ride on, games coming out still for the PS2 (see Final Fantasy XII, the be-all and end-all of console moving franchises,) and the fact that Playstation is still a very powerful brand.

    The XBOX360's lead time has proven to be little advantage, as Microsoft seems to have lost in Japan entirely as a result of not having crap for games available, and is having supply issues abroad. 6 months will not make the xbox360 any better unless better games come out for it, and they don't have any console-moving titles coming out save Halo 3, and that won't help them in Japan.
    • "see Final Fantasy XII, the be-all and end-all of console moving franchises"

      Complete BS. Not many at all care in the states about the FF series. I've seen about 2 billion Halo LAN parties - I've never seen a FF lan party.

      Zelda/Mario single handedly kept the Gamecube in the black.
      • *sigh* Unless you're playing FFXI, Final Fantasy does not have a multiplayer component. Which is the whole purpose of LAN parties. How about you list every other console RPG ever made, and let us know how many LAN parties you've seen for those? And how LAN parties are the ultimate determination of every franchise ever?
        • *sigh* Unless you're playing FFXI, Final Fantasy does not have a multiplayer component. Which is the whole purpose of LAN parties. How about you list every other console RPG ever made, and let us know how many LAN parties you've seen for those? And how LAN parties are the ultimate determination of every franchise ever?

          Regardless, Final Fantasy is not the "end all and be all" of anything. Halo hasn't been around as long as Final Fantasy so it has a more limited track record, but so far, in terms of sales

      • I play a lot of warcraft 3 and all my friends play it too but I know the FF series completely outstrips warcraft 3 in sales. So whil your Halo parties might be more common in your circle of friends it means nothign because the FF series tends to sell in numbers as great or greater then any of the two halo games. And there have been 10 single player FF series. That would mean it a far greater success so far then the Halo series has been. And actually, the FF series has been the king makers for the last 3 gen
    • Even months later, the same misinformation keeps popping up.

      The Xbox 360 costs $400. Period.

      Any bundles you may have seen were created by the *retailer*, not by Microsoft. And you're crazy if you don't think the retailers will do the same thing with the PS3 when it comes out.

  • Announcement (Score:5, Funny)

    by RealErmine ( 621439 ) <commerce.wordhole@net> on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:19AM (#14915827)
    The big announcement of course being that Sony is skipping the Playstation 3, ditching the Cell and going right to Playstation 4 which is powered purely by marketing.

  • Insanity (Score:5, Insightful)

    by thefirelane ( 586885 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:24AM (#14915867)
    This sums it up nicely, we'll know which it is only after the release

    Bruce Feirstein:
    The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success.

  • Article misses the obvious explanation (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Andy_R ( 114137 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:25AM (#14915878) Homepage Journal
    Sony have known for a long time that the Xbox 360 would be first to market. Rather than watch their potential customers make a huge investment in a competing system they are obviously going to do whatever it takes to make buyers wait for the PS3, which means constantly dangling the carrot of a possible huge announcement in the near future infront of the gaming public... which is exactly what they are doing. Hardly 'brilliant' or 'insane', their strategy strikes me more as 'bleeding obvious'.
    • No one outside of people who read this site and other gamer sites is waiting for the carrot of launch information. When it happens, they might hear about it, but your average gamer does not wait on the edge of their seat for this sort of thing, as you or I might.
    • And, one might add, they can't follow the tried-and-true model of releasing 100% bullshit specs before the release, because they already did that to the dreamcast and the gamers who remember - lots of us, of course - will take such a gigantic PR-related shit on Sony if they pull that nonsense again that their ancestors will stink in hell.

  • Come on, Honestly. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by casualsax3 ( 875131 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:37AM (#14915978)
    If I have to read three articles a day about the PS3 until it launches in December or whenever - I'm going to stop reading Slashdot. The fact that there is no news about it means there should be no headlines or articles about it... am I right? Read this submission - it's an story about how we might get an story with substance tomorrow.

    There is an article here practically every day that has a headline basically asking "has Sony lost its mind?"

    Everybody seems to be missing the fact that the PS2 outsold the 360 in January. Sony does not need to rush to market with the PS3 when there are still some KILLER titles coming out this year. I'm not trying to be a troll, honest, but please stop posting these insufferable articles.

    • "If I have to read three articles a day about the PS3 until it launches in December or whenever - I'm going to stop reading Slashdot. "

      No kidding...I am so frigging sick of the ramp-up marketing madness surrounding the consoles...its just plain disgusting. I'll be glad that there's no information on it. It all comes down to the games, now whatever marketing buzz you can generate over your system. Gamers will look at marketing and say "oh cool" but they won't make their buying decision based on that alon

    • "Everybody seems to be missing the fact that the PS2 outsold the 360 in January"

      Is that because purchasers preferred the PS2 over the X360, or because there were all of 17 X360s to be had worldwide at the time?
  • I'd have to say Sony is playing this rather smart. Whether they wanted to or not, they avoided the Christmas 2005 ("Q3/Q4") season, traditionally the biggest hype and buy time of the year. Fortunately for Sony, the XBox360 has been relatively uninspiring so far. Console players are typically kids (or people with lots of free time on their hands), so things like "spring break" and "summer break" are good times to get your marketing message out.

  • Any advertising is good advertising (Score:3, Insightful)

    by BecomingLumberg ( 949374 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:41AM (#14916002)
    The adage is true. Consider this: Despite the fact that nobody outside of sony has even seen a game run, the PS3 gets more headline coverage than Xbox360, which can be bought today. I believe sony has always wanted a release a year later than microsoft, since they have always made PS3 out to be something 'worth waiting for'... its the same reason your parents get you to be good for Christmas.

    My vote is for brilliant. Sony controls the media, so sony controls the market.

    • Consider this: Despite the fact that nobody outside of sony has even seen a game run, the PS3 gets more headline coverage than Xbox360, which can be bought today.

      I guess nobody went to E3 in May of 2005 and saw the PS3 Unreal demo: http://ps3.ign.com/articles/614/614712p1.html [ign.com]

      When it comes to PS3, You obviously don't know what you're talking about. Plenty of people outside of Sony have seen code running on a PS3. There were hundreds of developers at PS3 devcon a couple months ago and we've had PS3 d

  • Me love me some 360! (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Rydia ( 556444 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:54AM (#14916150)
    While I think the premise is interesting, the article has some really loopy conclusions. First, there seems to be a lot of MS love, considering the author's assertion that Nintendo is now a distant third and the 360 is primed to take over the market. The 360, which is plauged by issues and being outsold by the PS2?

    Plus, his idea that every decade the industry just changes itself is a little bit absurd. The changes he cites came about for different reasons. Atari failed because of public indifference to "games" (hence "entertainment system"). Nintendo's failure was more technical than social, even against trumped-up charges of mistreatment regarding developers (which were serious, to be sure, but definitely not the main reason everyone jumped ship). Just taking periods of time and saying "hey, they're similar!" and then basing your entire analysis on that is ridiculous.

    As for the secrecy potentially being a huge problem for Sony, I agree completely. He should have fleshed that idea out more, however, rather than just throwing around poorly-informed speculation.

  • The correct answer to that question is... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by RyoShin ( 610051 ) <tukaro@@@gmail...com> on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:56AM (#14916162) Homepage Journal
    ...Yes.

    While I can't be sure what their release srategy is, Sony knows that they control the majority of the console market. With this, they can continue to play and prod with release dates, demos, and specs. With each new tidbit, they make the fans drool all the more over the system, increasing the hype. (To be fair, Nintendo does the same to us Nintendo fanboys, only we get less promises and specs, and at a much slower rate.)

    However, one has to wonder how long they can hold this off. I'm sure PS2 hardware sales are already dropping as game stores start pushing for reserving a PS3. Eventually, the numbers will reach over into game sales (where Sony makes up profit loss on the console), becuase no one will be buying a new PS2, and thus won't get Grand Theft Auto 10 or whatever. If they hold off too long, this could give them a big bite, though I'm sure that software sales will surge (including PS2 titles) when the PS3 comes out- assuming it has backwards compatibility.

    In fact, the same thing is happening across the board, excluding the XBox (360). As news of the DS Lite travels, regular DS sales will slow as people decide to hold off for a few months to get The Next Best Thing. Same thing goes for the Gamecube and the PS2.

  • Is lack of a strategy a strategy? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by diabolus_in_america ( 159981 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @10:57AM (#14916183) Journal
    I think we are seeing what happens when products try to be all things to all people. The muddled information about the PS3's launch is understandable because everything else about the system is so muddled. How much will it cost? Will it be backwards-compatible? I've not seen answers to those are very simple questions yet.

    And I think the reason we don't know the answers to the simple questions is because Sony hasn't yet answered all the hard questions internally. It just doesn't seem like there is a solid plan or a road map for the PS3 other than being "faster." Why are they using blu-ray? What is the H-D plan for the PS3? Why are they using bluetooth? What are their online plans? I should not have to dig through countless gaming sites to find out these details.

    I think Sony has taken a lot of things for granted with the PS3. It could be that the installed base of the PS2 has clouded their thinking. But Sega proved that a next-gen machine had to have more than just technical superiority to succeed (and they were first to market with the Dreamcast!)

    Sony needs to get the public informed about the PS3, and they need to do it soon. Else, the XBOX 360 may do to the PS3 what the PS2 did to the Dreamcast.
    • Aside for the brief holiday stint, the hype for the 360 is over. To add insult to injury, many of the games on the 360 have competant current-gen versions. Herein lies the problem. Microsoft hasn't given customers any reason to buy the 360 other than that it is new, somewhat prettier, and Elija Wood has one, and of those 3 things only "it's new" has stuck in the mainstream public's mind.

      Sony has plenty of time to buy their own half hour on MTV. I think they thought the PS3 development would be all pickled h
    • "How much will it cost?"
      It will be around $500 with all the options. $400 bare. However, this is subject to change. Companies change their pricing up to the very last minute, and Sony is no exception. Rest assured though, it will be in line with all other next generation consoles. Sony is not stupid.

      "Will it be backwards-compatible?"
      Yes.

      "solid plan or a road map for the PS3"
      The solid road map is to produce the best gaming system they can, and plan on having that system out for 5 to 6 years; anything e

  • Neither: Flailing (Score:2, Interesting)

    by ereshiere ( 945922 )
    Everything they're doing is a "me-too." Is there a single new idea in the PS3?

    It seems, in fact, that even the components are going to be copied: the bad bad Cell (anyone even remember the supposed promise of the Emotion Engine?) will be used in computers.

    They're poorly trying to play catchup on the Xbox Live|SNES/NES download services. Downloading a dual-layer PS2 DVD sounds very bizarre, if their service is ever built to the specifications they listed. Certainly we will have the ability to, one da

  • The strategy is to keep Mind Share (Score:3, Interesting)

    by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @11:59AM (#14916866) Homepage Journal
    so long as all the blogs and media outlets are talking about Sony, talking about Blu-Ray, and talking about the really cool games that are coming with the PS3, they keep you from wanting to buy an xBox360.

    Most people I know are waiting until all the consoles are released before they buy, and I live in xBox360 central (Seattle), so you know it's working.

  • BEWARE!!! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Erich ( 151 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @12:06PM (#14916933) Homepage Journal
    The 15th?

    Beware the ides of March!

    BEWARE!

    Et tu, nintendo?

    Sigh. Like anyone reading Slashdot these days finds this funny. Back in my day... et cetera.

  • Who cares? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by wvitXpert ( 769356 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @01:38PM (#14917871)
    If all you care about is graphics you can get an xbox 360. If you want good games get the Revolution. What is the point of the PS3? The only people that I can see buying one are people who are hooked on GT, or PS2 fanboys who would buy a PS3 if all it did was make toast.
    • I'm so sorry i got a ps2, why I only got to play games from my favorite creator Hideo Kojima--Metal Gear series. Numerous obscure but fun japanese rpgs along with mainstream ones like FF, Xenosaga, Dragonquest. How about gran turismo, being able to recreat an old ae86 and tuning it to hell is so shitty. But i guess those and all the other games I've played and the genre of games I play are just mediocre altogether. Why i should have bought a gamecube to play mario party and metroid or something. Why no
      • OK, you fit in the first category.
        • Yes, because i chose gran turismo because of it's awesome graphics (it doensn't now matter how much you exaggerate) and not at all for the realism that is found requiring very goddamn precise techniques that are missing in 95% of games touted to be ultra realistic.

          And my precious japanese sometimes sprited and cell shaded graphics. Uber!!! Teh graphics are teh pwn.

          • "The only people that I can see buying one are people who are hooked on GT, or PS2 fanboys who would buy a PS3 if all it did was make toast."

            The first category are people who are hooked on GT (although other PS2-only games could fit here also). That seems to fit you from what I've read in your posts. I'm not saying anything bad about you or even Sony. Just that the PS3 doesn't really have the advantage over it's competitors that it needs. I owned a PS2 before I ever got a GC, and I really like GT. But th
            • Ah sorry, i mistook your first so called "category" to be the first thing you listed. I guess your category's start at zero, you should have specified that!

              But I'm not quite sure how i'm a gt fanboy. I actually got gt later in my ps2 enjoying life. It's not quite as awesome as the psx with third party titles and companies just going wild with new types of games but it has a lot more stuff then the gc.

              Nintendo's Revolution is hype at it's worst. They've always been very conservative thats why their own g
  • I mean, we do know that PS3 is the next generation of Sony gaming platform, Apple seems fit to surprise us every few months with "just one more thing". We don't even know if Apple is truly has a new video iPod that may or may not be released in March or April. If Sony's strategy has been insane, I think most Apple's exec's should be locked away in straight jackets with the key thrown away.

    For Sony, the bottom line is that the PS3 is hotly anticipated and we are aware that it WILL be released and basically
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • PS3 - Drowned By Sony's Boat Anchors (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Kamalot ( 674654 ) on Tuesday March 14, 2006 @04:15PM (#14919163)

    Sony has created the Playstation 3 (PS3), not as a game machine, but as a vessel to float the company into new lands. They are burdening the system with a new movie format (BluRay) unheard of levels of digital rights management for music and video, Memory Sticks and more.

    The results are already starting to show. A year ago, Sony promised to launch the PS3 in Spring 2006. Instead, they waited till Spring 2006 to announce that they won't be launching the system until November 2006, in Japan [1up.com], with other regions perhaps as soon as Spring 2007. Why? Digital Rights Management issues with the upcoming BluRay format.

    The other divisions of Sony are dragging the PS3 down. The Playstation Portable (PSP) suffers from the same illness; too many hands in the basket. The PSP was designed around a slow-loading UMD format for distribution of movies which makes the machine less than ideal for game playing [blogspot.com]. Compared to ROM cartridges, UMDs are too slow loading [joystiq.com] and consume too much battery time. They make the machine more fragile and introduce problems with additional moving parts. In short, they are a sacrifice to the movie industry arm of Sony; giving up on the optimal game experience for the opportunity to sell you movies you probably already own on DVD.

    The delays brought about by making compromises to the core functions of the system will put a great strain on Sony. Currently, their ark is full of holes and loaded with baggage. The flood waters rise. How many gamers will wait until this time next year in order to pick up a PS3 when Xbox 360 games are available today and are getting excellent review scores? How many will pass up the Revolution this holiday season when it is affordable and fun? How high will the waters rise before Sony can launch the ark?

    Will it float?

    More can be found here: Kamalot Blog [blogspot.com]

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