Microsoft Comments on DS vs. PSP Battle

geekboy_x writes "At the Halo launch event a senior Microsoft VP took time out to comment on the coming battle between the Nintendo DS and the Sony PSP. In a nutshell, he thinks that Nintendo's domination of the handheld market will make this a rough go for Sony. He also, as is apparently required by Microsoft law, makes a candid yet derogatory comment about Linux." A more personal version of commentary made two days ago, as reported by GamesIndustry.biz.

Based on Bach's comment...

[Donoho]

Moore pointed out the dominant position achieved by Nintendo in handheld gaming devices and said Sony's decision to enter the space would be "like developing your own little operating system and saying, 'Well, I'm going to challenge Windows.' "

Nintendo better work to maintain what they've built instead of resting on their laurels, lest they give away the top spot, all while arrogantly berating the competition...

Good for the industry but my money is on Sony

[landimal_adurotune]

I find it fascinating that MS would comment on the battle at all, and after reading the article I wonder if we'll see Halo for Nintendo DS.

Sony has vast amounts of IP to throw at its new handheld, its not just a game system, it can play movies and cartoons. Parents (myself included) love the idea of a 'keep em quiet in the car' device, and I see Sony being able to position themselves in that market strongly.

Re:640k is enough for everybody...

[vhold]

I agree it was correct for the time, but it was still short sighted. As a result of accepting that limitation early we ended up dealing with it in some seriously sloppy ways for years.

It was a massive pain for quite a while trying to use above 640k on a PC, juggling various TSRs in and out of various memory managers. The prospect of an enduser trying to get their PC to run the newest game, modifying config.sys and autoexec.bat was totally insane. Eventually memmaker was integrated into MsDos pretty late in the game. It really damaged Microsoft's reputation at the time to deal with all of that crap because of thier shortsightedness. Even on into Windows 95 it was possible (but admitedly rare) to bump into 640k issues.

While I can't prove it of course, I personally feel that it was a real speed bump for PC gaming that sent quite a few people packing in frustration to consoles because they were spending more time rearranging their himem and creating multiple boot profiles for every game then they were actually playing. When I first used linux, the fact that 'free' simply showed all my memory in as one giant usable chunk, all 4 glorious megs of it, was seriously awesome.

Apparently, Bill Gates claims he never said it though..

He's partly right though

[AvantLegion]

Even if he's "-1, Troll"-ing, the guy's partly right.

It WILL be a rough go for Sony and the PSP. They have a fantastic piece of hardware, but they are having problems keeping it powered, and they're entering a market used to a specific vendor whose products are strong at what the PSP is currently weak at.

MS knows what entering a gaming market late is like. The Xbox is a superb piece of hardware, easily superior to the competition, but gaining acceptance has been an uphill battle the whole way. Some brilliant moves (like Xbox Live) have helped along the way, but they have had to fight the whole way.

I want a PSP a lot more than a DS because of the game lineup and the beautiful wide screen. But, I'm not a Sony fanboy that thinks it's just going to waltz in and destroy the competition. The days of a single dominant provider in a gaming market are numbered. The next console generation will be a LOT closer, and Nintendo isn't going to have total free reign of handhelds anymore.