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Sony Profits Conundrum

Posted by Zonk on from the coming-and-going dept.

Alice, over at the Wonderland blog, has an interesting post wondering about the state of Sony's finances when put in contrast with their view on second-hand game sales, and new title prices. From the article: "Yet it turns out that discounting new releases also results in higher sales. MCV continues: 'BVG's The Chronicles of Narnia jumped ten places up the ChartTrack top 40 last week, thanks to a 16 per cent sales increase, following its slashing to £19.99 at most High Street retailers.' My question: what the hell are they complaining about? Why curtail the perfectly reasonable and legal second-hand market if they're making money hand-over-fist with the current situation?"

3 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Greed by ClamIAm · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Getting a percentage of each used game sale is probably Sony's wet dream here, but they should look at other industries to see a perfectly reasonable and much better idea. Car manufacturers often have "certified" used cars, where they go through and perform maintenence and slap a warranty on the thing.

    Games could work the same way. Work out a licensing scheme where used game retailers could buy a special console that checks for errors and disc scratches. They then make sure the manual and everything is there, and then give a new warranty. Ta daa.

  2. From the department of duh by MMaestro · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Yet it turns out that discounting new releases also results in higher sales.

    Discounting new releases means higher sales? No, really? /sarcasm

    Gamers have asked for new releases to come down in price sooner, rather than waiting for the company to think 'well gee, sales and hype have hit rock bottom lets try discounting games now that everyone already bought second-hand copies and hope we make some more sales.'

  3. "Greed" is glib by tengennewseditor · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Simply because a corporation seeks to maximize profits doesn't mean it shouldn't keep the customer's interest in mind. It's in Sony's interest to keep the secondary game market alive so that PS2 console owners remain happy and come back for the PS3. But yes, this also obviously hurts the primary game market. There's an obvious tradeoff here, which makes a console maker's decision whether or not to support or squash a secondary game market an interesting decision. Simply calling it "greed" marginalizes the whole conversation because it's obvious and insufficient at the same time.