EA Pushes Sony on PSP, Price Cuts Possible

GameDaily reports that EA has been pushing Sony to be more proactive with the PSP. The software giant feels that Sony is 'letting the DS win' by failing to adopt an aggressive strategy for the handheld console. The article mentions a piece run on CNN's Game Over column, where Chris Morris talks about the possibility of a price cut by the end of the year. From the EA article: "'There is a price cut coming in the second half of the year,' said P.J.McNealy of American Technology Research. '[The PSP] has lost momentum. Nintendo has had a great run since it launched the DS Lite and Sony needs to regain some ground.' In the meantime, though, EA has been thoroughly encouraged by the DS and DS Lite and conversely discouraged by the PSP, to the point where the publisher is apparently reconsidering its strategy in the portable market."

Comments

Where are the games?

[MBCook]

I basically regret my PSP purchase. I've played a handful of games. The last game I played that I really enjoyed was Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee which was released a little over a year ago. Me and My Katamari was kind of fun, as were a few of the early games, but by and large I don't feel like I've gotten much in the way of games. What's coming up? Not much. The only two games I am looking forward to are MGS: Portable Ops and Gitaroo Man Lives! (which is supposed to be part re-release/port).

Compare that to my DS. Two or three Castlevania games. Mario Kart. Mario and Luigi: Partners in Time. Kirby. Yoshi's Touch and Go. Wario Ware. Phoenix Wright and Trauma Center. That's what I can think of off the top of my head. Then there is the upcoming Yoshi's Island sequel, the next Phoenix Wright, Mario vs. Donkey Kong, Elite Beat Agents, Kirby Squak Squad, another Castlevania, Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, and I'm sure more.

I feel my DS has been a great purchase and I've gotten tons of play time out of it. I've barely touched my PSP in the last year and I regret it's purchase.

Sony has delivered tons of games on their last two platforms. The PSP is just sitting there. Not many games so far. Not many coming. The seeming killer feature that is to come is old PS1 games.

Re:Where are the games?

[neonprimetime]

My guess: The reason they have no games? They've got their entire staff concentrating on getting PS3 out before the end of the next millenium.

Re:Where are the games?

[Wind_Walker]

Sony is making the same mistake on the PS3 as they are on the PSP. Too much focus on the "extras" and too little focus on the games. On the PSP it was UMD movies (which are about to go the way of Betamax) while the PS3 has it's Blu-Ray. PS3 launch games are sorely lacking, while we just had a Slashdot article detailing the 25+ launch games for the Wii.

It's interesting to note the similarities between Nintendo and Sony with respects to their consoles. NES was good and had lots of good games. SNES was king of consoles, with thousands of AAA titles and lots of third party support. Then Nintendo rode their hubris and put out the N64, and drove away their supporters to the sleeker PS1 and Dreamcast. Nintendo has been playing catch-up ever since - though the Wii has the potential to revolutionize the industry, much in the same way the NES did so many years ago.

For Sony, PS1 was good with a lot of exclusives, and PS2 was king for a lot of the same reasons as the SNES. But Sony has displayed so much hubris in the buildup to the PS3 launch that sometimes I wonder if I've slipped into a Greek morality play. "The PS3 is actually pretty cheap", "We'd sell 6 million consoles even without games", "$599 US dollars", "Giant enemy crabs"... Sony is ripe for a fall.

Re:Where are the games?

[thatguywhoiam]

But Sony has displayed so much hubris in the buildup to the PS3 launch that sometimes I wonder if I've slipped into a Greek morality play. "The PS3 is actually pretty cheap", "We'd sell 6 million consoles even without games", "$599 US dollars", "Giant enemy crabs"... Sony is ripe for a fall.

Yeah no kidding. I think there was exactly one rationalization for the PS3's price, and it was:
Surely people will pay as much for a PS3 as they will for an iPod.

I think that's all Sony thought.

(Although now that I think of it, the iPod was (and is) nearly universally derided for being too expensive. But I don't think the situation is comparable. Nintendo is the innovator here. They should be charging $600 for those things, heh.)

Re:Where are the games?

[Bastian]

And yes, consumers are clueless. By any self-respecting nerd measure, almost utterly so. That's not meant to be elitism; its just that most consumers don't know what a rootkit is, for example. Heck, most of the people I talk to with iPods don't even know there's DRM built into the things.

No offense, but most Slashdot members are clueless, too. For example, most of them seem to conveniently forget that it's not just the iPod that is DRM-encumbered. Nearly every major MP3 player on the market supports a DRM-encumbered format. Or do Windows Media files not count?

Or how about that Slashdotters are more than ready to point out that pundits and the media in general are more influenced by fashion than reason when it comes to deciding what product to hound and what product to not hound? Oh wait, they do remember - but only when it's $FOSS_PROJECT that's being derided. And don't even get me started on Slashdot as a source of knowledge about the zeitgeist of the computing world. It isn't, and here's a simple reason - the vast majority of people here on Slashdot are here for the melee. Consequently, vitriol is overrepresented here. Heck, a look through my own posting history shows that that's most of what I do. It only makes sense - I have a stronger urge to voice my feelings when I'm feeling miffed than when I'm not.

Yes, but my context was the iPod launch, not the subsequent long line of successor products. Originally it was quite expensive - I don't recall exactly if it was $600, but I know it was at least $500. And Mac-only.

OK, taking it from there, you're right, the story's a bit different. But Sony's still insane to think there's any comparison. The iPod is essentially a standalone product - you can buy one, and as long as you have a computer with a FireWire (and, later, USB) port and the ability to create MP3s, you can keep throwing music on the thing. (Keep in mind that the battery's long-term survivability wasn't a known issue at the time; knowing that I'd certainly agree that $600 seems crazy.) The iPod didn't need to have any serious command of the market any more than the more pricey brands of other products need to, because all the consumer cares about is that they buy the product and it's done.

The PS3, on the other hand, is more than just a single product. It's also a library of games, which must be maintained until the next generation. To get that, there must be a strong presence in the market, so that game publishers will publish for the platform. It's also a community - the next-gen system with the most people will have a better chance of having a richer pool of users for online gaming. Plus, you can share games with your friends or take a game over to a friend's house or whatever if you both own the same system. If the PS3 only succeeds in getting a tiny share of the market, it can find itself just as any of the other myriad failed home console platforms. Comparing PS3 to an iPod is like comparing a deck of cards to an MMO.

Personally I think bifurcating the platform is a terrible idea; it runs counter one of the main points of a game 'console'. A better argument is to say they should have ditched Blu-ray altogether

My understanding is that the PS3 won't be playing games on Blu-Ray, it'll just be there for movies. Games will still come on DVDs. You're right, if they want Blu-Ray to be a future option for games, bifurcating the system would be crazy. But if that's not the case, it wouldn't really be bifurcating the platform because Blu-Ray wasn't a part of the games platform in the first place.

DS would make for a great "Sport manager" title

[RyoShin]

I don't know if there are any football games out for the DS already, but I've always thought that the touch screen would be a great way to do sports like football.

On the top screen you would see a normal 3D set-up of the football field with the two teams ready for the hike. The game would pause, and you'd have X seconds (or maybe unlimited time) to use the touch pad to draw out a game plan (as if you were drawing on a chalk board planning plays). You would have defaults and could save custom plays for quick recall, as well.

Once the ball is snapped, you would have the option of "getting dirty" and assuming the role of one of the players while the other players act out your strategy, or you could just let the AI handle it all.

strategy?

[MrSquirrel]

"by failing to adopt an aggressive strategy" Sony has let Nintendo win the portable market? Or maybe it's the fact that the DS is an exciting new concept that is geared towards fun, while the PSP is just a rehash of the PS2 in portable form. Aggressive?! Sony HAS been aggressive -- PSP commercials and ads everywhere! I don't think I've seen any DS commercials on television, and the ads I've seen have all been online ones at gaming sites.

Any business major can tell them that success is dependent on the 5 P's -- product, price, place, promotion, people. PSP is same-old-same-old as any other handheld, Nintendo's product is innovative and has 2 screens, one of which is stylus-oriented. Talk about fun! Price -- the DS is quite a bit cheaper than the PSP. Promotion -- PSP beats the DS here from what I've seen. Place -- they're both pretty available... except newegg has been sold out of the DS since it came out! People -- the Nintendo people seem a little slow to jump on the latest graphics and such, instead orienting around fun... sometimes a little too kiddie-fun... but the DS is an example of fun triumphing over "omg megahertz!!!". The Sony people are bastards who put rootkits on music CD's and tout that people will buy their products even if there are no games for them.

Re:strategy?

[Manmademan]

you mean BESIDES the black/white ads that generated insane amounts of controversy, and were all over the news INCLUDING a rather lengthy discussion here on slashdot?

Re:strategy?

[MrSquirrel]

I'm not sure how popular they were in other places, I was just speaking from my experience: I usually only watch Adult Swim + Discovery Channel + History Channel, and those damn PSP ads were all over those stations (the ones with the mice, and the dust-bunnies, and the squirrels... they almost ruined squirrels for me!!!... those bastards).

Aside from the GTA: Liberty City Stories commercials, I never once saw a commercial for a PSP game... or even the features the PSP had... only "it's like cheddar you can play with outside" sub-culture references offensive to squirrels and humans.

PSP has some nice games...

[CaseM]

But lunch-hour Mario Kart racing on our DS's have us hooked here in my office. People look at us like we're nuts when they walk in while we're saying stuff like "You nuked me you damn jerk...eat my red shells..." but we still have fun. The DS's never fail to draw attention, especially when they make three grown adults behave like we're 12 again.

And Don't forget BrainAge etc...

[nweaver]

When the parents take the console away from the kid to play games of their own, thats a success...

The DS has to come up, doesn't it?

[CharAznable]

Seems like every discussion about the PSP has to turn into a "I love my DS" thread. And rightly so, so I'll say it: I love my DS. It has me spending on games like they're ale and whores, and I just can't get enough of it. I brought it to work one day and the next day 3 coworkers got one each. The thing is just fun and contagious, which is exactly what a console is supposed to be. The price is there, the games are there, the people to play with are there... Nintendo have a bona fide hit on their hands, while Sony pays the price for their arrogance. The fact that any thread about Sony ends up being about how awesome Nintendo is just drives the point home.

Oh for the love of

[TommyBear]

Let's get a couple of things straight:

- If the PSP is no fun at the moment, how about EA actually making some fun games?
- There are 122 games released for the DS
- There are 147 games released for the PSP
- For the DS: 18 are bad, 69 are okay to good, 33 are great (backed up by media reviews and users)
- For the PSP: 7 ar bad, 87 are okay to good, 52 are great (backed up by media reviews and users)

Look it up:
http://www.metacritic.com/games/psp/scores/
http://www.metacritic.com/games/ds/scores/

- The PSP has shipped(not sold) 20 million units worldwide
- The DS has shipped(not sold) 21 million units worldwide

etc etc etc.

Look, I have a PSP and I play the the games I have and they are fun. I'm starting to feel that the people that moan about game being crap on the PSP are complaining about the ripped pirated games they play on their 1.5 handhelds. You know, the ones missing assets, sounds, movies and models.