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Where the PS3 Stands Now
Phil Harrison and 1up's Luke Smith had a chat about the current positioning of the PlayStation 3, and it makes for some interesting reading. A quietly confident Harrison discusses the future of game distribution online, their attitude towards competition in the console market, and clarifies a few things about the potential for PS3 price cuts. The previous discussion about price cuts was apparently a big misunderstanding. "PH: Well, do you know what [Takao Yuhara] said was, cost reduction, not price drop, and there's a big difference between cost reduction and price drop. So, that I believe is where the confusion came from. Obviously, we are investing our money in making PlayStation 3s cheaper to manufacture -- that's part of our business plan. 1UP: You're not going to pass the savings along? PH: When we can, when there are savings to pass along to the consumer, we would obviously choose to do that. That's the business model. 1UP: Wait? You guys are doing this to make money? Really? PH: That's videogame hardware 101."
Sony is selling the PS/3 at a loss. I've seen estimates as high as $300 (loss) per unit. Clearly their strategy is to get the manufacturing cost down ASAP and recover some of the loss via higher game royalty payments. They MAY even be limiting production - at least till they can further lower manufacturing costs.
A risky strategy, when you consider the deep pockets of Microsoft (also selling their console at a loss), and that Nintendo is actually making a profit on their consoles. But it's still early in the cycle for this generation of consoles. Personally, I'm cheering for Nintendo. But it's MUCH to early to count Sony out of the game.
[Insert pithy quote here]
Christmas was more than a few days ago.
*please mod informative, please mod informative*
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
The "Thud" comment is (reasonably) justified ... According to VGCharts.org Virtual Fiter 5 sold 49,500 in it's first week
... ... ...
... Another way to look at it is that Virtual Fighter 4 sold 367,500 in its first week. At this pace Sega will be lucky if Virtual Fighter 5 sells 100,000 to 200,000 copies in it's lifetime.
Last week Lets Make a J-League Pro Soccer Club 5 sold 108,250 and Harvest Moon: The Island I Grew Up On sold 81,000 in their first week
The week before Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas sold 220,750 and Romance of the Three Kingdoms Wars DS sold 81,750 in their first week
And the week before that hack G.U. Vol. 3 sold 132,750 and Wario: Master of Disguise sold 94,000 in their first week
These are very 'average' games in Japan selling 2 to 4 times as much as Virtual Fighter 5 did
You do realize Virtua Fighter 5 is being released on the XBox 360 as well though right? So I don't really see this as reason to buy it on the PS3 for $100 - $200 more than it would run you on the Xbox 360. And if the past is anything to go by, the 360 version will have nice online play and voice chat...does it on the PS3?
http://xboxyde.com/news_3903_en.html
- "Scientia non habet inimicum nisp ignorantem"