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Sony Exec Says Luxury Could Be PS3's Downfall
Via Next Generation, an interview with CEO of Sony Corporation Sir Howard Stringer on the site CEO Exchange. In the piece they report that Stringer has gone on record as saying the PS3's price may be its downfall. This is the first indication we've had from Sony's upper management that the console's price may just be too high. "Wii is a wonderful device, but has a different target audience. If we fail, it is because we positioned PS3 as the Mercedes of the videogame field. PS3 is after a different audience and it can be whatever it wants -- a home server, game device, even a computer." Relatedly, a Goldmann Sachs analyst has opined that a PS3 price cut could come this year. Assuming they drop the price by $100 or more, this might blunt the objections many have to the console's lofty pricetag.
"What? A console war? I know what to do... Let them eat cake!"
Of course, we all know what happened the last time someone was this blind.
TONIGHT WE DINE IN HELL
Well... at least it only took them a holiday season and three months to figure out. This would start the road of recovery, and now that there's plenty of supply on the shelves, Sony can start throwing their weight around and eating away at the 360's advantage.
Throw in a couple good games, see if people are willing to buy Casino Royale since it's Blu-Ray only... some positive numbers might start coming around.
-Rob
Biblical fiscal responsibility
They are saying they made a console that costs way more than anyone wants to pay...
If it's dead, you killed it.
Ah, yes, the luxury of playing PS2 games. And a couple of decent PS3 games, too.
Oh, and the luxury of playing Blu-Ray discs, which most people don't care about. I want a game system to play games, not movies and other "luxury" media.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
I know another device that can be whatever it wants - it's called the PC.
The word "duh" comes to mind ...
I don't think that anyone here will doubt that they would have bought (or be considering buying) a PS3 if they had sold it for $300.
The important question is what will happen to Phil Harison and Ken Kuratagi if (in my opinion "when") the PS3 fails to sell 25 Million consoles worldwide?
If you want quality, you have to pay for it...
Personaly, I would rather pay £100 more for something faster, quieter, better built and most importantly reliable...
Look at the junk of junk 360, with it's 1 in 3 failure rate, and jumbo taking off in your living room noise levels.. it's obvious it was designed in a rush and thrown together in a sweatshop in mexico or eastern Europe...
The real question I have is how it took this long to penetrate to upper management.
Well, the Neo Geo was an extremely expensive machine for its time also. I would almost compare it with the PS3 in terms of features, price and era. Look how well it did. It had a rabid, but extremely small, fanbase. As long as Sony is confortable with that, then everything is dandy. Now granted, the console buying market has grown a lot since then. But still, of all the game fanatic friends I know, who have multiple consoles, only one had a Neo Geo.
maybe you were talking about 3DO.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
Like it or not, the PS3 is always going to compete in the same exact market as the Wii and Xbox360. No matter what features they include with the system, how powerful they make it, what claims they make consumers will always consider it first and foremost a game console.
Anyone who wants a system that does more will buy a PC. The PS3 is built around a gaming console so it will never function adequately as a PC. Not to mention it wouldn't be compatible with anything on a PC. Those interested in a home theater want dedicated hardware. They don't want audio/visual performance compromised. So ultimately, while for what the PS3 offers it might not be a bad price, it's perceived by everyone as a game console. And in that regard it is overpriced.
Nintendo has clearly learned from their attempts to turn the NES into a home computer. They've focused on the entertainment aspect and are emphasizing gameplay. Microsoft is in a far better position to bridge the gap between PCs and consoles given their extensive experience with operating systems. Even then, Microsoft hasn't forced an overpowered system on the consumer. They're a lot more subtle.
Eventually, PCs and consoles might unite as a home entertainment appliance but that day is still a ways away. Sony tried to do too much too soon and now have put themselves in a very difficult position.
it can be whatever it wants -- a home server, game device, even a computer."
1. Inanimate objects don't want.
2. I just want a fricken game device. I have computers already, and the whole "home server" concept has always seemed like more of a pain in the ass than it's worth.
At the moment, it's a Ford with Mercedes price tag. Maybe Sony should simply abandon the failed machine and start making the PS3 they originally promised, with 4 fully operational Cell chips, rather than the 7/8ths of a Cell (minus another 1/8th for DRM) the PS3 currently has.
The current PS3 is simply too little, too late (it's still not launched yet here in Britain!) and too pricey. The British price for a PS3 without game is more than the price of a Wii with game + a core Xbox 360 with a game put together.
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
...is that he's the first Sony exec we've heard from that appears to be coming across from a reasonable position. So reasonable, in fact, that it's amazing that Sony got into this pickle in the first place.
:-/
Then you read between the lines of his "Sony Silo" comments, and realize that he's no more in charge of the company than a sheep herder is in charge of a clowder of cats. i.e. Every section is still doing its own thing. The only difference is that the video game section is currently "top dog", so they get to mark their territory on behalf of the entire company.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
They designed a game machine with an awesome cutting-edge processor, a high-capacity next-gen optical storage, and bottled it up behind a mediocre graphics card. Thus it will never dominate over the cheaper XBox 360 in the screenshot wars. OOPS!
"But we couldn't get our people to understand software. And we are a music company. They saw digital media, panicked and didn't like it." In the end Sony designed a closed music system that didn't work.
Ever one to promote the Blu-ray, Stringer also manages to point out Blu-Ray's 3-to-1 sell over HD-DVD, calling HD-DVD a "transition tech." One might see their blu-ray interests as having a hand in helping the decision to make the PS3 a luxury item, but the CEO doesn't mention any thing about the $600 stand-alone blu-ray player Sony is releasing this summer. This of course really means they wanted a luxury item, not just a trojan tech carrier.
Finally, I think I can see in the article the closest reasoning to why the PS3 is a Sony-tech catch all device: "Each product category was its own 'silo.' PlayStation was a silo. All the divisions were in their own little worlds. There was no sharing of information between these divisions and little acknowledgement of software." What he did was to try and break down the silos with a program called "Sony United,."
It sounds to me like Stringer's decision here could have atleast influenced the PS3 development decision. In a company that tries to engineer superior technology products, perhaps a good degree of separation is necessary to prevent the expensive bloating of some endevors.
Demented But Determined.
The problems of the PS3:
The combination is a disaster for Sony. They probably could have overcome any two of those problems. If, say, they'd shipped a year before the XBox 360, there would have been a year to get through the "hard to develop" problem, and the price comparison wouldn't have been so unfavorable. Or if Sony had the low-priced entry, like last time with the PS2, they could have won out. But expensive, late, and hard all in one box may be too much for Sony.
It isn't the price alone that hurt the ps3, its the expectations that come with that price and the failure to meet them. With an extra year and and extra $200, it really needed to show up the Xbox 360 and its yet to really do so.
In the end a 60 gig ps3 cost $840 usd to create last november and a xbox360 cost $330. It's priced like a mercedes for a reason. It dissipates just as much heat and does it in a far quieter way (larger heatsink with a larger low rpm fan). Everyone who has taken apart seems to like the build quality of it over the xbox360.
There isn't much that separates a ford and a mercedes other then luxury. You can get a fast ford and it can run very reliably as long as it is not abused.
Hmmm... Pie...
I also own a 360. The PS3 is connected to a Sony HS-20 720p digital projector via HDMI and to a standard dd5.1 sound system via optical out. Here are my impressions:
Setup on the PS3 is very buggy and filled with poorly translated instructions.
- when first initially turning the unit on, it will auto-detect HDMI and display 480p. The second or third question it then asks is: "Do you want video and sound to be output via HDMI"? Since I wanted to output sound via optical, I thought this was asking if I wanted to split audio off the HDMI connection, so I selected "No". What then happened was that it spit 480i video out the composite cable.
- When initializing the network via wireless it will search and then display a list of available wireless SSIDs. Select one and DHCP an ip address. Now test the network. It succeeds in grabbing an IP address, but the network test always reports a failure even though the network is live and updates can be downloaded.
- Everyone knows about the lack of background downloading. Blech.
All that said, once I stuck a Blu-Ray copy of Casino Royale... whoah. I gotta say, the image is stunning. BD is definitely much much much better than HBO-HD, SHO-HD and OTA HD material. NO pixelation whatsoever. Extremely fast video plays without a hiccup. I'm IMPRESSED.
I don't have an HD-DVD player, so I can't compare the two. I suspect they're about the same in quality. But Blu-Ray has the movies. So... my impression is that if you want a BD player, the PS3 is the cheapest option out there and it's VERY GOOD.
As for games.... well, frankly, I'm much more impressed by Gears of War than I am by Resistance. JMO.
not a general purpose one anyway, Sony's got too large a PC division to let that happen. Too bad too, $600 bucks for a solid general purpose computer and game console is pretty good.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
That's if you're not in Europe or Australia. If you are, you can change that to "playing some PS2 games".
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
Given that most people end up buying two or three PlayStations over the life of each system (both PS1 and PS2) due to piss-poor manufacturing/quality, who wants to buy something at $600 three times!
That they consider the potential PS3 audience to be a different target audience from Nintendo's Wii.
They shot for luxury buyers - but the reality is that most console purchasers of PS2 were never luxury purchasers.
I know, I get targeted ads designed to appeal to me to buy fancy watches, suits, vacations, etc - all because I like to read the magazine Vanity Fair and run a Family Trust and have saved a lot of money - but they miss the market truth that I have never paid more than $35 for a watch, like most millionaires, and stay in inexpensive hotels when I travel.
Know your actual market - and don't destroy your existing one when you launch a new product.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
It isn't the price alone that hurt the ps3, its the expectations that come with that price and the failure to meet them.
I agree, one of the expectations was that the PS3 launch title games would be not just graphically superior, but fun to play - and yet glitches aboutnd and it's not as fun to play as the PS2 (have one).
In the end, it's the games. Bundling a Blu-Ray movie was less smart than Nintendo bundling a fun series of games with Wii Sports along with their console.
Know your market. Game console buyers care only about one thing - fun games.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
A Wii is £179.97 at Tescos, and comes with a bundled game (Wii Sports). Add £194.97 for a Xbox 360 core system and you get a number that may appear to you to be £484.99, but those of us with more of a grip on reality can see is actually £374.94
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
I can't imagine that PCs and consoles will unite at any point. There are too many variables with PCs. I have a Wii. I know that if I buy a Wii game, it will perform the same as it does on somebody else's Wii. I don't have to worry about video cards, ram, etc. impacting performance. These variables are one of the reasons I strongly prefer console gaming over PC gaming.
Maybe it's just me, but that sounds like a really, really dumb strategy. I think I read somewhere that on average, a publisher needs to sell 500,000 copies of a next-gen game just to break even. How are they planning to do that with a console that they claim that 90% of the market is too poor to afford?
I thought marijuana was illegal in Japan.
Actually, all devices can be what they want. As far as I know, no device which even wants anything has ever been created...
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
...they just grabbed another one sitting on the store shelves, glad to be able to shift it ;)
I once read that the component cost of a PS3 minus the Blue-Ray drive is less than half of what it is now. Basically, what this means in plain language is that if they shipped the PS3 with a normal DVD drive instead of a Blue-Ray drive, the price to the consumer would be $200-$250.(!)
The perfect solution, and I really hope someone at Sony reads this, is to offer a PS3 "lite" with a DVD drive and make the Blue-ray drive an extra option, much like how you can get a hard drive for the XBox360. Buy it, remove the original drive, and snap the new one in place. Or not - because there is currently no game made that a dual-layer DVD won't handle.(and expected Blue-Ray games are exactly zero for the forseeable future)
To know why the PS3 will have a hard time succeeding, see the following link:
s 3.asp
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/xbox360_vs_p
In many cases, the decisions made by the Xbox 360 team seem much more sensible than those of the PS3 team. Looking at this table, it's not hard to understand why the Xbox 360 is much cheaper and came out earlier than the PS3.
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
The longer they wait to cut the price the less it will matter whether they cut the price or not.
If they're keeping the price up to avoid cannibalizing the sales of Blu-ray standalone players, they're just duplicating the whole Beta-VHS fiasco.
I finally got a second job to be able to afford the PS3, now you are telling me it is too expensive... no way, I trusted in your companies words, that it is a bargain worth to get a second job for.
If the PS3 is a Mercadies, then the Wii is a Miata and the Xbox is a Mustang GT. So which is the most fun?
So far, I haven't bought a next gen console... mostly because Nintendo still can't keep up with demand. I still plan to get a Wii, but honestly I'm no longer even bothering to get my ass out of bed on a sunday morning on the offchance I'll beat someone else to the store. I was for a while, but screw that. Directly lost sales of games until Nintendo pull their thumbs out of their manufacturing asses.
Anyways, I'll buy a PS3 for GoW3. That's it. And if the price hasn't dropped into the realm of disposable cash for me by the time GoW3 comes out, then screw that, I'll just keep on playing on my future Wii. A 100 dollar price drop that everyone keeps saying here doesn't bring it into the realm of what I'd consider disposable. I don't have, want, or care for, high def anything. I just want games I like.
Gary (-;
Trying to compare video game consoles to cars just doesn't work out. Trying to sell a video game console like it was some super-high priced luxury/sports car(Mercedes, Bentley, or anything namedropped on Top Gear) is doomed to fail. Whether it's a beater or a Veyron, they get you from point A to B. Video game consoles have many more factors, like oh, I dunno, games to play on it? If we compare console titles to roads, there seems to be quite a few more roads the Xbox 360 than there is on the PS3 railway system. The loss of exclusive games(which is increasing by the week it seems) is just going to steer "I'll buy this console just to play this game" people away.
:)
Trying to sell a video game console at a premium price, hyping it is a Bentley doesn't work when there's so few titles available for it. I don't remember it happening successfully before.
So, how long before I can buy a PS3 at the thrift store?
The Neo Geo might have failed as a home console, but it was possibly the most successful arcade board ever!
Really? I would have given that honor to a board that had more than three memorable games to its name (Metal Slug, Bust-A-Move, and Generic Street Fighter Clone #45)
Sony was unable to pick up on one very important point: home theatre systems are still, largely, a status symbol. There are two very different demographics for home theatre owners: wealthy baby boomers and people over 40, and younger tech-friendly YUPIs. The latter is a fairly new and up-and-coming market. Home Theatre systems largely came out of Beverly Hills, Bel Aire, upper-east-side NYC, etc. For this demographic, the mear thought of using a video game system (ie: childs toy) as a home theatre system is utterly out of the question, and completely destroys the status symbol aspect of Home Theatre systems. To this crowd, the person with the largest number of black boxes, remotes, and wires wins. They aren't looking for a way to hide a bunch of functions, conveniently, into one plastic case, they want it big, visible and intimidating. I may be exadurating, but you get my point.
It's the same as having a cheap Timex watch that keeps time just as well, and has about 10x the functions, as a $1000 Rolex. No matter how many features you pour into a Timex, a Bel Aire aristicrat still won't buy one.
I understand that 40+ age people are gaming more and more, but in that age group, it's largely a blue-collar affair. These are not going to be the kinds of people who will likely drop over half a thousand dollars on a home theatre/gaming system. The PS3 simply has no solid demographic. They tried to create one by pushing the mainstream into HD and talking up home theatre systems, but you can't CREATE a demographic, not easily and without a lot of ingenuity and amazing marketing (Apple).
Multiplayer Gaming (defined): Sitting around, discussing single-player games with my friends, at the bar.
You apparently haven't driven a Mercedes AMG CL65.
And I like it. I don't think Sony is doing anything wrong. My two cents.
... Start updating his resume. The higher-ups at Sony don't like any kind of criticism.
But can you get a decent gaming computer, keyboard, mouse, and video cables for $600? (For example, the base model Mac mini with SDTV output is $620 plus shipping.) And how well does the computer's preinstalled GUI work on standard-definition composite video? And how many players per computer do typical computer games support?
Can the PC be a party video game machine? Not currently. Most multiplayer games designed for the Windows platform, unlike console exclusives such as Smash Bros. and Mario Party, require four PCs and four televisions, one per player. Sure, there's Atomic Bomberman from the mid-1990s, but it hasn't been updated in a decade, nor have there been other titles like it.
"You never know when some crazed rodent with cold feet might be running loose in your pants."
-Calvin
JAMMA is just a keyboard/video/sound connector between the game board and the arcade cabinet. It's more like HDMI+USB than anything else. Which specific board are you talking about that had more memorable games than Neo-Geo? CPS-1/2? Wasn't that mostly Double Dragon clone #336 and Super Ultra Hyper Street Fighter Alpha Beta Gamma Mach 3 Turbo?
So, your PS3 "lite" wouldn't play Blu-Ray movies any more - nor would it play any PS3 game released on a Blu-Ray disc (which is all of them). You'd basically end up with an expensive, half-broken PS2 that could manage a few downloaded games too.
Sure, Sony could start re-releasing games on DVD, but there's already a next-gen console with DVD games for that sort of price, and a larger range of games too - the Xbox 360.
Really, now that exclusives are disappearing and multiplatform games are becoming the norm, the primary difference between the PS3 and the 360 is the Blu-Ray player and the extra money. And when HD disc players drop under $200 next year, then even that won't matter.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
Give 'em an inch of space and they'll waste a mile.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
An owner of a last gen console arrives at Console Hut. While he examines the new consoles, a salesman approaches. He points to the Xbox 360 and asks about it.
"It has three processors for horsepower with high definition graphics capability. With a subscription of $50 a year, your game vehicle has access to Live where you can talk to other Xbox 360s. If you want to watch HD-DVDs, you need to buy an add-on."
"Do I get to drive down new roads?"
"Oh no! You only go down the same roads you could with your previous console. The difference is now it has three processors! And high definition capability! You go down the same roads faster with clearer and better windows (resolutions)."
"How about the PS3? Do I go down new roads with that?"
"No. But the console has awesome horsepower of the CELL processor! While it is more expensive than the Xbox 360, it has Blu-Ray and other features. You do so much with the PS3!"
"Except you are stuck driving down the same exact roads..." (sighs)
"Well, there is a console, the Wii, you probably wouldn't like." said the salesman.
"Why is that?"
"Well, it uses a similiar engine as your previous consoles. It isn't high definition. It simply doesn't have the POWER of the last two consoles and none of its extra perks. But it does do something the other consoles do not: you get to drive down roads no one has ever seen before. No one knows what type of games will appear on that machine. The future of its games is going into a new territory where gaming hasn't gone before..."
"I'LL TAKE IT!!!"
PS3 is not just a mercedes. It is a mercedes going down the same exact gaming road, seeing the same sights, only with more horsepower and better windows. While the Wii is an economy car, it has the ability to deliver new experiences.
Since entertainment is dependent on surprise, it is no wonder people prefer the new and unknown road.
Actually, I would argue that the 360 shows perfecly well that people are not going to pay more than around 200 bucks for a console. The 360 still sells worse than the original Xbox, and even though I'm a hardcore gamer and know many hardcore gamers, I know exactly one person who owns a 360 - a friend of my brother. I don't even know his name, I just know he exists. The 360 is a failure, compared to other consoles.
The thing is, tech stuff in general has gone down in price. Computers cost less than a tenth of what they cost two decades ago. Everyone owns a cell phone that can do more than a computer from a few years ago, and he got the cell for free or next to nothing. Consoles have not gone down in price. People seem to accept that, but they don't accept increases in price.
Let me start out by saying that I'm somewhat of a Nintendo fanboy. I like quirky, fun party games. I own a Cube as well as a Wii, and I play them both regularly. Having said that, I love arcade offroad racers.
I've spent the last few weeks unlocking everything in Excite Truck, which is a game I simply adore. The PS3 launched last week in Europe, so I played Motorstorm for the first time. It felt like playing in slow motion. Yes, I realize there's a turbo button. I realize the default level on the kiosks isn't the fastest level. Still, to me, after having played Excite Truck with its insane speed and huge jumps, it felt as if the whole game was playing insidea jar of honey.
I'm disappointed, especially after watching the target renders, which looke truly wicked.