Sony Shifting PS3 Marketing to Focus on Blu-Ray

Tabernaque86 writes "What started as joke among gamers Sony is now using as a Christmas advertising campaign. Kaz Hirai, president of the games unit, has been quoted as saying that the PlayStation 3 'makes a great Blu-Ray player'. That theme will be central to a wave of ads in North America and Europe. From the article: 'Sony on Thursday disappointed analysts by failing to cut the PS3's price, but Mr Hirai did not rule out a future price cut. "Going aggressive only on price without being able to back it up with content doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me," he said. A price cut would have a "real impact" on sales only if there were enough software titles to support the PS3. But analysts were skeptical and said Sony could miss its shipment targets for the year. "Without a price cut close to Christmas, reaching 11m shipments is going to be very tough," said David Gibson, analyst at Macquarie in Tokyo.'" This is regrettable, too, because there really are a number of strong titles coming out for the console this year.

Comments

Cheapest, and possibly upgradeable

[Shabbs]

Well, it is one of the cheapest Blu-ray players out there, and possibly one of the ONLY ones that is upgradeable to Profile 1.1. All other Profile 1.0 players are most likely not upgradeable. So, while it's not "hi-fi looking" it is not a bad buy if you want a Blu-ray player. You can always fall back on it as a gaming/media platform.

Cheers.

Re:Cheapest, and possibly upgradeable

[KDR_11k]

The problem with that stance is that the vast majority of the market wouldn't pay much more for a BRD player than a DVD player and realistically the hi-def formats won't become dominant until you can buy a player for ~50$ so going with a HD player isn't a big decision anymore. Even if I had a HDTV I wouldn't pay 10x the price for a movie player just to up the resolution.

Strong Titles?

[voidstin]

"This is regrettable, too, because there really are a number of strong titles coming out for the console this year."

Really? In 2007? Like What? Looking at the release dates, I don't see a decent exclusive before LittleBigPlanet or Killzone, both of which are in February.

Re:Strong Titles?

[ILuvRamen]

but didn't you read the story saying like 40-something percent of owner didn't know it played blue ray? Hurray for Sony marketing lol.

Re:Strong Titles?

[click2005]

but didn't you read the story saying like 40-something percent of owner didn't know it played blue ray?

It does something else besides play overpriced movies?

Re:Strong Titles?

[Aladrin]

He didn't say exclusive, he said strong. The PS3 needs -any- good title at this point. I loved DW Gundam, but that's it so far... It's really sad.

I cancelled my pre-order of Stranglehold because the PS3 demo didn't play as well as the 360 one... The controls felt off, and I'll probably rent the 360 one instead.

Folklore's demo sucked. I was looking forward to it until I played that.

Looking forward to Ratchet & Clank and Bladestorm, though I pre-ordered Bladestorm on the 360 before I had my PS3. Might change that.

The Orange Box... I really only care about Portal, though.

Uncharted looks neat.

So there's plenty of 'strong' titles, just no 'strong' exclusive titles. I'm guessing that's why Sony has decided to push the Bluray player thing harder again. As a player -and- a game machine, it's very nice. As just a game machine, I could get away with just a 360.

BTW, the PS3 is the best media player (DVD, Bluray, streaming) that I've had yet. The original XBox modified with XBMC is the second. Sony finally got that aspect right, and the remote is very nice.

Re:Strong Titles?

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"The Wii is in 1st place in large part because of its price."

You make a good point, even if it's wrong. The price is part of why the Wii is on top. The majority of the reason is because Nintendo says it's a Game Console first and foremost. It's not a Blu-Ray player. It's not a media center. It's a low priced game console that offers strong gameplay and a unique controller.

Re:Strong Titles?

[king-manic]

Heavenly Sword looked awesome back when it was a potential launch title and no one new it was only 6 hours long.

I bought it on friday and am about 1/2 -> 2/3 done. It's a good 6h. No filler. I guess you take it as you will. Some 30h games are mostly filler. This is a 6h game that is very good without filler. It's well paced, somewhat difficult. Frustrating but fair. Very polished. But short. IT's been more then 6h right now. I think they mean 6h if your good at god of war. I'm not that good and I keep trying to play it like ninja gaiden so I'm only 2/3 of the way through after about 12h.

Re:Strong Titles?

[gravis777]

Ratchet and Clank, Call of Duty 4, Medal of Honor, and Unreal all come out before Christmas, according to the post you posted. Are you saying these are not going to be strong titles? I am pretty sure Ratchet and Clank is a PS3 exclusive, and seems to be a successful francise for Sony.

Games, games, games

[vlad_petric]

... which are made by developers, developers, developers.

The main problem with PS3 is not the price, it's the games. There are a few good ones, but certainly not enough. With respect to developers, developers, developers, Sony made a few wrong moves:

• The CELL is perhaps the most difficult platform to develop for. Instead of a clean SMP interface, they opted for a two-instruction set asymmetric architecture. They took a relatively complex problem—developing for a multi-processor—and made it much, much, worse. I always hear that current generation games don't fully utilize the PS3 ... to which I reply "D'oh, if you only knew what it takes to fully utilize it ... "
• They did not release proper tools and libraries. Our developers are smart people, we'll let them figure it out ... That worked out well for the PS2, but it certainly doesn't work for PS3
• Their arrogance (most likely) alienated quite a few developers that'd have produced exclusives.

Conclusion: bad moves -> few games -> third place as a console

Re:Games, games, games

[MBCook]

It didn't work out very well for the PS2 for quite a while. Games were a bit slow at the start. It took quite a while. The best thing Sony had with the PS2 was the huge demand. Coming off the PS1 (which took Sony from not in the market to #1 by far), developers wanted to be on the PS2. They were willing to put up with the tough times until tools got better and middleware started to appear. I've read things by developers that said that was a HUGE screw-up on Sony's part. If they had tried to pull that with a new console (say the PS2 was their first video game console) they may have failed.

The XBox had (from what I've heard) fantastic development tools. But that's what you would expect from MS and from someone trying to woo developers. I seem to remember reading that the dev tools for the PS1 were very good and one of the reasons the platform took off as it did (N64 cartridge prices and the Saturn multi-CPU setup being some of the others).

The PS3 doesn't have the momentum this time. The 360 had a head start. The XBox put up a very good fight in the last generation (relative to how well the Saturn or Dreamcast did). The 360 is simpler to develop for (thanks to the CPU and tools). The PS3 is very expensive (down from incredibly expensive). At $300 tons and tons of people wanted to get a PS2 for their kids. At $600, the PS3 was.. to put it charitably... a little more of a luxury item. Compared to the cheaper and already out 360 and the yet cheaper and innovative Wii... the PS3 didn't have the golden-boy status that the PS2 had.

The PS3 may end up doing quite well, and may turn out to be the most powerful. But if it does, it will take quite a while to hit it's stride the way the PS2 did.

Re:Games, games, games

[Osty]

It didn't work out very well for the PS2 for quite a while. Games were a bit slow at the start. It took quite a while. The best thing Sony had with the PS2 was the huge demand. Coming off the PS1 (which took Sony from not in the market to #1 by far), developers wanted to be on the PS2. They were willing to put up with the tough times until tools got better and middleware started to appear. I've read things by developers that said that was a HUGE screw-up on Sony's part. If they had tried to pull that with a new console (say the PS2 was their first video game console) they may have failed.

The (lack of) PS2 developer tools was a case of Sony not seeing the forest for the trees. They had shipped some decent developer tools for the PS1 early in its life cycle, but after 6 years or so on the market every developer had either built their own specialized set of tools or moved to middleware that provided more functionality "out of the box" than the Sony tools. Upon seeing that nobody was using the PS1 tools any longer, Sony decided not to invest in tools for the PS2. That was a mistake, because there was nothing to bootstrap PS2 development. They tried to apply the end-game state of the PS1 to the start of the PS2 without realizing that it takes time to build up a proper library of specialized developer tools. Apparently they failed at this again with the PS3.

The PS3 may end up doing quite well, and may turn out to be the most powerful. But if it does, it will take quite a while to hit it's stride the way the PS2 did.

Unlike the PS2, the PS3 doesn't have a year on the market to itself. The Xbox and Gamecube shipped a year after the PS2, giving developers time to work on their tools before fighting strong competition (the Sony marketing machine had already killed the Dreamcast). This time around, the 360 was out for a year before the PS3 and Wii shipped, which means that "another year until really good games make it to the PS3" is really two years into the "next generation". Sony was banking on momentum from the PS2 without realizing that they had killed a lot of that with their arrogant attitudes (show of hands for people who got a second job in order to buy a PS3? There ya go, Kutaragi).

Re:Games, games, games

[Osty]

Yeah, I call shennanigans on Sony's "marketing machine" being the Dreamcast's downfall. As we can plainly see, Sony's "marketing machine" sucks. The PS2 just had tons of mindshare momentum coming off the PS1, a good performance-per-dollar factor, large library of PS1 games it was (mostly) compatible with, and some good exclusive games.

People hadn't yet fully seen how arrogant Sony can be (they were just coming off the successful PS1, and though they promised the world with the PS2 just like they did with the PS3, nobody knew yet that they couldn't deliver). Sega didn't have the money to compete against Sony in terms of marketing dollars, and they were not as successful in getting third-party developers on the Dreamcast platform (the EA sports games were notably missing). Things are different this time around because:

• We've already been through one round of Sony's lies. The PS2 never really lived up to the claims that it could render Toy Story in real time, so we took what they said about the PS3 with a huge grain of salt.
• Microsoft replaced Sega in the console wars, and they have more than enough money to meet Sony blow for blow in a marketing war.
• EA has all of their sports games on Xbox, and this time around the 360 is the premier console while the PS3 gets the shitty ports (rather than the other way around last time).

Sony's burned too many bridges and they have very strong competition this time around, with the Microsoft juggernaut out of the gates early with Xbox 360 and the breakout success of the Wii. Sony will need a miracle if they want the PS3 to become something other than another 3DO.

Confused

[Ajehals]

I'm not a gamer and I don't own a console, so I may be missing something but does

Going aggressive only on price without being able to back it up with content doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me, mean what I think it means? i.e. "We are not dropping our prices because we have don't have much content as yet, but when we do have more content we will drop our prices".

I mean I can see the sense in the fact that more games will drive sales, but I don't see why people would pay more for a console when there are only a few titles* why not drop the price, have people buy it as a blueray player and then *not* drop the price again when the titles are out (after all it will already be as cheap enough as if they dropped the prices when the titles came out). Wouldn't that mean that more people would consider buying the console before the content is available (albeit at a lower price)

Anyway,makes no sense to me, but as I said I'm not a gamer.

*I have no real idea how many titles are available for the PS3 or how it stacks up against its rivals, so take that statement at face value rather than assume I am insinuating that the platform is not as good as or worse off than $otherplatform.

Re:Confused

[Chuck Chunder]

I mean I can see the sense in the fact that more games will drive sales, but I don't see why people would pay more for a console when there are only a few titles* why not drop the price,

Because if you sell at a lower price you take a bigger loss on the console which means you need to sell more games (of which there aren't many of) to recoup the loss and actually make a profit.

That's probably why a blu ray focus makes at least some sense. Producing a reasonable amount of game content is going to take a lot more effort and time than putting out a Blu-ray version of already existing movies. It therefore makes sense to try and sell to a market that will buy the content that you are actually in a position to sell content to.

Re:Confused

[SuperMonkeyCube]

Speaking as a gamer - as my handle might imply,
"A lack of games? Appalling! - and the price is much too high!
We just got rumble back last Thursday after much outcry.
We do much love our Sony - Hope this Blu-Ray thing will fly."

"The games? Well, I'd say they're not that much alike,
You won't find much FPS on Nintendo's little tyke -
Unless some Wiimote Metroid or RE4 is what you like.
And, of course, M$ has got Halo's new Third reich."

OK, enough verse. My personal philosophy for purchasing a game machine since the SuperNintendo/Genisis days was - and still is - 'It's about the games, stupid.' Sony does have some catchup to do here. They're going to have a hard time in a couple of days. They're not going to carry the day on price, so they better have some games lined up to even things out.

Re:Confused

[7Prime]

Oh, I don't doubt that Sony have a plan. But Microsoft and Nintendo also have plans, and currently, they're already way ahead.

Sony is already playing catchup against two companies that ALWAYS have tricks on their sleaves. Sony hasn't ever had to pull Aces out of their asses before now, where-as Nintendo, and to a lesser extent, Microsoft, are well versed in the ace-ass-pulling.

Re:Confused

[7Prime]

You must have not been around for the GameBoy Advanced and Nintendo DS... if there's ever any "pulling victory from their ass" award, it goes to those boys. And from what I'm seeing, the Wii seems to be the third system IN A ROW that did the same thing.

If you think about it, basically every system launched after the GameCube has been a complete success. And I still standby the statement that the GameCube only "failed" (and only in marketshare, not profit) because of the horrendous disaster that was the N64. Many systems sell according to their predicessors. The GameCube sold less units, but it gained a very strong following, which is one of the many reasons why the Wii is doing so well. The PS3 is an accepteption, because I don't think anyone has ever managed to shoot themselves in the foot more accurately than Sony.

So yes, Nintendo is one of the greatest in "ace-ass-pulling". And their hardware division is only part of it, their gaming division is even better at it.

but it runs linux

[larry bagina]

they ought to advertise linux compatibility. A lot of people are interested in linux but don't want to reformat their computer. Selling a PS3 with ubuntu installed would be pretty popular.

Re:but it runs linux

[Chandon Seldon]

It runs Linux like crap because it doesn't provide access to hardware accelerated graphics. And by "hardware accelerated graphics", I don't just mean 3D games and Compiz. It doesn't even have 2D acceleration, so you'll see redraw lag just scrolling in Firefox.

Basically Linux compatibility was just a scheme to get into a different import tax bracket in the European Union (where computers have a lower tax than video game consoles or media players). Actual usability wasn't a design goal.

Re:but it runs linux

[revengebomber]

I feel a haiku is the proper way to express your misunderstanding:

Subtle jokes are made,
But sometimes not even seen.
You can hear now, WHOOSH.

PS3 as a Blu-Ray Player

[Dr Cool]

I bought a sweet 47" 1080p LCD TV about a month ago. Of course, I had to get some kind of HD movie source and I don't watch cable TV. I prefer to rent movies. Since Blockbuster is now stocking Blu-Ray movies, it was a natural choice that I choose a Blu-Ray player. I looked around at prices and all the players are fairly expensive. Sony sells a standalone Blu-Ray player for $499. Imagine my surprise when I walked around the Circuit City store and noticed a 60 GB PS3 for... $499! I intended on buying a Blu-Ray player. But I walked out with a PS3. I haven't owned a console game machine since the Nintendo back in the day. And my roommate is the only one who's played games on it so far but I do enjoy watching him play it. So yes, I'm one of the few who bought a PS3 specifically because it's a Blu-Ray player. But I'm sure that if a killer game comes out that I'm dying to play and I know it's not coming out for the PC (my preferred gaming platform), I'll definitely drop $60 on it for my PS3. But for now, it's my HD movie machine.

ummm

[nomadic]

This is regrettable, too, because there really are a number of strong titles coming out for the console this year.

Uhhh..and now this marketing plan will somehow prevent those titles from coming out? I don't get it.

If the PS3 platform is going down in flames...

[Gavin Scott]

...at least those flames will be beautifully rendered at incredibly high resolution and we'll all go "oooohhhhhh! ahhhhhhhhh!" as it plows into the ground and erupts in a huge fireball.

G.

Re:If the PS3 platform is going down in flames...

[revengebomber]

The PS3 will just sort of sink into the mud. The 360, on the other hand, would explode in a brilliant display of silicon fireworks after the GPU reaches critical heat and collapses into a hunk of raw, fissible uranium.

Re:Sony CEO to VP Marketing

[dank zappingly]

A few questions: 1. In what way does Microsoft advertise its console as a media center? 2. Isn't this article about how Sony is going to start advertising its console as a media center? (because it is not currently advertising it in this way) 3. Who has made that argument? While both 360 and PS3 have media center capabilities, I haven't seen any advertisements that tell consumers that. They're all game advertisements. I think people like to be able play movies on their consoles. There are many reasons why the Wii is selling well, but I don't think one of them involves people saying, "Gee, I really want that one because it doesn't play movies."

'Course they're not saying they're dropping prices

[r_jensen11]

Why the hell would they say that they're going to drop prices November 23rd when it's only September 23rd? That's still two months away. Once you announce a future price cut, sales temporarily slow down until said price cut occurs. Then you see a spike in trading volume, followed by a trailing off toward your new equilibrium.

What the f...?

[shoptroll]

Sony, for the love of all that is holy please have your right hand talking to your life hand.

http://blog.wired.com/games/2007/09/kaz-hirai-plays.html

Please please please adopt some consistent marketing and executive speak.

Re:Heavenly sword -- killer app?

[bigstrat2003]

Tycho, as insightful as he usually is about games, is flat-out wrong on this one. Heavenly Sword is short, but it's such an amazing ride that I, at least, feel it worth it to support the developers who made it. It also is fun to replay, which helps mitigate the shortness somewhat. Tycho's other opinions about the game are just bizarre, imo... he insults the other characters, but picks out Kai, easily the worst character in the game, as the best? How can anyone not enjoy Andy Serkis' over-the-top bad guy performance? I really don't get where he's coming from on this one.