Video Game Console Wars

Sony is getting killed in the next gen war...PS3s are everywhere.....30 at the EB games and they said they can't get ride of them and tons came back after Christmas.

DD

 

No kidding? Wow... I didn't expect that.

 

Well, at least my sony stock is doing really well. Don't know why though.

 

I have a hard time believing the Sony brand name will get utterly destroyed this generation. I expect they'll be fine as time goes on. Not the domination of the PS2, hell maybe not even first place, but still not as doomed as it seems.

Having said that, though:

They are getting a bad combination: bad press, bad word of mouth, bad internet buzz and at least the perception of low demand. I've seen a *lot* of PS3s around now. I know some Gamestop managers personally and they've actually told me that they just have units sitting there.

That's not a good sign.

 

I wish I could afford a nice tv to play these new videogame machines

 

Yes...but then again, I'm a bit of a stats geek if you guys couldn't tell.

To be fair, it really isn't a quarter, at least for the Wii and PS3 (360 has only outsold the PS2 for one month since it has been out though, so that definitely illustrates your point). The PS2 outsold the PS3, Wii, and 360 in November, which is the only month we have sales data for all the systems. December sales don't come out until Thursday. Some expectations/predictions seem to be that the 360 and Wii outsold the PS2, while the PS2 outsold the PS3 (and the sales of laser disc players were 4 times that of PSP sales ).

It is anecdotal evidence (which I hate), but it certainly seems like there are a ton of PS3s sitting on shelves; as mentioned, that can't be all that great for Sony. Apparently, Sony really picked up on shipping PS3s these last few weeks, and they still expect to have 1M PS3s in consumer's hands within the next week in NA if not sooner. Combined with the ~500K they have sold in Japan so far, I guess that would be around 1.5M sold in 2 1/2 months. Not bad compared to the PS2 and 360 IIRC, but not at all close to the Wii (probably at 4M or more by now) and a long way away from where the 360 is right now (little more than 8M?).

I suppose if PS3s start stacking a mile high in stores, we might be seeing a price drop sooner than expected. Howard Stringer (Sony's CEO) said something about the PS3 breaking even by the end of the year, so they might be more aggressive on the pricing...they'll probably have to be if they want to be competitive. Launching in Europe and other countries might help a little bit (especially with the games currently scheduled for launch), but that would probably just be delaying the inevitable.

Their electronics and movie divisions seem to be doing very well. Maybe because of that.

 

From a price point perspective, there is certainly sticker shock...compared to the 360, including Wifi and HDDVD, the PS3 is cheaper...Also, the Wii is a lot cheaper, but $250 is a lot, for what you get...I'll probably get one for the kids for x-mas next year...

Having said that, I'm glad I picked up the PS3...I was watching Wired for Sex on G4 and it mentioned the main reason Sony lost the Beta vs. VHS war...p*rn..yes, p*rn...Sony initially wouldn't do p*rn on the Beta format, thus VHS won out...

I still haven't played a game...I plan to do that tomorrow...I'll be using mine mostly for Blu-Ray movies...

 

The PS3 is really ahead of its time.
I have mine and it feels like more than just a game machine. Once HDTVs become more of a standard in the next few years, the standards for video game machines will change as well.

As of today, most people don't expect a video game machine to be HD. I use it just as much for BluRay as a game machine.

Once you have a big TV, the smaller resolution standards just don't seem that great. You might rather watch it on a smaller TV. When people need a blu ray player, the PS3 will do really well.

Can't a lot of you say you got the PS2 in part because it plaid DVDs?

 

I have a feeling that it's going to take a couple of years before the PS3 catches on. Once their library expands it'll start picking up.

 

I got a PS2 for gaming...I could care less what else it did.

And when I feel like I need a HD DVD/Bluray player, more than likely it'll be as affordable as dvd players were when I first bought one (175 range). Yeah that's how long I'm willing to wait.

 

Sony's movie division had the biggest grosses of any movie studio with about $1.7 billion in ticket sales, so I don't think Sony overall is doing too bad.

Perhaps Sony will get out of the console market all together like Sega did and just make software

 

Are you talking solely about HD? If so, I disagree. The 360 has been doing HD for a year now. Heck, wasn't the first XBOX even capable of HD resolutions?

Many of the criticisms of the PS3 are that - and we're talking right now, of course - is that it doesn't really do anything to put it above the 360. And this is from 'professional' sites, guys that have seen HD and next gen for a lot longer than most of us.

Unless you are talking about just movies. In which case, yeah...but even then the HD-DVD addon I imagine gives much the same effect.

I expect, as I said, for that to change over time as the system comes into its own (and the games come with it).

But it seems that Sony intended the PS3 to be the thing that 'pushed' Blu Ray. If it becomes the other way around (Blu Ray needed to 'push' the PS3) I don't know that that is a good thing.

 

No waaaaaay. According to internet fanboys.com Sony only has one division and their going to fall off the face of the planet because of their arrogance!!!

In Sony's defense (I always do), I see a megaton of xbox 360's everywhere I go. At least 40+ in every Best Buy stacked up like a pyramid.

The ps3 isn't doing as well as I initially expected, but I guess all the "negative" press and some comments made by a certain individual really did hurt them. I think the xbox360's hardware malfunctions and drought of good games has scared off potential customers for now.

The Wii on the other hand is doing great, but I still question their long term success. If they can do 1:1 motion sensing with the remote I would jump aboard the Nintendo bandwagon. I'm still bitter about their previous two hardware consoles and I'm still not impressed by any of their games (before someone screams fanboy I'm not impressed by anything currently out for the ps3 or xbox360 either except NFS: Carbon and maybe Gears once I try it). The only thing I really dislike about the current success of the Wii is all the closet Nintendo fanboys who came out of no where and started to talk trash.

Really, I don't see any point in fanboyism. If you like a system, great. Go play it instead of wasting your time online bashing the other systems. If your system is so awesome, why go to a web forum posting about how great it is instead of actually playing it? Btw this isn't directed to anyone in particular, just a general question.

 

But 360s have been out over a year. So it should be easy to find.

 

Possibly to avoid situations like this for a number of games:

I can think of at least 2-3 PS3 games already released that take up more space than what DVD provides (especially if you reserve 1.5GB for security purposes). Probably several more in the future (Lair, GT5, FFXIII, possibly MGS4, etc.). No telling how many in 7-8 years from now.

BTW, I didn't realize this, but Blu-ray and HD DVD sales are way ahead of DVD sales back when it launched. In the first 2 years, only about 1M DVD players were sold; the PS3 and Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on already exceed that IIRC (and standalone players probably exceed the 300K that DVD players sold in 97). Fun fact of the day I guess.