Tag Archives | Sony

PSP Go is Real, PS3 Price Cut is … No Go!

Posted by Jared Newman on June 2, 2009 at 3:01 pm

press-sony-psp-go-1First, the bad news: Sony’s Playstation 3 will continue to sell for $399.

Next, the sort of bad news: the PSP Go, a smaller, lighter handheld dubbed “the worst-kept secret of E3″ by Sony’s Kaz Hirai, will cost $249 — far more than a Nintendo DS or an iPhone.

But hey, maybe the handheld will pay for itself if its 16 GB flash drive and downloadable games prove cheaper than the UMD purchases. Sony didn’t say, so we’ll have to wait until the October 1 release date gets closer for details.

The PSP Go announcement complimented a lengthy segment in Sony’s press event on the Playstation Portable. The company announced a handful of big-name games — already known about, thanks to that leak — and stressed that 2009 would be a big year for the console, which lags behind the Nintendo DS with roughly 50 percent less worldwide sales.

We saw videos of a PSP Gran Turismo and Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker, plus mentions of LittleBigPlanet, SOCOM and Jak & Daxter games for the handheld. Sony also said that its video service will be available directly from the PSP, meaning users won’t have to download the content onto a PC first.

Importantly, Hirai stressed that support for the current PSP model won’t go away. “Let me very clear, the PSP Go will not replace the PSP-3000 or the UMD,” he said. With the PSP-3000 selling for $150, Sony’s set up a tough decision for people looking to buy in.

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The Obligatory E3 Wish List

Posted by Jared Newman on May 29, 2009 at 7:17 pm

The run up to the Electronic Entertainment Expo is always full of predictions, rumors and promises, but I’m tired of peering into the crystal ball. Instead of guesswork, here are my wants and needs for the games industry’s biggest trade show:

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From Microsoft: Word on the street is that the Xbox 360 will get a motion-sensing camera to compete with Nintendo’s Wii. No thanks. I’m pretty happy with the Xbox 360’s thumbstick gaming, and I’d rather see Microsoft wait on motion control until the next console cycle, when the company can gather a full stable of game developers behind it. Instead, lets see Hulu support over Xbox Live. A robust gaming handheld, as rumored, would be cool, too.

From Nintendo: This is a tough one. Conventional wisdom holds that The Big N will focus on games instead of hardware this year, maybe with a Zelda or Mario-related announcement to please the fanboys. I’d like to see something that uses the Wii MotionPlus in a mind-blowing way. If such a game involves any Nintendo icons, so be it.

From Sony: Cut the price of the Playstation 3 already, jeez. Seriously though, the most likely rumor — that of a UMD-less PSP — is the one that I like. I desperately want to see what happens when a game console ditches physical media, and Sony has the chance to be ahead of the curve.

From Game Publishers: It’d be nice to hear that the old way of piling up game releases around the holidays is being phased out. Ars Technica’s Ben Kuchera has a story today on why this may not happen — basically, there’s still a market for all those games, so no reason to hold back — but as a gamer it’s frustrating. This spring was fruitful for good games, but I think we’re headed for a dull summer before the usual fall/winter pounding.

I’ll be covering the show here in Los Angeles, starting with Microsoft’s Monday morning press conference. In the meantime, feel free to offer up your own hopes and dreams for the future of gaming.

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“Girlfriend, Wife and Mother” Enjoying the PS3, Sony Says

Posted by Jared Newman on May 22, 2009 at 5:35 pm

playstation3Sony is boasting about its downloadable movie and TV show offerings on the Playstation Network, telling Video Business that revenues are up 300 percent from the same time last year.

There also appears to be a new demographic in play. “We’re getting people in the households who hadn’t yet interacted with their [Playstation 3] in the past,” Eric Lampel, the Playstation Network’s director of operations, said. “This is the girlfriend, wife and mother.”

He points to the film Bride Wars as an example, as it became a top-ranked movie download after its April 28 release.

I suspect a hint of marketing in Lampel’s statements. Video Business notes that a hefty amount of PSN’s movie offerings are action and animation flicks — not exactly fare for the missus — and Lampel concedes that the service is “very game heavy.” It is a video game console, after all. There’s probably truth in what he says, but I think the “everyone’s digging it” idea is a deliberate message.

Sony has ambitions to expand the PS3’s role. Lampel said PSN wants to be a major source for original, mainstream (as in, not nerdy anime?) programming. He speaks of broadening the console’s audience “not necessarily around gaming” and mentions HBO’s exclusive content creation as a model worth following. Can you imagine the Playstation 3 churning out edgy dramas and comedies? Perhaps it could happen through cooperation with Sony Pictures.

One thing I’ll add, alluded to Lampel’s quote about wives and girlfriends: If the Playstation 3 (and the Xbox 360, for that matter) are going to gain broad appeal beyond the stereotypical college male gamer demographic, it’ll take those dedicted gamers to reel in the outsiders. That means the original content has to be so good, it’s worth evangelizing. Let’s see what Sony comes up with.

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Sony Hints of PS3 Price Cuts

Posted by Jared Newman on May 15, 2009 at 8:27 am

playstation3The last time everyone got excited for a Playstation 3 price cut, only to be disappointed, I swore off reporting on the matter, but only on the word of analysts, retailers, game publishers or other blogs. Here’s my loophole:

The whispers are now coming directly from Sony. In a conference call with overseas investors, the company said it plans to sell 30 percent more consoles this year than in 2008, CNBC reports. Asked specifically by an analyst about price cuts, corporate executive officer Nobuyuki Oneda said Sony had nothing to announce at the moment, indicating that he couldn’t discuss pricing strategies because it would affect inventory.

But then, another analyst asked how, exactly, Sony planned to reach 13 million PS3 sales this year. “Well, I think you have to guess what will be our pricing strategy,” Oneda said.

I would have liked to hear the tone of Oneda’s voice. It was probably straightforward, but I’m imagining a “that’s for me to know and you to find out” kind of coyness. Anyhow, there’s more reason than ever to speculate when, rather than if, the PS3’s price will come down.

E3 would be the obvious time to make grand announcement, but there’s also a feeling Sony will wait until August to squeeze out some more higher-priced sales before entering the holiday season. As CNBC points out, though, even a little sign like this is a warning to consumers. That’s why Sony has been so adamant in denying every previous rumor. Now it’s creating one, so why wait to seal the deal?

It’s worth mentioning that Nintendo projects flat sales figures for the current fiscal year, meaning it’ll sell roughly the same 26 million Wiis and 30 million Nintendo DSs this year as it did last year. Granted, Sony and Nintendo are in different boats, but we’ve had two months in a row of US sales declines for the PS3 compared to 2008, and two months of overall losses for the industry. The recession may finally be taking its toll.

For Sony to battle declining sales, it’ll have to do something drastic. I think we’ll have to guess what that will be.

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Sony CEO: We Could Have Beaten Apple

Posted by Jared Newman on May 11, 2009 at 1:46 pm

sonylogoBoxing in customers is rarely a good idea, and Sony CEO Howard Stringer says he’s come around to that reasoning.

In an interview with Nikkei Electronics Asia, Stringer spoke of how his company didn’t take open technology very seriously in the past, pointing to the failed Sony Connect music store as an example. The site’s tunes came in the proprietary ATRAC format, which only worked with Sony’s music hardware and obviously displeased freedom-seeking customers. Connect was phased out beginning in 2007.

Stringer blames the store’s failure on a type of proprietary digital rights management. “At the time, we thought we would make more money that way than with open technology, because we could manage the customers and their downloads,” he said. “This approach, however, created a problem: customers couldn’t download music from any Websites except those that contracted with Sony. If we had gone with open technology from the start, I think we probably would have beaten Apple Inc of the US.”

The interview, published this month, seems slightly dated, as Stringer talks about Apple’s use of FairPlay DRM and how Sony can maybe exploit that weakness. Of course, Apple removed DRM from iTunes last month.

Beyond Stringer’s “open vs. closed” epiphanies, the interview’s other main takeaways deal with the Playstation Network. He drops some hints about an expansion of the network “to hardware other than the PS3” and speaks of “evolving the PS3 into a platform for Web services,” but doesn’t elaborate in specifics.

With the exception of Bravia TVs and maybe the revamped Walkman X-Series, I don’t see much room for expansion. Owners of a Playstation 3 and PSP can already transfer movies and TV shows between the two, and the PS3 is the only home console that can access Hulu, albeit through the machine’s Web browser. That’s not to say those two pieces of hardware wouldn’t benefit from an online media store.

And besides, Hulu and video downloads are relatively recent developments anyway, taking hold in the second half of last year. Perhaps Stringer’s shift in thinking began a while ago.

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Pachter: New Consoles in 2013, “If At All”

Posted by Jared Newman on May 1, 2009 at 2:57 pm

wii-360-ps3Remember when Technologizer wildly guessed that the next generation of game consoles would arrive in 2010 and 2011? Michael Pachter, the Wedbush Morgan analyst who routinely makes headlines with his predictions, begs to differ.

His latest newsletter, via Edge, states that the next console cycle won’t begin “before 2013, if at all.” That’s right, Morgan even leaves room for the possibility of an indefinite current-generation.

“We remain convinced that the publishers will resist the introduction of any video game hardware technology that requires a refresh of software, as the publishers have as yet to capitalize on the immense investments made in being competitive in the current cycle,” Pachter writes.

The flaw in this logic is that it’s not a new concept. As a rule, console makers love to cash in on their investments, letting software revenues roll in while hardware costs decline, and yet new consoles have been popping up on a five-year cycle ever since the 8-bit era.

There is, however, a wild card this time, and I’m surprised Pachter doesn’t mention it: Motion control. Nintendo tapped into previously uninterested markets with the Wii, and there’s no shortage of speculation that Sony and Microsoft are looking to get in on that. Rumors regarding a Playstation 3 motion controller have popped up as recently as today, and we’ve previously covered one possibility for the Xbox 360.

It all boils down to whether Sony and Microsoft get into motion control (or some other game-changing concept) in this generation or save it for the next cycle. I won’t predict whether that’s going to happen, but if it does — and if it’s successful — then yes, the next generation is a long way off. Otherwise, I’m sticking with my earlier predictions.

Am I waffling? Sure, but that’s why Pachter gets the big bucks.

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