Okay, we’ve covered the Wii and Xbox 360, now it’s the PS3’s turn, while I have personal experience with the Xbox, the PS3 isn’t even available here yet, so I cannot gauge how it’s doing, but just looking around local stores and online game stores I notice that the PS3 is still available for pre-order after 2 weeks, either Sony has got a serious amount of consoles available, or pre-orders are slower than Sony anticipated, but enough of the anecdotal stuff, onto the serious part.
Why it might win
- Playstation
- Great Games
- HD Graphics
Why it might lose
- Price
- Sony
- Blu-ray
Click for the analysis
Why it might win
1. Playstation
Playstation is a global brand, it’s recognisable everywhere, mention PlayStation to most people and they know what you’re talking about, the PS2 sold over 100 million units worldwide in the last generation, and given the recognition there’s no reason why a new PlayStation shouldn’t do the same.
2. Great Games
Sony managed to secure some amazing exclusives in the last two generations, stealing the Final Fantasy Series from Nintendo on the PS1 helped the PS1 win against the Saturn and Nintendo (it wasn’t the only reason). Metal Gear Solid, Devil May Cry, Final Fantasy, all these game series were PlayStation exclusives and gave people reasons to buy the PS1 & 2, and all of these are confirmed as PS3 exclusives, if you want to play MGS4, DMC4 or FFXIII you will need to have a PS3, and a lot of people do want to play these games.
3. HD Graphics
Like the Xbox 360, the PS3 has High Definition graphics, infact the GPU on the PS3 is more powerful than the one in the 360, however it doesn’t have the scaling chip the Xbox 360 has, so games have to be targeted at specific resolutions, but the Blue-ray disks can hold 50Gbytes of data, so having multiple assets isn’t a serious problem for storage.
Why it might fail
1. Price
Lets face it, the PS3 is expensive, while it might actually represent good value from a hardware standpoint (there’s a lot of stuff in a PS3) however from a consumer standpoint the price is too high, Sony have stuffed the PS3 with so many features that it’s believed that Sony are losing about $200 per console sold, however at £425 or $600 the PS3 is perceived as expensive for a games machine.
2. Sony
You’ll probably have noticed a trend here, the company producing the console is a factor in all three platforms, however it’s only a positive for the Wii, but why you may ask is Sony a liability for the PS3? Aren’t Sony a byword for quality? Well they were a byword for quality, however in recent years Sony’s image has taken a tumble, what with rootkits on CDs, exploding batteries, SoE’s treatment of SWG players, and the decreased build quality of Sony products in general (my second Sony MD player has died, but my original MD player works perfectly, but doesn’t support LP2 or 4 and is a pain to record onto, and my Sony DVD burner in my PC is dying after 1 year). It also hasn’t helped that every time a Sony PR person has opened their mouth about the PS3 they’ve ended up putting their foot in it ($1200 for any PS3 sitting on shelves, PAL PS3 Backwards compatability, SIXAXIS rumble).
3. Blu-ray
Both the Xbox 360 and Wii have DVD-ROM drives, the Xbox 360 can play back DVDs and has a seperate optional HD-DVD drive, but the PS3 has a Blu-ray drive and can play Blu-ray movies, however given the current low penetration of HDTV how many people actually need to play HD movies? If you’ve not got a HDTV then you aren’t in the market for a Blu-ray player, even if the PS3 is (or was since Sony now do a $600 BD player) the cheapest Blu-ray player on the market. This adds to the perception that the PS3 is HD only, even though it works perfectly well on SDTVs. I know Sony are saying that the PS3 is to have a 10 year lifespan, however for the next 4-5 years HDTVs are going to be in the minority and cheaper Blu-ray/HD-DVD players will be available long before most people actually need one. Sony have added a massive cost to the PS3 which for most users just isn’t worth the investment, and if a console doesnt do well in the first few years, then 3rd party support goes, and without 3rd party support a console dies, and any 10 year plan along with it.