Time to Talk Sony... Again

Sony. What can I say about Sony? Perhaps I should ask what shouldn't I say about Sony? Please, dont get me wrong, the Playstation and Playstation 2 were brilliant. They changed how we looked at video games, and to an extent how we played them. I don't think there is a person who currently plays video games who would want to go back to a cartridge based system. (That having been said I'm sure someone out there will say that they'ed rather, and in some ways I still prefer cartridges).

I could talk about EverQuest, and how it changed everything, and then blew up, this time though, I'm not looking at MMOs. I've already posted about SOE anyway. No today I am looking at the Playstation 3, and the Sony Play Station Portable (PS3, and PSP respectively). How many problems, how many holes, how many errors has Sony made with these two systems? i can't answer that question.

Let me start with the Playstation 3. As someone who was a computer scientist, we actually looked at this system as something that is going to be a wave of the future. Technologically speaking it is so advanced that computer science students, and magazines written for computer science professionals, looked at this system. That's pretty amazing. We are talking about the people who work our tech, make sure it's working right and doing what it needs to be doing, are looking at this thing changing the computers we have in our living rooms, possibly replacing the majority of the technology that is found in them. One word for that... wow.

However, depending on who you believe, and what source you use, some to most (I think half or less) Playstation 3 systems are used as Blue Ray players, or mostly as Blue Ray players. I mean half... 50% of those systems are nothing more then a new format DVD player. Sales of the Playstation 3 are also third out of the three consoles. Reasons for this I'll get into later, but that means that if Sony has sold 10 million Playstation 3 units, only 5 million are earning Sony money for video game sales.

Where's the problem and why is this disappointing? Well when you consider the bulk of the money that a system earns for the company comes from listening, and games sales, and from what I've heard it takes along the lines of 20 to 50 games sold to completely pay back the hardware, when you factor in research, wages, etc. for the consoles. I don't know how many consoles that is based off of, but if Sony isn't meeting these numbers why aren't they changing their business practices?

Instead what does Sony do? They remove backwards compatibility for PS1 and PS2, they do not lower the price, and break promises about things such as PS Home (which is still in beta), and refusing to replace what backwards compatible consoles that people do have, with backwards compatible consoles when they break. They have in my opinion failed to failed to capture what this generation's users are looking for, and continue to fall backwards. Be this due to leadership which refuses to lower the price point, in hopes to get more sails, leadership that fails to realize they have to pay for some of the most wanted titles, or failure by the leadership to even be consistent (I mean look here about 1/4th the way down) so much to memorize just so you know what features your system has!

Then there is the integration with the PSP. Yeah, it works. Have I tested it? No. Am I interested in testing it? No. Do I care about it? NO! So far I have seen nothing that is offered though the PS 3 that I want to put on to my PSP. Its that simple. For me it is a pointless feature that people taunt as if it were equal to the Nintendo DSi's download-able games. Sure the PSP is a plus over the Xbox (Microsoft has at time of writing NO hand held system in the public's hands save the Zune), but the DSi has games people want to play, and in some cases extends Wii games, the PSP not so much.

The folks over at G4 actually make a very good point here, talking about the new PSP coming out, the PSP Go. I have had 2 of the 3 current models of PSP, and they are different, but I'm not overly impressed. The UMDs are nice and reasonably small, but the plastic case they are in is easily broken, which ruins the "disk", and the case they ship in is a fantastic way to destroy them. Try it some time, take a UMD you don't want any more and rock the top tab forward enough to prop the disk up, if you let go before its out that tab will catch on the bottom half of the disk and tug at it, which could (and working where I've worked I've seen it) cause the bottom half of the plastic case that holds the disk part of the UMD to separate away from the top half.

Lets face it. In shorty Sony has been riding on the success of the PS1, and PS2, to carry people though to the PS3, and games such as God of War 3 and Metal Gear Solid 4 have, and will sell systems. That isn't a maybe, its a guarantee. However it won't win Sony the console war, nor will it make people eager for the predicted new start of the console wars in 2010 - 2012. In fact I'm not sure I will pick up a four. If Sony wants to send me one fine, but for my money right now the 360 has the games. The PS3 might have the options (I hate Microsoft's pay-for-membership service and their weird dollar to point conversion), but Sony lacks anything that makes me really desire their system. In fact I bought my 3 to play God of war 3, and so I could give an honest opinion on the console wars.

Give Sony more money? I don' think so. I'd rather give GameStop my money for a used game then I would to pay for something new any more.