Posted May 18, 2007 at 05:16PM by Nicolo S. Listed in: PlayStation 3 Tags: Sony, Gameboy Advance, PS2, Michael Pachter, NPD
Ó

Sony's big boy - Image 1There are mixed criticisms regarding Sony's decision to create the hefty (and pricey) PS3. Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter believes that Sony's strategy of incorporating the Blu-ray format and a microprocessor that will stand up to ten more years of technological advances "may have been overly ambitious."

Pachter gave his comments after NPD's numbers and figures for April were revealed. He explains that "consumers are balking at paying the prices asked for PS3s."

"Sony has to make a choice between subsidising the Blu-ray and cell costs, or waiting until their production costs drop." says Pachter. With that said, the Wedbush analyst believes that Sony will not break tradition and just keep selling units below the manufacturing costs.

It's not as bad as it seems though - if the strategy worked for the PS2, the same could happen to their current console when its library expands and gamers get the big titles that they're waiting for.

Pachter's guess is that Sony may announce a PS3 price cut in July. It's very likely, given the poor sales recently; but with much anticipated titles like DMC 4 and MGS 4, Sony will hopefully get the boost they're expecting.


[Via Games Industry] Permalink  |   Email this  |   Linking Blogs   |   Digg It!

Bookmark / Find this article on:


9 Comments


Sort by:
   by damonous - 2007-05-18
 » Stripped-down 20gb

My prediction is that Sony will re-introduce the 20gb system somehow with a few more strip-downs, and position that around the $350-400 mark. Something has always seemed odd about the move to discontinue it. If they're trying to promote PS3 for games and at the same time position the unit as an excellent but low-cost Blu-Ray player, I don't know why you'd discontinue it...unless you were refurbishing the design in order to make it even more affordable. --How about a 20gb PS3 without the RSX chip, but with emulation like in Europe?


   Re: Destroyter (Unregistered) - 2007-05-19
 » WTF!!!

Dude, the RSX chip is what renders the graphics on the screen, take it out and nothing will be displayed on screen.

   Re: whoelse (Unregistered) - 2007-05-19
 » you

you cant take out the graphics crad that the ps3 uses. Thats stupid. Also, the ps3s in europe DO NOT contain the emotion chip, but the ones in US and Japan DO.

   Re: damonous - 2007-05-19
 » Confused the chip names

Ok, relax. That was what I meant. The PS2 emulation chip. If they remove that instead, and perhaps streamline (unfortunately, that probably means cheaper housing parts) the innards, they might be able to reduce cost a bit.
   by Advertising -
   by Bill Gates (Unregistered) - 2007-05-18
 » Next-Gen (PS3 & X360) Fact Sheet

* PS3 exclusives; score of at least 80 out of 100: cool (90, console seller), decent (85, rent it first), garbage (80, total suckage), unsure (it can be either cool or garbage).
- Dynasty-Gundam Musou (garbage): hack n slash
- Lair (garbage): aerial hack & slash
- Final Fantasy versus XIII (garbage): action RPG crap just like many other action RPGs
- PS3 Home (garbage): I won’t waste even 5 minutes on this
- Heavenly Sword (garbage): 20% God of War rip-off + 80% hack n slash
- Crysis like FPS (garbage): best graphics + extremely boring gameplay
- The Wall (garbage)
- Getaway (garbage): GTA rip-off
- Afrika (garbage): 3rd person Safari maintenance game; it will feature most advanced A.I. in the whole gaming history based on the advertisement from the developers...
- The Eye of Judgment (garbage): another card game
- Dead or Alive 5 (garbage): DoA5 is rumored to be PS3 exclusive; at CVG.com on Apr. 30 (you can read it in the news archive unless you are illiterate)

- LittleBigPlanet (decent): childish gayness
- Tekken 6 (decent): Tekken 5’s the most sold (based on the number of copies sold) fighter in gaming history; however, single-player only
- Ninja Gaiden Sigma (decent): Ninja Gaiden Black is generally called the best action-fighter in gaming history
- Folklore (Monster Kingdom) (decent): super-mesmerizing graphics
- Warhawk (decent): super-good
- Heavy Rain (decent): cinema quality game, how about the gameplay?
- SingStar (decent)
- Socom Confrontation (decent): Socom is the most sold shooter among all PS2 shooter games. Socom is most play online game on the PS2 + worse graphics than GRAW 1

- Ratchet & Clank (cool): super mind blowing graphics, character animation
- Uncharted-Drake's Fortune (cool): Indiana Jones adventure + Resident Evil 4 like shooter + super mind blowing graphics, character animation
- (tentatively confirmed) MotorStorm 2 (cool)
- (confirmed) God of War 3 (cool): absolute dominator
- (tentatively confirmed) Resistance 2 (cool): Resistance 1 got an average review score of 90.3 from 115 different publications
- Gran Turismo 5 (cool): GT 4 is the most sold racing game in the gaming history
- Metal Gear Solid 4 (cool): absolute dominator
- Final Fantasy XIII (cool): absolute dominator

- Killzone 2 (unsure): the journalists who saw the actual footage at the GDC said KZ2 is like Half-Life 3 and next-gen Black combined
- Eight Days (unsure)
- Jak and Daxter (unsure)
- White Knight Story (unsure)

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

* X360 exclusives.
- Overlord (garbage): total suckage
- Shadowrun (garbage): from the 3rd rated FASA studio (a subsidiary of Microsoft), MS announced that FASA studio will be closed and fired after the release of Shadowrun.
- Mass Effect (garbage): Rare and BioWare were great in 1990s, but they both only made 3rd rated games since 2000 (Rare which is owned by MS made Perfect Dark Crap)
- Flatout-UC (garbage): Flatout 2’s average review score: 65.3 from 129 publications
- Ace Combat 6 (garbage): AC5’s average review score: 71.8 from 92 publications
- (Huxley-ALSO ON PC) (garbage): from a 3rd rated Korean developer
- Too Human (garbage): 3rd rated Canadian Silicon Knight
- Theseis (garbage)
- Eternal Sonata (garbage): Namco Bandai mostly makes crappy to mediocre games

- (Bioshock–ALSO ON PC) (decent): single player only for a corridor shooter
- Project Gotham Racing 4 (decent): PGR 3’s average review score: 83.7 from 152 publications
- Fable 2 (decent): Fable 1 got an average review score of 73.8 from 97 different publications
- Lost Odyssey (decent)
- Halo 3 (decent): run and gun, no tactics or skills required, friendly shooter for beginners, laughable storyline, terrible mind blowing (literally in this case) graphics (Halo 2 HD, Halo 2.5, or Halo 2-Episode 1)

- (Alan Wake-ALSO ON PC) (cool): from Remedy (Max Payne 2)
- (tentatively confirmed) Gears of War 2 (cool)
- Forza 2 (cool)

- Halo Wars (unsure)

   by whoelse (Unregistered) - 2007-05-19
 » i agree

Sony is over ambitous. Imagine if it did not have a blu-ray player. Then it would retail at around the 360 price or a tiny bit more. Then people would be pouring in to get it. SOny would have their exclusives that they lost and it would be affordable!


   Re: Barakku - 2007-05-19
 » But

It'd just be a 360 with a slightly better (in some situations) processor. I don't want three consoles that are the same damn thing, and I'm sure that's why Nintendo was willing to let the Wii have lower graphics capability and include better controllers.
   by ƒÏBÊ®WÏ®Ë (Unregistered) - 2007-05-19
 » blu-ray is necessary

whoelse, sony might be overly ambitious, but without Blu-ray how do you expect them (developers) to have PS3 games on a single disc in the future?

eventually games will take up more space, and when that day comes, you will be glad you bought a ps3 (with Blu-ray) so you don't constantly have to switch discs (or buy an HD-DVD attachment for games).

the only way for Xbox 360 to have a game on a single disc is to pray to god it is under 9 GBs, but since BDs have so much more capacity then DVDs (close to 6 times the capacity of DVDs) they will have plenty of room.

   by ^stupido (Unregistered) - 2007-05-19
 » negative

games will never use more than 9gb storage *****. only movies use that much. i'm sorry you got OWNED! haha noob..



Add QJ.NET
Add to My Yahoo!
Google Reader Subscribe with Bloglines
Add  to your Kinja digest Subscribe in NewsGator Online
Subscribe with Pluck RSS reader Add 'www.qj.net' to Newsburst from CNET News.com
Subscribe with SearchFox RSS del.icio.us www.qj.net
Add to Technorati Favorite! Add to My AOL
furl! it Stumble for Treehugger!