 |
| |
Sony has been a consumer electronics leader for decades. They know
the consumer electronics market as well or better than Nintendo or
Microsoft (who has spent most of it's life selling software, not
hardware) What were they thinking bringing a game system to the
market for $600? That is larger than most car payments and many
mortgage payments, especially if you exclude escro payments and just
count principle and interest. Hardcore gamers will pay just about
anything for great hardware, but hardcore gamers make up only a small
portion of the gaming market. How many parents can afford to buy
little johny a ps3 and games and still have money left over for other
Christmas presents? How many birthday presents for kids *say 12-16*
are in the $600 range? Did they bother to do any marketing research?
Did they anticipate a huge drop in components that just never
happened? MOST importantly at this point: Is the PS3 hardware strong
enough to last long enough to wait out the component price drop, bring
the PS3 down to $240-$300 and still be new enough to sell? I figure
it will be at least 2 years for this drop to happen. Will the PS3
still be a viable game system to invest $300 in 2 years from now? At
that point the hardware will be 3 years old. Will people want to
spend the $300 to buy a 3 year old system? Probably not. Sony's best bet is to drop the ps3's price ALOT and take a beating on
each machine and make it up in software. Sony made billions of
dollars worldwide in software sales and licensing fees with the ps1
and ps2 and could probably do it with the ps3, but they have got to
move more machines and the only way to do that is a price drop.
People like the machine, they just can't afford it. Sony could also license the technology for the arcades, internet
kiosks and the like. This would help, but not solve the problem by
itself. |
| |
 |
| |
Sony decided to position the PS3 in the high-end AV market, instead of the
gaming market. $600 for a piece of AV gear is pretty cheap - especially
when you're talking about a next-gen video player. Remember, when blu-ray
players first came out, they were between $1000 and $2000 - by comparison
a $600 player seems like a bargain. Sony was convinced that they could
sell the PS3 as a blu-ray player more than as a game console. My guess is that they figured by the time the Blu-ray hardware came down in
price, the PS3 also become cheaper while also having a decent enough game
library to entice gamers to buy it. What I don't understand is why Sony thought people would be so excited
about Blu-Ray when it launched a format war. Surely they of all people
should remember the LAST time there was a home media format war. After
all, their format (BETAMAX) lost - but not before lots of people bought
into it before realizing they'd bought the 'wrong' one. Furthermore, the
only people in a position to take advantage of Blu-ray or HD-DVD are the
folks with a HDTV - the very same market burned by the VHS/Betamax war
from 20 years ago. Also, unlike the difference between VHS to DVD, the difference between DVD
and Blu-ray/HD-DVD isn't as pronounced - especially when comparing upscaled
DVD on a HDTV to Blu-Ray/HD-DVD. Considering that many people are still
confused about what "HD" is exactly, it's going to be harder to convince
them to upgrade. > That is larger than most car payments and many > mortgage payments, especially if you exclude escro payments and just > count principle and interest. Hardcore gamers will pay just about > anything for great hardware, but hardcore gamers make up only a small > portion of the gaming market. That's both true and false... As Sony saw with the PS2, the majority of
their customers tended to be males in their mid-late 20s. These folks
were usually fresh out of college, enjoying their first "real" job, and
had larger amounts of disposable income and free time since they didn't
have a house, wife, and kid(s) to deal with yet. (I can tell you that when
I bought my house, my gaming budget was severely reduced but then I got
married and haven't had as much time to play games as well...) |
| |
 |
|
| |
| |
