Screaming Penguin - Source Does Matter

Ross @ Joystiq says:

In all honesties, I think the PS3 might be ‘too’ powerful - some of the technology (Blu-Ray discs and multiproccesor chips) might be too early and too untested. I know I am about to be flamed for saying that, but I hold by it. I don’t believe everything this article says - I do believe that the PlayStation 3 will do well - but maybe Sony should take caution with their words and audacity.

Then again, it’s the games that matter, and if they’re fun, I’ll bite. But I’m just one miniscule consumer - fanboyism aside, what do you think of Sony’s direction and attitudes towards the next generation? Are they being too cocky?

I don't see it as being too cocky at all. I would argue that you have to look at Sony, not just in the context of the Playstation line, but as a company as a whole. Their overall consumer electronics line is generally considered "meh", and their brand in everything from TVs to portable music has been lost-- Apple has all the sex appeal and Matsushita and Mitsubishi have taken the "quality" brand title. SOE sat on their money grubbing lethargic asses and have watched Blizzard chew up what used to be an immensly profitable king-of-the-hill line of games (though I imagine they are still vastly profitable, if not immensely so).

In short, the Playstation is the only area where Sony still rides high, and they desperately need something to keep them on top. One of the great ironies, though, is they are now looking at mutliple markets and trying to come up with a clear line of thought, and there may just not be one -- at least not one that applies to the American market.

Look at the portable console space. You have the PSP which is sleek and powerful and faring well against the more elegant and innovative DS. However, Nitendo has that end to end picture. They not only introduce an innovative hardware platform, they make damned sure there is a "Nintendogs" title to take full advantage of it and show other developers that there is more out there than just what they have been doing. Apple has basically done the same thing with the iPod. They have provided the elegant and innovative hardware, good support software and they have gone to bat against the powers that be to make sure the content is there and they are in the drivers seat. They pulled off the coup de grace Sony has tried over and over with everything from the Betamax to the MiniDisc (and now UMD) and has never been able to make stick, mostly because they really haven't ever had a sense of innovation, but rather production. The WalkMan wasn't an "innovative" product as much as it was a technical demonstration of transistor fabrication for the 1970's. Its user import was not a design consideration, like the iPod, but a almost fluke byproduct.

The PS3 represents Sony being Sony for the first time in a while. It is a technological marvel that is pushing the envelope. Moreover, it is not pushing the envelope in the Nintendo sense, where Sony will have to educate developers on a whole new promise. It is simply more and better and smaller of the same thing. I also find the idea that multi-core chips are somehow risky to be funny. SMP and multicore technology are decades old now. If anything, the real issue is teaching the legions of hack game programmers how to manage threads. However, I think we are on deck for something really new.

Hardware like the PS3 is about to really open up new lines of gaming. This kind of power will mean more than just polycount. As I have discussed in this space before, the cost in art development to deliver on the new high-polycount engines is already taking far and away the lead line item spot from anything else in game development. I think we are really going to start to see a whole lot more of the Will Wright and GTA type games. Non-directed with larger and larger actor pools and larger simulation mechanics in behavior. Games are going to become less and less about "Game" and more about "Play", and as everything from the MMO and GTA and Sims lines have demonstrated, that has the ability to really open up new markets for gaming that haven't been there before.

Ok, pontification over. The real question, though, is not whether the PS3 is the right move for Sony -- it is. It is not whether it is "Sony" enough -- it is more "Sony" than anything else out there. It is also something that seems very directly related to what Sony needs to reestablish their brand in the American market. The real question here, is in a race for horsepower and ISV buy in and overall market penetration by "Any Means Possible" if they can hold up to an enslaught from Bill & Co. I mean, Microsoft managed to convince legions of Americans that Halo was a good game. If that's not a marketing triumph, I don't know what is. Meanwhile, in the "All Press is Good Press" department, games like GTA and Halo are defining the American game world. While I certainly won't call them bad they are worlds away from Onimusha and Final Fantasy MMVI or whatever. I think Sony need more buy in from "Western" game companies like UBI and EA and Rockstar and Blizzard, but those companies see cross platforming as good for their bottom line even though they understand the value of ubiquity. Frankly, from the standpoint of the ISV, right now they would rather see Microsoft win that fight... and that is what is scarey.