PS3 expected to live 10 years in the market?
posted July 25th 2005 6:23PM
Besides the original Game Boy platform, no
system has ever lasted 10 years in the market. Pretty much straight up like that. But that apparently didn't stop Sony
Computer Entertainment Prez Kenny Kutaragi from stating at PlayStation Meeting 2005 that they're "looking at a life
cycle of 10 years with the PlayStation 3"
due to the transition to HDTV. Uh, ok, that's a little oblique—so how do they plan to accomplish this? Why, with "full
HD features from the start so that consumers won't have to buy another version of the console in the future." Ahem. And
what are we to conclude from this? Well, perhaps the money is in Ken's quote that "the PS3 can't be offered at a price
that's targeted towards households," and, "I'm not going to reveal its price today. I'm going to only say that it'll be
expensive." Sorry for all the quotes, but we're just laying it down—with previous estimates hovering at
about $400 per unit, should we take this as
a possibility that the PS3 is getting a big price bump in the wrong direction, and might just perhaps be classing
itself right out of the market? Hope not, but we don't even know what to expect anymore—execs tend not to whine about
their gear being too expensive if at all possible.
[Via The
Guardian]
don't forget, ps3 is also a hd-bluray player
$499 is a resonable price
dor the first half of 2006
to #41:
for your ps2, you could ask sony to repair it for you. they will fix the disc error problem for free. the only cost you have to pay is the shipping. just call their customer service.
i had this error few months ago and called sony. their customer service is pretty good. they sended me an email with all the info and stuff. lucky that i was really close to their repair depot. i just brought the ps2 there and didn't have to pay the shipping. only took them 3 days to finish repairing it.
wtf is the fuss about, peeps? let the guy talk all he wants... u dont have to listen... geeze... 10 years or 5 years.. who gives a &#*(? as long as u enjoy the games ps3 will offer.. and 500 bucks for ps3 is not overkill either... compared to buyin an equivalent pc
the ps3 will sell for $600 next summer when it is released in the us. sony will lower the cost to $500 for christmas, so consumers "feel" like they are getting a deal. the 360 will be $300 next summer and $250 at christmas with the revo coming out for christmas 2006 at $250.
why the high cost for ps3?:
1) sony games division is the only money maker for sony.
a) sony can't afford to lose their shirts on hardware sales because of point 1.
2) the cost of manufacturing a console will only go down as the parts become mass produced.
a) with the inclusion of a cell processor and a blu-ray drive there is no mass production of these new technologies and the initial cost to produce them is high/at a premium.
b) with a high cost, the demand won't be as high and sony won't have to initially manufacture as many. only the trule hardcore sony fanboy and those with significant excess cash can afford one (or those who have worked really hard as kutaragi would say).
c) as actualy blu-ray dvd drives begin appearing and maybe a cell server for christmas 2006 and xdr memory more readily availble, the cost of the ps3 can finally come down with a higher demand during the christmas season.
39 said: would likely end kutaragi career with the company, not unlike that of the gameboy creator after the virtual boy failure.
you mean he's going to die in a car crash?
what is this? blueray this, blueray that. what will you play with your blueray player? the movie industry dosen't even support blueray. most of it's members are behind hddvd because of lower manufacturing cost. even then they are waiting for machines to hit the $250 range. if the current trend continues, the blueray will not play anything except maybe sony movies. those that are smart will wait until the industry decides on a final format and avoid the betamax heartbreak. only one dvd format will survive and right now nobody know which one.
$600 dollars, that would be suicide. my money is on $400, and even that may end up being suicide, since no console has been succesfull after launching at a price over 300. sony will lose a ton of money like the did with the ps2, and if their plan is as successful as before they will earn it all back and more over time.
sony and that retard ken kutaragi have gone too far. they are making a big mistake with the ps3 as a whole. well i guess since their system isn't geared toward households, i shouldn't dish out $600 for the system alone. screw sony. they are a bunch of lying, over-hyping, arrogant bastards. all of my ex-fellow fanboys have fun spending $800 just to play one game and hook up 7 boomerangs to a fridge. i had faith in sony, i really did. but they just went to far, and now they've lost a loyal and valuable fanboy.
nintendo is done, so i am going to have to side with the enemy, now my friend, microsoft. their system is cheaper, includes a hard drive and a headset, is coming out sooner, has a good lineup, and even looks better.
well sony, it was good while it lasted. screw you.
it's interesting that so many of you talk about the price of the ps3 and how high or low it may be at launch. i guess none of you are pc gamers, who will spend thousands of dollars year over year to upgrade their gear. the reason that pc gamers will spend crazy amounts of $$$$ is because they want to play the latest and greatest games with all the bells and whistles set to the highest levels.
i will category state that the price of the ps3 is meaningless as long as the games are strong and look great. after all its a fact that the release of halo years ago boosted xbox sales tremendously just to play this game! also, blue-ray & hd-dvd are meaningless as drives, other then to support larger game environments. no one is going to by a ps3 to view hd film content, a properly engineered stand alone player will do a much better job and represents another revenue stream for the manufacturer.
what the ps3 needs to succeed in the market is great games coupled to a great marketing strategy. the 10 yr life cycle is just marketing hype, if ms intros another xbox in 3yrs (xbox-520?) and its a better performer then the ps3, you can bet that sony will launch a ps4 shortly thereafter.
the true issue with consoles, unlike pcs is that the companies that produce these systems have never understood that the upgrade market can help them to recuperate revenue loss. now i'm sure some of you are going to say that sony is a pc maker and understands this issue, but they are a failed pc maker with limited market penetration in na, there not even in the top 10 in usa. it's quite possible to produce a console that has upgradeable video, processor and drives in order to increase profitability. however the console manufactures believe that there is greater collateral value in hyping a new console with greater capabilities. well this is arguable since none of these companies have ever truly invested in designing a genuinely upgradeable solution and market it as such.
i used to be a pc gamer (who now makup 1/10 of the gaming industry), until i had to upgrade my graphics card and memory every other year to play the games. i could justify the purchase by saying that it improved my overall computing experience, but that is no longer the case. now that every application instantly loads and i can fully multitask up the wazoo, the only reason to upgarde my pc would be to play games ... which doesn't cut it when it costs 5x more than a console ($600 for the latest graphics cards alone). console game's grpahics are better or on par with pc game's graphics for at least the first 3 years of the console life. not to mention i can play while lieing on my couch enjoying my full surround sound home theater.
the ps3 will be at least $500 and probably closer to $600 especially after buying the memory card/hard drive. there is no reason for kutaragi to make the comments he did if it were coming out at $400, because that's what the industry expected. by saying that it'll be very expensive and not a common household item, he's causing analysts to reevaluate their sales forcasts for sony. if everyone expected a console at $400 and then sony released at $600, it would drastically hurt sony's stock because they would never meet the market forcasts for sales. that would be suicide for sony. now forcasters can readjust their 14 million units sold prediction. by selling at a premium to the hard core gamers, sony will minimize console revenue loss while improving production costs. when production costs diminish enough, they'll lower the price appropriately and obtain significant market penetration anyway.
don't forget, they have almost 2/3 of the console market now, and i think they are playing their cards right in thinking that most people aren't looking to upgrade their console next year and will be looking to do so in 2007 when a good game library exists, games will be much closer to fully utilizing the true power of the ps3, and hd television will be the norm. then production costs will be far less and you'll be able to ge the ps3 for $300. basically, sony will milk it from those who can not wait to have the latest and greatest.
at best, the 65816's compatibility to the very popular 6502 made for a much reduced learning curve for developers. all to often, by the time a company is ready to produce a new console the best choices for cpu supplier has changed.
i'd like to point out that accounting for inflation, the ps2 debuted at about $335 in 2005 prices, and there was no huge leap forward in terms of technology. $400 does not seem to be an unreasonable price.
if they priced it at $600, they would lose a lot of the market permanently to xbox360. remember that most people only buy one console per generation.
#55
nintendo is done, so i am going to have to side with the enemy, now my friend, microsoft. their system is cheaper, includes a hard drive and a headset, is coming out sooner, has a good lineup, and even looks better.
how can you discount nintendo already? nintendo doesn't overhype or lie...and when miyamoto says statements like this "unsurprisingly miyamoto refused to reveal any details of the top secret and much-hyped revolution controller, but he did say he believed it would prove very popular with gamers and eventually become the industry standard."
i believe they probably have what it takes to give gaming a fresh kick in the pants.
i agree with everything else you say though. and blueray is bullcrap hype.
i think the 10yr lifecycle means when they stop sell them--not when they become obsolete. hdtv is the best reason why it will be obsolete in 5 years or less... plenty of resolution to show off graphical improvements. hdtv increases graphical demands--especially once true hd programming is commonplace for most homes. video games were approaching low resolution tv quality... once the consumer is accustomed to the much higher quality hd programming, they'll expect more detailed graphics on their games. sony will have at least one--and probably two--new systems before they actually stop selling rehashes of the ps3 in 10+ years.
anyone remember the 3do? $500!!! yeah, but it's better than all the rest. wait for it..... (insert sound of system tanking due to the company assuming it knows what a consumer will pay for instead of letting the consumer deciding). this happened to the edsel and 3do. "you want this and you want to pay this much for it!"
no, we don't.
as stated by paul leiba, "blue-ray & hd-dvd are meaningless as drives, other then to support larger game environments."
now for those of you that are saying to your selves "great! the ps3 will be a blue-ray dvd player too. wow that's great. it's well worth it.".
stop and think for a moment....
what's the number one problem that ps2's develop???
laser burnout or misalignment.
and what is the biggest cause of this??
using the ps2 as a dvd player.
playing dvd movies in your ps2 is the worst thing to do and is a sure way to cut down its laser life drastically. the constant reading and tracking of the laser head is what kills it. the ps2 is not build to the same quality standard as your average dvd player for dvd video playback. and for sure nether is the ps3 going to be when it finally gets here.
i bought my ps2 used and have had it for over 5 years, and its still going strong.
i know the ps3 is going to be expensive and i'll have to get a hd set just so i can get the best quality out of it, but there is no way i'll play any blue-ray dvd movies in that baby. buy a dedicated player for that once the price comes down. then again you'll only be able to play sonymgmcolombia made movies in it anyway.
as stated by paul leiba, "blue-ray & hd-dvd are meaningless as drives, other then to support larger game environments."
now for those of you that are saying to your selves "great! the ps3 will be a blue-ray dvd player too. wow that's great. it's well worth it.".
stop and think for a moment....
what's the number one problem that ps2's develop???
laser burnout or misalignment.
and what is the biggest cause of this??
using the ps2 as a dvd player.
playing dvd movies in your ps2 is the worst thing to do and is a sure way to cut down its laser life drastically. the constant reading and tracking of the laser head is what kills it. the ps2 is not build to the same quality standard as your average dvd player for dvd video playback. and for sure nether is the ps3 going to be when it finally gets here.
i bought my ps2 used and have had it for over 5 years, and its still going strong.
i know the ps3 is going to be expensive and i'll have to get a hd set just so i can get the best quality out of it, but there is no way i'll play any blue-ray dvd movies in that baby. buy a dedicated player for that once the price comes down. then again you'll only be able to play sonymgmcolombia made movies in it anyway.
i'd like to address a couple of comments here. those who are applauding the inclusion of the blu-ray disc feature of the ps3 as good value are sheep. the only reason the blu-ray is on there at all is because they want to beat toshiba to market to make blu-ray the standard hd-dvd platform. anyone remember beta? sony did well there too. i feel used just being offered that. sony, and microsoft don't want to make games. they both have ulterior motives for next-gen systems. that's also why they don't care about the development costs of games. the xbox 360 is just a high powered media centre pc. hence the hd support. ms needs it to be viable in this market.
the second point i'd like to address is the that the cost will drop as time goes on. if you beleive that please go get a vasectomy before you inflict me with little clones of yourselves running around and walking into shit. ps3 and xbox 360 are loss leaders. neither company cares one whit if they lose money on these systems, as long as they sell enough of them. they are pricing them to lose a certain amount on the systems and will hold themselves to that. probably anywhere from $100-$150 per console.
why? imagine how much money it would be worth to sony if the standard that replaces dvd's is from a patent owned by them. these following figures are best guess estimates, but probably not far off the mark. take $25 average cost of a dvd, now take 15% license fee from that ($3.75). multiply that by 30 (number of videos average person owns) ($112.50). multiply that by 80% of the american population that adopt these technologies over the life-cycle (within 5 years) (28,000,000)and you get a clear profit of around $3,150,000,000us. now imagine what happens when china starts buying these things. that's why they don't care at all. ms just wants to dominate the home entertainment market that is consolidating, and fast. if they can hold dominant market share on not only personal computing but television and digital cable devices. face it tv's are more like computers now and computers are more like tv's. the gap is closing.
if you want to play games next-gen. buy a revolution. it'll be cheaper too. look for somewhere around $180-$200-us.
"no system has ever lasted 10 years in the market"
*Cough*Commodore4*cough* .
It wont last 10 years just because better stuff will be out far before 2016.
Yep the commodore 64 (one of my favorites 8))lasted well over 10 years. I had one when they first came out and still preferred it to a NES when a buddy got one. As far as Sony and the PS3....$400 will hurt them as the 360 will get a price drop rite when Sony releases the PS3 (gurantee that, i remeber Sony doing it to MS when they launched the xbox), $500 will cost them a GOOD portion of the market (going to the 360), and $600 will get them killed. I mean jeez you cant compare a console to a PC, one is a toy the other is a tool, big difference. I was holding out for the PS3 but I may just go 360 now. Oh and Sony's hardware has ALWAYS been lacking (great games, lousy hardware). When the PS1 came out I went thru one about every 6 months (not a drive problem, the PS1 had severe heat issues), didnt buy anymore after 3, I had enough. First PS2 I bought I took home and had 1 game for it (they were VERY hard to find, my GF looked everywhere and found me one at a k-mart in the ghetto hehe)the game was summoner and it would play for a bit then come up with "DVD-error...retry". Took that one back and they didnt have another so I didnt get another till a year later, it lasted 6 months. owned an xbox for 18 months, sold it last christmas to my girlfriends daughter for her son and as far as i know it still works today (little over 2 years old now). Then I look at 360 and they arent even going to put the fucking cables in with it (sold seperately) and that makes me want to avoid them too (We all know Bill Gates is the greediest dorkiest looking nerd on earth), wouldnt go anywhere near a nintendo they will be gone soon (except for maybe in Japan), never seen a company that insisted on making the dumbest friggen games that could only be played buy someone 10 or under without feeling COMPLETELY idioctic. Oh well guess its wait and see time.
Wait a minute... I'm confused. So PS3 developer Lee Katongawana Kutaragi knew that internal affairs of the Xbox 360 and Revolution was setting him up???
The arguments supporting the PS3 lasting 10 years, and comparing it to other gaming consoles; Atari, Comm64, NES, is not accurate. These other gaming machines came during times when technology was not esculating as it is today. Sure, there is a niche crowd that supports the PSOne, but nothing substancial. The PS3's GPU will be outdated at launch. The bandwidth is already a problem on paper. In 2010, M$ will probably be selling its newest console, and PS3 will probably be dedicated as a 3rd rate Blu-ray dvd player. Thankfully it'll support 1080p, though.
The cost of the PS3 + one controller will be outlandish. Add on the HD drive, another controller and one game, the $400 price jumps to $550. That is supposing that it'll only be $400, we dont even know that for sure. It appears rather ugly at this point.