Huh? The quote is talking about the ps3. Here, let me give it for you:

Look at the bolded. He is talking about the current gen and the ps3. He says that they MAY add the psp into that as well...if he was talking about all of sony why would he talk about one console and then add in the psp? 

Sony fans are taking this out of context to try and make the quote sound different than what it is. And ifi you look at the numbers, the rev for the system he is taling about-the ps3-  is less than 10% (and the profits are even lower than that.). I doubt they really will drop support yet, but if that % goes down this year and next, then they have no real reason to support it.

@Aiemond : if they did cut support for PS3 (which already wouldn't make sense since they would loose money on it), Sony could cut them a lot of things in retaliation, like songs in guitar hero, or spiderman games...

Even if they wanted to do that, Actibliz would loose a lot of money from too many sides...

This 'threat' has been commented by multiple analysts and by Bioware. Everybody said it didn't make sense, it's a bluff.

It's a 'bluff' to ask for a price cut. Kotick knows PS3 would sell a lot more at a lower price, so he just wants more millions for Actibliz.

@Aiemond

Then he also mentions they might cut support for sony, which also includes the ps2

Sony does not work like that. Why do we even see those things on 360 if they play like that. The divisions are independent. And mario64, what have the analysts gotten right this gen? From the start to now most of the predictions and "analysis" has been wrong.

@leo-j: The context of the article is the price of the ps3. If he is going to cut ps2 then the rev are either way down or he expects by that time they will be way down. I do think it is a bluff, but the fact that they can do it and prolly lose only 10% rev (and it would be less than that as money from those projects would be put into other ones that could return profit) gives it a bit more teeth since it hurts Sony more than activision. 

Wow... some people are mixing a lot of things here.

1- 40 % ? Nope, rather 18% as someone spotted.

2- The PS2, while still strong, is rapidely declining and the PS3 is not growing fast enough.

3- Revenues are not profits. How much are they really doing on Playstation games ? Does the money invested in development, promotion is enough IN THEIR VIEW, compare to what they can make with the same amount of money on the Wii or even the Xbox 360 ?

4- PSP, dispite its huge installed base, is on the "low" side (hopefully, this might change). What was the latest PSP game that make the top10 charts outside of japan ? Furthermore, you can bet that the "boss of Activision" was among the people aware of the PSP Go, a console that is currently firing up the relations between Sony, publishers and retailers.

While the threat seems to me empty because highly improblable (not completly, after all, EA ruled Sega out during the short DC era), I don't see it as totaly stupid.

Kotic's job is to make sure Activision generate as much money as possible. Put the preassure on Sony so they cut the PS3 price and get a wider installed base, allowing Activision to sale more games, is normal.
He doesn't give a **** about Sony financial problems, and again that's normal.
But pissing off players is sure a stupid thing !

@Aiemond : It would hurt Actibliz much more than Sony gamers. Actibliz (which is mostly Bliz actually) has 2 meaningful games on consoles : guitar hero (but rockband would still be on PS3 and would sell take those sales to those 22 million owners), and call of duty (available on PC), which would increase competing shooters sales on PS3 (MAG, Killzone 2...).

It doesn't make sense to cut support to 22 million PS3, which could become 30 million or more when GT5 is released... There are only 30 million 360, that's not that much more...

WoW what a major spin. I laughed 3 times.

1. Rockband sales would take Guitar Hero sales
2. You try to say the loss of CoD wouldn't be THAT bad, because it is on PC.
3. The loss of CoD would increase sales of MAG and Killzone 2

I need to say that I think Activision won't cut its suppport.

But just imagine: IF they did this, it would probably mean Game Over for PS3 in the West. Guitar Hero / Call of Duty / Tony Hawk  are just too big to compensate.

If that is true, then the PS3 counts for less than 10% of all home console versions of the Playstation brand (PS2 and PS3).  So, it does look like there is a justifiable case for the PS3 not being supported by Activision, if trends continue.  If the percentage of total sales remains below 10%, and gets even worse, you can see Activision saying it isn't worth it, and they then decide to optimize their coding for the 360.  And, in regards to the PS2, it should be seen as on its last legs.  The PS3 doesn't play its games, and it doesn't do anything unique like the Wii, that appeals to casual fans.  So, we are looking PSP and PS3, and if Activision drops the PS3, and Sony then says "No PSP for you", then Activision would go "fine".

EA didn't support the Dreamcast, so Activision MIGHT decide to not support the PS3 down the road, if sales remain as they are, and portion of the marketplace shrinks.  Not saying this WILL happen, but MIGHT.

A few things people forget to account for.


First, PS3 was 8 percent of the revenue in 2008. It may be less in 2009, we don't know but I am sure they have a good idea where it will be. And his statement was forward looking, saying if things go down from here in 2010 or 2011 we may drop support. So he may be saying that if it drops to 4 percent we will drop support for it, we do not know the number he has in mind but there is one low enough that anyone would agree it is worth dropping. And do not forget that revenue is not equal to profit and that the share of profit generated could be significantly different then the revenue share.

The second thing is there is opportunity cost when developing for any system. Meaning if that it is not just a question of am I making money on the platform but could I be making more if I put the same money into another platform. For example say the cost of a typical game developed on 360 ported to PS3 is $3 million, obviously assuming a huge savings because it is a port. For every two PS3 titles released a high quality Wii game could be built or a budget 360 game or they could probably build 10 for mobile. If any of those games could have enough of a market to make more of a profit then the PS3 port then it is in the companies best interest to drop the PS3 and put the money into the other platforms.

Lastly there are cost savings in supporting fewer platforms because you can scale the fewer platforms to higher levels making them more resource efficient. To give a trivial example that can scale up imagine you had only one team per platform. Project resource demands are on a parabolic curve where you need only a few people in the beginning but scale up to a massive team by the end. With only a single team it is very hard to keep everyone busy all the time. As you add projects you can schedule them such that the peak in one overlaps with the valley in another and use your resources more efficiently. As you add more teams this efficiency increases. This same concept works for other departments such as marketing and even into HR as well as for capital expenses such as hardware and software licenses. Of course if all of your platforms already have enough projects that they are highly efficient then this is less important, but it is something to watch for as the number of titles for a platforms goes down.


I am not saying Activision really meant they would drop support for Sony soon or at all, I do not know enough about their business to be able to say. What I am trying to remind people of though is to not dismiss something so casually because there are conditions for everything where what seems unthinkable one day becomes a reality the next and you never now where that tipping point is.

Nope.

You would be right if it was another third party publisher, but when you're talking about Activision, E.A. and maybe even Ubisoft, that wrong. Some of their licence are strong enough to drive console sales.

Loosing COD, GH, Tony Hawk, Dreamworks and Lucasarts franchises would be a huge hit for Sony (not to mention how bad it might look if some Sony movie-games were not released on the PS3). Maybe not as much as loosing E.A. [Sports], but surely enough to give a definitive edge to the X360.

Kotic's threat was clumsy, but so was the answer from Sony, dismising it as if it was nothing, while the original claim (PS3 price cut) can currently be heard from so many developer's mouth.