Japan and WW up 1st Jan

[Alby_da_Wolf]

drkohler said:

Alby_da_Wolf said:

 

About Sony's relatively low profile, I suspect that Sony chose not to attack frontally either MS or Nintendo this Xmas for more than one reason, it wished MS had least possible temptations to start next gen too early, it wasn't ready to fight a price war yet and, finally, it must be very happy about MS and Nintendo fighting each other now (Kinect is hitting directly Balance Board, and Ninty was forced for the first time to start regularly bundling it in some regions) and leaving it alone. Did it work? I think so, MS dealt just one blow below the belt to Sony during the last quarters, while Ninty fought very fairly, with Sony it looks like there's almost a truce, concentrating its might to defend itself from Kinect. And both PS Move and WiiMote Plus are so underutilized that a de facto cooperation could easily start between the two, as their similarities and their respective user bases adding up could boost 3rd party development for them, although multiplatform, not exclusive.

Pretty much sums up what happened this holiday. Sony's main goal was to stay profitable in sight of even worsening exchange rates, and reach the targeted 15mio units sold this fy (this is the only goal, it is completely irrelevant for the business plan whether another unnamed company sells more of the same or less). Looking, in Europe, at the complete lack of GT5 advertising, cheaply made commercials for the Move unit (downright horrible compared to US commercials), no price cuts or heavy bundling of software, and insufficient Move supplies, they might have probably gone a bit too far with cost savings..

Yep, I tried to be good towards Sony, but it's undeniable that while a low profile was justified in a lot of things this Xmas, it was really a tad too low for GT5 and Move.    And it's sadly true, Kevin Butler ads were amusing, why use crap in EMEAA, Sony's biggest market, instead? So it looks like some moves were played right, some others were almost totally wrong and just PS and GT brand names, coupled with Move and GT5 actual quality, managed to patch up the mistakes and grant at least in EMEAA and WW a result that is very satisfying for a low profile Xmas. But something more could have been done even without directly defying MS and Nintendo.

I have a theory about Sony: it suffers from ADHD. It's an intelligent and hyperactive company, it does a lot of things, it even manages to learn from a lot of its own mistakes and lessons received, but it NEVER manages to learn from each one of them. Even when they are under its nose, jumping, gesturing and screaming to be noticed.