Cross-play on PlayStation 4 is now available for all developers to use in their games

[DonFerrari]

RaptorChrist said:

Here's the way I sort of see it: (I have a hunch that I'm going to say things that are unpopular, but I think that's because some of the things that people may view as a negative are not necessarily negative in my eyes. I'd like to see your take on this.)

I agree that Sony has generally been the one to play it safe, but it's mostly because of the part of the market that they have control of. It's not that they aren't a creative company, but that their product is targeting a market comprised of people that want a traditional gaming experience. They are not so much trying to invent something new as they are simply trying to perfect said experience.

Since they put PSVR, something entirely new on the gen, and make games for it, plus have plenty of different genres and games released (new IPs as well) the only way to say Sony is playing safe is because they released less games and most if not all have done very well commercially and critically. But having success in all you have launched doesn't make playing safe, more like playing smart or just succeeding. And when game development take longer to do it is kinda hard keep similar output to last gen, and since they don't need to convince people to get back to Playstation they also don't need to bet on the 60% of their output making loss and only 20% profiting. Still we got Racing game, Open World, FPS, Action, Platformer, Hero Games, etc. Hardly less than MS output or "risks".

Relatively speaking, in a market with only three major players, Nintendo has historically been the one to take risks. As a result, I think this is why Nintendo is overrepresented in gaming communities, as they are an easy company to like (don't take that the wrong way). In other words, I think Nintendo "appears" as though they deserve the most market share (let me explain).

Risk on HW maybe, risk on SW nope. Their games use less resources and sell more than most titles from other companies. Just look to the thread where someone said Sony is reaching Nintendo level of sales of SW and all the denial it received.

Sony and Microsoft have created eco-systems that rely largely on third party software, and as such, the overall size of that market is less volatile than what Nintendo aims for. Nintendo has had major successes and major defeats, while the disparity between Microsoft and Sony's biggest defeat compared to biggest success is not as large.

You can say rely, but since Sony have made several blockbusters and steady launching them, plus GOTY contenders and winners in spade on the gen (some years with over 3 contenders) it is more like that at this moment the platform is where 3rd party can thrive not one that depends heavily on them.

Here's what I think, although I'm curious if people agree or not: Hypothetically speaking, if Sony disappeared, another company (possibly Microsoft, maybe a newcomer) would fill most of that gap. Contrastly, if Nintendo disappeared, the market would shrink drastically. And this is one of those negatives I mentioned in the beginning of the post. I think some may read this as if I'm saying "anyone can do what Sony is doing", and that's not at all what I mean. The reason Sony is where they are at is because Sony has done it best. So much so that Nintendo seemingly decided to re-strategize and focus more on their own thing. But if they disappeared, whoever is next best would have to suffice. That's what I'm saying. :)

How would the market shrink so drastically (talking about consoles) if it haven't shrink at all when they failed on N64, GC and WiiU? And since Nintendo isn't doing Handhelds exclusively as far as we know then that major shrink wouldn't really happen.

Both companies have separate goals, and provide consumers with vastly different products. So much so that owning both a Nintendo console and a Sony console is common compared to owning a Microsoft console and a Sony console (no source; assuming this based on anecdotal evidence).

No need for source (it may have changed this gen who knows) but we have seem plenty of sources on Wii and WiiU that a lot of its owner also had A PS3/4 or X360/1, which would defeat your previous point.

(Anyways, it's late, and at this point I don't know which side I've upset more. :P)