| badskywalker said: While I would say that Sony did bring some new concepts to the table, the main distinguishing factor is more that they focused on multimedia aspects of devices, PS1 doubled as a cd player while giving better deals to third parties, but it wasn't the first console to use discs, just as it wasn't the first console to have a 32 bit processor. The PS2 allowed for DVDs to be read, while adding the idea of backwards compatibility, whilst making the graphics better than both the PS1 and N64. The PSP acted in a similar light, allowing music on the go, as well as videos (I don't remember if I just downloaded that illegally, or if it was apart of the system). After this however, Sony more or less was the same as its competitor microsoft. Yes it did bring in more ideas, however these ideas were tried by its competitors, while PS2 had internet capabilities, I believe that the Xbox Live was better for the time.The wiimote had a speaker in it before the playstation had a controller that did. Many of the things you pointed out about the PS3 and 4, in my eyes were just natural evolutionary steps, with the exception of the psmove (copied from wii), everything you listed for the PS3 was really related to graphics. The things about the PS4 was just minor things, I never really used the touchpad, actually I found it quite annoying, and using x86 was kinda a given for this era in gaming. In short I believe Sony's biggest strength came not from innovation, but rather from being able to see what worked well and what didn't, it wasn't really innovating so much as copying and pasting. Does this make Sony a bad company? No, it makes them a great company. Does this make Sony innovative? No, there consoles are in an evolutionary pattern, building on the previous and ditching what it doesn't need. This does mean that as you stated, they do the good job of looking at what can be improved, but calling them innovative is a bit of a stretch. Also N64 did a lot more than you give credit, with a rumble pack, analog stick (which sony copied), personalized controller memory, etc. It wasn't a single Idea console. I will admit I own every nintendo console except the gameboy advance, but I also own a PS1,2, and 4, as well as an Xbox and Xbox 360. |
Of course, Sony has borrowed many ideas its contemporaries brought to the table. But the thing with PlayStation is that Sony has always been able to take Nintendo and Sega's stuff, and not only make them better, but apply them to a much larger leap in the gaming experience. CD gaming was nothing new, but the PlayStation was the first console powerful enough to actually do the format proper justice. The PS1 also popularized the now standard Dual analog control setup, and baked rumble tech into the controller, rather than selling it as an add-on like Nintendo did. DVDs have existed before the PS2, but the PS2 single handedly legitimized the format, not just in movies, but also for games, same with the PS3 and Blu-Ray. On that note, the PS Move may be a response to the Wii, but Sony crafted a much more advanced and dynamic motion controller than the simple tech of Nintendo's, combined with the Power and games library the PS3 already offered. Even now with the PS5, Nintendo may have been first to bring HD Haptics to a console controller, but Sony's DualSense has the potential to take it to the next level by using it in full next gen experiences.
This why I say Sony is good at innovating the holistic gaming experience, rather than focusing on just one core concept. Sure, they may not have invented much of anything, but innovation IMO, isn't about who makes what first, its about who uses the tech in new and exciting ways.
