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Kyuu on 30 March 2025
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twintail said:
Kyuu said:

I did say in the long run. It's lagging behind PS4 in sales despite much weaker competition from Xbox. One quarter is nothing.

For the price, PS5 is doing great, but PC is growing much faster. PC popularity is exploding in Asia and developing countries, and it's no doubt been stealing players from consoles. Normally, people would argue a weaker competition from Xbox would feed more into Playstation because it's the "direct competitor", but evidence suggests that a lot of them are switching to PC instead.

Consoles have an aging population which is problematic for growth. PC is now the cool device among teenagers, and Nintendo consoles dominate the younger demographic. While Playstation just keeps finding ways to make their consoles look optional and uncool. Over time, more and more gamers will ask themselves "why am I buying this?" It won't be as bad as Xbox mind you, but Playstation is not immune to the multiplatform strategy, so Sony has to be extra careful.

If Sony moves further towards being a 3rd party publisher, they will lose more players than they gain, and the PS6 might decline considerably in sales despite Xbox's disappearance. It happened in the handheld space 2 generations ago (DS/PSP vs 3DS/Vita) and it can happen again with traditional home consoles.

Let's not forget the higher price and the fact that it was supply-constrained for like 2 years because of Covid. It's an apple to pears situation. if PS4 had to release under a pandemic it could've had problems with supply too and thus have impacted sales. And we're seeing Dualsense and PS Portal being consistent sellers throughout the year. 

Right now all boats are rising except for Xbox. 

Of course, it's a situation Sony needs to examine carefully. Right now, rumours point to a variety of ways Sony looks to continue remaining a relevant player: the use of PSSR to avoid higher specs, a handheld release to re-enter that space. 

I do think it's important that they get their game development pipeline under control after the last few years, which have been bumpy for sure. If they can correct that, which perhaps they will have with this year onwards, then at least they'll have consistent high quality games releasing, which is what they need to keep their console selling, among many other factors. 

Yes Sony can stay strong so long as they recognize the value of exclusives, not against Xbox alone, but also against PC and Nintendo consoles. "Indirect competition" is less indirect than ever before, so if they don't rethink their multiplatform strategy and especially PC support, they will lose more players and the word of mouth will be unkind. Playstation, the once king of exclusives, is being memed on as the next "no games" console. I think if nothing is done about this, it'll definitely translate to weaker sales at some point.

Lower prices and handheld versions of their consoles would help for sure, but it's easy to "want" cheap things. The question is: can Sony make PS consoles cheap while remaining profitable and powerful enough? Hardware-wise, PS5 was a bargain early in the generation, but it's quite expensive now relative to past trends and what console gamers are used to.

I feel that Sony needs to return to at least "4+ year long exclusivity", make handhelds (PlaystationDeck), sell hardware at bigger losses, and commit. Otherwise they will accelerate losing market share to PC and Nintendo. Nintendo refuses to put their games on other systems for a reason... they know it's a recepie for disaster.

Unlike MS (a gaming software powerhouse), Sony can't afford to weaken Playstation. If they keep prices high and trivialize PC and Switch as non-threats, they're in for a rude awakening.