Alternate history: Sony don't join the console race

[Tober]

SeaDaVie said:

How does being in the EU help with importing of goods manufactured in Asia? The benefits of the EU were in interacting with other EU countries primarily.

The Wii was also a super important part of the historical market growth, a system that introduced gaming to a way more casual audience that Sony had ever reached. Why is that even relevant though, it’s not like the 2 are mutually exclusive facts or something.

Also, we’re talking about a 130% growth rate, that’s not something that just happens naturally without some seismic shift.

Unifying the markets did lower cost. Before Nintendo (and others) would have either separate offices in the different countries or different distributor agreements. One reason was to help with the certification process.

Countries would have different legislation to register products to be sold in their respective countries. Meaning the need to go through a separate certification process for each one. 

The EU unified those certification requirements, meaning if you certify a product in one country it can be sold to all other members. Not just game consoles, all products. Cars is a good example.

The result is far less offices in Europe and a smaller amount of distributors not only making it more efficient to sell product in Europe, but also enables the European countries getting products fairly around the same time. The separate certification process in the past meant that some countries got consoles and games much later than others or not at all.

Last edited by Tober - on 16 July 2025