Well, well, well... It looks like I'm not the only one who "knows" that Crash Bandicoot was the original Playstation's mascot, and Sony's goto boy.

No, you are not :)

 I do know some about Japan because I have alot of friends from their and I like to discuss these topics with them.  Microsoft had a very bad approach - they went convincing them that they were "liberating" them from their own company - Sony.  Then they gave them the impression in the original Xbox era that they hated their taste in gaming and wanted to convert them into a Halo / FPS loving country like America and Western countries.  Sounds a bit like America in current foreign affiars, huh?  With the 360, Microsoft is working hard to reverse that trend, and its working to a small extent.  But the original Xbox left a bad taste.

However, Apple was successfully able to tear down Sony's dominance in portable music.  Minidisc was huge in Japan, and still had a huge presence when I was there in 2005.  Ipod took it by the storm.  The reason was because Apple showed a great reason why they should defect from their support in the Minidisc format - style and innovation.

While last generation, Microsoft really tried the "our stuff is better than your stuff" approach, this generation they are trying the "me too" approach.  It's working slightly better than the old approach - making RPGs and paying Japanese developers - but they need to go further.  They need to show something that the Japanese have not seen before that they will accept.

As far as what you said about the Wii.  Trauma Center and Mario Galaxy are excellent examples of games that embrace the Wii.  Wii Sports and Wii Play are also fun to play when drunk with friends.  However, some of the shovelware for the first year really made me want to cry. 

Actually...Polygon Man predates Crash, and died a horribly obscure death.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=-PCJ1lWMaSA Anyone who doesn't believe Crash used to be Sony's mascot, watch this video. 'Nuff said :)

Nice to see a real new-commer ... I think Ive started my life on VGC wit only a couple of sentences :P

@Mr. Pickles - Excellent first thread (post?)

I agree, (as does Square Enix - see other thread) that with the PS3 Sony continues to have an idenity problem. Everyone who's every heard of Xbox knows Halos and has a clear picture of what it's about. Anyone who's heard of Wii knows what it's all about (WiiSports is more of an association than even Mario, but Mario remains an excellent mascot representing what Nintendo is all about).

With PSX Sony clearly defined themselves as being for the guys 'too old' for N64. People 'Too cool' for Mario and Sonic. And they grabbed up the 15-25 market from their competitors. Crash was the mascot here and he was similar to Sonic in that he was cast as 'more cool, more badass' than the others.

PS2 continued that and they successfully labeled the GC as the 'kiddy system'. Being purple didn't help Nintendo either. This allowed them to (pretty-much)own all non-kiddie software. Then came MS who did the same to Sony as they did to Nintendo. MS cast themselves as the 'core' elite gamer system, for people 'too cool' for Sony.

With PS3 Sony seemed to forget what had worked for them before and focused on MS and seemingly attempting to win that market back. Apperantly they totally disregarded Nintendo and just assumed all other demographics would just stick with them.

The PS3 was too powerful and too pricey for the mainstream, so they correctly targeted the 'core' gamers with games in the first year aimed at them. Again, it's like they just assumed everyone else would keep buying PS2's until the PS3 dropped in price. But this sent a contradiction image to the masses. Where the PS2 was for 'everyone' clearly the PS3 was not. This pissed off a lot of PS2 owners who felt betrayed in a way, that they no longer seemed to matter to Sony. Too make it worse they alternatively marketed the PS3 as a multi-media device and as a game system adding to the idenity crisis. This provided Nintendo a golden oppurtunity to steal the masses. They executed this better than almost anyone could have guessed with the Wii.

While the Playstation brand is great, it's now muddled. They could sure use a new mascot that CLEARLY defines what market they are going for (even if it's 'everyone') and what they stand for. Branding is extremely powerful, and in the English speaking world, currently, Playstation is the weakest brand.

I disagree with the Wii not appealing to your definition of "hardcore gamer". Many people on this forum who fit the definition own and promote/defend the Wii, including me.

Plus, categorisation is pretty useless when it comes to predicting future trends. I wouldn't split it at all, and wouldn't try to "justify" previous and current sales by audience types. It never worked that way - look at Dreamcast. While appealing to "everyone", it failed for economic, marketing, availability, competition, third-party support and poor quality of mascot games, etc.

 The Dreamcast's biggest failure was being tied to Sega, with all the failed upgrades and console flops over the years, who wanted to take a chance on them?

 That's actually a lot of insight about the XBox's bad first impression in Japan. Thanks.

Reminds me of Sega of America's "Genesis does what Nintendon't" commercials. Sega of Japan was furious over them. But it did let the Genesis actually get a foothold in the Nintendo-dominated market. Thanks for the insight.