Jay520 said: The first thing they need to focus on is software. Price is important but people won't buy a a console with no games, no matter the price. That was the PS3's biggest problem. It didn't get any blockbuster, system-selling titles until 2008 with Metal Gear Solid 4. That was nearly two years after the console released. During which time, the Xbox 360 had exclusives like Halo 3, Gears of War, Mass Effect, Bioshock, along with superior with multiplats like Modern Warfare, Assassin's Creed, etc. Top it all off with a superior online system at the time and it's clear why the PS3 had such a terrible start. As long as the PS4 starts out the gate with some system-selling exclusives, it's going to do fine, well, better than the PS3 at least, regardless of price. The PS4's next biggest concern is it's ease of development. The PS3 was such a pain in the ass to develop for that a lot of the earlier games were down right atrocious on the system compared to the 360, nearly forcing gamers to buy the games on the superior console-the Xbox 360. Take a look at some of Sony's top developers and you can see that they are STILL learning the system. Regardless of how 'futuristic' this makes the Ps3 seem, this should not be the case. Developers should be able to get the most out of the console as early as possible. You have Xbox exclusives which more-or-less get the most out of the system early on. Games like Halo 3 & Gears of War spring to mind. Both of these games had modes like single-player, local multiplayer, online multiplayer, & co-op campaigns. Sure later iterations upped the graphics & other technicalties, but the earlier ones still really optimised the system to the point where the games had all these basic features. These are all system selling features which the PS3 lacked early on. Look at a franchise like Uncharted that didn't receive online until 2009 & didn't receive local Mp until 2011, you can blame this on the system's difficulty to develop for. Or look at a game like killzone 2. The game released nearly 3 years after the PS3 launch, yet still lacked standardised modes like offline multiplayer or campaign co-op. The series didn't see campaign co-op until 2011 with Killzone 3. And probably the biggest victom of the PS3's foreign architecture is Gran Turismo 5, Sony's biggest game. It didn't release until 2010, a whopping four years after the PS3's launch. How misfortunate. One can only imagine the HW boost this game would have caused if it released in the PS3's launch window. The Last Guardian is another example. The game has been in development for 4-6 years and we STILL don't know when it's releasing. The PS3's foreign architecture is a problem & Sony need not make this same mistake next gen One can only imagine how big the PS3 would be right now if Uncharted had online, or if Killzone 2 released a year or so earlier with local MP, or even if Gran Turismo 5 was released a few years sooner. I guarantee the PS3 would be a lot bigger. Now, maybe the problem isn't the PS3. Maybe it's Sony developers. Either way, Sony needs to get it's blockbusters out before the second half of the generation. Developers should be able to optimise the system early on in order to catch those early consumers. Sony has SO MANY developers, I'd hate to see them missing they're full potential next gen because of hardware complications. Pricing is also important too, but no where near as important as launch games & ease of development. Of course, that's all my opinion.

You hit the nail on the head there when it comes to games, 2 years to wait for any blockbuster games is atrocious, that's something they will never recover from this gen.

online that can match the 360 even if it has to be paid for

some exclusive mature rated SW that can match the features found from the 360 like gears and halo

make the fucking console easy for 3rd party devs to develop for, (most likely sonys next console will release after the next MS and even if they dont i have a feeling it will probably cost more) cant have people pay more for a game console and have multi plat games be inferior. when someone pays alot for something they want to have the right to brag that there product is superior

new controller design at least the shape

BHR-3 said: online that can match the 360 even if it has to be paid for ...It's close enough, I would rather keep it free. some exclusive mature rated SW that can match the features found from the 360 like gears and halo Seriously? The PS3 has more than enough of those types of games as it is. Since when was Halo "mature" anyway? If you are talking about system sellers and brand recognition then you have a point.

Find a magic lamp.

Jay520 said: The first thing they need to focus on is software. Price is important but people won't buy a a console with no games, no matter the price. That was the PS3's biggest problem. It didn't get any blockbuster, system-selling titles until 2008 with Metal Gear Solid 4. That was nearly two years after the console released. During which time, the Xbox 360 had exclusives like Halo 3, Gears of War, Mass Effect, Bioshock, along with superior with multiplats like Modern Warfare, Assassin's Creed, etc. Top it all off with a superior online system at the time and it's clear why the PS3 had such a terrible start. As long as the PS4 starts out the gate with some system-selling exclusives, it's going to do fine, well, better than the PS3 at least, regardless of price. The PS4's next biggest concern is it's ease of development. The PS3 was such a pain in the ass to develop for that a lot of the earlier games were down right atrocious on the system compared to the 360, nearly forcing gamers to buy the games on the superior console-the Xbox 360. Take a look at some of Sony's top developers and you can see that they are STILL learning the system. Regardless of how 'futuristic' this makes the Ps3 seem, this should not be the case. Developers should be able to get the most out of the console as early as possible. You have Xbox exclusives which more-or-less get the most out of the system early on. Games like Halo 3 & Gears of War spring to mind. Both of these games had modes like single-player, local multiplayer, online multiplayer, & co-op campaigns. Sure later iterations upped the graphics & other technicalties, but the earlier ones still really optimised the system to the point where the games had all these basic features. These are all system selling features which the PS3 lacked early on. Look at a franchise like Uncharted that didn't receive online until 2009 & didn't receive local Mp until 2011, you can blame this on the system's difficulty to develop for. Or look at a game like killzone 2. The game released nearly 3 years after the PS3 launch, yet still lacked standardised modes like offline multiplayer or campaign co-op. The series didn't see campaign co-op until 2011 with Killzone 3. And probably the biggest victom of the PS3's foreign architecture is Gran Turismo 5, Sony's biggest game. It didn't release until 2010, a whopping four years after the PS3's launch. How misfortunate. One can only imagine the HW boost this game would have caused if it released in the PS3's launch window. The Last Guardian is another example. The game has been in development for 4-6 years and we STILL don't know when it's releasing. The PS3's foreign architecture is a problem & Sony need not make this same mistake next gen One can only imagine how big the PS3 would be right now if Uncharted had online, or if Killzone 2 released a year or so earlier with local MP, or even if Gran Turismo 5 was released a few years sooner. I guarantee the PS3 would be a lot bigger. Now, maybe the problem isn't the PS3. Maybe it's Sony developers. Either way, Sony needs to get it's blockbusters out before the second half of the generation. Developers should be able to optimise the system early on in order to catch those early consumers. Sony has SO MANY developers, I'd hate to see them missing they're full potential next gen because of hardware complications. Pricing is also important too, but no where near as important as launch games & ease of development. Of course, that's all my opinion.

I completely agree with your point about they need better games earlier but I think I need to say a few things. I sincerely doubt The Last Guardian is being hindered by ps3s architecture, team ICO is very small and their games have always been fairly low budget and well it is true it is taking longer then their last game every new gen requires more content then the last but their team size didn't increase, so they need to do more work which means more time. Second ps3's architecture isn't just randomly hard to develop for the problem was very poor dev kits early on (due to the fact that the application for the technology was completely new) and they have made significant improvement too it and the devs are learning it, I think using the same architecture next gen is there best move due to the fact it's cheap for it's processing power, it will make ps3 BC alot easier and they should be able to improve the dev kit further and not have any problems with developers.

Kantor said: Andrespetmonkey said: Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that, Blu-ray also equals easy backwards compatibility :D Well, the PS3 plays DVDs like the PS2 did, and look how that turned out. Backwards compatibility is a lot more than just a matter of disc format. You have to emulate or replicate the entire system architecture.

Yes you do have to replicate the systems architecture but this can be done purely by software. Therefor making a PS3 emulator within the PS4 should only be a small task and with few expenses really.

kurasakiichimaru said: kitler53 said: sony is probably going to be a lot worse off next gen -- they should just give up. in today's market it is the software/services that are making money not the hardware. as long as sony still positions itself first and foremost as a hardware company that makes some software instead of a software company that also makes some hardware they are going to lose more and more ground as time marches on. This doesn't make sense at all. You're saying it as if they aren't making money off of software when it was software sales that kept them floating when they can't have any profit from the hardware. Sure, their main exclusives are not selling as well as Nintendo or MS but they aren't crawling on the dirt either.

also @rottingcorpse...

i might not of have been clear, i didn't mean games.  since we are talking about what the ps4 system what i meant was the software as a platform in the ps4: psn and the ps4 OS mostly.   from the psn outage blunder to their inability to find a way to implement key features like cross-game chat among many other things sony has shown an inability to push the interface of their platform.  as such MS is always going to be ahead of them and sony is always going to be playing catch up imo.  that's not a winning strategy.  games are important too but sales show that the market (ps2 and ps3 both) do not care much about sony's first party.  :/

rottingcorpse1 said: I completely agree with your point about they need better games earlier but I think I need to say a few things. I sincerely doubt The Last Guardian is being hindered by ps3s architecture, team ICO is very small and their games have always been fairly low budget and well it is true it is taking longer then their last game every new gen requires more content then the last but their team size didn't increase, so they need to do more work which means more time. Second ps3's architecture isn't just randomly hard to develop for the problem was very poor dev kits early on (due to the fact that the application for the technology was completely new) and they have made significant improvement too it and the devs are learning it, I think using the same architecture next gen is there best move due to the fact it's cheap for it's processing power, it will make ps3 BC alot easier and they should be able to improve the dev kit further and not have any problems with developers.

You're right about TLG, but I still think there are some external issues. This wait is just too long.

About the dev kits. Well I knew there was some problem with Sony getting their games out, and optimised, early. As long as they fix that problem, I'm fine.

Triggers will support the most popular genre on consoles, this will greatly improve their chances. $500 seems to be the sweetspot like this gen $400 was. Focus more on the us market to prevent Microsoft from getting critical mass adoption. Allow apps on the playstation network. Give more attention to BRIC country's.

Jay520 said: rottingcorpse1 said: I completely agree with your point about they need better games earlier but I think I need to say a few things. I sincerely doubt The Last Guardian is being hindered by ps3s architecture, team ICO is very small and their games have always been fairly low budget and well it is true it is taking longer then their last game every new gen requires more content then the last but their team size didn't increase, so they need to do more work which means more time. Second ps3's architecture isn't just randomly hard to develop for the problem was very poor dev kits early on (due to the fact that the application for the technology was completely new) and they have made significant improvement too it and the devs are learning it, I think using the same architecture next gen is there best move due to the fact it's cheap for it's processing power, it will make ps3 BC alot easier and they should be able to improve the dev kit further and not have any problems with developers. You're right about TLG, but I still think there are some external issues. This wait is just too long. About the dev kits. Well I knew there was some problem with Sony getting their games out, and optimised, early. As long as they fix that problem, I'm fine.

I think Sony just needs to give them more muscle if they want it done fast, and just have the muscle do simple grunt work to avoid from lowering the quality. If they use the Cell again it should be a little better then it is right now to develop for, which isn't exactly the extremely easy use that they went with the psv but it should be fine, and it has other advantages like ps3 BC (which I honestly don't think will work right without the cell, look at what ps2 BC on the ps3 took) and more processing power for a lower price.