I wonder how much profit Sony will make off of the new Super Slim PS3 model. Also would Sony products selling better in Japan help the situation? Why would currency being strong in one market be a bad thing for a company.

I just think that if Sony can get the Japanese market to buy more Sony products in Japan, wouldn't that help even with the terrible "Yen strength being bad".

The 380 million buyout of Gaikai is gonna show up for starters.

Oh, right, I forgot about that. I imagine that's going to take a piece out of their total.

It would help but that's a difficutlt thing to do with out spendeing a lot of money to start with (major ad campaigns, paying for exclusivity, etc...) and that's without even considering just how much it would really help.

Hey, I'm as optimistic as they come.  I believed in the Wii when everybody was dogging it, I grabbed a 360 when it didn't sell very well during its first year, I repeated that the PS3 would come into  its own after the initial slump, I said time and time again that the 3DS would be fine after its first Christmas, I bought a Dreamcast a week before Sega quit the console business, and I didn't sell my VIta, yet.  I think that the Wii U and next Xbox are going to be the only consoles on the market for a long time.  Sony will say that the PS3 still has untapped potential and, unlike the competition, there was no need to create a new console but I think that will be a smoke screen.

It's just something I believe, though.  I"ve been wrong before.

I wonder if Sony is making MORE off of PS3s in Japan now rather than 4-5 years ago. That's what I'd like to know. I thought that the weakening of the Yen would be good for EVERYONE OUTSIDE OF JAPAN as far as importing and what not. Is there or was there any signs of inflation in Japan going up because of this? I'd really like some understanding on this?

It's strengthening, not weakening.

It will be an interesting turn if Sony can keep the PS3 a viable platform that sells at least 7 to 8 million units a year for about 2 to 3 years after the Next Xbox and Wii U launch. Interesting because Sony could pitch to third parties that the PS3 has a stronger userbase than the new systems and it's a platform they have used countless times in the past.

Whereas with the Wii U and Xbox 720, there isn't much of a base yet. Games like The Last of Us, God of War: Ascension, Beyond: Two Souls and Potentially another PS3 Killzone will push hardware. Showing that third parties will have a safer time staying with the current generation of hardware, while Microsoft and Nintendo are pushing developers and publishers to jump to even more expensive hardware.

Can Sony pull that off, hell no. But it would be an interesting tactic if they could.

Middle ground. A massive tech push won't be cost efficent in the beginning and full-on innovation just isn't their style.