bdbdbd said: @senseinobaka: Sony does have new console and new handheld in R&D (and "improvements" to existing ones). I doubt they are going to give up. Sony wants to get back its investments, so they propably reuse as much as possible for PS4 from PS3 and next gen Sony will have a lot better strategy than this gen.

Sony's official party line is that there is no R&D on a PSP2 and that the PS3 is a 10 year cycle machine. Now to be fair, Nintendo has also denied a DS2, however their R&D budget is burining thru 100's of millions of dollars a year. Sony's gaming division has no reported increase in R&D spending. And from their own comments, especially, their said desire to make the gaming division profitable, it's really hard to imagine Sony bleeding more money on R&D at this point. I think sony will reuse alot of mature technology like Nintendo does (a comapany that has been profitable since it entered the gaming market), but I dont think they will have a strategy to match Nintendo next gen since they already have a very hefty head start in R&D.

Also, sony isnt making any feature additions to the PS3, if anything they have been removing functionality since E32005. You wouldnt believe how happy I am to have a 60GB launch system. As for the PSP, feature additions do come routinely, but these are simple changes that require no R&D, such as a newer screen.

NJ5 said: Your post would make sense, but I have two problems with it. I don't see Sony's game division doing any significant layoffs yet, and I still don't see that they'll become profitable with the measures done so far. Did I misunderstand anything?

I dont think you can really expect layoffs in the gaming division. The sony owned labor is at a higher level (management and executive). The manufacturing, game development, etc are all outsourced. So layoffs would come in the form of not extending or cutting corners on contracts, which they have done.  Also the measures sony has taken has improved their situation and as component prices come down the effect will be additive. But as someone mentioned earlier, being in the black is not profit, profit it making enough to be in the black, recoup all losses, and then some more.

 

So financial analysts say the PS3 is heading for a bumpy ride and is still losing a lot of cash and some people say that is promising?! You do realise losing money is bad right? Especially when your in your 3rd year when sales year to year are down a lot?

@senseinobaka: Official line may differ largely from reality. If there's no R&D for PSP2 or PS4, you can be quite sure there will be no such things.
Sony is propably aiming 2011-2012 for PS4 release, so if they don't have the R&D going already, they are going to be very late.

R&D isn't something you "just start when you need it", it's a continous process. PSP3000 required R&D, removing the BC from PS3 required R&D, PS3:s white colour required R&D, new power brick required R&D, cutting the power consumption required R&D and even the different bundles require R&D and the list goes on. If Sony didn't have R&D going for PS4 and PSP2, their R&D costs would be down a lot. Things don't "just happen" you know.

If game developement is outsourced, why does Sony own so many studios? If Sony has a large number of studios and all they have in the studios is executives, you can be damn sure that layoffs will happen, since all they'd do is pay for byrocracy for nothing (=high administrative costs).

Hyruken said: So financial analysts say the PS3 is heading for a bumpy ride and is still losing a lot of cash and some people say that is promising?! You do realise losing money is bad right? Especially when your in your 3rd year when sales year to year are down a lot?

Well see the thing is now the PS3 is up to where 360 sales were 6 moths ago. 360 sales jumped when they cut the price to Sub wii levels- big surprise. What's the bottom line? PS3 gets a price cut in 09 and then it will get a sales boost. They go back and forth and the truth is that they are selling pretty much equal over their lifetime. However Bluray and the cell means that PS3 has the tech to go against the 720. Who wants to bet that the 100-1000GB games of the future will be multiplat PS3/720 games. This is why they know they HAVE to kill of PS3- but they can't- even at half the price, even with a years headstart- they have what- a 7 million console lead?  And is MS still in the hole for 6 billion with the X-Box Brand, are they not about to lay off , what 100,000 employees?  And PS3 which ensured bluray won the format war which means the 720 will be using bluray drives (or what digital downloads? Some vaporware tech? Don't make me laugh might as well just stick with PC gaming). Which means that MS will be sucking at Sony's teet for the next 10 years+ and so will everyone else. It's already been confirmed that bluray is being adaped faster then DVD was and HD digital dowloads are not going to be a viable mass market option until fiber is the norm. So those who-lol- want PS3to die you should be get a grip. The PS3 won't last a year longer then 360, it will last mutiple years into the 720's lifespan 2-3 years after the 360 is dead in the water. Just look at the exclusive linup for next year. What does 360 have to go up againse Killzone 2, Uncharted 2 or God of war 3? 50 million doller GTA4 episodes? Alan "no gameplay footage" Wake? Metal Gear Solid 4 a year too late?

 

/thread

 

 

 

@Steroid: Sony is cutting 100k jobs? That's quite a lot considering the company employs about 150-200k if i recall. That would make Sony having about as much employees as M$, which has around 50k (Nintendo has 3k).

Next gen multiplats will propably be between 720, PS4 and N6, if the control methods can be ported without huge costs.

HD-DVD is and option too as the medium for the next gen consoles. Even that HD-DVD died from the market, the tech still exists and isn't much different from BD.
Anyway, i'm not going to start guessing the next gen medium for the consoles, even DVD is a possibility, since storage space isn't going to be an issue, the costs of making the game is. More data equals more costs.

Steroid said: Hyruken said: So financial analysts say the PS3 is heading for a bumpy ride and is still losing a lot of cash and some people say that is promising?! You do realise losing money is bad right? Especially when your in your 3rd year when sales year to year are down a lot? (1)Well see the thing is now the PS3 is up to where 360 sales were 6 moths ago. 360 sales jumped when they cut the price to Sub wii levels- big surprise. What's the bottom line? PS3 gets a price cut in 09 and then it will get a sales boost. They go back and forth and the truth is that they are selling pretty much equal over their lifetime. However Bluray and the cell means that PS3 has the tech to go against the 720. (2)Who wants to bet that the 100-1000GB games of the future will be multiplat PS3/720 games. This is why they know they HAVE to kill of PS3- but they can't- even at half the price, even with a years headstart- they have what- a 7 million console lead? (3)And is MS still in the hole for 6 billion with the X-Box Brand, are they not about to lay off , what 100,000 employees?  And PS3 which ensured bluray won the format war which means the 720 will be using bluray drives (or what digital downloads? Some vaporware tech? Don't make me laugh might as well just stick with PC gaming). (4)Which means that MS will be sucking at Sony's teet for the next 10 years+ and so will everyone else. It's already been confirmed that bluray is being adaped faster then DVD was and HD digital dowloads are not going to be a viable mass market option until fiber is the norm. (5)So those who-lol- want PS3to die you should be get a grip. The PS3 won't last a year longer then 360, it will last mutiple years into the 720's lifespan 2-3 years after the 360 is dead in the water. Just look at the exclusive linup for next year. What does 360 have to go up againse Killzone 2, Uncharted 2 or God of war 3? 50 million doller GTA4 episodes? Alan "no gameplay footage" Wake? Metal Gear Solid 4 a year too late?   /thread

Okay, before I say anything - I hate it when people say /thread, as generally - they've just made the thread a lot worse.

On to the reply.

1) Sony has said several times that there will be no price cut in the first half of 09. I trust them on that (most people don't). There might be one in the second half, but how much it will beat the 360 with is very doubtful (almost certainly not as much as the 360 has been > the Ps3 with lately). Now, I agree with the 2 consoles selling about equal in the end though.

About the Ps3 going up against the next Xbox - no way. To go up against the next Xbox, it would have to sell like the Ps2 did (after the next gen starts), which definitely won't happen (unless you expect Ps3 to sell more in year 7 than year 2...)

2) Microsoft wants to put themselves in the place as the main HD console. Sony wants to do the same thing, but they're in a HUGE mess, and are (currently) unable to place any major punches.

3) Nice number you got there. 17% of 90,000 equals 100,000, eh? You're a genious I see :P. Sony did the same thing not too long ago - and lots of companies have. The recession is to blame for this, not the Xbox brand. Also, I very much doubt the Ps3 was what ensured the format wars - the BluRay was superior in every way. And the 6B gap that Microsoft is in, isn't Sony right now down slightly below 4M for the Ps3? That's a far, far worse blow for them.

4) Well, duh! Of course Blu-Ray is being adopted quicker than the DVD. Everything gets adopted quicker nowadays (in electronics)

5) Even if the Ps3 lasts 2-3 years longer than the X360, those years will be very minor, and probably total out just slightly above what the 360 did in its first year (~ 6M)

And oh, what will counter those masterous titles you just posted? Surely, the X360 has no good games whatsoever! Seriously, you posted 3 games - none of which will break 5M (heck, 3M might be a strech for some).

 

So overall, I feel that your post has some information, but that it is being used incorrectly. You draw conclusions that favour the Ps3 unrealistically much.

(I might sound very pro X360 and anti Ps3 in this post, but that is because I find Steroid's post so ridiculously pro the Ps3. Sorry for sounding anti Ps3).

 

Steroid said: Hyruken said: So financial analysts say the PS3 is heading for a bumpy ride and is still losing a lot of cash and some people say that is promising?! You do realise losing money is bad right? Especially when your in your 3rd year when sales year to year are down a lot? Well see the thing is now the PS3 is up to where 360 sales were 6 moths ago. 360 sales jumped when they cut the price to Sub wii levels- big surprise. What's the bottom line? PS3 gets a price cut in 09 and then it will get a sales boost. They go back and forth and the truth is that they are selling pretty much equal over their lifetime. However Bluray and the cell means that PS3 has the tech to go against the 720. Who wants to bet that the 100-1000GB games of the future will be multiplat PS3/720 games. This is why they know they HAVE to kill of PS3- but they can't- even at half the price, even with a years headstart- they have what- a 7 million console lead?  And is MS still in the hole for 6 billion with the X-Box Brand, are they not about to lay off , what 100,000 employees?  And PS3 which ensured bluray won the format war which means the 720 will be using bluray drives (or what digital downloads? Some vaporware tech? Don't make me laugh might as well just stick with PC gaming). Which means that MS will be sucking at Sony's teet for the next 10 years+ and so will everyone else. It's already been confirmed that bluray is being adaped faster then DVD was and HD digital dowloads are not going to be a viable mass market option until fiber is the norm. So those who-lol- want PS3to die you should be get a grip. The PS3 won't last a year longer then 360, it will last mutiple years into the 720's lifespan 2-3 years after the 360 is dead in the water. Just look at the exclusive linup for next year. What does 360 have to go up againse Killzone 2, Uncharted 2 or God of war 3? 50 million doller GTA4 episodes? Alan "no gameplay footage" Wake? Metal Gear Solid 4 a year too late?   /thread

That was a pretty charged up reply. But you clearly missed some facts here and made up some of your own.. SONY is still losing money on the ps3 (around $50 atleast according to estimates), that doesnt lead to a very strong possibility for a massive price cut..maybe a small one but a $100 cut looks unlikely, especially with the fact that SONY has bled off around 5billion in recent times. A $50 cut for a $399-499 console isnt a massive cut and isnt likely to bolster much. m$ dont have to worry about killing off SONY, which is pretty much nutered into third place.. it has been the console leader since the last 15 yrs by a wide margin..the 360 has already done its job,partly made easier by the high price the ps3 is tagged at.

Why would the 720 need to use bluray? dreamcast used GDROMS, nintendo always uses proprietory disc technology. Its never been about disc space/format. Thats just something videogame companies make you wanna believe.

As beautiful as sucking on SONY's "teet" sounds..no one is doing that but fanboys. Your insight on the 360's lifespan is interesting. Why would M$ kill off the 360 when it is finally profitable and selling well. The original xbox had a shorter lifespan cause M$ had payment disputes with nvidia which was bleeding them- m$ have lost a shit load of cash on the xbox brand.. but here is the big BUT.. they can afford to.. they have 10 times more money than SONY does. And ultimately this was what this thread was about.. finances.. and not some fantasy hogwash..

 

/thread

@Arsenicazure: Famicom Disc System and 64DD had proprietary discs if i recall, but GC and Wii doesn't. Wii uses standard 12cm DVD and GC used standard 8cm mini DVD (as their tech). What's proprietary, is the DRM, copy protection and the disc being compressed "reversed".

senseinobaka said: NJ5 said: Your post would make sense, but I have two problems with it. I don't see Sony's game division doing any significant layoffs yet, and I still don't see that they'll become profitable with the measures done so far. Did I misunderstand anything? I dont think you can really expect layoffs in the gaming division. The sony owned labor is at a higher level (management and executive). The manufacturing, game development, etc are all outsourced. So layoffs would come in the form of not extending or cutting corners on contracts, which they have done.  Also the measures sony has taken has improved their situation and as component prices come down the effect will be additive. But as someone mentioned earlier, being in the black is not profit, profit it making enough to be in the black, recoup all losses, and then some more.

That's not true. Sony does a lot of game development, in fact they have more employees than Nintendo. 1900 at SCEE and 1200 in Japan, can't find data for SCEA but surely it puts it above Nintendo's 3800 employees.

 

@bdbdbd

Would you classify it as a DVD disc if it were non readable in a DVD ROM drive?