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Forums - Sony - Activision threatens to "stop supporting" Sony consoles.

BMaker11 on 19 June 2009
leo-j said:
mwjw696 said:
Cthulhu said:
Activision threatens to "stop supporting" Sony consoles

...k and sony is scared now..if i was Sony i would buy them and make them my bitches

All that is Activision now days is COD and GH, it would be foolish to turn their backs on 22m people


LOL you think broke ass Sony has the money to buy that kind of developer? Ha Sony could not afford to buy anyone at this point. Let alone drop the price of the PS3. I say let em go because they are going to be fucked if lower the price right now. Sure it would sell better but at what cost to Sony? You dont want to bankrupt that division. Think ill make a new post about my idea of why PS3 has the worst attach rate. Hmmmm yea I will.

Ofcourse because the MULTI BILLION dollar company known as SONY is absolutely broke

A multi billion dollar company with many MANY different divisions also....noy just Sony Computer Entertainment



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jcp234 on 19 June 2009
jahheim said:
@jcp and nj5: the question though is what other platforms would they put their investments towards that have higher ROI? On a big game, publishers spend $25-30mm on dev costs, $30mm marketing, and maybe $30mm inventory build (although the last is just a working cap issue), so after that point whether a game is breakeven or not and whether it is a "hit" or not is largely driven by how many units they sell (this is the video game business model). Yes they have to pay SNE some royalties but that's a variable cost. If they spend $60mm developing and marketing an FPS for example, other than 360 or PC where are they going to be able to sell the game at a premium $60 ASP? Wii premium pricing at $50 which doesnt hurt, but ATVI would never abandon potential sales to the PS3 install base unless MSFT or Nintendo was paying them for the exclusivity to make them whole or the incremental dev costs to port the game to PS3 wouldn't justify expected PS3 unit sales + royalties. I don't know for sure but my guess is that dev for PS3 and 360 is more similar than 360 and Wii given Wii's more limited hardware. this is why it doesnt make sense for bobby to leave ps3 - bc he is in the business of making money, not bc he can't

I cannot answer your question because I am not familiar with Activisions business model and/or project forecasts.

I do not work for Activision and I am not familiar with its overhead, project processes or relationship with Nintendo or Microsoft, but I do not think I need to know those details.

The CEO of the company is communicating to us (very boldy) that unless there is a change in the market, it is considering abandoning Sony platforms to pursue projects that will potentially have a higher return on investment.

This is not coming from a marketing puppet or even a deparment head...this is coming from the CEO. I think it's pretty pretentious for any of us to challenge his competence and strategies he considers implementing for Activision...I doubt if any of us currently secure the CEO position of a major company...or even work for Activision...so what basis does anyone have to challenge his statement?



I'm not a fanboy, I just try to tip the balance in favor of logic and common sense.

jahheim on 19 June 2009

SNE does have many different divisions, but if you look at them over the past 20 years or so, the playstation was the cyclical driver that always drove their bottom line to profitability.. not saying that has to be true going forward (and its looking pretty difficult for that to be the case at this point) but just food for thought



jahheim on 19 June 2009
jcp234 said:
jahheim said:
@jcp and nj5: the question though is what other platforms would they put their investments towards that have higher ROI? On a big game, publishers spend $25-30mm on dev costs, $30mm marketing, and maybe $30mm inventory build (although the last is just a working cap issue), so after that point whether a game is breakeven or not and whether it is a "hit" or not is largely driven by how many units they sell (this is the video game business model). Yes they have to pay SNE some royalties but that's a variable cost. If they spend $60mm developing and marketing an FPS for example, other than 360 or PC where are they going to be able to sell the game at a premium $60 ASP? Wii premium pricing at $50 which doesnt hurt, but ATVI would never abandon potential sales to the PS3 install base unless MSFT or Nintendo was paying them for the exclusivity to make them whole or the incremental dev costs to port the game to PS3 wouldn't justify expected PS3 unit sales + royalties. I don't know for sure but my guess is that dev for PS3 and 360 is more similar than 360 and Wii given Wii's more limited hardware. this is why it doesnt make sense for bobby to leave ps3 - bc he is in the business of making money, not bc he can't

I cannot answer your question because I am not familiar with Activisions business model and/or project forecasts.

I do not work for Activision and I am not familiar with its overhead, project processes or relationship with Nintendo or Microsoft, but I do not think I need to know those details.

The CEO of the company is communicating to us (very boldy) that unless there is a change in the market, it is considering abandoning Sony platforms to pursue projects that will potentially have a higher return on investment.

This is not coming from a marketing puppet or even a deparment head...this is coming from the CEO. I think it's pretty pretentious for any of us to challenge his competence and strategies he considers implementing for Activision...I doubt if any of us currently secure the CEO position of a major company...or even work for Activision...so what basis does anyone have to challenge his statement?

i dont think anyone is challenging the competence of the bobby kotick (except the person who did earlier on this thread) but it is a mistake to take everything at face value.  i think he is being a good and very competent (if not very aggressive) ceo by trying to use his negotiating leverage to make sne lower their ps3 price faster than they want to.  so i agree that he is very competent and knows how to run his business, i just think he's not doing it the way you think he is



NJ5 on 19 June 2009

The idea of Sony buying Activision is pure folly. We're talking about a company which has less than $10 billion in cash and now losing money, buying a company which is worth $16 billion in the stock market, and then presumably throwing away its most profitable parts.

The previous paragraph is a bigger reply than the idea deserves...



My Mario Kart Wii friend code: 2707-1866-0957

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FonzGemini on 19 June 2009

Well Im not a fan of CoD games so I wont miss out on much. I already have GH World Tour and I dont intend on buying all those other ones (Metallica, Smash Hits, Band Hero, etc.)...... So Im good



jahheim on 19 June 2009

sne buying atvi makes no sense bc of 1st party/3rd party conflict of interest



jcp234 on 19 June 2009
JEDE3 said:
jcp234 said:
JEDE3 said:
Face it jcp most people get it just not everyone is doom and gloom for sony

I never said it was gloom and doom for Sony. I would like for Sony to stay in the competition; however, you are not aware of Activision's business model.

The company may be able to produce a greater return on investment by reallocating funds from Sony platforms to other areas. My point is, it's not as black and white as some "overly enthusiastic" playstation fans make it seem.

I just think it's funny that some posters challenge the business competence of a CEO. lol When it seems most do not have a solid understanding of how businesses actually work.

The goal of a company is profit maximization...Sure, Activision makes money from its Sony platform projects, but who is to say Activision cannot make more money from investing those resources to other platforms? and projects?

If Activision believes it can achieve a sustainable greater return on investments by abandoning Sony platforms....what basis does anyone on these boards have to question it? Unless they are a member of the company.....which I doubt

 

 


Thebest they'd be able to do is make a new game for the 360. And that would probablly cost more than a Ps3 version of a CoD game. And do you think they think they can sell more copies of a new game on the 360 then a Ps3 version of CoD?

I am not aware of the production costs/overhead Activision would require to port a PS3 game; and I am not aware of how Activision would reallocate its resources if it did abandon Sony platforms...

But I think it is apparent that some developers are sending subtle hints to the market that maybe the PS3 needs cheaper development  costs and lower risks (which could be achieved by getting more consoles into the market).

For example, when mutiplatform titles release and the PS3 version is obviously inferior...I think it's evident that developers do not want to incur the additional resources required to create a product on par with the 360 version.



I'm not a fanboy, I just try to tip the balance in favor of logic and common sense.

jcp234 on 19 June 2009
jahheim said:
jcp234 said:
jahheim said:
@jcp and nj5: the question though is what other platforms would they put their investments towards that have higher ROI? On a big game, publishers spend $25-30mm on dev costs, $30mm marketing, and maybe $30mm inventory build (although the last is just a working cap issue), so after that point whether a game is breakeven or not and whether it is a "hit" or not is largely driven by how many units they sell (this is the video game business model). Yes they have to pay SNE some royalties but that's a variable cost. If they spend $60mm developing and marketing an FPS for example, other than 360 or PC where are they going to be able to sell the game at a premium $60 ASP? Wii premium pricing at $50 which doesnt hurt, but ATVI would never abandon potential sales to the PS3 install base unless MSFT or Nintendo was paying them for the exclusivity to make them whole or the incremental dev costs to port the game to PS3 wouldn't justify expected PS3 unit sales + royalties. I don't know for sure but my guess is that dev for PS3 and 360 is more similar than 360 and Wii given Wii's more limited hardware. this is why it doesnt make sense for bobby to leave ps3 - bc he is in the business of making money, not bc he can't

I cannot answer your question because I am not familiar with Activisions business model and/or project forecasts.

I do not work for Activision and I am not familiar with its overhead, project processes or relationship with Nintendo or Microsoft, but I do not think I need to know those details.

The CEO of the company is communicating to us (very boldy) that unless there is a change in the market, it is considering abandoning Sony platforms to pursue projects that will potentially have a higher return on investment.

This is not coming from a marketing puppet or even a deparment head...this is coming from the CEO. I think it's pretty pretentious for any of us to challenge his competence and strategies he considers implementing for Activision...I doubt if any of us currently secure the CEO position of a major company...or even work for Activision...so what basis does anyone have to challenge his statement?

i dont think anyone is challenging the competence of the bobby kotick (except the person who did earlier on this thread) but it is a mistake to take everything at face value.  i think he is being a good and very competent (if not very aggressive) ceo by trying to use his negotiating leverage to make sne lower their ps3 price faster than they want to.  so i agree that he is very competent and knows how to run his business, i just think he's not doing it the way you think he is

You are right, he could be bluffing and just trying to put a little pressure on Sony (which is MOST likely, I admit)...but some of these comments pertaining to the circumstances are just ridiculous....

For instance...the notion of Sony being able to buy Activision?

My participation in this thread is simply to point out that regardless of the CEO's true intentions..It's not totally out of the realm of possibility that if market conditions do not change...Activision may be able to engage more financially beneficial projects by exercising the option to abandon Sony platforms and allocating those resources elsewhere.



I'm not a fanboy, I just try to tip the balance in favor of logic and common sense.

jahheim on 19 June 2009

@jcp, i know you don't know the production costs/overhead of the publishers, but just thinking broadly about the major cost inputs, a publisher doesn't really free up that much resources by deciding not to port to a particular platform, and definitely not enough to create a new title (you're saying they're going to create 2x the games for the price of 1?). also which titles are you referring to that are inferior on the ps3?

in terms of resources, atvi has $3bn of cash and $0 debt, so its not exactly like they are constrained here - as you mentioned before companies are in the business of maximizing profits, and bobby is a competent ceo - if there was good use for that cash to earn a better return vs sitting on their balance sheet, wouldn't they have done it already? no need for them to get cute and cut porting to one platform to save some incremental porting costs..