Soapbox Saturday: Activision To Sony, You’re Bustin My Balls
Saturday 20 June 2009 @ 10:18 pm | By Sol 6 CommentsA flurry of web chatter surrounded Activision Blizzard CEO, Bobby Kotick, over comments he made towards Sony in an interview with the UK publication, Times Online. Bobby states, “they (Sony) have to cut the price, because if they don’t, the attach rates are likely to slow,” adding, “if we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony. When we look at 2010 and 2011, we might want to consider if we support the console — and the PSP too.” Sounds like a thinly veiled threat to me.
So the facts: Activision is a multi-platform developer and publisher of content. Sony has been resisting a PS3 price cut and has openly admitted they fumbled their worldwide launch, but has “no plans” for a reduction in the price of the PS3.
The problem: PS3 is expensive for consumers and exhorbantly expensive for developers. As someone who owns all 3 systems I generally say the Xbox360 is good for gaming online. The Wii, party machine when I have friends over and the PS3 when I want to play with myself…no wait. I mean if I have an RPG or FPS that has no online play (or I care to play online) I’m going with the PS3. It’s also great for Blu-ray movies.
Why did I want to use this week’s soapbox? Because it’s a utterly ridiculous and empty threat. Activision give me a break. I mean really? They are closely tied to Sony. With franchises like Guitar Hero, Tony Hawk or Call of Duty, stopping support of Sony is cutting off your nose to spite your face. I don’t think it is a wise decision for Sony to cut the price of their hardware. Whine all you want.
What would be a smarter (and more strategic) decision is if Sony reduced the cost of their development platform licenses. This approach has a pronged effect: producers can lower development costs thus increasing the PS3 game library, while also being able to learn the full technological capabilities of the system. Simply this translates to more games that look good because developers understand the system better.
I project the PS3 will stay the price it is for sometime. Live with it. Don’t agree with me? Tell me in the comments.
-Sound off-
*Editor’s note* Due to a technical snafu points at Sol this piece wasn’t published on Saturday in the AM as designed. In the future we’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again, our bad…
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There has been increasing talk of a price drop and some people are guessing it will be at TGS ‘09, right in time for the holiday season.
I wouldn’t be surprised if there is no price drop. I assume that Sony is still taking a loss for the US$400 PS3. I don’t think they’ll cut price until they can make a new, cheaper revision of the PS3. Hmm, a slim PSthree then?
Possibly. The PS3 is a boat anchor compared to the other consoles. And initial console hardware it usually the most expensive until a redesign, but it would take a major redesign to be a cost-cutting and smaller version. Not to mention if they make a slim one, lower the price, and the new units are defective a la Xbox red ring o’ death. New gamers will flip a lid. Sony tends to get the hardware right (although sometimes it isn’t user friendly), but consistently fail when they assume how willing people are to pay for it.
Personally, I held off on buying the PS2 until Sony released the Slim version and reduced the price.
My personal prediction: i will get a PS3 when some of these conditions are fullfiled:
-have a yearly income above US$8300
-live outside my parent’s house
-no one complains that i play for an hour or more
Until then, perhaps the PS4 will come out. And the PS3 might even be backwards compatible on the PS4 or similar…
Alright i will buy it sometime in 2 more years. That’s a more serious goal.
Despite how much I would love a price cut, they are already losing money as it is selling a ps3.
I do agree that lowering the cost for making games on the ps3 would be better, or just translate more games.
ps3 is still too rich for my blood even though i like what i’ve seen in it…
but i agree that Activision is kinda going a bit far and cant really afford to cut ties with sony