Sony's temporary answer for the Wii U

[hypernova]

More expensive?

Sony has revealed a new design for the PS3.  Non-adopters until now can rejoice!  It's more expensive than the current cheapest model!  Wait...what?  More expensive?

The selling point is the HDD capacity and lighter weight/smaller size.  I don't know about the rest of you, but it seems to me that once you get in the late stages of a console's lifetime, the HDD size would be less of an issue, unless you like to catch up on a large backlog of games.  Am I the only one who thinks that way?  I would've thought they kept the HDDs the same size and just dropped the prices (along with the size and weight, of course).  Or at least not raise the price while slightly enlarging the capacity.  Instead they choose to make a 6 year old console barely cheaper than the soon-to-be Wii U.  Sure the Wii U will have next to no HDD space, but from what I've read it will be USB HDD compatible, so heck, maybe you could add one on that you already have and forgo the expense of another one.  Whether that actually happens I'm still a tad skeptical.

Granted, I'm no expert, but maybe they're compensating for movies and shows and hoping you'll keep the PS3 for years to come.  But it just seems a little odd to go this route so late in the game, and then to top it off by raising the price.  Heck...maybe most people won't notice or care.

[pinballjim]

Man, I gotta say... the PS3 is a real turd of a system.  If it didn't play BluRays I would have sold it at least a year ago.  It's not even that great of a BluRay player - takes forever to fire up and then you have to manually shut it down.  It'll grind that drive motor away for weeks if you forget.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Uncharted 2 and 3.  If I didn't have a RGHed 360 in the house I'd probably sing the praises of the system but it's just an overall meh.

[Samstag]

Hey, just what we've all been asking for.  Same console, same price, but 200% more ugly!

[Howard_Casto]

I never have got how Sony has become as successful as they have.   I get Microsoft, they came out with affordable hardware that was still fairly state-of-the-art as well as basically re-inventing online gaming.  I obviously get Nintendo as well.  They have this HUGE ip catalog that keeps them afloat even in the bad times and even though people don't always like what they come up with, they are always trying something new in an attempt to keep the gaming experience fresh. 

So what does Sony bring to the table?  I'm not flaming, I'm genuinely asking. 

I mean I get what got them their initial start.... the n64 decided to go cart-based and the psx didn't.  Personally I feel that Nintendo made the right call on that one.  The load times on many of the popular playstation games were just awful and the only benefit the extra capacity seemed to ever add were fmv and higher-res textures, which looked awful anyway thanks to the psx's crappy 3d hardware.  But I do understand how people could see it the other way and jump to team sony. 

Then the Ps2 comes out.... ok I get it, the gamecube looks goofy and has an admittedly goofy controller and this new "microsoft xbox" is an unproven console by an unproven brand.  So I can see SOME of team sony remaining loyal throughout that whole generation.

But this generation, I just don't see why anyone could remain loyal to that company.  The 360 comes out of the gate swinging and it's a hit.  Improves every aspect of the xbox classic that needed fixed and everybody pretty much loves it.  The Wii comes out alongside the ps3.  Keep in mind that at this point most "serious gamers" already have a 360.  The Wii offers soemthing completely new, it's a bit scary but the thing only costs 250 bucks and it comes with a free game.  The thing becomes  a runaway hit.  Ps3 is released around the same time.  It offers absolutely nothing new.  It claims to have better graphics than the 360, but all of the launch titles look as good or worse than the 360 games.  Oh and the thing is 600 bucks.  Wait what? Now thankfully common sense prevailed and that holiday season the ps3 didn't sell all too well. 

My question is why did it ever recover?   I honestly don't get how they've improved anything other than getting the price down to a slightly more reasonable level.

I mean don't get me wrong, Sony has some exclusive titles, but not a lot.  You've got Metal Gear, which is slowly but surely migrating to other consoles anyway.  Uncharted which is fairly new.  Final Fantasy, which even by FF fan standards has admittedly hit a rut and God of War, which is "cloned" in countless games across all three systems. 

So what is the draw?  Is it like that whole iphone 5 thing... where you "have" to get one even though the iphone 4 (not to mention 3 and 2 and to a degree 1) is just fine because "it is one newer"?

[shponglefan]

Blu-Ray was a big part of it.  While it did add considerably to the cost of the PS3, it helped Sony win the high-def format war.

As for the prior generations, the success of the PSX and PS2 was mainly built on games.  Simply put, they had the best game libraries.  Generally the system with the best games will win that generation's console war.  Although Nintendo seems to have bucked that trend with the Wii.

[SavannahLion]

Blu-Ray was a big part of it.  While it did add considerably to the cost of the PS3, it helped Sony win the high-def format war.

As for the prior generations, the success of the PSX and PS2 was mainly built on games.  Simply put, they had the best game libraries.  Generally the system with the best games will win that generation's console war.  Although Nintendo seems to have bucked that trend with the Wii.

+1 on this.

You gotta remember, at the time PS3 came out, Bluray was still a relatively new format and those players were expensive. With the PS3 swooping in at that price point and being able to play games was a major selling point.

Part of the extended life Sony gave their PSx and PS2 is due to their reducing their licensing fees towards the end of those consoles. Remember those craptastic games like Parapa the Rapper? They are a direct result of the reduced licensing fees and the sudden explosion of games for the PSx at the end of the lifecycle (it happened with the PS2, but it doesn't seem as obvious).

The lack of a price reduction is indeed puzzling though. It doesn't take half a brain to know when console companies release a new console version, they're reducing their costs in some fashion. They all do it. But for Sony to announce a new console design and not reduce the price? Either they're being overly greedy and confident for their console or one of the engineers dropped the ball and they're using new (as in more expensive) parts to produce the console.

[danny_galaga]

Also, PS3 has a lower break down rate than the 360. Out of those two, I would get the PS3 just for that fact alone, given that the games that tend to catch my eye on are on both...

[ChadTower]

Most people I know with a PS3, granted this is a sample of adults, bought the PS3 "because I want a Blu Ray player anyway".  Few of them actually use the thing for much other than media.

[Necroticart]

Honestly Sony has always offered quality games which are all exclusive same as Nintendo but on the other hand Microsoft has a real lack of exclusive titles the only ones memorable are Gears of War and the Halo franchise

[DaveMMR]

Most people I know with a PS3, granted this is a sample of adults, bought the PS3 "because I want a Blu Ray player anyway".  Few of them actually use the thing for much other than media.

Yup, hand raised over here on that one. But I do enjoy the console so no regrets on it.

So what does Sony bring to the table?  I'm not flaming, I'm genuinely asking. 

With the PSX and PS2, Sony simply had a great library of games for all types of players that were also inexpensive (especially when they're a few years old). Sony was basically the replacement for Sega: an alternative to the more 'family-friendly' fare over on Nintendo (but not like Sega with the useless add-ons and market oversatuation with complete different hardware products being on sale at the same time).

And here's a realization I came to - but this is more personal: how you feel about Sony is how I feel about Microsoft and their Xbox/Xbox 360 consoles. For whatever reason, I always felt those consoles lacked any 'personality' or standout titles (not a hardcore Halo fan). I'm thinking it has more to do with the cultural differences; Japanese culture to some of us westerners always had that quirky charm that Xbox, as an American made system, seems to lack. Plus Sony has some IPs that are somewhat amusing ('Sackboy', 'Ratchet & Clank', 'Drake'). Basically what Necroticart said.

I didn't say the above to start a fanboy war BTW. People come to me for console buying advice and I do direct them to Microsoft's console more often than Sony's based on what they're looking for.

As an aside: I wonder if there's some "Third Console Curse". Think about it: N64 was Nintendo's third home console and first real defeat. Ditto for the Sega and their Saturn (although that was more a spectacular failure in the states). Sony's third console is also struggling even when it seemed easy enough to build off the PS2 momentum (this was before any price announcements of course).

That all being said, Sony has some great titles but just can't seem to be competitive this go-around. The hardware's impressive but they can't get it to the consumer at an attractive price.

[pinballjim]

Japanese culture to some of us westerners always had that quirky charm

Really?  I think they're treacherous perverts.

[hypernova]

But this generation, I just don't see why anyone could remain loyal to [Sony].  The 360 comes out of the gate swinging and it's a hit.

Microsoft's very public hardware issues certainly had a hand in some people picking PS3 over 360.

Final Fantasy is no longer PS exclusive, either.  360 had FF13.  (Which ended up sucking no matter what console you have!)

[Well Fed Games]

[Howard_Casto]

Well Sony having a "great library of games" is certainly subjective.  I can count the sony exclusive titles that I actually enjoyed, much less found to be "must have" titles on my one hand.  Mind you microsoft doesn't have any exclusives worth having either, but Microsoft didn't ask you to pay 600 bucks for their console.  And in the xbox classic generation, the xbox had the superior hardware without a cost increase so I bought it. 

I would say 95% of what I play on the 360 are multi-platform titles.  If I had a PS3, it would be the same.  Honestly the only sony exclusive title I ever fell in love with was twisted metal II on the psx.  All the subsequent sequels were complete crap though so my love affair soon ended. 

Nintendo, IMHO is the only company that has ever had exclusives worth buying a system for, and that goes back to the sega days. 

The thing about bluray players being expensive at the time is a bit of a myth as well.  I'm guessing it was propigated by sony themselves to sell the console.  I've got a very good samsung player sitting in the living room that was bought around when the ps3 came out.  I think we paid around 110-120 for it?  Something like that?  Mind you it was on sale, but I didn't go camping out in the cold or anything... I just saw the sale in the paper and went "cool I'll pick that up this week" and it was still there when I finally got around to it.  I mean yeah it might seem like you are saving money, but when the console is 200 bucks higher than the other you really aren't.  What you are getting instead is one of those horrible combo devices.  As pbj said, the ps3 isn't real good as a bluray player to begin with.  Even if it was a savings then I would rather get two dedicated devices that did their jobs well.

Now that certainly explains Sony's success in Japan though.... space is at a premium over there and combining two appliances into one makes a lot more sense. 

Anyway thanks for the info... I think I'm just going to have to come to the conslusion that Sony consumers are just wierd.


Dave:

I don't think there is anything to the "third console curse"  The N64 certainly didn't sell as well as the psx, but Nintendo made a buttload of money off of the N64, so it wasn't exactly a failure.  Yeah the Saturn was a failure, but so was the 32x, the Cd, and the Dreamcast.  Sega was really a one hit wonder of a company in terms of hardware, even though sega fans fail to see it that way. 

Again, this is just me and it should be apparent that this point that I don't care for sony and it's consoles at all, but I think this was the first release on equal footing.  Nintendo is always going off and doing it's own thing, so there isn't as much straight competition with them.  So sony was essentially unopposed for the ps1 era, and had unproven opposition in the ps2 era.  Now that the xbox 360 has finally caught on they finally had equal competition, but I get the feeling that as a company they felt that they had been competative all along when really they haven't.  They offered a product nobody else did until recently.  Wait.... that might be my answer right there.

[yotsuya]

Japanese culture to some of us westerners always had that quirky charm

Really?  I think they're treacherous perverts.

Says the guy with the rapey bartop!

[shponglefan]

Well Sony having a "great library of games" is certainly subjective.

Not for the PSX and PS2 generations.  They had the largest library of titles and therefore a greater number of higher rated games, based on aggregate review scores.  Again, that's basically why they won those console wars.
 
For the current generation, they are on par with the 360, but largely due the sheer number of overlap.  The Wii remains the console with the lower-ranked titles, but more exlusives though.

Nintendo, IMHO is the only company that has ever had exclusives worth buying a system for, and that goes back to the sega days. 

Depends on what games you are interested in.  For example, JRPG fans flocked to the PSX and PS2 because the largest bulk of those games were on those systems, including the venerable Final Fantasy series.

The thing about bluray players being expensive at the time is a bit of a myth as well.

When they initially came out they were expensive.  I recall ~$400 being the entry point at the time.   And a lot of them had teething issues to boot, which is another reason the PS3 did well.  It was considered for awhile to be one of the best Blu Ray players.

[DaveMMR]

The N64 certainly didn't sell as well as the psx, but Nintendo made a buttload of money off of the N64, so it wasn't exactly a failure.  Yeah the Saturn was a failure, but so was the 32x, the Cd, and the Dreamcast.  Sega was really a one hit wonder of a company in terms of hardware, even though sega fans fail to see it that way. 

Compared to their runaway success during the 8 and 16 bit generations, yes the 64 was a disappointment. It was their first "lose" in the console wars.  Also consider they lost a lot of their successful and previously loyal third parties. Square jumped-ship completely while Capcom and Konami focused most of their attention on the PSX. The most memorable N64 games were first party releases and maybe some Rare titles. I love Nintendo but, realistically, the N64 was not their finest hour.

However, they still did finish second out of three considering the Saturn was dead in the water in the US. And Nintendo typically sells their hardware at profit so they're still making the money (not to mention that sweet Gameboy and Pokeman cash-machines they had churning). So yeah, it was not a dismal failure. But considering their third entry is the one seeing Nintendo falling the farthest off the pedestal, I have no reservations calling the N64 the low point of console releases.

As for Sega: I don't really count the 32X and Sega/Mega CD as "separate consoles". They didn't work without a Genesis and, ergo, were very sophisticated add-ons. And yeah, while a one-hit wonder, Sega still had some momentum they just completely blew. Better marketing and pricing would definitely have made the Saturn a contender. But they stumbled harinterestingut of the gate never to recover.

And finally, take that "third console curse" with a healthy grain of salt. You can stretch the definition infinitely in either direction to prove or disprove it. I certainly did, considering I didn't count Sega's non-US released SG-1000. It was just a somewhat fun parallel to what Sony is going through now with their third entry.     

[Howard_Casto]

Well I'm not going by personal feelings on this one, I'm just going by what the guys at Nintendo said.  Iwata and others in countless interviews have said that the N64 did astoundingly well.  It's just that the psx did even better.  You've got to remember, Nintendo made the console and all the accessories, they owned the cart factories so the companies had to pay them just to get their game manufactured, and on top of that there was a royalty.  And it isn't really that those companies jumped ship, it's just that nintendo had a new policy that said "we are going to try to make 3d games" and those companies weren't ready.  Anybody who's ever played Castlevania 64 or the psx megaman fps can attest to that. 

Nintendo says that the Gamecube days were it's darkest hour.  Yeah the NGC sold really well, probably as good as the n64 if not better, but they had invested a lot of money in it to make it competative horsepower-wise with the ps2 and upcoming xbox.  So they didn't make nearly as much profit.  This is what lead to their current strat btw.  So it isn't about sales, it's about profit per-unit. 


Yeah that's what I was getting at with Sega.... basically they did really well with the Genesis/MegaDrive and that was it.  The Mastersystem wasn't a complete embarrassment, the sgc-1000 wasn't even on the radar and everything else with maybe the exception of the dreamcast was a colossal flop.  Can't really judge the DC because by the time sega released it they were bleeding so much money that they pulled the plug before the console wars even started.

[shponglefan]

Nintendo says that the Gamecube days were it's darkest hour.

So are they just pretending the Virtual Boy never happened?

[Mysterioii]

Nintendo says that the Gamecube days were it's darkest hour.

So are they just pretending the Virtual Boy never happened?

I don't think it even qualifies for "darkest hour".  Darkest eight minutes maybe...

[Mysterioii]

Japanese culture to some of us westerners always had that quirky charm

Really?  I think they're treacherous perverts.

I think the pervert thing is part of the charm.  Ah, sweet sweet fan service...   

[Yenome]

yea i dont get the whole omg look its a new model ps3. then again the ps2 had like 12 models go fig. To me i play more exclusive titles that are on the ps3 than xbox360. plus again sony made the smart choice and choose the right media that would win out the media wars. I had seen a video that claimed the xbox360 wasnt really doing 1080p. that it was just 720p upscaled but hell half the time i cant tell anyway. I have all the systems at my disposal but mostly buy for ps3. It is also my opinion that xbox has the better controller design. after playing on the xbox for a while its hard for me to play the same title on ps3. wish i could get a xbox360 controller that worked on the ps3. and not those lame ass ps3 controllers that clone the xbox360 layout so poorly. course all the systems are collecting dust as im too busy playing mechwarrior online.

[ChadTower]

Nintendo says that the Gamecube days were it's darkest hour.

So are they just pretending the Virtual Boy never happened?

Nintendo never planned for the VB to be a primary product.  The VB was a side project of one of their top people that they threw out there to see what might happen.  Really, the VB gets an undeserved rep, IMO.  It's fun and different than anything else.  The only major problem with it was the tripod.

[DaveMMR]

Well I'm not going by personal feelings on this one, I'm just going by what the guys at Nintendo said.  Iwata and others in countless interviews have said that the N64 did astoundingly well.  It's just that the psx did even better.  You've got to remember, Nintendo made the console and all the accessories, they owned the cart factories so the companies had to pay them just to get their game manufactured, and on top of that there was a royalty.  And it isn't really that those companies jumped ship, it's just that nintendo had a new policy that said "we are going to try to make 3d games" and those companies weren't ready.  Anybody who's ever played Castlevania 64 or the psx megaman fps can attest to that. 

Nintendo says that the Gamecube days were it's darkest hour.  Yeah the NGC sold really well, probably as good as the n64 if not better, but they had invested a lot of money in it to make it competative horsepower-wise with the ps2 and upcoming xbox.  So they didn't make nearly as much profit.  This is what lead to their current strat btw.  So it isn't about sales, it's about profit per-unit. 

Fair enough. I was comparing the quality of the N64 as a console to the previous two consoles (especially the SNES) from a gamer's perspective. But yeah, sales-wise, Nintendo wasn't hurting at all. And even though the Gamecube was their least profitable console, I thought it was a much better system. Though it did have the worst Mario 3D game...

Though I don't think the companies were unwilling to make their games 3D. Everyone did. You can count off the number of PSX 2D titles on one hand. It's the reason you couldn't find a game like "Castlevania: Symphony of the Night" in stores as everyone assumed sidescrollers were out of style. And for every good game like "Mario 64", we had dozens like "Contra: Legacy of War" or "Bubsy 3D" that unwisely went into the third dimension. I really never liked that whole generation (save for a handful of exceptional games, of course) - which is why I look towards the N64 as the low point.   

Yeah that's what I was getting at with Sega.... basically they did really well with the Genesis/MegaDrive and that was it.  The Mastersystem wasn't a complete embarrassment, the sgc-1000 wasn't even on the radar and everything else with maybe the exception of the dreamcast was a colossal flop.  Can't really judge the DC because by the time sega released it they were bleeding so much money that they pulled the plug before the console wars even started.

Sega made great games (YMMV) but they couldn't market a console for crap. You can forgive them for the Sega/Mega CD as the industry was CD-ROM gaga at the time. But there was no reason for the 32X. And they botched the launch of the Saturn. And instead of just riding out the current generation, they released the Dreamcast at an awkward time when people were heavily invested in their PSX/N64 and there was the PS2 right around the corner.

[ChadTower]

You can count off the number of PSX 2D titles on one hand.

But it would take all afternoon to count off the number of failed, crappy, nearly unplayable PSX 3D titles.  The PSX has a huge library of bad 3D games.  Even a lot of the good ones were good despite the way the 3D was implemented.  Resident Evil comes to mind here.  Try playing the original now.  The actual gameplay is awful.

[Howard_Casto]

Yup and that's what I was getting at.  Back in the N64 days nintendo still did "quality control" and by that I mean if they didn't like how your game was turning out they wouldn't publish it until you fixed the issues they had with it.  The PSX had little to no quality control and it shows by the 15 barely even playable games to their one quality game.  Now developers complained to no end and Nintendo eventually fully dropped this practice, and this is why you get tons of shovelware, even on Nintendo consoles now. 

Don't misunderstand the N64 library was much much smaller than the psx, but then again a larger portion of n64 games were of good to high quality.  The n64 has a place in my heart because with a few glaring exceptions (cough cough superman 64) it was the most shovelware free console of all time.  If you didn't like the n64 library I can only assume you didn't fully explore it.  You could pick some random bargain bin cart out of a hat, pop it in and odds are it would at least be pretty fun.   

Now to me, and this is just to me, the psx was the start of bad habits in the gaming industry that still go on to this day.  Using videos to supplement a sub-par game, bad camera angles on 3d, using fancy graphics (in the case of the psx hi-res textures) to hide the fact that levels are poorly designed ect...  All of that came out of the sony console camp.  I'm not saying that sony is responsible, far from it, but they created an environment in which such games could exist.  It's kind of like building a casino in the middle of town and not expecting crime to follow.

Sega didn't really make great games, or at least they didn't make great console games.  75% of what they released was ports of their arcade hits, which is great, but their console specific titles were always rather lack-luster.  Most of their titles, like Nintendo's was third party.  Unfortuantely they usually got Nintendo ports as well, and Nintendo had the better hardware.  The genesis certainly had it's hits, but nearly every title on the scg and mastersystem was crap.  The 32x merely sported some rather terrible ports of more arcade hits and the cd... well it was just awful due to inferior hardware more than anything else.  It did a lot of pc ports, the only problem was the console just wasn't powerful enough to run them, so they looked awful.  Also a ton of FMV games, and those are always awful.

As for the Virtual Boy, it's a misconception that they lost any money on that one.  As the others said, it was a side project.  Much like Sega with the DC, they actually pulled the plug on the Vboy before it even got started when their projections said it wasn't going to turn much of a profit.  So yeah, they actually made money on the vboy!

I'll have to disagree with chad though... the thing has one huge problem.... namely the red display.  Black and white, green, blue... all of these colors are easier on the eyes, and yet the chose to make the screen a bright red.  It was so hurtful to the eyes that the games actually had an auto-pause feature to make to stop playing every 15 minutes!
That being said, all of the vboy games are fun and worth playing.  Just do it on an emulator so you won't kill yourself. 

[shponglefan]

Sega made great games (YMMV) but they couldn't market a console for crap. You can forgive them for the Sega/Mega CD as the industry was CD-ROM gaga at the time. But there was no reason for the 32X. And they botched the launch of the Saturn. And instead of just riding out the current generation, they released the Dreamcast at an awkward time when people were heavily invested in their PSX/N64 and there was the PS2 right around the corner.

Yeah, Sega seemed overly confused at the time as to what they were trying to do.  It makes me wonder what might have happened if they jumped straight from the Genesis to the Saturn or Dreamcast, and skipped all the crap.

[northerngames]

yeah sony should be saving the time money and effort on the next gen conosle not another of the same.

so when the wii U comes out and I have a choice to buy the new wii U or I sell the ps3 I already have so I can turn around and buy the same for more?

like other's already stated it is way to late in the game for that sony as most already have a ps3 by now.

the only thing that kept sony going in this gen to me was it won the HD media war with the blue ray over the HD DVD.

that and they had MGS4 and GTA to back them for the people that did not care about blue ray but expected the best games they played prior to be even more amazing.

so for me if it was the winning of the HD media race and the two exlusive's that held sony afloat otherwise they probably would have been shut out at launch from microsoft if they M$ also had the blue ray and gta4 at launch.

really why would one want the ps3 at launch if there was no blue ray or MGS4 and GTA4.

what's even worse is GTA4 was and is the worst GTA made IMHO I replayed the other's many times and still had fun, never had in the interest to even play the 4rth for more then a hour or two and decided this games is just retarted..

[DaveMMR]

You can count off the number of PSX 2D titles on one hand.

But it would take all afternoon to count off the number of failed, crappy, nearly unplayable PSX 3D titles.  The PSX has a huge library of bad 3D games.  Even a lot of the good ones were good despite the way the 3D was implemented.  Resident Evil comes to mind here.  Try playing the original now.  The actual gameplay is awful.

Heh, it's no surprise that my current PSX collection is embarrassingly small. It's not that I can't find games. It's just I see a bunch of Playstation titles in some garage sale or thrift store and I don't even want to take the time to take the dollar bill out of my pocket to pay for it. And as you said, the good ones aged very, very poorly.

Don't misunderstand the N64 library was much much smaller than the psx, but then again a larger portion of n64 games were of good to high quality.  The n64 has a place in my heart because with a few glaring exceptions (cough cough superman 64) it was the most shovelware free console of all time.  If you didn't like the n64 library I can only assume you didn't fully explore it.  You could pick some random bargain bin cart out of a hat, pop it in and odds are it would at least be pretty fun.   

I think what kept a lot of N64 titles elusive for me was the price tag (many of my current carts were actually from Blockbuster clearance, etc.) Star Fox 64 was released at $80 or something (though it came with a Rumble Pak) for cripes sake! Even the "Million Seller" titles were still $40. Part of PSX's success was the fact that many titles were dirt cheap when they gained "Greatest Hit" status. So yeah, for the price of a N64 cart, you could get two to three PSX games - even if they're not as polished.

And what did Sony care anyhow? They were catering to the older, more casual crowd who were not as picky.

But at least nowadays I have my N64 back with my carts so I have the time to give it a second chance.

[RandyT]

Sony isn't stupid.  The "new" PS3 is a marketing device to freshen the market, meaning to re-introduce the machine to those who are going to decide between the three players this coming holiday season.  If Sony were to drop the price in light of the Wii-U introduction, this would be seen, likely very incorrectly, by the market as an admission of inferiority to Nintendo's offering.  The PS3 packs a lot of gaming and media punch, and even XBOX aficionados consider it to have a bit of an edge on the hardware side.

But we all know that hardware specs, even though important, aren't what makes a great console.  The XBOX, as a full package, edges out the PS3 in the eyes of the marketplace, at least according to the sales figures.

IMHO, the Wii-U has a very steep hill to climb.  From initial reports, it doesn't seem to have any major advantages over the the other two players, which have very mature hardware and software libraries to match.  Consumers who aren't enamored by the Wii-U simply because it's a Nintendo product, or who don't believe that the controller it sports will add anything very significant to the gaming experience, probably won't give it a second glance.  In the same vein, folks who already have a functioning PS3, be it fat or slim, probably won't dump it to buy the new version either.

In any event, it's pretty silly to call the latest incarnation of the PS3 "Sony's answer to the Wii-U".  If anything, it's Sony's "option", and one that has been out there for quite a while now.  Folks seem to expect the game boxes to be media centers as well, and in that regard, the PS3's large hard drive (stock) and Blu-Ray player make the decision pretty easy.....unless, again, one is willing to place the desire to play with a touchsreen ahead of that sort of utility.  That last part is really the only "wildcard" in this scenario.

[SavannahLion]

Sega made great games (YMMV) but they couldn't market a console for crap. You can forgive them for the Sega/Mega CD as the industry was CD-ROM gaga at the time. But there was no reason for the 32X. And they botched the launch of the Saturn. And instead of just riding out the current generation, they released the Dreamcast at an awkward time when people were heavily invested in their PSX/N64 and there was the PS2 right around the corner.

Yeah, Sega seemed overly confused at the time as to what they were trying to do.  It makes me wonder what might have happened if they jumped straight from the Genesis to the Saturn or Dreamcast, and skipped all the crap.

From what I can recall, it wasn't confusion per se, it was... for lack of anything better to call it, bickering amongst the different SEGA regional offices. SEGA USA wanted to do one thing, SEGA JAP wanted something else and SEGA EU kind of sucked it up. A good example would be the Brazil market, even though it wasn't technically distributed by SEGA, the SMS is considered a wild success there (though I don't quite see how approx 2 million consoles from 1989-2005 can be a success ). With SONY, Nintendo, and Microsoft, the different regions don't have a choice so the console options remain consistent. SEGA apparently didn't do it that way so SEGA spread themselves paper thin supporting so many different consoles across so many different markets.

Look at it this way...

You have American developers trying to port any game they can get their hands on to the Genie/SCD/32X platforms. Then you have the Japanese developers trying to wrap their head around the Saturn architecture. Not sure what the EU developers was doing and you have the South American market siphoning off classic titles to their console (Wikipedia cites 70 region ports). That's a big damn army of developers doing their own thing for nearly half a dozen different platforms.

[DaveMMR]

Sony isn't stupid.  The "new" PS3 is a marketing device to freshen the market, meaning to re-introduce the machine to those who are going to decide between the three players this coming holiday season.  If Sony were to drop the price in light of the Wii-U introduction, this would be seen, likely very incorrectly, by the market as an admission of inferiority to Nintendo's offering.  The PS3 packs a lot of gaming and media punch, and even XBOX aficionados consider it to have a bit of an edge on the hardware side.

Maybe there's a method to their madness. But six year old consoles don't typically go UP in price. A price reduction - or releasing a separate "budget" model - wouldn't be unusual at all. Especially considering you can fulfill the "media center" and BluRay requirements with a cheaper piece of equipment. And also that people pay little attention to specs anyhow (see Wii's success).

[Malenko]

Thankfully this generation of consoles will be my last. I have no interest in the Wi-U, the PS4, or the XBOX3. I preferred my 360 to the PS3, and the last system I owned that I truly had a blast playing was my SNES. I'm in the red when it comes to money spent vs games enjoyed; and unless the game companies send me a buncha free games, I'll never get into the black so I'm not going to bother trying.

[shponglefan]

If Sony were to drop the price in light of the Wii-U introduction, this would be seen, likely very incorrectly, by the market as an admission of inferiority to Nintendo's offering.

At this point, however, all the diehard Sony fans who are willing to suck up a higher price probably already have a PS3.  At this stage in the PS3's lifestyle, price is going to be a bigger factor. 

And besides, look what happened with the PSP Go and Vita.  They were too damned expensive (esp. compared to the original PSP) and didn't catch on.

[pinballjim]

Clown on the Wii U all you guys want but there's absolutely nothing else for parents to buy their kids this Christmas.  You really think a bratty 10 year old is going to be happy to get a PS3?  He got one of those 3 years ago.

If you didn't get in on the pre-order, you're not getting one for at least six months unless you want to go to the store at 1am.

[Mysterioii]

Luckily my girl is 2 so I can still get off pretty cheap this holiday season...   

[ChadTower]

Luckily my girl is 2 so I can still get off pretty cheap this holiday season...   

Just get her a big shiny empty box and she'll be ecstatic.  It'll save you the aggravation of watching her ignore some $150 toy and playing with the box instead.

[RandyT]

If you didn't get in on the pre-order, you're not getting one for at least six months unless you want to go to the store at 1am.

If Nintendo tries to pull this stunt again, it will be the nail in their coffin.  They need to meet any market demand which develops, or continue to lose sales to the others.  If junior has a 360 and Mom and Dad want to buy him a new system, somehow I don't get the feeling that the Wii-U will be in the running....especially if they have a Wii he never bothers to play anymore (or never played much at all.)

Besides, weren't there similar predictions about the 3DS, while stock was collecting dust on store shelves for weeks after the release?  I guess we will see soon enough if that will be the case or not with this new system, but I wouldn't count on turning a pre-order for a quick buck this time around.

[ChadTower]

You can still preorder white bundles at Walmart.   

[Howard_Casto]

You can get ahold of a white one almost anywhere, but you'll actually end up paying MORE money for it so nobody wants it. 

This is why I unfortuantely waited to pre-order.  I was looking into the charge base for the controller.  Apparently it isn't just some plastic stand, it's an actual accessory that will run anywhere from 20 -50 dollars.  So you get a 60 dollar game that may or may not be worth it to you (it is the new wii sports afterall) and a 20-50 charger as well as some nice little stands and a discount on all your online purchases.  Now you may not want the game, and the discounts might not appeal to you, but you are going to need that charge base so it's actually cheaper to get the black model.  I've got to wonder why they even offered the white one now that I've looked into it. 

On a side note, Randy worries me sometimes.  Charging more for a 6 year old product is never a smart move and I'm not exactly sure how a console selling out of pre-orders one week after pre-orders go on sale is in trouble.  I'm not sure how selling out of said pre-orders is "a stunt nintendo pulled" either.  The 3ds is selling like hot cakes as well.  The price point was only too high to begin with but it quickly became the best-selling handheld after they lowered it. 

Also kids frikkin love the wii, so I don't know what you are talking about.  Mind you some close-minded adults hate it, but kids... nah most of them are still playing the thing. 

I get the feeling you don't know how this holiday thing works either.  Parents don't really get a choice what to buy their children when it comes to electronics, unless they want their kids to hate them.  A kid writes down what they want, parents choose from the list... that's how it works.  Mom and dad don't go out and buy a ps3 because they feel their kids won't get as much use out of the Wii U.... heck most parents don't even know the difference between a ps3 and wii u!  Thus the list! 

And 8 year old billy, unless he has issues, isn't going to be interested in the 6 year old console that hasn't been on tv lately and thus has left his mind... he's probably going to be interested in that new nintendo console with the touch screen on the controller!  PBJ hit the nail on the head... kids care about what's new and pretty much nothing else.  Again, I can certainly see why adults wouldn't be impressed by the wii u, but the only way they could have made it more appealing to kids is if they sprinkled it with unicorn poop.