Well, I went out to Target earlier today to pick-up some eye drops since my eyes still get fairly dry after LASIK. As I was going over to the hygiene section, I passed the electronics section and saw two PS3s and no Wiis. I thought that this was rather strange considering the production problems that Sony has been having, however, Sony has said that they fixed their production problems and will be able to reach their 1 million mark by the end of the year (yeah right). However, I was thinking that this could also indicate that the Wii is selling like crazy and the PS3 is struggling (plus, a $600 price tag is fairly hard to sell, especially compared to $250 one). This wasn’t the only sign, I went to another store and they also had a bunch of PS3s and no Wiis. To make matters worse, I went around noon (quite a bit after the stores opened) on a Saturday (a generally busy shopping day). It is just very curious.
Everywhere I go in Lincoln I see signs out on the front door saying they’re out of the Wii. Nothing about the PS3.
Everybody assumes the PS3 is sold out everywhere so nobody ever goes out to buy one.
Or maybe they realized that there are <i>no good games</i> for it
You’re assuming that too TD!
So much assumation
Yeah, my Target has like 40 PS3s.
I can see why. A few of my friends have PS3s and they say the only good game is Resistence.
Yes, of course the Wii is sold out everywhere. Everybody and their damned cats want one. People were still camping out before Christmas for those (I don’t know now and I don’t plan to check :P). In some places, I’ve seen ratios of about 1 for 50 people (and 50 is a low approximation) waiting for PS3s vs Wiis.
I would’ve sworn I made a post saying something like Walhalla said somewhere.
I haven’t looked for a Wii yet. I reserve my right to wait until next year when most of the bugs will have been worked out and better games have come out (that also can’t be played on the GC). However my search for said multiplatform game of kickassness was made difficult by the lack of said game. I did mangage to attain one at the only EBGames in town and even then I had to wait until the day’s shipment came in.
As for anything to do with the PS3 was one line on the day of launch and that was it.
Sony should do like Microsoft and hide all the surplus consoles in secret depots so people get to think the stuff is actually being bought.
Yeah you and Hades had a big argument over which would be more successful.
Hades is always right, and here he comes with a bunch of made-up facts!
I keep telling my friend this but he doesn’t listen.
Ramza: The argument was about Sony and Nintendo competing for different markets, not the success of the individual consoles.
I like the Wii. I’d sooner buy a Wii than a PS3 until price drops. The problem is that a lot of people here are confused about the PS3’s premise; they don’t realize they’re not the target audience, and they go around bashing it. Or they think, because they wouldn’t personally buy a PS3, that no one would, and Sony’s made some kind of fatal miscalculation. They think: “Sony didn’t have me specifically in mind when designing this, it must be a fuck-up,” because they think everything should be tailored for them alone. That’s the kind of people who go here. People who can’t take a step back and say “hey wait, maybe Sony’s plan is actually to…” and so on. They’re drones. Because the PS3 won’t gratify them, they poison the minds of the people who might enjoy it. All I’ve done is encouraged people to make their own decisions, and not listen to the kind of bullshit that erupts from the asses of every self-proclaimed guru here, claiming that the PS3 is a fuckup before release. Give me a fucking break. This is EXACTLY what happened with the first X-Box, and look at it now. I don’t know what’s so hard about recognizing these trends and not shooting opinions so far off-center that even Hades starts to cry.
Man, you made so many things up and created so many straw men that don’t represent what people said in that last post its amazing.
I’ll go and quote one of my big things to show you’re completely out there in what you’re criticizing people said and I add that the fact that the PS3 is currently in the shitter isn’t because us self proclaimed gurus corrupted the minds of potential PS3 buyers, but because Sony really fucked up in a lot of ways and a lot more people ended up falling in the “this is not my system” category.
The PS3 category is the same as the hexbox category and the hexbox was still in very high demand at this time of the year, 1 year ago. The bottom line is simple: Sony did not do a good job getting its targeted demographic to want to buy its game beyond the launch.
So Hades, what IS the target audience for the PS3? I mean, we know about the Wii and the 360, but who exactly is Sony aiming for? Blu-Ray buyers? Who might not actually want a console and just the player? It’s certainly not gamers so far given the lack of, you know, GAMES.
SE, this is EXACTLY what I’m talking about. All you’re capable of looking at is the “so far” and you base your decisions on that.
Sony’s target is a small group of people who want either cheap Blu-Ray or good gaming or both and are willing to invest money now that will hopefully pay off in the future. And because you’re not part of this group, you deny its existence. Because you’re not the target, you think Sony has no target. Wake the fuck up.
Sin: Right now you fall into the same category as SE and your argument is only valid assuming that the PS3 is indeed analogous to the PSP, which I don’t agree with because you’re crossing the line between a world that favors power and a world that favors simplicity. I could easily (and more accurately than you did) claim that the Wii is analogous to the Dreamcast. That doesn’t mean I’m right to assume it won’t be successful.
You’re also forgetting the cards Sony holds right now in Square-Enix and a few other titles. Few people could’ve told you what a PSX was before FFVII was released. There are people, of which I am one, who would prefer three or four polished titles to the Wii’s machinegun of mediocrity, given the right price. I don’t have $700 to throw away, but there are people who do, and this is reflected in the PS3’s massive success. Oh wait, I forgot. Having two $700 units on the retail shelf means Sony’s in the shitter.
I’m not even saying the PS3 will be successful. I don’t even care about that. What bothers me is when people look at all the evidence from past successes and failures and formulate a prediction that is antithetical (or completely unrelated, in your case) to what the evidence suggests. I’m not expecting prophesies. I’m a little disappointed that every argument I’ve heard isn’t even consistent with itself though.
Hades is the reason abortion should be legal. :spam:
You’re saying the PS3 is addressed to people who want good gaming when the PS3 doesn’t have any good games yet, so of course people aren’t interested. I already addressed the claims you’re making in my last post about MGS4 and FFXIII and Square Enix. I already stated what Sony’s target was and you haven’t addressed how anyone here is or is not Sony’s target. All you do is throw accusations at people who are skeptical about the way Sony has comported itself about how the PS3 has been launched and presented, assuming that because people aren’t fanboys, because people are critical, that obviously they can’t be the people Sony wants to attract. That’s not a cause and effect relationship.
Nor did you address the statement about how Sony is targeting the same demographic as MS and is failing to generate the same interest, and more importantly, why that is. I also wouldn’t call that “cheap” blu-ray.
The whole point I’m making in the big quote is that Sony is repeating past mistakes and is dropping the ball and that they have very few trump cards to play, esp having lost DQ9.
The PS3 is not a massive success. That’s the whole point that Infonick made by making this thread and it is something other people can tell you: PS3s aren’t in as high demand, PS3 bundles sell less and slower than the Xbox a year ago, PS3s sell at cost price on Ebay when Wiis sell at the price of PS3s, etc… PS3 supplies are extremely limited, so saying that they sold out or nearly sold out is laughable. If you want to brag about selling out, you need to have a strong supply for a strong demand. If you have a weak supply, you can’t say whether or not your demand is really high or not unless you have people spending fortunes for your product on the internet (which they’re not) or people camping (which they’re not since they’re still in stock).
Oh dear no, I’m not denying its existence. The fact that it got outsold by its competitors is, at the very least, denying it’s suitability as an actual marketable “target”.
Yes, tomorrow a surge of AWSOME TITLES and HIGH DEFINITION GRAPHIC MOVIES!!!1111ononone will/might be launched, but buying a PS3 right now is nothing but an exercise in lack of foresight for three certain reasons and a possible fourth:
- A console only gets cheaper with time
- Sony has a long record of releasing faulty first-batch software.
- Until that surge arrives, the machine will only sit there and do nothing but waste time from the warranty period.
And possibly:
4) If that surge of quality titles isn’t what you expect, you have a $600 paperweight.
You might also want to notice the developers that are shifting over 360 and Wii, and the little detail that the Square that did FFVII no longer exists. It may be called the same, but the actual people handling things aren’t.
You say “invest” and “hopefully pay off”. No company on their sane mind releases a machine with only the promise of making it better “at some point in the future” to back it up as part of a carefully meditated plan. Sony rushed and fucked up their launch big time by throwing the console into the market without providing enough stock or any immediate reason for why anyone should buy it. Kutaragi isn’t Sun Tzu and this isn’t the first stage of masterfully crafted plot as you seem to believe, they messed up and the sales confirm it.
Yes, the machine has plenty of time to pick up. I’m not denying that possibility. It’s just not doing well now and the outlook is bleak.
Ultimately, when you look at how things are, my analysis of the PS3 vs Wii was right on.
Saying that people shouldn’t make predictions based on past information is utter folly. You have to learn from your mistakes to avoid repeating them. By understanding why something happens, you can predict what will if it happens again, as it is happening again for the PS3 and the Wii. Even if the comparison isn’t perfect, you can get a vague idea about the way things are going. If you end up being wrong it is because something changed, there was something different that you didn’t account for.
This is simple physics: an object in motion will remain in motion unless acted upon by an outside force and an object standing still will continue to stand still unless acted upon by an outside force. In the same way you look at the situation, you look at similarities and differences and you use your experience to get an idea if differences will lead to a change or will be insufficient.
Its by making wild, unsubstantiated assumptions that you shoot yourself in the foot.
This doesn’t mean things won’t change. They could change if Sony gets its act together and doesn’t do what it did with the PSP, which is release good products. If Sony only has FFXIII and MGS4 that’s worth buying and even then, we don’t know when these are coming, that doesn’t bode well, just like if Nintendo repeats the same mistakes with the Wii as it did with the GC and squanders its current advantage.
Questions for Hades: what is success? How is the PS3 demographic different from that of the Xbox 360 (and no blu ray vs hd dvd doesn’t count because at this point, that market is irrelevant as there are barely any hd dvds and blu ray movies even available)? If the PS3 is not a monetary investment (except for the early PS3 ebay sales) , how is it an investment?