PS3 goes “back to basics” with games focus

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Thursday, 20 September 2007 12:33

Opinion and Analysis

Interestingly, and for some, disappoingly, there were no cheaper US $399 40GB PS3 models announced at the keynote, as some in the media expected, and no cheaper US $99 PS2’s on offer, but Hirai did talk about Sony’s efforts to continue reducing manufacturing costs through component reductions in size and number. Some believed a $399 PS3 would be the perfect weapon to deflect against the upcoming Halo 3 Xbox 360 juggernaught both Sony and Nintendo will shortly be weathering.

But unless it's planned for closer to the end of the year, it seems the only cost savings will go to Sony at this point in time as they work hard to further lower PS3 manufacturing costs while maintaining comaptibility and quality. The prospect of such cost reductions being passed onto the consumer looks set to be delayed until 2008, beyond any more generous bundles that might yet come before year's end.

Another big announcement was that Home was being delayed to the Northern Spring in 2008, which is one of those approximate timeframes that gives Sony a bit of flexibility if the first day of Spring arrives and they’re not ready yet.

The reason given for the delay is to deliver a better product, with AP quoting Hirai as saying that “We wanted to wait until we could offer what would be totally satisfying for consumers”.

Well, I sincerely hope that’s what they’re doing. Second Life (SL) is what Sony’s Home is most closely related to and compared with, and while SL might be getting a lot of publicity, it’s clear that the critical mass they’ve reached isn’t yet critical or has enough mass yet.

Certainly, SL cannot be ignored – it is a fantastic virtual world that is nevertheless thriving, and despite some interesting demonstrations of Home by Sony, Home has a long evolving journey ahead of it as it grows in size and sophistication, just like Second Life.

If Sony expects people to really use Home on an ongoing basis, what they finally release to the world has to be spectacular, with all kinds of interesting activities, content to create, remix, watch, interact with, buy, share, there needs to be worlds to explore, mutual activities to undertake, ways of communicating easily through voice and video while still seeing and being in the virtual world, games to play in world, games to download, to sample, to buy, and more.

I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what Sony delivers with Home and with the Playstation Network, but given everyone knows their experience is not as smooth and satisfying as Microsoft’s Xbox Live implementation, Sony have a fantastic opportunity to catch up, and this time, in a welcome change surprise us all – and this time in a good way!