Sony dismisses Activision threats, PS3 price cut rumors

[antonkan]

Sony Corp. CEO Sir Howard Stringer brands third-party publisher's comments as "noise," SCEA CEO Jack Tretton says other consoles don't deliver the same value.

Ever since the PlayStation 3 launched in November 2006, third-party publishers have been grumbling that it is too expensive. That dissatisfaction came to a head last month, when the world's largest third-party publisher publicly threatened to discontinue support of the costly-to-develop-for platform, which lags behind the rival Wii and Xbox 360 in terms of market share.

"They have to cut the price because if they don't, the attach rates are likely to slow," said Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick. "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."

Today, Sony Corp. CEO Sir Howard Stringer responded directly--and dismissively--to Kotick's comments. "He likes to make a lot of noise," the Welsh-born executive told Reuters at a tech conference in Sun Valley, Idaho, which Kotick is also attending. "He's putting pressure on me, and I'm putting pressure on him. That's the nature of business. … [But] I lose money on every PlayStation I make--how's that for logic?"

Speaking of the PS3, Sony Computer Entertainment America CEO Jack Tretton deflected questions that a widely rumored reduction in the console's cost could come as early as next month. "We feel that we're sacrificing the short term to pay dividends in the long term," he told Silicon Valley magazine Fast Company. "People are having short-term thinking--the platform is not even three years old…. It costs a lot to invest in rolling out new technology, and if the consumer walks away before the life cycle is over--you can talk about the install base of hardware, but how many of those machines are still active, how many people are still playing them?"

Tretton also said he hoped 2008 was the nadir of the worldwide economic recession, which has slowed the game industry in general and sales of the $399/$499 PS3 in particular. Still, he pointed to an increase in the console's market share last year as a sign of progress.

"In 2008, we had a 38 percent increase in sales and we hit our 10-million-units-worldwide goal for PS3 sales," he explained. "We had $6.4 billion in revenue in US alone on the PlayStation brand, and a 116 percent increase in software sales. At the worst possible time, if you're hitting numbers and delivering success... my hope is that as our production efficiencies improve and more great games come to market, the horizon has got to be better for 2009 and 2010."

The result: Sony ignores PlayStation 3 price cut!

Source: Gamespot

Activision Threatens Sony to Give PS3 Price Cut

 

[DSGamer64]

Sony probably can't fucking afford it, Activision should shut their god damn mouths seriously, just more proof that they want more money, greedy assholes. I wish people would stop complaining about the PS3's price, if you are an American you have the fricking luxury of paying far less then what people in other countries have to pay for the damn thing. Sony will cut the price when they want to, their shit is expensive to produce and they gotta make money off it.

 

[Hop2089]

Sony probably can't fucking afford it, Activision should shut their god damn mouths seriously, just more proof that they want more money, greedy assholes. I wish people would stop complaining about the PS3's price, if you are an American you have the fricking luxury of paying far less then what people in other countries have to pay for the damn thing. Sony will cut the price when they want to, their shit is expensive to produce and they gotta make money off it.

Yes they can, it's all for greed for Sony.

 

[ojsinnerz.]

Sony Corp. CEO Sir Howard Stringer brands third-party publisher's comments as "noise," SCEA CEO Jack Tretton says other consoles don't deliver the same value.

Sure, Sony, whatever you say.

Though I've been enjoying my PS3 quite a bit, it's exclusives really lack the length and content. inFAMOUS is short as hell, Drake's Fortune is Short, Rachet and Clank is short, Heavenly sword is short,and so on. Sure, there's FPS games, but I'm pretty tired of them right now. Oh, and not to mention, all the games I mentioned, besides FPS games, don't even have offline multiplayer.

If it wasn't for 5 of the PS3's most highly rated games, and a free HDMI cable, I wouldn't have jumped on it.

 

[Cermage]

it'll be interesting to see how this plays out. didnt another publisher also say they were going to abandon sony if there weren't price cuts?

 

[GentleFist]

agreein on sony

ps3 is expensive but its good

 

[jphriendly]

Well Sony, be prepared to go the way of Sega if you don't get your crap straight.

 

[Wabsta]

Well Sony, be prepared to go the way of Sega if you don't get your crap straight.

qft.

 

[DSGamer64]

Sony probably can't fucking afford it, Activision should shut their god damn mouths seriously, just more proof that they want more money, greedy assholes. I wish people would stop complaining about the PS3's price, if you are an American you have the fricking luxury of paying far less then what people in other countries have to pay for the damn thing. Sony will cut the price when they want to, their shit is expensive to produce and they gotta make money off it.

Yes they can, it's all for greed for Sony.

Ok, first off Sony isn't even making money off the PS3, they are still taking losses as far as I know, and considering how much money Sony sunk into Blu Ray and Cell technology, they want to make some of it back so even if they are making profits off of it, why should they cut off their income until they have recovered a bit?

 

[Dark_linis]

Sony probably can't fucking afford it, Activision should shut their god damn mouths seriously, just more proof that they want more money, greedy assholes. I wish people would stop complaining about the PS3's price, if you are an American you have the fricking luxury of paying far less then what people in other countries have to pay for the damn thing. Sony will cut the price when they want to, their shit is expensive to produce and they gotta make money off it.

This is what I dont understand about gaming companies. If you use alot of cutting edge tech then yeah, you'll be better than the opposition but it means nothing if people cant afford the said tech.

If the PS3 was cheaper I know alot of people who would have bought one (including myself).

 

[DSGamer64]

Sony doesn't have a strangle hold on any market they are active in, unlike Microsoft who dominates and pretty much has a monopoly over the computer market, so of course Sony doesn't have the same influx of cash that Microsoft gets because they are invested in so many different kinds of technology.

 

[Saywhatjj4]

Sony Vs Activision War!!!

Lets see how this Turns out

 

[raulpica]

Sony probably can't fucking afford it, Activision should shut their god damn mouths seriously, just more proof that they want more money, greedy assholes. I wish people would stop complaining about the PS3's price, if you are an American you have the fricking luxury of paying far less then what people in other countries have to pay for the damn thing. Sony will cut the price when they want to, their shit is expensive to produce and they gotta make money off it.

Yes they can, it's all for greed for Sony.

Ok, first off Sony isn't even making money off the PS3, they are still taking losses as far as I know, and considering how much money Sony sunk into Blu Ray and Cell technology, they want to make some of it back so even if they are making profits off of it, why should they cut off their income until they have recovered a bit?

The funniest thing is that the "OMGSOAWESOMERTHANYOU" Cell can't even make better games than the "old" and "plain" 360

And about the BluRay... It killed HDDVD. So, it DESERVES to fail. HDDVD should've been the true successor, and I'll NEVER think of the BluRay as a successor. More like a new Betamax.

 

[Guild McCommunist]

The only thing Sony would lose is Call of Duty (which is a rather big name nowadays), Guitar Hero (I doubt they'd dive out of the market with Rock Band competing with them and releasing the highly anticipated Beatles version), and a possible Prototype sequel (which isn't as huge as Call of Duty). The rest of their big series games have either been killed by them (Crash Bandicoot and Spyro) or just fell out of popularity (Tony Hawk).

 

[antonkan]

@Guild McCommunist: Sony won't lose Activision's games, just the price cut.

 

[Hadrian]

Call of Duty & Guitar Hero still sell on PS3, despite Guitar Hero being a shadow of its former self quality wise. Activision would be stupid to not put them on PS3.

As I said before, this is just Activision shaking their dicks about just because they're the top selling publisher around. Thing is I can see them making losses from getting complacent like EA did before they decided to change and go for "quality".

Seems to me that the PS3 is actually growing in user install base, while I don't see it taking over the 360 its still more worth while to put gamer games on it then the Wii.

 

[antonkan]

Call of Duty & Guitar Hero still sell on PS3, despite Guitar Hero being a shadow of its former self quality wise. Activision would be stupid to not put them on PS3.

As I said before, this is just Activision shaking their dicks about just because they're the top selling publisher around. Thing is I can see them making losses from getting complacent like EA did before they decided to change and go for "quality".

Seems to me that the PS3 is actually growing in user install base, while I don't see it taking over the 360 its still more worth while to put gamer games on it then the Wii.

Also, PS3 was NOW popular in Japan, so Wii is popular in the United States and Canada.

 

[shakirmoledina]

it was always said tht wat the ps3 brought was too early for the market to accept... haste became waste but not it is gonna pick up since the economy and ppl are getting back up... nothing to worry about since sony are pretty strong to oppose oppositions be it activision

 

[thebigboss14]

What we have to admit is that the PS3 is expensive because of the features it comes with like the main one which is the Blu-ray DVD player built in that people that live in the US like me know that they are about $300 dollars or around there depending the brand. Ok that means the the cost of the PlayStation is not the game system itself is because of how expensive it is to be manufactured and the part that it is made of. The hard drive is something too that comes with the high price, everyone knows that more space means more money. I could add other features like the built in Wi-Fi and stuff like that but thats already too much. So do what I did get the cheapest one and just change the hard drive to one with 340 MB jajaja real good right