Sony Defense Force: Assemble!
This month hasn’t been the best for Sony. First, the November NPD numbers came out and weren’t very encouraging for Sony’s big black box. Soon afterwards, Silicon Valley Insider issued a pretty scathing analysis of those NPD’s, calling the PS3 a sinking ship and pointing out that “sales of the PS3 are down about 19% from November 2007″. They continued:
So why is the PS3 flopping so badly?
- It’s the most expensive console on the market, $150 - $200 more than its rivals. Even if you believe the video game industry is “recession-proof” (it isn’t), a tanking economy makes consumers more price-conscious.
- The PS3’s big bonus is its ability to double as a Blu-Ray player. Too bad no one seems to care about hi-def DVDs. The differences between Blu-Ray and DVD are hard to see on a TV less than 50″.
- The PS3 just doesn’t have any must-have titles exclusive to the console. “LittleBigPlanet” has generated decent buzz but isn’t a game-changer, and neither is Sony’s new virtual world “Home.”
There’s really only one option left for Sony to remain in the game: deep price cuts, and not just for people with good credit. Tell yourself the PS3 has superior graphics if it makes you feel better, but a $400 console with a mediocre game library simply cannot compete against an Xbox 360 priced at $200 in this economy.
Yikes.
But the hits keep coming for poor Sony, as more bad news arrived today.