Sony and Nintendo losing lots of money - whats the impact going to be?

It’s not a competition to me; I won’t give a shit about God of War 4, either. What made the DS for me early on was Canvas Curse and Elite Beat Agents. Almost a year in, the 3DS still has nothing that makes it hard to resist buying one.

Though, to be honest, I always got the sense that Sony was really good at cultivating unique, borderline avant garde games for their systems. Think Parappa the Rapper, Ico, Pixeljunk, Flow/Flower/Journey, Patchwork Heroes, Patapon, Everyday Shooter/Soundscapes, Papo and Yao etc.

I find it more credible that Sony and Nintendo would work together before Sony and Microsoft. There’s actually more of a precedence for that in the gaming space.

The impact will be they scale back operations, lay off a bunch of people, design smarter (i.e., release not-so-cutting-edge hardware which is what Nintendo is doing with the Wii-U or whatever it’s called). They’re already dragging this generation of hardware for as long as possible (and still releasing great stuff, at least as far as 360 and PS3 are concerened).

I really don’t see the “big 3” going anywhere anytime soon because of the Ipad and smartphones.

As far as Nintendo, you can only be on top of the world for so long before you come back down. They made a killing with the Wii and DS and were always profitable (even with the GC which was considered by some a “failure”). Party’s over for them but they could still be profitable in the future even if they only sell half as many Wii-Us/3DSes as Wii/DS.

Though I don’t think it’s a bad idea if they went software only - with their IPs they’d definitely be a lot more successful than Sega.

Yes, i would rather pay $20 for a bluray of whatever new movie than $2 for a homemade dvd of an average quality inde film.

If we take this argument to its end point, i might as well pay $9/month for the yearly wow sub (i think it was that much) and then play wow 24 hours a day for the maximum value. These days i’m ok with paying a bit more for a better experience with my limited gaming hours.

I’m confused by your use of future tense here.

Actually, if you look at the sales numbers, even though it started out really slow, once you include the increase in sales from the price drop, the 3DS is actually selling better than the DS did at the same point in it’s lifecycle. Though the DS did have a pretty slow 1st year too, until canvas curse and the like.

The vita is charting way worse than the equivalent parts of the PSP lifecycle

No. There are a few people on my friendlist who are PSN+ members so some will pay for online regardless. I’m saying there is a large percentage where no online fee was the attraction for getting the PS3. But then again this was when the system was selling for $500/600 so I kind of paid it up front in a way.

But let’s say Sony did start charging for the PSN next month. I would seriously consider jumping ship to the Xbox if I’m going to pay $50 a month to play games online. Since they have a much larger userbase compared tot he PS3. Just taking a look at Qt3 console users, all the multiplayer games/leagues are on the Xbox, for example the Madden league.

I joined PSN+ to take advantage of some upcoming psn sales (the re4/code veronica releases). I’m hoping there are a few more sales like that that make this first year sub worth it. I doubt I’ll renew, but the first time I turned on my ps3 and saw all the updating of hardware firmware and software patches had been done automatically? It’s like I bought an hour of life back with that sub, and counting.

The ps3’s update process sucks, big time, likely intentionally so in order to push PSN+.

Stop it with the facts. This thread is all speculation. You’re doing it wrong.

I joined PSN+ to take advantage of some upcoming psn sales (the re4/code veronica releases). I’m hoping there are a few more sales like that that make this first year sub worth it. I doubt I’ll renew, but the first time I turned on my ps3 and saw all the updating of hardware firmware and software patches had been done automatically? It’s like I bought an hour of life back with that sub, and counting.

PS Plus is great. You actually get something for your money. Live’s model is to limit access to servives MS doesnt even provide. I don’t know why Netflix puts up with being behind a pay wall. In contrast, Sony actually gives you games and services and conveniences. I hope they continue that approach in the next generation.

I think you mean $60, that’s the current rate for 12 months of Gold.

I wouldn’t put it past Sony to charge for online access come the next console cycle, but they should be smart about it and make it very cheap. No extra features or services, just online play for a small fee. Perhaps that would pressure Microsoft into stripping down their crappy Gold bullshit into tiers as well.

Shit thread.

But to accomplish those sales numbers Nintendo sacrificed their traditional hardware profit. Their overall financial numbers reflect that. So if Nintendo is going to have to adopt a much closer to cost approach on their hardware, its going to force them to change how they do business overall.

Because a $60 game is targeted at a different market than a $3 game. Give me an in depth RPG or strategy game or great FPS for $3. Ain’t happening. There’s a reason they’re called “casual” games. Using your logic we should all be riding bicycles instead of driving cars.

Also movies aren’t $60. A better comparison would be a 50 cent movie or a $10 movie. And my answer would be that I would probably go to a $10 movie because a 50 cent movie is almost sure to be shit. Hell most of the time I would go see a $10 movie over some of the free movies that you can find on the Internet.

Nobody is walking into the store to get a copy of Modern Warfare 3 and walking out with Sniper Elite VII because it was 50 dollars cheaper.

Keep in mind that the existence of the 50$ games has a severe effect on the popularity of the 5$ games.

For example, people (I think) want to play Modern Warfare 3 because it’s one of the most popular and advanced shooters, and has a large multiplayer community, but if only 5$ games existed, then one of those 5$ games would be best and it would get bought for exactly the same reason.

In fact, it’s quite possible that the ability to charge high prices for entertainment simply creates waste in the economy due to people feeling forced to buy what is best or popular and funding extravagant wasteful expenses, while low-budget entertainment would have served the same purpose at lower cost, if the higher budget alternatives eclipsing it weren’t there.

And of course, if piracy becomes widespread enough, this might well be the eventual outcome (although games can have effective DRM, unlike other media, so it might not happen for them).