ps3 sku's may become 360 exclusives if ps3 sales under 100k 3 months s

[Himuro]

As we all know, last month ps3 sold 82k in NA. This came up on a Newsweek blog.

[Goldy]

This could be bad news for Sony......but i believe it is the lack of games that is contributing to the slow PS3 sales and if they start losing exclusives this is going to affect PS3 sales also.

[Tullaryx]

I think the lack of games is not the only problem for Sony. Their main problem will be are they willing to bring the company deeper into red ink territory to try to hold on to their current marketshare of the market or go for short-term profitability by keeping the price where it is. Either option is a lose-lose for Sony since neither one will bring in long-term success.

People will point out that Microsoft has been losing money with their console system all the way back to the first Xbox. This is true, but then again Microsoft have always been willing to lose money in a business venture if it means gaining a solid foothold in the market. Microsoft's business allows it to lose millions in one department and more than make it up with their core business which is their OS and Office products. Sony on the other hand is a consumer electronics company who doesn't dominate in any one type of electronics. Companies such as LG, Samsung and traditional rivals like Toshiba and Phillips have either surpassed or evened out with Sony in the non-gaming electronics. Sony pretty much lives or dies through its SCEA division and when that division takes a major dump of red ink (2 billion dollars last fiscal year which is more than any fiscal year loss the Xbox ever made) the company suffers despite strong showing from sales of their new Bravia HDTV line and higher profits from its film studio.

Third-party publishers will not abandon the PS3 just for the fact that it will begin selling sooner or later and they will not want to be left behind when it does take off. What they might do is create lesser titles for the PS3 while testing out major titles on the 360 first to gauge the reaction of the market. It's old news that a larger number of third-party publishers have begun introducing exclusive titles for the 360 than the PS3 and/or releasing previously Sony-exclusive titles for the 360 without any sort of time-exclusivity. The one thing that article failed to point out was the continuous grumblings by developers as to the difficulty in developing for the PS3. Sure, its a new system but Sony seems to have either been lacking in providing new tools to make developing easier the way Microsoft continues to assist developers with their questions about the 360. Where Sony's advantage in hardware manufacturing has given it a leg up on Microsoft in the past, their inability to make development less costly and easier for developers shows their lack of software knowledge.

The true barometer as to the PS3's long-term success will not be whether it can sell above 100,000 units a month once the summer gaming doldrums makes way for the busy fal land holiday season. No, it will be the holiday season itself. The 360 will not sell units in the amount the Wii has been since its release (something I see tailing off as market saturation of the Wii system will reach a critical point by year's end), but it will move triple, if not four times the number of PS3's due to one game: Halo 3. The two people in the article seem to think the Halo 3 may not be the big system mover as some say it will be. I think they fail to factor in the fact that there's Xbox owners out there right now who have held off buying a 360 just because Halo 3 hasn't been released. With a release date having been made official those same people will not be looking to buy their first 360. Microsoft can really put a major hurt on Sony's PS3 plans by announcing a slight price drop for the holiday season and this prospect is not out of the realm of possibility. The system will be two years old by the time the holiday season rolls around and the Xbox saw its first price drop on the latter-end of it's second year.

In the end, Sony's problems doesn't just come down to the PS3 being an expensive system with little or no titles to excite gamers to buy the machine in droves. It's problems also includes a Microsoft who learned from its mistakes in the first round and doing its best to chip away at Sony. The other problem being the resurgence of Nintendo and it's pasting of Sony in Japan. That is the one bad news which seems to be hauting Sony right now. They can't seem to be winning against Microsoft in the short-term, but have lost to a company they thought they were close to putting under the way Sega did.
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