http://www.xboxcircle.com/portal/content/view/443/1/
Shocking news is swirling the internet today, first reported on three seperate PS3 websites. The news is not good for Sony. Apparently Japanese game developers are packing up their PS3 tents and moving to Xbox 360. One site reported that the rate in which developers are leaving PS3 is "worse then Nintendo's Gamecube era." Kutaragi may be demanding too much from the developers, plus the fact that the initial investment required for PS3 is reportedly as high as 17.6 million US dollars are rumored to be the leading factors in the exodus.
Recently Sega announced that Condemned had been cancelled for PS3, with more and more developers saying they prefer Xbox 360. Another complaint from the developers is that Sony has built such an advanced and difficult architecture that programing for it is too difficult. A recent article on a Japanese site called ZakZak seems to be the source for the claims.
Most believe it will be a decisive victory [for Sony], with the catch phrase “Don’t stop evolution”, much like Junichirou Koizumi’s election victory with his catchphrase “Don’t stop reformation.” However, another industry insider confided, “This is nothing but a nightmare for many Japanese software development companies.”
One of the reasons for this nightmare is soaring development costs.
The industry insider went on to say, “Kutaragi has said, ‘Please develop suitable software for PS3 - this software must not be of the same standard as PS2 software.’ Developing software for the PS3 from scratch will require an initial investment of at least 2 billion yen [US $17.6 million] [not including development costs]. There are not many software companies that can easily afford that kind of money.”
So now faced with a dilemma, could Japanese game developers look to Microsoft for the answer? MS has built a system that will allow developers easy tools and low costs. Could Sony's super powered machine be too much for developers to handle? Could their over ambitious minds be the downfall of the PS3 support? Only time will tell.
http://game-science.com/news/001249.php
Diamond reports developer discontent with PS3 tools
The latest issue of Japanese economy magazine, Weekly Diamond, reveals that developers are unhappy with the state of PS3 development tools, and software is likely to be late in coming for the hardware. The article states that PS3 dev tools have only just started shipping to developers this month, while 360 tools were shipped last summer. Furthermore, SCE has not yet announced the price of the console, so developers are unable to predict what audience they are targetting games at. President of Enterbrain, Hirokazu Hamamura, says "We are unlikely to see games exhibiting a level only PS3 can achieve until the end of 2007."
The article goes on to compare the benefits of PS2 as a cheap DVD player when it launched in 2000, with PS3's Blu-Ray playback capabilities, the main difference between then and now being that the industry is currently deep in a format-war for next-generation video, and that Blu-Ray movies still don't exist. It is therefore deduced that the number of users who will pick it up as a cheap Blu-Ray player at launch is somewhat smaller, and that sales of game software will be key for the system.
Source: Shuukan Diamond
http://www.joystiq.com/entry/1234000803061082/
Rumors are flying high, spreading across a network of Japanese, Dutch, and German websites, that developers are wary of creating content for the PlayStation 3. Unfortunately, the article in question is difficult to decipher, but perhaps someone with knowledge of Japanese can give us the clear scoop. There’s also a Dutch article that has a quote in (broken) English: “In the (Japanese) game industry, many people are losing trust in Kutaragi’s non-stop pursue of this evolution, people are leaving PS3 at a rate worse than Nintendo’s GameCube era” (source unknown).
Several developers, like John Carmack, have publicly announced a preference for the Xbox 360. But could that number be growing? The recent cancellation of Condemned for the PS3 seems to suggest as much…
http://general.gamerfeed.com/gf/pr/9532/
Sony's Q2 Profit Falls 46%
By James Brightman -- News Editor, GD Biz
Published 3:26 PM CDT, October 27, 2005
PS3 development costs blamed
Sony Corp. announced today that its second quarter profits dropped by 46 percent. Net income fell to $247 million from $461 million last year, while revenue was flat at $14.8 billion.
It's looking likely that Sony will suffer its first full-year loss in 11 years; the company is expecting a net loss of $86 million for the year. While the game division saw a 79 percent sales increase, thanks largely to the PSP, it was costs associated with the PS3 that dragged the second quarter results down. The falling prices on television sets globally also was a contributing factor.
"They will have to show significant improvements in profitability or a great success in a specific product to get back the market's confidence,'' Carlos Dimas, an analyst at CLSA Asia Pacific Securities in Tokyo told Bloomberg.com. "They keep saying they want to use content to drive sales of electronics, but hoping that would happen is not a substitute for a business model.''
info about Blue-ray vs HD-DVD here >
http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000623059130/
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its worth noting that both apple and microsoft are more likely to back HD-DVD over Blue-ray atm..
HP have already threatened to not support Blue-ray unless sony make the format "more consumer friendly" which no doubt means they want Ble-ray to be compatible with PC's & Macs etc.. aswell as sony products.....
imo, if sony are basically relying on making blue ray the home name for flim media & PS3 games selling well, to gain back their market share... they are definately going the wrong way about it imo...
blue ray movies arent even on the shelves yet and its looking like PS3 may get even less releases than gamecube due to the difficulty & cost of developing on ps3, this could be offset by a large price tag for the ps3 console itself, as rumoured but i dont think its gunna sell well unless it has the sheer number of titles ps2 had...
i think this goes to show that you can easily be too greedy/selfsish in business... imo they should have just used other peoples chips & media formats imo, rather than trying to make their own and monopolise things too much.... guess we'll see for ourselves soon enough... but its not looking good for ps3 developers atm imo....
worrying stuff anyway....... i just hope Sony know when to stop being greedy and when to start doing everything in their power to please their customers!!
PS3's downfall? I hope not!
Originally Posted by Some dude on a crappy forum
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