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The NPD June 2009 figures for the gaming industry are out (update: full analysis on my blog here), and the only company that can be relatively happy with the result is Microsoft, as the Xbox 360 is the only console to have year-on-year growth in these tough economic times.
In an interview conducted with Gamasutra, Microsoft's Xbox 360/Xbox Live group product manager Aaron Greenberg goes on to reveal a few interesting tidbits regarding the current console wars and why the PS3 is languishing in third (and that's only if you ignore the DS, and occasionally the PSP as well, which has outsold the PS3 at times).
Greenberg tells of the success of Xbox Live, which had a 73% growth in paid downloads. He also says that the current generation is not even half way through the current cycle, so it will be at least another 4 years before Microsoft thinks we will see the PS4, Xbox 720, Super Wii or whatever they will be called.
There is also an interesting notion presented that Sony was thrown off their strategy by the success of DVDs on the PS2, and they wanted to replicate this again in the PS3 with Blu-ray. And this led to the increased cost of the PS3, delay in release, and a lack of focus on the core gaming capabilities of the PS3. This is what almost everyone has been saying from before the PS3 was even released, and sales stats, in which the PS3 sold 31% less than the Xbox 360 in June, seems to confirm this misstep. I think what Sony failed to realise was that my the time the PS2 was released, the DVD format was already on it's way to major success, and so the PS2 was a beneficiary, rather than a pioneer. Whereas with Blu-ray, the PS3 had to shoulder the weight of supporting not only itself, but also the Blu-ray format. It seems to have succeeded better in supporting Blu-ray than the PS3 gaming platform. The Xbox 360, on the other hand, is primarily a game console, and one designed to eat into the gaming market share of Sony. Despite the technical problems, it has succeeded in doing this, possibly more effectively than even Microsoft imagined.
The interview goes into more details on a wide range of issues from Natal to game lineups to movie/TV downloads:
In an interview conducted with Gamasutra, Microsoft's Xbox 360/Xbox Live group product manager Aaron Greenberg goes on to reveal a few interesting tidbits regarding the current console wars and why the PS3 is languishing in third (and that's only if you ignore the DS, and occasionally the PSP as well, which has outsold the PS3 at times).
Greenberg tells of the success of Xbox Live, which had a 73% growth in paid downloads. He also says that the current generation is not even half way through the current cycle, so it will be at least another 4 years before Microsoft thinks we will see the PS4, Xbox 720, Super Wii or whatever they will be called.
There is also an interesting notion presented that Sony was thrown off their strategy by the success of DVDs on the PS2, and they wanted to replicate this again in the PS3 with Blu-ray. And this led to the increased cost of the PS3, delay in release, and a lack of focus on the core gaming capabilities of the PS3. This is what almost everyone has been saying from before the PS3 was even released, and sales stats, in which the PS3 sold 31% less than the Xbox 360 in June, seems to confirm this misstep. I think what Sony failed to realise was that my the time the PS2 was released, the DVD format was already on it's way to major success, and so the PS2 was a beneficiary, rather than a pioneer. Whereas with Blu-ray, the PS3 had to shoulder the weight of supporting not only itself, but also the Blu-ray format. It seems to have succeeded better in supporting Blu-ray than the PS3 gaming platform. The Xbox 360, on the other hand, is primarily a game console, and one designed to eat into the gaming market share of Sony. Despite the technical problems, it has succeeded in doing this, possibly more effectively than even Microsoft imagined.
The interview goes into more details on a wide range of issues from Natal to game lineups to movie/TV downloads:
Turn down the suck...Turn up the
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