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PlayStation trying to grow market by expanding to PC but console remains core market (PS Co-CEO)

tmlDan

Member
Gaming PCs are going to be cheaper than unsubsidised consoles.

RTX 5xxx series is coming. My guess is a 5060ti outperform PS5pro for a $7-800 system price.
No they're not, not if you directly compare the tech in the devicea, you people will make PC's with worse and outdated components to match or use used products, its not the same.

Anyways, you ignored most of what i said, they are NOT convenient, stutters, graphics settings, blurry DLSS, massive drops in FPS, games just not launching, Blue screen of death (very common), all of these don't happen in consoles
 
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Senua

Member
It's over.
Comforting Big Hero 6 GIF by Sky
 

Mibu no ookami

Demoted Member® Pro™
Great, same strategy MS is desesperatly trying to do since XB1. Does it work MS?

The wider range of customers is a fallacy. We see PC players don't buy their single player AAA games. They dont. This money is nothing compared to what they do with MTX on their own store. What's happening is that consoles players are fed up about the prices and services and are starting to go to PC ecosystem giving their money to Nvidia, Steam and a bit to Sony. But overall, they are going to lose marketshare and money. Why don't they see it as super obvious is beyond me. I think at this point they are doing whatever their uninformed (western) strategists tell them to do: PC, GAAS, Woke, multiplayer !

Does Paramount have a fundamentally different strategy than Warner Bros with Max?

What is the difference between Disney+ and Netflix?

Why the difference in outcomes?

What was Sony's strategy in the 90s and how was it different from Sega's? Why did Sony succeed while Sega didn't?
 
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Senua

Member
Anyways, you ignored most of what i said, they are NOT convenient, stutters, graphics settings, blurry DLSS, massive drops in FPS, games just not launching, Blue screen of death (very common), all of these don't happen in consoles
hmm

Yes, some games do have annoying shader comp stutter, traversal stutter too but that also affects console games.

graphics settings
I think even the mainstream are opening up to these options, look at consoles, they're closer to PCs in that regard than ever, and seem to be getting more so.

blurry DLSS
What? DLSS is not blurry, in fact at quality mode it's usually sharper than TAA. PSSR is trying to do what DLSS does btw.

massive drops in fps
This is not unique to PC and depends on the game lol

games just not launching
This is almost always older games, games that you couldn't even play on your console with next to no backwards compatibility, and there are almost always fixes.

Blue screen of death (very common)
Robin Williams What Year Is It GIF
 

Mr.Phoenix

Member
Nintendo success means jack shit. They swing all the way from WiiU to Switch. Its pure luck which side they will fall in the future.

PC/PS/Xbox are more stable platforms with repeat customers. If next Mario / Zelda failed to grab people’s attention, it will be again a languishing platform.
As long as nintendo sticks to the Switch formal, they will be fine. The world always needs a decent handheld. And a Nintendo handheld would sooner be under Christmas trees than any of the PC based handhelds we are seeing now.
As for PS6 being cheaper, it wont be for long. New GPUs with advanced feature set release every 2 yrs.

Series X was high value platform at launch where it saw most of its sales. These days its match for entry level GPU.
You cant be serious... You do realize this works right? Your argument is totally biased when you compare an entire gaming platform to just a GPU. I find myself using this word more and more on here, but you can't get any more disingenuous than that. The Series X, is NOT just a GPU. You can not build a PC that outpaces it fo $500 any more than you an build a PC that outpaces a PS5 for $450.

The reason you can even make such a shallow argument is that the grounds of your point is flawed to begin with. You are weighing an entire gaming platform, (CPU, GPU, RAM, SSD, PSU, Controller) to a GPU?

A console will always be cheaper than an equivalent specced PC. That will never change.
 

tmlDan

Member
hmm


Yes, some games do have annoying shader comp stutter, traversal stutter too but that also affects console games.


I think even the mainstream are opening up to these options, look at consoles, they're closer to PCs in that regard than ever, and seem to be getting more so.


What? DLSS is not blurry, in fact at quality mode it's usually sharper than TAA. PSSR is trying to do what DLSS does btw.


This is not unique to PC and depends on the game lol


This is almost always older games, games that you couldn't even play on your console with next to no backwards compatibility, and there are almost always fixes.


Robin Williams What Year Is It GIF
All of what you said does not matter, they do not happen in consoles, its called convenience.

"the mainstream" is what you see on twitter, it's not real life. That's why sales for PS and Switch are strong.

LOL stop acting like the blue screen does not happen, over time as parts degrade it happens much faster than a ps4 ive had for more than a decade. PC also don't last as long, got blue screen after my RAM failed in less than 4 years.
 

Topher

Gold Member
No they're not, not if you directly compare the tech in the devicea, you people will make PC's with worse and outdated components to match or use used products, its not the same.

Anyways, you ignored most of what i said, they are NOT convenient, stutters, graphics settings, blurry DLSS, massive drops in FPS, games just not launching, Blue screen of death (very common), all of these don't happen in consoles

Eh....convenience is the selling point for consoles over PC. The rest....nah, that's an oversimplistic negative view on PC gaming and not why console gamers remain on console at all.

All of what you said does not matter, they do not happen in consoles, its called convenience.

"the mainstream" is what you see on twitter, it's not real life. That's why sales for PS and Switch are strong.

LOL stop acting like the blue screen does not happen, over time as parts degrade it happens much faster than a ps4 ive had for more than a decade. PC also don't last as long, got blue screen after my RAM failed in less than 4 years.

And I cannot tell you the last time I saw a blue screen. My Astro Bot game crashed yesterday though. So what doesn't happen on consoles again?
 
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Rambone

Member
It will take me awhile to digest not buying consoles anymore when games exclusivity truly ends but it seems that Microsoft has been preparing me mentally for this inevitability with the Series X|S. I'm only in the console market for games exclusivity at this point but I'm kind of getting tired of having to make so many compromises having to choose between frame rate, resolution and graphical fidelity, why not all? It just turns me off, so in a way I'm kind of glad some of these true exclusive masterpieces are coming to PC so I don't have to cope while playing these games wondering what they could have been without being so gimped by weak console hardware. Nintendo is the worst of the worst when it comes to hardware. There have been so many games that have been released on that system that are absolute bangers. I sometimes wonder with games like Shin Megami Tensei V, what it could have been if it was developed to take advantage of PS5 hardware first.
 
Current crop of 4060ti PCs can be found at $900+. That price point is not going to shift down $100-200 magically with the 5000 series.
Depends on what components are used. For $850, a full featured all included pc with upgrade paths to next generation can be had.

Using 4060ti + R5 8400F.

Again, 150 more than pro. But I think it offers better value.
 

DrFigs

Member
They're willing to kill their console business to compete in the PC space. It's a bold strategy considering how important Playstation is to the company.

Keeping playstation as the core of the business while putting all games on PC is a contradiction. they're direct competitors.
 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Anyways, you ignored most of what i said, they are NOT convenient, stutters, graphics settings, blurry DLSS, massive drops in FPS, games just not launching, Blue screen of death (very common), all of these don't happen in consoles
You forgot about CPU overheatting causing forest fires and driver updates being the number 1 reason of divorces in the US.
 

tmlDan

Member
Eh....convenience is the selling point for consoles over PC. The rest....nah, that's an oversimplistic negative view on PC gaming and not why console gamers remain on console at all.
it def matters, you give humans too much credit, they're not very smart. They don't want to deal with PC issues, we're talking about the casuals, not people like you and me on forums or hardcore gamers. If they're willing to go to a computer shop every time there's an issue then they have more money than brains. Not sure anyone ever has had a flawless PC for a decade.
 

Senua

Member
They've been saying this since 2019. It's nothing new.

Anything other than this, is wishfull thinking for those that think Sony will do exactly what MS tried to do.
It seems inevitable the way things are going in the future. The main reasons Xbox failed is because they stopped making genuinely great games like they did in the 360 era. Sony and Nintendo never stopped, so they kept their pull. It's that simple IMO
 

Topher

Gold Member
it def matters, you give humans too much credit, they're not very smart. They don't want to deal with PC issues, we're talking about the casuals, not people like you and me on forums or hardcore gamers. If they're willing to go to a computer shop every time there's an issue then they have more money than brains. Not sure anyone ever has had a flawless PC for a decade.

That's fine. Consoles are easier, there is no doubt about that. I just feel folks get a little hyperbolic when characterizing issues with PCs as if it is an every day affair.

Depends on what components are used. For $850, a full featured all included pc with upgrade paths to next generation can be had.

Using 4060ti + R5 8400F.

Again, 150 more than pro. But I think it offers better value.

For some, sure, but you are still talking about a PC where not everyone wants a PC at any cost. Most people who game in their living room do not want a large gaming PC there and do not want to be fumbling around with their keyboard and mouse on their couch. You've got to understand the use cases involved. Consoles and PCs are not interchangeable.
 
They are seeing games like Palworld or Black Myth Wukong reaching 20M sales in a single month, stuff like Helldivers 2 being the fastest selling Sony videogame, Elden Ring or Hogwarts also selling 20-30 millions in like a year.

And they want that too, but i agree it can be risky for Playstation, so they are going for the Nintendo route to be able to keep growing their profits, by making money per each sold console since day 1, if that works they shouldn't need to risk with PC releases in a long time.
 

TrebleShot

Member
Depends on what components are used. For $850, a full featured all included pc with upgrade paths to next generation can be had.

Using 4060ti + R5 8400F.

Again, 150 more than pro. But I think it offers better value.
So for 150 more than the already expensive ps5 pro I get to rebuy my huge PS5 library again... this logic isn't logic-ing
 

ergem

Member
Playstation co-CEO:
"We are trying to increase the overall game market by expanding content to PCs. There is no doubt that home consoles will be the core of our business, but by offering titles for devices other than home consoles, we will reach a wider range of customers."
Might as well start releasing your PS4 first party games to Switch 2. Test the waters.
 

Bojanglez

The Amiga Brotherhood
At the moment PC is a secondary market, only way I can see that changing any time soon is if they release games on their own PC store for a limited times exclusive (before the eventual Steam and Epic releases).
 

Loomy

Thinks Microaggressions are Real
Of course there will still be some players around. Not everyone is going to make pcs.

But if PS6 is $799, one could just make a PC and play everything there. Its certainly a very compelling option.

My guess is only hardcore 15-20 million fans will remain.
Please share your $799 pcpartpicker build that can run games at the same performance/quality as a regular PS5.
 
I think their business is far from collapsing, I also thing there are absolutely zero similarities to what they do and what MS is doing/has done. There is a very very very big difference between releasing your games day and date on other platforms and releasing some of them 18-24 months later on other platforms.

It's nice that you think this, but the truth is the similarities are all right there. The only difference is timing and, in practice, as time goes on, a 1-2 year stagger (probably shorter if not Day 1) between console & PC versions will feel like nothing to a lot of people since there are so many games to play in the meantime. Not to mention evergreen GAAS titles that will also take up their time, and those games are all on console & PC Day 1if we're talking about PlayStation & Xbox.

So what I'm getting at is, increasingly this stagger window of SIE's is going to feel like theatrics for more and more people, who have less and less reason to play those games Day 1 since they might have yet many other games they're playing or look forward to playing. If buying habits begin to take shape around that, at that point SIE are just hurting their goal of maximized profits by doing the staggers in the first place. But that would only happen because they've engineered conditions to influence buying habits negatively impacting their own console in the first place...

....which is exactly what Microsoft ended up doing. So sadly, I'm gonna have to say that very soon, that 18-24 month stagger window (which given remarks like these from Hideaki, suggests that will shorten) will "feel" like a 3-6 month stagger at most for yet more people, given all the other options they have to play and how much of a shared library console & PC already have these days (especially for Day 1 releases) compared to even a decade ago. If SIE are counting on that stagger to prevent an onset of problems similar to (but not exactly like) what Microsoft saw with Xbox, quite frankly...they're completely delusional.

And do you really think someone that has only $450 to spend on a gaming platform is going to buy or build a PC and skip the PlayStation because the games may come 2 years later?

Well if that person has to also buy PS+ and some games to get any usage out of that console, and they may not even play all the newest AAA bangers Day 1 as-is (maybe they prefer indies for example), or they don't need fidelity quite like at PlayStation level to feel it's "good enough"...yes, the likelihood increases for those people to buy or build a PC, or get a laptop for gaming.

If we're also talking people who already use a PC for school or work and would prefer consolidating their time to a singular device anyhow, then that likelihood increases even more so. What SIE need to ask themselves is: how many high-ARPU hardcore & core enthusiasts are likely to make the switch to PC in light of their current or potential future accelerated PC strategy?

TBH, they don't have the answer to this yet, we saw that when Herman was answering the Goldman Sachs investor earlier this year. So they have to infer it from Microsoft's moves with Xbox, and I 100% doubt Microsoft are giving SIE or anybody else that type of data (in part because they're ashamed of it). Any high-ARPU hardcore/core enthusiast who doesn't play all of SIE's 1P games Day 1 is immediately much more likely to make such a switch, if they also dabble some in PC. SIE getting less of the big 3P exclusives like FF going forward just further compounds on that.

People don't understand that two companies can have the same or similar strategy but different execution.

More importantly, I don't think Day 1 PC is what hurt Xbox rather the lack of AAA games and Day 1 GamePass is what hurt them. Day 1 GamePass meant they had to limit their budgets, something that Sony mentioned and were mocked for (again different execution and strategy).

Microsoft started putting their games Day 1 on Steam at the same time they were launching Series X & S. The correlation here is almost too obvious, only obfuscated some by external factors that artificially boosted Xbox demand for a short while (pandemic lockdowns, chip shortages, PS5 & PS4 shortages coupled with plenty of Series S supply). If you take those away, the collapse in Xbox sales we started to see in late 2022 would have started likely a year earlier, meaning they'd be even lower in LTD than the ~ 27 million they're currently at.

Only things that may've staved off the collapse partially would've been the Zenimax acquisition but that'd be to retain hardcore & core Xbox enthusiasts in the hardware ecosystem longer. Would not have manifested in sales boosts outside of that without games and, well, PS5 had Deathloop & Ghostwire as timed exclusives so there 'ya go. But I also have to keep saying: yes lack of any big super-popular mainstream AAA exclusive and the Game Pass push also contributed to Xbox's console collapse.

That said, no one should pretend the Day 1 push on Steam wasn't a factor. And I specifically mean Steam here; MS were doing Day 1 partially on Windows Store but that market place was a dead zone for PC gaming, plus MS still retained full control of the storefront so even if a decay would've began console-side, they'd have full lateral conversion of revenue and profits to their own Windows Store instead, with minimal loss to outside ecosystems.

People like to convince themselves that people are clamoring to buy PCs to game rather than consoles, but x,y,z is holding them back. It just isn't true. Consoles have never been the most powerful way to play games. Arcades were always more powerful. PC was always potentially more powerful. Just like handhelds have never been the most powerful way to play. Consoles create a boutique experience that people want. They also offer the best performance for the dollar. That isn't going to change.

You are convincing yourself that most people on console "need" hardware comparable to a PS5 or PS5 Pro in order to get "good enough" gaming performance for their time. This isn't true. Many games on PS5 don't even fully leverage the hardware, meaning to run those specific games, you could get away with a PC that's at PS5 level or even lower spec-wise (within reason) and still run those games at peak or at least good-enough settings.

The truth is, yes consoles haven't been the outright most powerful option for gaming in any generation. You're right on that. But consoles have always sold on reasons other than just performance or providing a "boutique experience". They also sold because of their games, and in almost all past generations, there was either a strong distinction in library offerings or ease-of-access that helped create value for consoles beyond just being the "best performance for the dollar".

-Console vs. Arcade: Even if for many early consoles the home versions of arcade games were technically inferior, there were far more copies of the home cart made vs. coin-up machines for that same game. You could rent the games and as a novice, save more money playing them at home then trying to beat them at an arcade. Home consoles were also available in much higher quantities and in more locations than coin-op machines.​
-Console vs. PC/microcomputers: Up until the 7th gen, the vast majority of software library between home consoles and PCs were very distinct. Even certain genres were very specific between the platforms. If you wanted to play point-and-clicks, 4X, CRPGs/WRPGs, flight sims or simulator games (or the "real" FPS games), you went PC. If you wanted arcade racers, racing simulators, JRPGs, platformers, survival-horror, 3D action-adventures etc., you went console. Very rarely did you see consistent presence of these set genres (and even many established IP) across the two platforms for a period of decades until around the 360 era.​
Also worth mentioning is that even up to the middle of the PS3/360 era, PC gaming was a lot more complicated for the average user to get into for AAA releases and at stable/acceptable performance levels. The further back in generations you go, the more true this holds. Most kids & teens on PC today would have never bothered back in the late '80s or '90s where you had to manually set up DOS settings in the BIOS to configure resources so your game could run, or map memory extenders, or manually configure driver settings. Hell in some cases even as late as into the late '90s if you didn't have the right GPU, you simply weren't going to run a game like Quake outside of software rendering mode.​
Combine that with the prices needed to get even "basic" performance out of a game on PC, versus what mainstream consoles were selling for at the time, and all of those factors meant there was very little audience crossover or market crossover between console & PC gaming. But during the latter parts of 7th gen, combined with the growing rise of Steam, and the lowering prices for "good enough" PC gaming hardware & memory, and these factors gradually diminished.​
Nowadays, almost all of those market differentiations are absent, with barrier to entry for PC gaming (relative to back in the '80s, '90s or even most of the '00s) practically on par with console gaming. When we hear about stuff like shader compilation stutters or crap like that, it's really from the 1% elite of PC hardcore gamers who demand that everything MUST run perfectly and at the best possible settings. The vast majority on PC don't care for or notice that stuff, except in the rare cases of a game so poorly compiled they show up no matter your settings.​
In fact, IMO PC now has a big advantage over consoles due in part to the decades of x86/x86-64 BC. There are a lot of games on PC now, both old and new, that you simply can't play on a PS5 or Xbox (or Switch, but the focus of this console-wise is solely on Sony & Microsoft). Oh how crazy things have flipped in that regard...​

That being said Sony realizes gaming isn't just console and they're sleeping on markets by not being involved. That's why they're involved in VR, that's why they're getting involved in PC, and that's why they'll return to handheld, and enter mobile.

And there's a right and wrong way to do all of these things. Sony/SIE could've gone about their PC strategy much better. They could've iterated on VR more effectively & efficiently. They could've already been back in handheld and in a way more preferable than the Portal. They should've been pushing in mobile even before their push into PC.

We can agree that SIE having presence in these market segments is a good thing, while still acknowledging they went at a lot of these areas in frankly amateur ways that have caused more problems than necessary.
 

Topher

Gold Member
So for 150 more than the already expensive ps5 pro I get to rebuy my huge PS5 library again... this logic isn't logic-ing

That's a good point. Folks are not going to easily abandon their gaming library and start completely fresh in unknown waters. That's a big reason why Xbox Series failed. People were already entrenched with PS coming up from PS4.

I've been saying this a while not, but I think most console gamers will remain console gamers. They don't care what gets ported where and they are not interested in all the platform debates. It is a plug and play device and gives easy access to Fortnite, Call of Duty, Madden, etc etc. Tell those guys that God of War is being ported to PC and they will say "the fuck do I care".
 

Killjoy-NL

Member
It seems inevitable the way things are going in the future. The main reasons Xbox failed is because they stopped making genuinely great games like they did in the 360 era. Sony and Nintendo never stopped, so they kept their pull. It's that simple IMO
The main reason Xbox failed is because they made their consoles redundant by releasing day 1 on PC on top of releasing mediocre trash.

It's a no-brainer that Sony and Nintendo have been paying attention to what happened to Xbox.
If we see things happening, these companies see it as well.
 

Topher

Gold Member
It seems inevitable the way things are going in the future. The main reasons Xbox failed is because they stopped making genuinely great games like they did in the 360 era. Sony and Nintendo never stopped, so they kept their pull. It's that simple IMO

Pretty much. They never recovered from their absurd launch because they just didn't have the games. They created a solid base with 360 and squandered it all away for Kinect and TV instead of building up their studios.
 
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Senua

Member
The main reason Xbox failed is because they made their consoles redundant by releasing day 1 on PC on top of releasing mediocre trash.

It's a no-brainer that Sony and Nintendo have been paying attention to what happened to Xbox.
If we see things happening, these companies see it as well.
I'm not saying it didn't play a part, but nope it's not the main reason. Playstation will not fail like Xbox did, whether they go day 1 PC or not.
 

Ebrietas

Neo Member
Errr...

200.webp




I think their business is far from collapsing, I also thing there are absolutely zero similarities to what they do and what MS is doing/has done. There is a very very very big difference between releasing your games day and date on other platforms and releasing some of them 18-24 months later on other platforms.

And do you really think someone that has only $450 to spend on a gaming platform is going to buy or build a PC and skip the PlayStation because the games may come 2 years later?
The collapse doesn’t happen overnight. It didn’t happen overnight for Xbox either. This will affect the PC vs PS split moving forward. Both in terms of existing customers migrating to PC and in terms losing new customers to PC. The porting time is irrelevant. Most Sony franchises are now just as much Steam franchises as well. The end result is a severely diminished console user base that can’t sustain itself just like Xbox.
 

ToneyJ

Member
“why would I buy an Xbox when I can get the game day 1 on PC”

That’s when Xbox started to lose the hardcore gamer and early adopters in gaming. Those are the guys who tell their more casual friends which console to buy and they’re also they guys who dictate online discourse and social media discourse. All of the factors have a significant effect on a console’s year 2, 3, 4, etc.. And you can see how Xbox Series sales imploded over the years.
 

GHG

Gold Member
“why would I buy an Xbox when I can get the game day 1 on PC”

That’s when Xbox started to lose the hardcore gamer and early adopters in gaming. Those are the guys who tell their more casual friends which console to buy and they’re also they guys who dictate online discourse and social media discourse. All of the factors have a significant effect on a console’s year 2, 3, 4, etc.. And you can see how Xbox Series sales imploded over the years.

Yep, and if playstation want to go in the same direction then they will no longer see my money for their hardware.
 

Topher

Gold Member
The collapse doesn’t happen overnight. It didn’t happen overnight for Xbox either. This will affect the PC vs PS split moving forward. Both in terms of existing customers migrating to PC and in terms losing new customers to PC. The porting time is irrelevant. Most Sony franchises are now just as much Steam franchises as well. The end result is a severely diminished console user base that can’t sustain itself just like Xbox.

Xbox's collapse started with an overpriced, underpowered, poorly thought out Xbox One. Porting to Windows store was an attempt to generate revenue and it failed so badly that Microsoft eventually had to put their games on Steam as well. Xbox console sales tanked a couple of years before day one on PC effort really ever began. This continued into the current gen as Xbox Series had nothing compelling to offer that would entice gamers to abandon their PS library for Xbox.

PlayStation more than likely will never put their first party studio games on PC day one for the very reasons stated by the PS CEO (forgot his name). PS is their core business. We've seen ports on PC for a few years now and PS isn't remotely following the same collapse as Xbox. Microsoft stopped reporting sales numbers for Xbox the year after its release because sales were so bad.
 
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