[3liteDragon]

Utter PS5 Sales Dominance Is The Only Narrative That Matters To Sony Right Now

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, even though Microsoft has had a strong start to this generation, full of big, splashy headlines like them buying Bethesda or adding this or that game to Xbox Game Pass, Sony has been quiet because…they can be.

www.forbes.com

I've said this before and I'll say it again, even though Microsoft has had a strong start to this generation, full of big, splashy headlines like them buying Bethesda or adding this or that game to Xbox Game Pass, Sony has been quiet because…they can be. While Sony has not purchased any huge companies or come up with a real counter to Game Pass, what they have been doing is selling a truly massive amount of PS5s, a number that would be even larger were they not constantly supply limited.

Officially, the PS5 is the fastest selling console in US history, by both unit and dollar sales, according to a recent report from the NPD. While we don't have exact global figures, it stands to reason it's doing well in the rest of the world where PlayStation is usually picked over Xbox in most countries, with a few exceptions. It is impossible to understate the amount of goodwill Sony harvested from the PS4 generation, again, a relatively "quiet" run in any sense other than a console free of bells and whistles (and Kinects), and one that simply cranked out a large number of must-have first party games. So far, that seems to be the exact same plan this time around.

While Microsoft's plan has changed from the launch of last generation, as I've said before, they're in a position that requires them to tell their consumers to wait a long, long time for the fruits of their labor and recent purchases. Huge Bethesda games like Starfield and Elder Scrolls 6 don't even have set release years. And outside of Halo Infinite, which has already been delayed a full year, larger titles like Fable, Avowed and Perfect Dark again, do not have release windows at all.

It also doesn't help that Sony was yet again more or less able to undercut Xbox's price. While the next-gen-but-not-really Series S is $300, the digital PS5 is $400 to the Xbox Series X's $500 (with a disc-based PS5 costing $500). The same $100 gap is effectively present as it was last generation, in addition to Sony's other built-in advantages heading into this gen. I agree that Sony has been the victim of "bad looks" over the past few months. The entire idea of being the one to raise game prices to $70 looks especially silly in the face of Game Pass, and that culminated in a very awkward situation where Game Pass poached Sony's own MLB The Show, where it will be $70 on PS5 and "free" on Game Pass due to a sneaky Microsoft deal. Bad look.

But again, it's one game here or there. Fundamentally Microsoft has launched the Series X without any meaningful exclusives, something that is unlikely to change until next fall with Halo Infinite, but by then, Sony will be spooling up big releases as well like Horizon Forbidden West.

Xbox certainly looks more competitive this generation, but if Sony appears complacent, it's because they can afford to be. No amount of small PS5 feature annoyances or studios Microsoft has bought seems to be able to unsteady Sony and its decades-long investment in its own studios, and goodwill earned over four generations of consoles now. And if that narrative will change, it may take years for Microsoft's current investments to bear fruit.

 

[Explosive Zombie]

SONY feels unstoppable even with Jim Ryan fumbling the ball here and there.

 

[Stilton Disco]

SONY feels unstoppable even with Jim Ryan fumbling the ball here and there.

Honestly, it will be next gen at the earliest we'll see any negative consequences to the incompetence at the top. Probably the generation after that.

 

[JORMBO]

I think most of the things that have popped up against Sony lately are largely overblown. In the end it all comes down to games. Right now MS is plugging their gap in games a bit with Gamepass. That helps a little, but it stinks that the first heavy hitting exclusive (Halo) is probably around a year out from the systems launch. Sony has Demon Souls, Ratchet, Returnal, Kena and maybe Horizon in that timeframe.

Sony still has the most talked about, best selling and hard to get system. MS can dent that a bit over the generation if they can manage all their new studios correctly. We will have to see if they can pull that off. They already missed a good opportunity when they had to push back Halo. Having that ready and being a really good game at launch would have been huge.

 

[FactsAreDead]

(If I read the site rules correctly, "self promotion" is allowed, so I'll post an article I wrote that relates to the topic at hand. If that's not allowed, pls remove it, thx)

Sales Facts – A Sony Horror Story

Disclaimer: The following might be an educated guess overall, but it still is mostly speculation and little more than a fantasy scenario. However, with all the recent developments from the past cou…

outrageousfacts.wordpress.com

This is an article I wrote three weeks ago where I'm looking into the farther future, beyond the present and next 1-2 years. To summarize: All of Sony's current success is built on the goodwill they created with the PS4. That Forbes-article says the same. However, long-lived success can't rest on that alone. People in the West are still in the hype-launch phase that is being prolonged thanks to Corona and shortages. But looking past this initial time, there's many issues that Sony will have to handle and right now nothing points towards them doing anything about it.

The article mentions Horizon 2 as if that by itself was the deciding factor, but that's one crossgen-game. PS5 doesn't have better western support than Xbox, either. And the one differentiator, Japanese games, is an area Jim Ryan has been shitting on for a couple years now. Gamers not involved in Japanese sales-discussion often like to dismiss the importance of the Japanese market, but it needs to be said: PS5-software sales in Japan are non-existent, and PS4-software sales have been dying, too. There will come a point in time where even bigger Japanese developers will ask if it's right to only make games for an oversea's audience anymore. That will result in either multiplatform-releases (PS5 and Switch) or even Switch-exclusives (a big one happening now is Konami's annual Baseball-franchise). The Switch is a global success, not something that can be ignored, and when most Japanese games can be bought on that, too, Sony only has its 1st-party software as a differentiator in the West. And I personally doubt that's going to be a powerful proposition for gamers who have no investment in those.

MS is playing the long-game with GamePass and its acquisitions, their service is only growing and growing. With Nintendo basically owning the Japanese market and more and more Japanese developers putting all their games on the Switch, it will eventually be Sony that should be worried whether PS4-good will is enough to keep going in the future. So far, they haven't answered that dilemma. Hopefully this year's E3 will show something big.

 

[DonDonDonPata]

There aren't a ton of games pushing either system. All the big stuff is still coming out for PS4 and X1 (and Switch, in large part) so if they can race to the largest installed base it should help as markets settle and devs begin focusing efforts. Early in the gen it seems like sales dominance is the only narrative that should matter to either Sony or Microsoft.