PlayStation in 2015: Goodwill ensured that the party continued

Eurogamer:
Sony had its Great Gatsby moment at this year's E3 - and not the whole 'boats against the current' part. With the likes of Shenmue, Final Fantasy 7 and The Last Guardian, Shawn Layden played the role of Jay, throwing shirt after beautiful shirt high into the sky. Kickstarters! Remakes! Cat-birds! Dazzling!

And, as with Gatsby himself, there's a question of where all this success has come from. The PS4 remains comfortably ahead of Xbox One in terms of every metric that matters. But what, exactly, is Sony getting so right? And can the party continue for a whole generation?

[Gazondaily]

Getting it right at the start pays dividends.

From the gamer-centric approach to the console and of course, the price point, it all led them to build momentum. Couple that with the enourmous missteps on MS' part, particularly regarding its mixed messaging with the X1 and the mass migrations were bound to happen.

That momentum continues to grow and a lot of people are seeing that PS2 style domination for a reason' it looks like those times are coming back.

Sony were struggling as a business and they had to look to the PlayStation to sort it out. They couldn't afford to make any mistakes and luckily, with the likes of Cerny proving his worth, they did everything right by:

1. Delivering a powerful console
2. Easy to Develop
3. Listened to their fans and learned from the competition about the online space
4. Respected Indies
5. Stuck to the wishes of Core Gamers

All that and the fumbling by MS just created this vortex of success for PS4. And it continues on and for good reason. Sony do deserve all the credit here. It is an enormous success story and one that shows the value of listening to your fans and learning from your past mistakes.

[Genuine-User]

I can't argue with that. Although, PlayStation is not the only solution to their financial struggles.

Sony makes quite a bit of money through other divisions as well. Their recent distribution of SPECTRE (Columbia Pictures - owned by Sony) must have made them quite a buck.

[UltraNova]

Pretty accurate run down Septic.

Sony does deserve all the credit they can get simply because the gave us what we the gamers wanted.

Now I hope they back PSVR up the same way as the ps4 and we'll have everything one could wish for on a single platform.

Let the big hitters begin come 2016!

@ Genuine-User

Their image sensor division (now standalone) makes quite some money as well, as Sony's camera lens tech is considered to be some of the best.

Edit: Oh go watch The Walk, another great inspiring biography film about a wire-walker from Sony (they had a PSVR demo based on this very movie). Excellent flick.

[Genuine-User]

Yep, their image sensors are great and apparently among the very best in the DSLR market.

Sony is also a longtime supplier of mobile cameras for iPhones and iPads.

I'll check out The Walk soon, the VR tech demo looked quite good.

[donthate]

I think it wasn't what Sony did right, but what MS did wrong.

That view is still very much prevalent today so Sony is coasting on that.

[KainYago]

Its all right but i still dont understand why they had to make p2p multiplayer...

[Gazondaily]

No power of the cloud

[Inzo]

PS4s dominance shows me one thing, that most gamers arent caught up in the moment they also look to the future. That being said, all this nonsense about the PS4 not having games also shows me that some people aren't checking up on their facts.

[NeoGamer232]

I can't believe that anyone would be dumb enough to buy an electronic device of any type based on the "future". Consoles keep dropping in prices so why would someone buy now rather than waiting until the new content was there? I guess some people prefer to pay $300-400 on a console and watch it collect dust for a couple years waiting for that must have game rather than waiting and buying it when it is $200 and getting the must have game as a bonus.

PS4 does have plenty of games. But after you remove all the re-makes/remasters and all the games ported from previous devices including PC and other PS devices the list dwindles very quickly. Add a check for quality games and the list dwindles even more. (Same goes for Xbox One and Wii U).

I have had a console in every generation to date. Outside of the generation with the Atari 2600 I don't think I have been any more disappointed in a generation. (This includes Xbox One and Wii U). Quite simply I call this generation the re-runs generation.

There is some new content, but there simply hasn't been enough chip, memory, and graphical improvements to justify the new consoles. The only thing that is selling the consoles this generation so far is fatigue from the previous generation and a modest technology refresh to do a few things better than the last generation.

[Aloy-Boyfriend]

Electronic devices aren't bought just for a day. They last very long depending on their care and quality. As for the PS4, there are many games worth getting it and there's more coming. I don't care about discounts in the future if there's enough content to justify the purchase. Got my PS4 and launch and I have been using it ever since.

For you it may be too easy to write off remasters, but for the newcomers and new potential fans they serve a purpose and add to the amount of games. Even if you exclude them, you still have a many games either 1st and 3rd parties

Please tell me what console ever has got a big lineup day 1? With time games get harder, more expensive, and more ambitious. Devs aren't making sidescrollers or simple games anymore. You can't expect the same flow every gen, and this gen is bound to get better hopefully starting next year

[NeoGamer232]

@XiKurapikaKurta
When you buy an electronic it is "out of date", meaning that there is already something newer, faster, cheaper, or better ready to come out within the next six months. So, what you should be doing when purchasing electronics is ask, "Can this purchase wait, because I know something better or cheaper is on the way?". If a console lacks new and innovative content then the answer should be wait.

I am not talking about a day one deficiency of content for this generation of consoles. These consoles have had three consecutive years of sequels, re-masters, re-makes, etc. There has been new IPs, but most have been "more of the same" or disappointing.

By the third year of the last console cycle Sony had Uncharted, Resistance, Motorstorm, and LittleBigPlanet all providing AAA experiences and sequels as retail games. What have we had so far this generation? Bloodborne which has less than 2 million sales so far? DriveClub which was online broken day one and still isn't at 2 million sales? Until Dawn which has only scrapped a million sales?

I find too many gamers are saying, "the good stuff is coming" each of the last three years instead of saying, "the great stuff is already here".

When someone asks me which console to buy right now, the first question I ask them is, "are you still happy with your current console". And if they answer yes, I tell them to keep waiting for the next game that actually will be worth buying a new console for.

[RPGrinder]

They are getting the PS4 right despite Sony. Not because of them. First party software and publishing has been generally abysmal. It is the same problem with Vita. Difference? Third party publishers are picking up the slack on PS4.

[joeorc]

Its selling ...because of get this....

Games! I know. I know its a shocker!

While many keep trying to paint this as "just good will" and all the problems the competition has had. We are now going on three d@mn years & there is now over 550+ games that have been released on the PS4.

Those are games released for a games console, the reason a system mainly sell on is the games.

And there is now over 550 of them to choose from.

Good will is one thing, but trying to paint that as really the only reason the d@mn system is selling is erroneously false in my opinion. The large number of games for the system already say otherwise.

Its support, the number of games to choose from, the price for what you are getting in return, etc. There is many reasons that its selling. Good will is just one of them, and not the only main reason.

People have been playing games on playstation systems now in the world wide market on various models of PlayStation systems for decades.

There is of course problems along the way for every system in the market. Its the point that when over 500+ games are released on a game console in under 3 years time on the market than something is being done right.

At the end of the day.
Games sell systems