When Sony released their fiscal Q3 (Oct. - Dec. '06) financial results recently, most of the focus was on the PS3 and how the costs of its launch contributed to a massive loss for Sony's games unit. But, as the UK's Pocket Gamer points out, a massive slowdown in PSP shipments worldwide is probably just as worrying for the company.
In the three month holiday period, Sony shipped just 1.46 million PSP units worldwide, a nearly 72 percent decrease from the 6.22 million units shipped during the same period a year ago. Broken down territorially, Europe and Japan each got roughly 900,000 systems while North America saw only an anemic 10,000 PSP units shipped in the three month period (no, that isn't a typo). For comparison, Reuters reported in November that Nintendo planned to ship 1.5 million DS units to Japan in December alone.
But not all is doom and gloom in the Sony numbers. NPD data from December showed relatively healthy sales of nearly a million PSPs in North America, suggesting that Sony slowed North American shipments to let retailers sell off some of the 2 million systems shipped during the summer months. And despite the slowing hardware shipments, PSP software shipments actually rose 20 percent to 21.2 million units worldwide for the holiday season. Still, it's easy to look at this massive shipment slowdown and see the tide decisively turning towards Nintendo in the portable market share battle.
Acquire, famous for games like Tenchu and Octopath Traveler, becomes KADOKAWA subsidiary. Can this mean a revival for beloved series?
I would kill to have a Way of the Samurai game with a huge budget and modern tech... The first game was one of my greatest joys on PS2 back in the day. And I really hope From Software will do something with Tenchu... I hate that they're just sitting on the IP like it doesn't even exist.
Tenchu would be superb in this day and age. Ninja and samurai games are hot right now and more is better.
Final Fantasy 7 has come back under the spotlight thanks to the release of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, but is it worth replaying the original?
Got to Zacks part in 7 Rebirth. Said f it. Finishing my game in 7 og. Just got to part 2 yesterday. I also got Crisis Core... So it'll be a while before I'm back to Rebirth. I just keep thinking about it too smh, want to get back to playing it. Not till I know Zacks story though. I beat 7 og sooooooo long ago, it's crazy going through it again and remembering things.
Got to Zacks part in Rebirth?
You mean you started the game and turned it off?
The game starts with Zack...
... Really 🤓 lol. His second part, I've played for 80hrs lmao. <---- PS5 Run time, probably not all game time. You guys know how it goes.
Did you not ever play the OG FF7? After you recruit Vincent, later in the game, disc 3, return to that basement and look at the pod, there's a whole Zack story that'll trigger as a memory.... it's well hidden in the game and a lot of things regarding Zack are cleared up. FF7 Crisis Core is basically an extend feature of that hidden flashback... It took me years to discover it back then lol
https://www.youtube.com/wat...
@ravens52
80 hours in Rebirth by doing everything, and you should've reached Zacks story about 5 times 🤣
Ye I kno that's y I said not all gameplay time. But also I am very anal when it comes to exploring.
Not to mention fighting Titan at his full strength. Hours spent trying still haven't succeeded. Found all 3 ruins but I'ma masochist when it comes to games.
Very much so. Graphically it's dated but the story and the gameplay haven't aged a day. It's still one of my all time favourite RPGs and for me is better than Remake in some ways.
It always takes me back to Christmas 1997, I got it as a gift and I was blown away when I played it. I couldn't believe games could look that good. The combination of pre rendered backgrounds and FMV really made it stand out. It definitely still has a certain charm that modern games can't replicate.
I can't imagine people will still be talking about Remake and Rebirth in 27 years.
Fully agreed. To me the atmosphere, pacing, gameplay and music are all better than in the remake.
Remake is so amazing, pure FFVII Love, play it on PS5 please! aww the graphics the battles, the music... a dream come true.
Final Fantasy XVI producer Naoki Yoshida is interested in working on a brand new Final Fantasy Tactics game.
Not from you.
Knowing how you handled FF16 by trying to make it appeal to non-fans and changing the entire gameplay design I can see you changing Tactics to appeal to non-fans.
If they’re going to do this please give it to someone who wants to keep the game and genre in tact.
He worked on tactics ogre reborn. Was there changes? He wouldn't make an FF tactics game an action game. It will be AA but faithful. Probably what the Diofield Chronicles team and some of the FFXVI team is probably working on already and he is just keeping a secret.
And FF hasn't had a set gameplay design since X. I disliked the MMO, 12, 13 FF's but didn't mald for years. I played other games. Stop crying as he probably won't make a single player FF again and will be busy with the next FF MMO.
Tactics Ogre Reborn was an overall solid product but almost eliminated the concept of builds in the game.
So we'd probably end up with a system where character jobs like Mercenary for Ramza is 80% of the character instead of being freeform.
Tactics Ogre Reborn changed a lot of gameplay mechanics for the worse. The class system is weird and hard to lock in roles, and they shoehorned a new "random card appearing" mechanic on the maps which makes no sense. Previously you obtained those boosts from killing powerful opponents, not spawning randomly.
There's a way better way to play Tactics Ogre: the fanmade onevision mod of the psp version.
16 was just a terrible mess.
Its not even a JRPG let alone a final fantasy game.
Yosi piss(who said he hates JRPGs) should not touch another Final Fantasy game ever again.
87 metacritic can't be a terrible mess.
If Kingdom Hearts is a JRPG then FFXVI is a JRPG. And he said he hates the term JRPG as it carries a bad stereotype with western journalists.
So you're just incorrect on several fronts...
I wouldn't mind a new FF Tactics longs they keep the tactical elements of Tactics in it as well as a very in depth story. Which FF Tactics years ago has by far one of the best stories in the series.
Yes, alongside with Vagrant Story. Playing FFT, then Vagrant story and finally FFXII is a bliss. Deepest lore and best stories ever made in video games.
Probably downcuts on PSP shipments because all their money and all their production facility has to back up the PS3.
It's a company in distress, struggling to get BluRay pushed as a format. If it fails and the PS3 fails, they're in big, big trouble. The PSP already about lost the war from the Nintendo DS although doing reasonably allright. But they won't win the war with that device.
All signs point out Sony's business model isn't right. I hope they get their act together, before they end up like Nintendo 10 years ago, or even worse, like Sega with the Dreamcast. Which isn't totally unthinkable. Their TV department also lost market share to Samsung, Philips and Panasonic.
What will save SOny?
Dropn' Bombs on your moms'. Well said. 72% is a HUGE decrease anyway you slice it
good concept, decent machine, if only they didn't try to force a new format on the world(umd) they might had a chance against the DS. Also the price was a bit high, but at least sony learned from their mistakes;)
They also make good batteries, thanks for the recall Sony. I don't recall their stereo equipement being market leaders anymore, maybe they still are.
*double post*