Sony begging PlayStation 3 developers to stay?

[marcode]

Sony begging PlayStation 3 developers to stay?
Author: Joe Martin
Published: 22nd Oct 2007

Sony has been having a tough time as of late and it's come as a bit of a shock to some that the company, once hailed as king of the consoles after the awesomely successful PlayStation 1 and 2, has appeared to be fighting an uphill battle with the PlayStation 3.

Released twelve weeks after the Xbox 360, the PlayStation 3 hasn't sold as well as might have been expected and the console has suffered from a lack of games when compared to the Xbox 360.

Now, it looks like Sony may have finally cottoned on to how precarious a position they appear to be in. In a report on the NPD breakdown of sales figures Dean Takahashi of the Mercury News alleges that Sony has been begging third-party developers not to abandon the PlayStation 3 as a platform.

"One piece of news that came out this week was that Sony pleaded with third-party developers not to abandon its struggling platform. That change in attitude is a marked difference compared to the arrogance of past years." Said Dean on his blog.

"The argument is that the PS3 will show its strength as developers learn how to make games for it. But developers know they can staff four or five Wii teams with the same number of people it takes to make one PS3 game."

The NPD gave a breakdown of game sales last month and only one PlayStation 3 game made the top ten list - and only just even then. Even the PlayStation 3 version of The Orange Box has been delayed by a few weeks, putting it behind both the PC and Xbox 360 versions, strengthening the idea that the PlayStation 3 is a system which developers find hard to work with.

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2007/10...ers_to_stay_/1

[Mario87]

Released twelve weeks after the Xbox 360, the PlayStation 3...

12 weeks?? Last time I checked it was a whole year! Think they mean 12 months!

More bad news for Sony!

[{{909}}]

its a load of bollocks, sales are no worse than the 360's at this point in its life.

[Absurd]

Agreed. The original Playstation had sluggish sales for its first year due to the dominance of the SNES and Mega Drive/Genesis. Now there are just waaaay too many platforms on sale and your average gamer/family can't afford to just readopt the minute a new console is launched. Also, for the first 12 months of the PS2's life quality games were pretty thin on the ground because devco's then were saying the PS2 was a twat to code for.

[EvilBoB]

To be fair analysts were pretty much expecting every other home to have a PS3 by this point pretty much lol.

I think the problem Sony have is that their console is a beast to develop for and requires a lot more development time. This is not an attractive option for small development companies as time is money and companies are out to make money.

I know people that work in the industry that say their software houses are shying away from the PS3 because of this. If sony want these companies to continuing developing then they need to put more effort into making the SDK better and supporting them better rather than "begging"

[prezzy]

But do you really believe they are 'begging'?

I would have thought that for a company as big as Sony they would realize that they need to develop the SDK and make it easier for developers. It is very early in the PS3's life and I really do expect them to up the ante in the near future.

:edit: meant to say I can't believe that Sony would be begging for anything and the PS3 is actually selling well. Once the exclusive titles (and there are some!) start coming out many more people will be buying.

[djm2k1]

To me it seems they've probably confused the term "begging" with the word "incentive". Sony don't need to beg, the system is taking off but it will take time to reach a level in the marketplace. Believe it or not, Sony are sitting on a goldmine with the PS3 - release as soon as they can every PS1 game they have the rights to onto the PSN for a few quid a pop and just for the people who download them for the PSP alone will rake it in with the PS3-PSP link-up.

[Billhouse]

They have created a newer SDK called Playstation Edge which makes it easier for developers to harness the the Cell's SPE's and the RSX. One of the first games to use this is Killzone 2. They just need to get it out to more 3rd party developers.

[EvilBoB]

I had heard there was a newer one but that it was being kept internally to Sony at the moment. This is very typical of them and they will probably charge obscene amounts of $s to 3rd party developers.

[Mario87]

but isn't the PS3 easier to develop for than the PS2 was at the start of its life? I know developers hated the PS2 at first, but once they got the hang of it, it really started to shine!

[ant3b]

pity the dreamcast had better graphics hehe then the ps2..

[{{909}}]

The DC did have better GFX at first, but that was for the exact same reasons as we have now with the 360 and PS3 and we all know how that turned out.

It will take someone like Kojima or Square Enix to show us what the PS3 is capable of, I would expect Final Fantasy whatever to look like nothing we have ever seen, the problem with that is the massive development times may make release years away yet.

Its also worth noting that while sony may be 'begging'. M$ have also been throwing money at developers since day one, Rockstar especially and they have still had to delay the 360 release of GTA so it simultaneous with the PS3 launch.