New Technology TV

Before the holidays, next generation video gaming consoles were all the rage. The major competitors were Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's Play Station 3. Nintendo's new Wii (pronounced "we") also came out about the same time, but was aimed at a different audience. While both the Play Station 3 and the Xbox 360 had similar features, each system there was a lot more buzz around Sony's Play Station 3. That's because, at least on paper, the Play Station 3 had a lot going for it. It could play all of the same video game titles of previous Play Station models and the newer games were supposed to feature such realistic graphics that many reviewers reportedly had to remind themselves that they were watching a video game rather than a video of something that had actually been recorded from live action. On top of everything else, the Play Station 3 had a Blu-ray disc drive so that it could also serve as an High Definition DVD player able to play discs in Sony's proprietary Blu-ray format. Of course, the Play Station 3 was also set up and designed to display video game graphics in high definition TV resolutions as well.

The Xbox 360 had similarly impressive hardware features, although the graphics weren't quite as good. Also, although the Xbox 360 didn't come with a built in high definition DVD drive it was possible to buy a separate drive that played Toshiba's HD-DVD discs so that the Xbox 360 could also function as a high definition DVD player.

Of course all of this is still true, but now despite a number of technological superiorities, the Play Station 3 is sitting on shelves and is being outsold by the Nintendo Wii. Given the initial high demand for the Play Station 3 that caused people to wait in line for days before the release of the video game platform, get into fights over the systems, and sell the systems on ebay for prices in excess of two thousand dollars; something has obviously gone very wrong with Sony's marketing of this system.

Some analysts believe that including a Blu-ray drive with the Play Station 3 was a crucial mistake. The addition of this new technology brought the price tag on the Play Station 3 up to a minimum of about five hundred dollars which makes it significantly more expensive the the Xbox 360 or the Wii. That, combined with the fact that Play Station fans want the video gaming platforms for playing video games rather than watching movies made it so that the Play Station was just more money than they were willing to spend. Sony's strategy on the whole subject was to some extent built off of the role that the Play Station 2 played in bringing the original DVD format into widespread acceptance.

There may be an even simpler explanation as to why the Play Station 3 isn't selling. After the initial rush for Play Station 3's upon their release, there was a shortage of units available to the general public. Now, apparently there are plenty of Play Station 3's to go around, but Sony has neglected to tell anyone about it. Most consumers may still be under the impression that there's a shortage of the video game platforms. In this case, it's another example of Sony making a great product and then botching the public relations end of things.