Why the PS3 Will Lose This Christmas

Once again, video gamers are treated to one of our favorite things: the console war. There will be hundreds of thousands of preorders, game sales, hype, and for those of us like myself, camping outside the local Best Buy waiting for the stroke of midnight to get our choice of game system. Perhaps this is a moot point as all the preorders have been sold for both Sony's Playstation 3 and Nintendo's Wii. But if I may be so bold, I think that Sony will lose this generation's console battle.

The question I always ask myself when a new game system is launched is "What does this system offer me for the price?" There's the usual talk here of bits and bytes and graphic mapping and so on, but how many people really understand what that really means? Most of the time, its parents buying the systems or games for kids and half the time, they don't even know what the name of the system is. The usual scene is a parent comes into a video game store looking like a freshly baited fish walking up to me and saying "My son wants me to get that new... what is it? Um... Oh I don't know that new game system everyone is talking about." After that I need to alert the medical team when I tell her the price leaving the poor lady from having to go through the shock of realizing she's not getting one this Christmas.

That aside, what does the Playstation 3 have to offer for its $699 asking price? Not enough. First there is the Blu-Ray DVD technology included. Oh good, I can now use my PS 3 as a DVD player for all the HD-DVD disks I've been stockpiling since I first heard about Blu-Ray technology. And at $30 a DVD believe me, I have thousands. What, aren't you independently wealthy too? Ha ha ha silly mortals. I guess for those of you who absolutely need to have HD-DVD right now the PS3 is a good idea. But for the rest of us who don't have enough money to buy sports cars, word on the street is one of the Japanese companies has developed technology for a HD-DVD/DVD player hybrid that should be mass marketed sometime next year.

Not to mention, the speed at which the HD-DVD lens has to move reading my video games? I'll pass. Video games are rather fragile and if your kids are anything like me, they've left the game system on and left for a few hours (I once left my PS2 on for a week straight. Not on standby but actually on. Fried the disc and the system.) Strike one for uselessness of technology.
Second comes the lack of solid launch titles. What good is a $699 video game system when there are no games I want to play on it?

There are 30 titles in all including the usual array of EA sports games (which are not PS3 exclusive). There are no titles exclusive to the PS3 that make me think that I need to have the title right now. Let us take the Wii's launch titles for example though. There are only about 20 launch titles, but in there are some heavy names. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (which I will get into later), an array of family games (i.e. Happy Feet, Spongebob Squarepants), and the usual Mario and Sonic games as well. Strike two for the lack of jump-off-the-page launch titles.

Finally there is the playability issue. Think back 10 years or so to the first time you picked up a home console racing title (i.e. Mario Kart, NASCAR, whatever). Remember when you were trying to use the controller as a steering wheel but it just didn't work that way? Fortunatly for the PS3 the controller is now motion sensitive. This adds a new dimension to the game. So for shooting games and flying games, we will feel more immersed. But, sorry Sony, you've been beaten by Nintendo again on this one. The Wii took the motion sensitive controller to new levels.

I feel I only need to write two things: Marvel Ultimate Alliance. What kid (or adult) won't have fun playing as spiderman and actually having to flick his wrists to sling Spiderman's web? and for LOZ: Twilight Princess. One of Link's weapons is the bow and arrow. The user has to hold one controller up to aim and the other they need to pull back behind their ear to draw the bow. As the arrow is being pulled back the user hears the bow stretch from a speaker in the controller. When the arrow is fired, the sound travels from that little controller all the way to the front of the screen. Strike three for getting beat out on the controller.

One final point is the online system. Sony just realized literally seconds before developing the PS3 that Microsoft may be on to something with the XBox live. So they dropped a ton of money into developing a multi-player online system. But guess what fans, it won't be available in time for the PS3 launch date and will require an additional download. Nintendo also threw an online community together for the Wii, but will have the almighty virtual console. For a small price, users can download classic games ranging from the NES through the N64. That plus the established multi-player system puts it on top of the PS3.

If that isn't enough to convince you that the PS3 will lose this war, let me predict Christmas 2007. Sony had originally said that over the summer they were going to plan a $75 price cut for the system. However, after discussing this with US retailers they decided this was not a good idea. Parents and poor college students, that means after the dust of this Christmas has settled, through the whole year, Sony will cost as much as two Nintendo Wiis. Will Sony eventually win this console war? Probably. They have better deals signed with better game development companies. Ultimately though, I think Nintendo will sell more units solely on the interactivity, the family environment, and the price.