Next-gen launch strategising *Spawn

But seems like PS4 overall is still doing well. So maybe not as much of an impetus to ship a more powerful console.

There’s no synergy for other Sony products like them trying to win the Blu Ray vs. HD DVD format war with the PS3. Sony sells UHD TVs and UHD disc players but those aren’t as big businesses for them.
 
Sony can wait, bring something more powerful and correct the competitor's mistakes but at the same time they might be sacrificing market share and will not be able to compete in pricing.

If the present and future is forwards/backwards compatibility, this is less of a risk. When each console generation brought a software library 'wipe' there was no real downside to switching consoles but the deeper and more you invest in a software ecosystem, the bigger that loss is going to be if you care about that back library.
 
Presumably price will be the biggest factor. MS stumbled with the $500 price and bundling Kinect 2. It didn’t broaden appeal to casual gamers willing to pay for a voice UI for controlling TV content as they had hoped.

Now can a $500 price point succeed 7 or 8 years later or will they have to make sure to hit that $400 price point?

There are no non-gaming features which will drive sales now. MS thought the XB1 would be the new portal for all the TV sources, not just regular TV but the streaming services, which are now way more popular than back then.

Now you can get a voice-driven UI to control shows from many sources.

So the selling point would be more power? Or would either Sony or MS try to steal the Switch’s thunder and look at some kind of a dockable/handheld form factor?
 
Is there reason to think it isn't? A recent UK poll placed PlayStation as the fourth strongest brand in the UK. Sales are comparable to those machines but at a higher price. I've no idea what launch strategy Sony should pursue, but the PS brand seems very solid.

Searched for some branding lists. The internet -- lists of everything!! A cursory glances seems to place PS higher than XB. eg. First list, PS at 40, XB at 81. Doubt there's much data going back to PS1/2 for comparison.
Well it is strong. But back in the PS1 and PS2 times the significance of the competitors were critically diminished next to Sony's super massive success. The MS is a stronger adversary than any of it's previous competitors. XBOX One sales may not be PS4 levels but it is still very strong in the US market. I believe there is more faith in the XBOX brand due to PS3's mistakes and MS gained market share last gen. But I am not sure if it is large enough to have a significant impact on Sony's marketshare in case of a one year delay and/or higher price tag
 
Is there any indication that PS4 or PS4 Pro is losing sales to X1X because it’s more powerful?

Threads on ResetEra indicate a good number of PS4 owners picking up OneX for multiplatform titles.
 
Threads on ResetEra indicate a good number of PS4 owners picking up OneX for multiplatform titles.
But those people own PS4s, so Sony is not losing a sale. Plus Resetera basically represents the core gaming audience, which is relatively small to begin with. And even then, there are a lot of people there who have stayed with Sony. Or skipped XB1X because they already own a more powerful PC.

Are buyers choosing XB1X and skipping PS4 entirely due to power? Sure, probably. But my guess is that number is relatively VERY small. XB1X is already a niche product that mostly caters to core gamers. Then you have PC to compete with.

The only type of person that would skip PS4 entirely in favor of XB1X are XB fans that don't care about Sony's exclusives and want the best console experience (ie don't want to deal with PCs), and are willing to pay a premium for it. PS4 sales were down YOY in 2018, but it was still one of their best years. I think it's pretty safe to say that PS4 is virtually unaffected by the XB1X's existence. And I would argue that it's thanks in large part to their strong exclusive lineup.

If the question includes sales from third-party software, then that is something that I could see being a bigger hit to Sony. Multi-console owners would certainly opt for the better version of MP games, unless there's a multiplayer component and they would rather play with their friends. But even software sales seem to be unaffected, judging by software splits.
 
Last edited:
Are buyers choosing XB1X and skipping PS4 entirely due to power?
Hmm.
seems a bit backwards to me. The goal of hardware sales is to expand the user base so that the businesses profit off licensing for the software and services.

If PS4 owners are picking up X1X for Multiplatforms than that money is no longer headed to Sony but to MS. Which could also send over gamepass and Live sun as well, making their PS4 largely just an exclusive machine. Which is bad because that isn’t all that profitable for Sony to just be an exclusive machine.

Just like it’s bad for MS to be a UHD device. Vice versa.

Tldr; I don’t think it should matter what hardware they own, it’s where they buy their software that drives the major profits.
 
Hmm.
seems a bit backwards to me. The goal of hardware sales is to expand the user base so that the businesses profit off licensing for the software and services.

If PS4 owners are picking up X1X for Multiplatforms than that money is no longer headed to Sony but to MS. Which could also send over gamepass and Live sun as well, making their PS4 largely just an exclusive machine. Which is bad because that isn’t all that profitable for Sony to just be an exclusive machine.

Just like it’s bad for MS to be a UHD device. Vice versa.

Tldr; I don’t think it should matter what hardware they own, it’s where they buy their software that drives the major profits.
Thats the thing with MS. They have found a clever way to eliminate the competition's ability to advertise the PS brand as the most powerful console and the best place to play.
This is the main purpose of the XB1X.
This is why I believe they are targeting two SKU's for next gen. The normal one and the high end one. The normal one can be released soonish for a quick market share take over, while the high end, although will be more expensive, it might be able to compete against the more powerful PS5 at a normal attractive price once it is also released. The less powerful unit could be very cheap by then and sell like crazy during the holiday season when the new PS5 will arrive
 
Thats the thing with MS. They have found a clever way to eliminate the competition's ability to advertise the PS brand as the most powerful console and the best place to play.
This is the main purpose of the XB1X.
This is why I believe they are targeting two SKU's for next gen. The normal one and the high end one. The normal one can be released soonish for a quick market share take over, while the high end, although will be more expensive, it might be able to compete against the more powerful PS5 at a normal attractive price once it is also released. The less powerful unit could be very cheap by then and sell like crazy during the holiday season when the new PS5 will arrive
I think Phil and MS felt it was very important to seize back the title crown, they talk about it a lot in their overall strategy. I recall one of the Sony executives saying that the were blown away by initial PS4 launch year and they went into analytics to figure it out, and they did, but they didn't want to reveal what took them there.

I can only assume it was power + DF that really bolstered them above and beyond expectations.
As we saw MS copy and paste that strategy as soon as X1X launched.

Though as we are agreeable with each other here on this forum, I think we've come to the conclusion that for most of us, power isn't everything. And there's a lot of agreement around just playing games because at the end of the day we just want to play the games we want.
And posters across neo-era, elsewhere and here have largely used that line of reasoning and the fact that Xbox isn't outselling PS4 as proof that power isn't everything. And to some aspect I agree; however, there is a time for viral (at the beginning) and it's much too late for a reverse viral trend, Sony hit critical mass so quickly that once you hit that, people will choose platforms just because of their social relationships. If we re-launched today as the ecosystem features stand, I suspect Sony wouldn't be enjoying the lead that they have.

The real advantage is that every single multiplatform title that is released is free positive press when you are the power leader. BC and enhanced BC being always dissected by DF also is free positive press. And then Games for Gold has their 2 BC + 2 Xbox Titles for positive Press. And now Gamepass games each month being introduced is positive press. So it quickly became a positive press cycle each month for Xbox because of new and old games being brought to the forefront by DF and other sites looking to cash in on that. This seems to be working out for them if you just look at Xbox in isolation and see the YoY numbers. Earlier in the generation a majority of posters predicted some things that came true and other things that failed to come true. What did come true was the lack of available power on XBO1S. It's now definitely 720p machine. What didn't come true was Xbox being outright dominated to the point of business exit.

Following, Sony won on the generation reset. A little bit like how MS rode the reset the previous generation (really failed to finish though). A bit like watching opening moves in a chess game. Beginning the game with large opening blunders and the rest of the game just plays out with no way out 'usually'. Thinking about that, curious to see how next generation will play out as this generation reset will be softer with libraries moving forward. Multiplayer games that dominated the generation won't get 'wiped' out because of population loss. And that's a big deal I think for Sony to not reset. You can't kill your important GaaS title populations as it's going to be a detrimental strategy moving forward and I'm sure MS has had this in mind ever since they got their asses whoops this generation. I mean, they had such a stronghold on Call of Duty, the generation reset killed off that population and they had so much hubris to believe that everyone would just purchase the next CoD on Xbox "because". Hard to imagine the outlook on the sole company that decides not to do BC and forces a reset on their Fortnite, Destiny, Warframe, CoD/BF, Minecraft, and GTAV populations? MS must have taken a deep look at why they failed and saw the obvious population declines as soon as next generation rolls on. The fact that Sony is now the marketing leader for many of MS' 3P marketing deals of last gen speaks volumes. And like how history plays out, Sony got back into the game building up their 1P library and we see MS making similar motions, funny how history tends to move in cycles.

They'll try to wrap up the generation ideally with some output from their exclusives 1P and if possible have some output from those new studios purchased. I think from a sales perspective, at least i think MS will finish strong because their population has some form of guarantee their library is going to move forward regardless of what X2 will do; they won't feel pressured to wait for next gen. They'll purchase hardware at the end of this generation cheap, and then wait for sales on next gen to buy at a price point that is affordable for them.

Playstation is very much still going to have a very strong draw with their exclusive lineup and will end their generation with a strong set of exclusives building into their next gen. The strategy has worked out very well for them, they can't do anything more with this generation with next gen being so close so their plan is really to make sure all those features that their customer base wants happens in next gen. They continue to sell more than Xbox even though their YoY numbers are down from time to time so there's that which really speaks to the strength of the brand.

I suspect at this time, if we're to determine whose 'winning', if that really matters, it's probably the number of paying/active subscriptions on each platform - assuming we are having problems figuring out the hardware splits.
 
Yeah. If you want to play the power card, it needs to be at launch to own that title for the generation (or half gen). There's always one console that bares the mantel "most powerful console ever" and if you have that, you can use it as a significant anchor point for your branding.

On the flip side though, we should look at Nintendo. Never the most powerful console but they manage great sales (here and there). As oft discussed, imagine a competently powerful Nintendo console with both the Nintendo stronghold library and the full glut of cross-platform titles in their native glory. How much are people going to value Nintendo's whimsy and execution over a few more frames per second or higher DF pixel counts?

I'd say MS are the most in need of the power crown at the moment, because they haven't a notable identity outside of that, at least to my mind (maybe market research shows otherwise?). I mean, PS is known for its blockbuster AAA titles and diverse library. Nintendo is known for Nintendo classics. MS's strategy hasn't been consistently applied, so XB has been the hardcore multiplayer shooter platform, and the Kinect family games machine, and none of that has stuck. At the moment they have a value-add subscription service. "Xbox - the cheapest place to play" - is that a slogan MS wants as the base of their strategy? If MS doesn't have the most powerful console, what's their primary message going to be? What's the tag-line/offering that people will identify Xbox with? "Play Anywhere" would be quite a good one IMO if they could establish that.
 
Last edited:
Hmm.
seems a bit backwards to me. The goal of hardware sales is to expand the user base so that the businesses profit off licensing for the software and services.

If PS4 owners are picking up X1X for Multiplatforms than that money is no longer headed to Sony but to MS. Which could also send over gamepass and Live sun as well, making their PS4 largely just an exclusive machine. Which is bad because that isn’t all that profitable for Sony to just be an exclusive machine.

Just like it’s bad for MS to be a UHD device. Vice versa.

Tldr; I don’t think it should matter what hardware they own, it’s where they buy their software that drives the major profits.
The original question seemed to be strictly hardware related.

But yeah, I kind of touched up on that in my post. Sony may be taking a bigger hit to software sales due to multiplatform owners picking up games on XB1X instead of PS4. But like I said, software sales also seem to not be affected much by XB1X's existence judging by software splits and the amount of software revenue generated by Sony.

To be clear, I'm not saying Sony isn't losing money from XB1X. Again, XB1X (and Pro) are niche products, the majority of console owners own the base consoles. So XB1X doesn't seem to be affecting PS4 in a significant way, or even noticeable way. PS4 is still selling extremely well, both HW and SW.
 
Last edited:
Just wondering if the next gen could be affected by high prices for GPUs due to the crypto craze, though it seems crypto currency prices have crashed.

Hell if they launched a couple of years ago, they might have ported crypto mining software to new consoles and let them link together in some parallel mode for maximal mining.
 
Threads on ResetEra indicate a good number of PS4 owners picking up OneX for multiplatform titles.
I have my doubts about what Resetera can indicate at all.
The thing is like the high-security isolated psychiatric ward of Neogaf. Are there actual devs posting in there?

Why would PS4 owners buy a OneX for multiplatform, if PS4 exclusives run much better on the PS4 Pro?
Unless we're talking about the population who buys all the consoles regardless, and choose to purchase multiplatform titles for the OneX because it offers better graphics.
But I can't see how that's not a tiny niche.


As oft discussed, imagine a competently powerful Nintendo console with both the Nintendo stronghold library and the full glut of cross-platform titles in their native glory.
Better yet: imagine Nintendo becoming a 3rd party whose games run on consoles made by companies who don't skimp on the hardware budget.
Their CEO certainly hinted at that very strongly, during his latest interview.
 
Why would PS4 owners buy a OneX for multiplatform, if PS4 exclusives run much better on the PS4 Pro?
Unless we're talking about the population who buys all the consoles regardless, and choose to purchase multiplatform titles for the OneX because it offers better graphics.
But I can't see how that's not a tiny niche.
Generally speaking this in combination with
But like I said, software sales also seem to not be affected much by XB1X's existence judging by software splits and the amount of software revenue generated by Sony.
likely has merit.
If there are people switching off PS4 for X1X just for 3P titles, it can't be many. How many could there honestly be realistically right.

Further more, the ratio of PS4 to Xbox makes this number even harder to determine. Trying to separate a venn diagram without any significant data points is an exercise in futility.
 
Because multiplatform games run better on OneX, and those enthusiast gamers want the best performance.
We're then talking about PS4 gamers who:

1 - Can afford two console ecossystems (not just consoles but also subscriptions for online);
2 - Are actually willing to bother handling two different consoles in the living room;
3 - Are enthusiasts who actually pay attention to the IQ difference between platforms;
4 - To such a level that they're willing to buy a XBOneX because of the very small IQ delta between it and the PS4 Pro;
5 - But don't own a PC with a GTX1070 / Vega 56 or better, which would objectively play any multiplatform game with a considerable IQ advantage.

It just doesn't feel like this is a relevant population at all..
 
It just doesn't feel like this is a relevant population at all..
this number is probably smaller or near non-existent at the beginning of the generation. But as we approach the end when the prices keep coming down etc, you're likely to know more people with both consoles.

Though, I still suspect still small overall.
 
It just doesn't feel like this is a relevant population at all..

Someone asked if it happens, I showed it does and where to find such things. I never said any comments as to the size.

Question: Is there any indication that PS4 or PS4 Pro is losing sales to X1X because it’s more powerful?
Answer: Yes.
 
Back
Top