It's likely not very cost effective to take that route. Why pay a lot of money to a big 3rd party studio like Namco to make a game exclusive for some limited period, when that money could be better spend in your own studios.
You can do both. As for Tekken, if, and that is a big if, Namco was/is looking at broading the market with it Sony would need to consider the fact Tekken has been a major Playstation brand for over a decade. Its sales volume has declined, but the presence of the brand is important for mindshare and association. While losing exclusivity may not mean much in regards to sales, it would represent a changing relationship with Namco to a minor degree but more importantly would signal a change in the market winds: For a decade being exclusive, even without a deal, was worth the effort because the consumer base was so large and compelling, and riding the identity so rewarding, there was no reason to consider the small fries in the market. Losing some exclusives is bound to happen, especially these timed exclusives. And some long held defacto exclusives are going to change. But it is to Sony's advantage, both from a consumer and publisher point of view, to minimize these rumors.
Sony needs focus on attracting devs to their platform using means other that paying them off.
It is all about the money. Either from Sony directly or a market base that is so compelling they can be confident in reaping a significant windfall. Obviously publishers are not going to ignore the millions of units Sony sells, but if they can sell 1M on MS and 1M on Sony then they will.
For example, leading by example with their own titles and really showing off the delta between a PS3 exculsive and a multi platform game. Or getting devs excited about the hardware by showing real world results.
The time for Sony to show such a delta is launch--if not a year ago when development on titles for 2007 were already well under way.
Further, from a publisher perspective it doesn't matter. MS has a large install base lead and time to market lead in NA (12 months) and Europe (15 months or more), has a fully deployed and fleshed out online service, and have resolved the majority of their system bugs and quirks. And the PS2 clearly demonstrated that even hardware significantly faster in many areas doesn't create more compelling games (i.e. it is a software/talent issue). Even worse, even if Sony shows off a killer PS3 app, which publisher can 1) fund it and 2) expect to make a profit on it? If you spend $50M on a next gen title you absolutely MUST have a profit guaranteed. If Sony isn't going to help you foot the bill, then you are going to put that on other platforms--especially if the competition has more customers in your release window.
Finally, you assume such a delta exists. I think graphically you will be hard pressed to prove such. Worse case scenario for MS is the Xbox 360 has the same amount of system memory and a relatively competitive, if not frustrating, graphics subsystem.
With MS currently throwing money at studios at Japanese studios, it's not smart for Sony to get lured into a bidding war at this time. That is a path MS would destroy them on since they could out bid them every time.
The real solution is marketshare. That has been Sony's weapon of choice for 2 platforms. Which makes the PS3 strategy pretty interesting. Release a year later, offer a significantly more expensive product, have limited availability in the trend setter/pay anything stage, and have a library of multiplatform titles with few exclusives, and even fewer high budget / extremely polished titles. Sony was on notice in Spring of 2005 that they had 18 months to get killer apps out the door Day 1 to make up for their delayed strategy and compensate for the platform cost differences. I am still scratching my head why they just didn't aim for 2005 (Cell and RSX could have been ready), with software development starting in 2004, and just blow MS and Nintendo away. 3 gens with 100M units would have been the ultimate nail in the coffin.
So now Sony is a year late with little software to show for itself. If you don't have a huge market share lead at the beginning the only other option is to fund development. MS has chosen to fund developers and publishers (not necessarily bidding as you say--there is a difference). Nothing is stopping Sony to fund projects. at this point it seems like a good move.
Using money to pick up new/young studios is a different story though. There is high risk here but the reward potential is big.
True, which is why MS has funded Mystwalker, Realtime Studios, Peter Jackson and have also funded new Ips from Bioware, Epic, Silicon Knights, and so forth.
But buying something like Tekken you practically already know what the sales numbers are going to be before it is even created. Your selling to a built in audience. Your chances of it exceeding expectations with regard to sales is small.
What happened to Sony showing them how it is done and how an exclusive could far outstrip a multiplatform title
On the pre-built audiance, I think you hit the nail on the head. And when a number of exclusives become multiplatform, that pre-built fan base now doesn't have to say, "GTA or Halo" but can say, "Hey! I can get both!" Keeping that fanbase can be important because they buy other titles as well. And for a rabid fan base, like VF5's fans, they can help with console adoption.
Now Tekken may be so weak of a brand that at this point the fans don't care and the mindshare/PR issues are pretty irrelevant. But IF this happens, it will show a shifting in the industry. At some point you have to call it a trend if this continues, at which point the entire dynamic by which we view the consoles changes.
I will say this: For every past exclusive that becomes multiplatform a couple things happen: Platform cost becomes a much more relevant purchasing decisions, services and extended features come into play (BDR, online, etc), and exclusive become a grey area of great importance for fence sitters but also less forceful for many as there is a smaller "block" of exclusives to sway a buyer one way or the other. And dare I say the first couple "killer app" must have games could dramatically sway the market.
