"[RSX] ... we're still waiting" - Anon games exec, BusinessWeek article

[wco81]

You figure the overall market is increasing. Not only are games more accepted as a mainstream entertainment choice, the people who gamed back in the Atari days or at least the NES days are still gaming and introducing their children to gaming.

Now there may not be too many kids under 10 who get a leading-edge console but when they grow into their teens, they might. You couple that with people in their 30s and 40s and maybe even older still buying consoles (which are more than game-playing toys which they used to be even just 10 years ago) and you have the potential for a growing market.

If gamers grew out of playing games, the way say kids grow out of buying tricycles or bikes with training wheels, then the market might be static or at the mercy of the birth rate. But if older gamers are sticking with the hobby and children are growing up with the games...

Or another analogy might be smoking. They have to get new kids hooked on it because the older smokers are dying off or trying to quit. So that market has to constantly be developed.

Don't want to rehast the same arguments from the other threads but Blu-Ray will have more impact than the DVD drive in the PS3 because in 2006, the PS3 will be one of the few 1080p sources. In the US, this is the first year with a number of 1080p displays. You can bet there will be more next year and the year after that and prices will come down. People who already have HDTVs will probably upgrade in the next few years and they're going to be looking for sources to feed these expensive toys.

 

[nelg]

yep . china's middle class alone is about 200-250 millions peoples.

I am sure Sony et. all are really interested in selling subsidised hardware into China where the average selling price of software is 110% the cost of blank media.

 

[NavNucST3]

You figure the overall market is increasing. Not only are games more accepted as a mainstream entertainment choice, the people who gamed back in the Atari days or at least the NES days are still gaming and introducing their children to gaming.

Now there may not be too many kids under 10 who get a leading-edge console but when they grow into their teens, they might. You couple that with people in their 30s and 40s and maybe even older still buying consoles (which are more than game-playing toys which they used to be even just 10 years ago) and you have the potential for a growing market.

If gamers grew out of playing games, the way say kids grow out of buying tricycles or bikes with training wheels, then the market might be static or at the mercy of the birth rate. But if older gamers are sticking with the hobby and children are growing up with the games...

Or another analogy might be smoking. They have to get new kids hooked on it because the older smokers are dying off or trying to quit. So that market has to constantly be developed.

Don't want to rehast the same arguments from the other threads but Blu-Ray will have more impact than the DVD drive in the PS3 because in 2006, the PS3 will be one of the few 1080p sources. In the US, this is the first year with a number of 1080p displays. You can bet there will be more next year and the year after that and prices will come down. People who already have HDTVs will probably upgrade in the next few years and they're going to be looking for sources to feed these expensive toys.

I don't disagree with your gaming age analogy except for the most part that would lead them into PS4 and xbox3.

Also, while growing, the number of HDTVs that can ACCEPT a 1080p signal I believe can be counted on one hand, maybe, both hands. That is why there is such a scrambling for the HP DLP.

I often find it funny that people downplay the "HD revolution" for the 360 because "no one owns an HDTV", but then immediately extoll the benefits of the PS3 with DUAL HDTV support and 1080p, as if the HDTV market will somehow grow exponentially from Nov. 22nd to PS3 release date.

While I would be more than happy to replace both my HDTVs, it has absolutely nothing to do with either BD-ROM or HD-DVD, its more about weight (My TXN3075WHF weights 126lbs/57.15kg) and size, I would like to move to 50+. Also, the image quality on my LCD TV is blown away by my CRT (which is to be expected, imo, nothing is better than crt in terms of PQ).

As far as sources go, of course, we all want the best quality, which is why I don't plan on selling my DVHS. As long as the firewire port on my Comcast box continues to output HD to my DVHS, I am pretty much covered. Would I like an optical format? It would be contradictory for me to actually want an optical format, as I was in the "pro-digital distribution camp", but I could live with it. I think BD-ROMs in 2006, will have little to no impact on the market as a whole, but we shall see.

 

[Qroach]

I often find it funny that people downplay the "HD revolution" for the 360 because "no one owns an HDTV", but then immediately extoll the benefits of the PS3 with DUAL HDTV support and 1080p, as if the HDTV market will somehow grow exponentially from Nov. 22nd to PS3 release date.

I agree. i see this often as well and can't understand how people do that. Realistically HDTV adoption is pretty slow, it's picking up speed. Having a high def movie player will help this, but in reality having LOTS of highdef TV channels will probably drive this futther into the mainstream. Anyway, I don't see blue ray being the silver bullet that DVD was on the PS2. mainly due to the many people that don't have high def TV sets. Everybody could benefit from DVD on a normal SDTV when compared to VHS. However to get the benefit of blueRay playback you "need" an HDTV (and not only a regular HDTV, but a HDTV with HDMI) and since everyone can't get this immediate benefit (unless they buy a new TV set) i doubt it will have the same impact as DVD popularity. I figure it would take three or four years to catch on with the mainstream before it could become a silver bullet type feature.

 

[SMOKE]

[ I think BD-ROMs in 2006, will have little to no impact on the market as a whole, but we shall see.[/QUOTE]


I have to disagree with you there my friend

If history is what you guys go by then why is it every household owns some sort of DVD player when they were first released upon the world. There were those going to renta-centers just to see what was so better about DVD players. Now that technology has gotten more advanced out of TV and picture clarity is more better than say 5 yrs or so ago, people are doing everything just to have HD sets in there homes. I work and make a decent wage and when I first read about the PS3 and 360 going Hi def (also walking into CCs and passing by all those HD sets) I went shopping for me one not knowing there werent too many signals for that kinda stuff yet. But wait...... it gets better, When Sony unleashes its Hi Def "CAMPAIGN" in 06 people will flock to that shit like "WHITE ON RICE" For those who dont own Hi Def sets yet and watched in amazement of all things to come from Sonys PS3 and MS 360, did you not sit there for a while and add up what you can cut out to obtain you a HD set of your own. But why is it ok for you guys to chunk $500+ on GFX cards every yr to 6 months for your PCs but its not logical for normaol consumers to do the same in a different timely manner with there TVs. Hell me and all my friends own HD sets for almost a year now just to have games like we are waiting for out of NEX GEN. I for one believe SOny will get the ball rolling fast and we will see a increase in HD sets this yr and it will be big. Hell, I still owe for my dam set and I get my use out of it now from the 360 but before that it was the DISCOVERY channel and ESPN

 

[Qroach]

smoke,

If history is what you guys go by then why is it every household owns some sort of DVD player when they were first released upon the world.

Why? ...because every single owner of a TV, could see the benefit DVD playback offered over VHS. The same can't be said about blueray, why? becuase you need an HDTV to see the benefit.

You didn't need a new TV to get the benefit out of DVD. I'm sure you can see that point?

 

[_phil_]

I am sure Sony et. all are really interested in selling subsidised hardware into China where the average selling price of software is 110% the cost of blank media.

how much is a blank BD media ?

 

[senas8]

smoke,



Why? ...because every single owner of a TV, could see the benefit DVD playback offered over VHS. The same can't be said about blueray, why? becuase you need an HDTV to see the benefit.

Ummm last time I checked 28"HDTV Tube are about $500...affordable.

 

[Qroach]

Ummm last time I checked 28"HDTV Tube are about $500...affordable.

That's not the point. DVD could be enjoyed by anyone that had a TV. HD requires you to get a new TV to see the benefit. If people expect to see the same frenzy of people buying PS2's as cheap DVD players to occur with PS3 and blue ray, then it's likely not going to happen until MANY more people have HDTV's. I'm talking mainstream consumers, not power buyers and early adopters.

 

[expletive]

That's not the point. DVD could be enjoyed by anyone that had a TV. HD requires you to get a new TV to see the benefit. If people expect to see the same frenzy of people buying PS2's as cheap DVD players to occur with PS3 and blue ray, then it's likely not going to happen until MANY more people have HDTV's. I'm talking mainstream consumers, not power buyers and early adopters.

Add on here the format war which will keep many consumers on the sidelines for a few years and also digital distribution/"on demand" services. DVD had MUCH more going for it at the beginning of last gen than either HD-DVD or BR have this time around.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

And those $500 HDTVs are taking in 1080p signals and have HDMI?

I doubt it. What you are really proving is that people who are still adopting to HDTV to get the benefit of HD cable/Sat, are actually less likely to go purchase yet ANOTHER new expensive HDTV when they realize that the one they just bought doesn't make use of BR.

So you've got a situation where nobody with a SDTV is going to see the benfits of BR. You've got a situation where most people who already purchased expensive HDTVs aren't going to see the benefits of BR because they don't carry 1080p or have HDMI inputs. You honestly believe those people are going to buy yet another expensive HDTV? No, more likely they'll feel like they were screwed by being earlier adopters and will just stick with the improvements in quality they get from OTA broadcasts, progressive scan DVDs and Sat/Cable for a couple of years until the standards are fleshed out.

That leaves you with the remaining market of people who have lots of cash, but somehow didn't already early adopt HDTV and are willing to go buy the PS3 and a new HDTV, and the extremely small market of people who have even more cash and are willing to toss out their 2 year old expensive HDTV to purchase a newer, even more expensive one.

Yep, that's the identical market as DVD had when everybody with a TV could see the benefits of upgrading from VHS to DVD and didn't require an additional expensive investment.

 

[thatdude90210]

If people expect to see the same frenzy of people buying PS2's as cheap DVD players to occur with PS3 and blue ray, then it's likely not going to happen until MANY more people have HDTV's. I'm talking mainstream consumers, not power buyers and early adopters.

Plus some of those might go with a cheap Chinese manuf (a powerful competitor they didn't have last time) HD-DVD player or whatever other formats.

 

[dskneo]

200 million in 5 years is crazy talk. PS2's managed half that and PS3 is going to face stiffer competition.

what stiffer competition?

ps2 had the worst conditions do succeed. the weaker Dreamcast came earlier and 2 stronger consoles after, xbox and GC!

now ps3 is the most powerfull one (or so the world thinks so), it has competition from the equivalent X360 and the weaker Revolution...

i dont see more stiffer competition than ps2 had...

for me, the stiffest competition was with PS1, against strongest N64 and Saturn... again it won.

 

[AlNom]

so... about the RSX bandwidth being 1/10th in the dev kits... How bad is that exactly for game development? I have no idea about how things are done with respect to optimizing the frame rate and stuff so... could someone give me an example or idea of what implications there would be to have a dev kit with a lot less bandwidth than the final hardware?

 

[senas8]

No 1080P... I said affordable. So the average consumer now can get their foot in...and about the format war...let that be because if you purchase a PS3 you dont have to worry about what format you need....im taking about the PS3 fans here.

 

[nelg]

how much is a blank BD media ?

~91% of the street price of a future PS3 game in China.

 

[expletive]

~91% of the street price of a future PS3 game in China.

lol

 

[AlphaWolf]

No 1080P... I said affordable. So the average consumer now can get their foot in...and about the format war...let that be because if you purchase a PS3 you dont have to worry about what format you need....im taking about the PS3 fans here.

Well thats pointless. The ps3 fans don't even need a tv and they will buy one. What about the other 90%+ of people who may be in the market?

 

[Johnny Awesome]

I agree with Qroach. It's safe to say that the PS3 will not have as high a marketshare as the PS2 had. MS is sure to make gains this time around. Right now the market is roughly:

PS2 - 100 mil
Xbox - 25 mil
Cube - 25 mil

It won't surprise me to see 50 mil unit growth by 2011 to 200 mil with a breakdown something like this:

PS3 - 100 mil
X360 - 60 mil
Rev - 40 mil

IMO this is reasonable, but 200 mil for PS3 in 5 years with much better competition and more expensive hardware is a pipe-dream.

 

[senas8]

Well thats pointless. The ps3 fans don't even need a tv and they will buy one. What about the other 90%+ of people who may be in the market?

My point is that HDTV are affordable. In time they will get even cheaper.