Sony Should Have Delayed Their Launch A Year? Nonsense!

This man…

…is utterly wrong.

In a piece written yesterday for Advanced Media Network, Lucas Dewoody claims that Sony would have been better off delaying the launch of the PS3 until this year. Like, in a month from now. From the article:

And imagine what a two year delay could have done for the price. If Sony had waited until this Christmas, the machine could have possibly retailed for as low as $399–a price AMN’s own Rumor Reporter is already hearing talk about for this holiday season. That’s still a lot, but apparently Xbox 360 owners were perfectly happy with that price in 2005 and its weak launch lineup.

If Sony had waited and let the “still highly profitable” PS2 run its course, they could have ridden into the next-gen late, but with a ton of launch content and more importantly still maintaining that mainstream superiority complex the PlayStation dynasty used to project to people. Sure, they would have been late, but it’s better to show up to a party late with a boatload of gifts than to be the first in the door empty handed. It leaves a bad taste in the host’s mouth, or in these situation— gamers.

Could that lineup combined with a lower price point have been enough to fully counter the hype machine that is Halo 3 or the casual appeal of Wii? Maybe not, but it would have sure taken a huge chunk out of the wind in the competition’s sales

…

Kill me now.

…

The absolutely fatal flaw in his logic is that he assumes that the only thing that effects technology’s pricing is time. In reality, a huge part of price is involved in mass production, which leads to more efficient methods of manufacturing a certain product. If Sony was launching today, they wouldn’t be at $399. And that’s the real scary thing, because Microsoft would have had two years out to market, and the games catalog would be overwhelming. It would be ridiculous to think that Sony would ever be able to compete with the 360’s price point with a two year head start on manufacturing and distribution.

No, the PS3 if anything was launched too late. MS beat them to market and they scrambled and lied, saying that the PS3 would come out in February. If that fabrication had actually come true, they might have stolen more of the 360 and Wii’s thunder. They needed to build a less “future-proof” (to use their own terminology) console, and focus on one that plays games. Not Blu-Ray discs, games.

But Sony’s strategy has always centered on the platform–from the DVD player in the PS2, to UMD discs in the PSP, and now the Blu-Ray player for the PS3–they are a hardware company through and through. And that is what is killing them right now. A hardware launch philosophy only works if you hit the market at the right time, with the right need, as they did with DVDs and the PS2. But as we’ve seen with the PSP, if you bank your strategy on a new medium, and that medium fails to come off, you’re sunk.

So, I’m sorry Lucas, but you don’t know what you’re talking about. Even the most staunch PS3 supporter would agree that launching your product two years after the competition is akin to nailing yourself into your own coffin. Build a box that is cheaper to make and easier to develop for from the start, and the games will come. Pay the money up front to keep exclusives and people will have to buy your system to play the games they want. Sony did neither of these things, and the results are telling.

–WG