Are Sony starting to fall foul of their own hubris?

Thought this might be an interesting discussion following an E3 in which the strongly prevailing opinion is that Microsoft knocked it out of the park whereas Sony flubbed it?

A couple of points to possibly support this view:
- Starting their E3 presser in a strawberry floating church they built just to demonstrate TLoU2 then expecting people to be happy hanging around while they shifted a few hundred people to another theatre.
- Continually being tone deaf on community desire for crossplay support.
- Falling behind MS on ecosystem QoL stuff like backwards compatibility, name changes, general PSN jank.
- No 4K Blu-ray drive.
- Answering the Fortnite account blocking outcry with a statement basically gonna saying ‘look how many PS4s we’ve sold’.

I’ll leave personal thoughts on any of those for a while, but does any of this start to suggest we might be seeing the beginning of a stumble similar to the beginning of the PS3 era?

Or, are Sony at such a strong position with their first party exclusives that any of the above is just inconsequential?

NickSCFC

Conference was bad, but their first party output looks better than ever.

They're slowly becoming arrogant dicks again and their main first party output now all seems to be the same identikit big, story-focused cinematic adventure style of game.

Attitude towards cross-play is just plain anti-consumer.

They still ignore backwards compatibility. Still think it's ridiculous I can't play any of my PS1 classics on the system even though it's clearly possible (same with PSP, Vita and PS2 games too) and I'm really surprised how little criticism they get for this compared to Nintendo and the VC.

I didn't watch their presser so didn't know about the church thing :lol:

They do still have the better first party but the arrogance is starting to seep through.

Microsoft are starting a buzz but Sony seem to be coasting.

It's all cyclical. MS did the same when the 360 hit big. Now Sony are the leader it's their turn to push their luck.

Sony are coasting along, and will probably continue to do so until the PS5. A 4K Blu Ray will inevitably be a minor selling point for the next machine.

I think their lack of interest in BC at the moment is because they’re going to release a new PSone.

Game wise however they keep releasing hit after hit, whereas with the PS3 it launched very late behind the Xbox 360, was much more expensive, and until about Ratchet and Clank and Uncharted had nothing worth playing. Sony tried something different with their E3 this year and it flopped, but the games themselves weren’t the problem.

Mafro wrote:They're slowly becoming arrogant dicks again and their main first party output now all seems to be the same identikit big, story-focused cinematic adventure style of game.

This is a good point I didn’t hit upon.

All of the big 4 from them at this E3 and big exclusives looking back, very much fit into a certain ‘style’. Action Adventure games with a mix of combat and exploration, third person view, ‘mature’ story telling, upgrade trees, collectibles, even down to the small white plain text in some games.

Say what you will about the quality of the likes of recent entries to Halo and Gears, plus other MS exclusives like Sea of Thieves and Recore, but at least they’re very different from one another.

Gemini73

Happens every time when one of these companies run ahead of the pack. Didn't Nintendo start throwing their weight around during the runaway success of Wii, Wii Sports and Wii Fit before coming crashing back to earth with Wii U?

Fowl?

Didn't know Sony were run by chickens.

I am a huge fan of the PS4; the ease of use and huge range of great games are excellent. Sony has - albeit slowly - made some improvements, too, with things like the external hard drive capability. The choice of excellent first and third party software is second to none. I need to think a little more on this but. at the moment, it feels like it could be my all-time favourite console.

But... yeah, I do wonder if Sony are deliberately holding back in some areas. I look on enviously as Microsoft deliver excellent backwards-compatibility functionality and online cross-machine play. Meanwhile, Sony have taken a step backwards with zero compatibility and a fairly expensive - and not as good - streaming option, alongside disabling any kind of cross-console play. As well as slapping on a 25% cost increase for online play.

To me, the PS4 is a superb console but, due to its success, Sony has rather sat back as their competitors work hard to develop more attractive options.

It's almost as if big companies don't learn from their past mistakes...

Watch MS come through resurgent with an amazing next-gen console and first party support to match, and Sony pull another PS3.

They've probably become a little complacent with how they're doing this generation, their first party games are still great though, I've not played them all mainly due to lack of time but the ones over played have been great and a lot of the others indeed look great.

If you manage to get PS Plus below RRP (such as £30-35 at the moment) it has really delivered the quality games the past few months (Call of Duty Black Ops 3 being the latest addition) but GamePass and EA Access is something Sony will need to adopt sooner rather than later. PS Now is expensive in comparison (£13), not as current, and requires a solid internet connection. But clearly this model represents the future.

They got away with doing the bare minimum required of them at the start of the gen, due to Microsoft's colossal fuck-up. They got to look like the gamer's best friend simply by default, and even managed to start charging for online play. I can only imagine the joy in Sony's boardrooms when Microsoft announced their plans, because it meant they could sneak in the online play charge and STILL look like the good guys.

The only reason Microsoft came in so underpowered the last time is because of that stupid camera. They won’t be making that mistake twice. If both systems are nigh on identically powered next time, and launching in November 2020, it will all come down to services and games.

Microsoft have laid the groundwork for backwards compatibility, so by the time the new Xbox comes around they’ll have a machine that will play a decent selection of Xbox 1 games, the vast majority of Xbox 360, and all Xbox One games. I think Sony will want to shift a PSone in 2019, so that gives them a year to flog that before possibly putting the chip back into the PS5 (which was present in the PS2 and 3). PS4 games will have to work, so that leaves the anomaly of PS2 and 3.

What will be most interesting is if Sony have come up with their own way of making old games look better than they originally did (like the Xbox One X does very well).

I literally have no interest in backwards compatibility. So many games and so little time means I don't have time to replay games in the current gen, let alone replay or play for the first time games from a previous gen.

Mafro wrote: their main first party output now all seems to be the same identikit big, story-focused cinematic adventure style of game.

I'm sure I can't be the only one that doesn't see this as a bad thing. These games are exactly my cup of tea so I'm happy for Sony to keep churning them out.

There is loads of variety on PlayStation 4 and the system is an integral part of my every day media activities.

The attitude of the company doesn't interest me as it's all about the games baby.

What's this Psone people are talking about? A daft wee retro mini console?

I read that Sony executives weren’t taking to the enthusiasts press at E3, that’s bloody awful.

suzzopher wrote:I read that Sony executives weren’t taking to the enthusiasts press at E3, that’s bloody awful.

Source?

The interviews Phil Spencer did at the Coliseum and with Giant Bomb were both really good.

Are Sony starting to fall foul of their own hubris?

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