Here we go again... the Wall Street Journal aren't feeling too good about the possibility of the PlayStation 3 console's success.
In their latest article (linked above) they doubt it will come back and assert that the PS3 is sagging, while the XBox 360 and Wii are widening their leads.
They pick up on a number of factors including the PS3's price and lack of 'attractive' and exclusive titles.
To quote: With Stringer saying, 'We will be profitable,' you can't cut price," says Michael Pachter, a research analyst at Wedbush Morgan Securities in Los Angeles. He expects Sony to cut prices at the start of its new fiscal year in April, which could help boost sales.
Sony also is suffering from a lack of attractive titles that are exclusive to the PS3. Microsoft has hit the jackpot with two action-adventure game franchises, Halo and Gears of War, which are available only on the Xbox 360. Most of Nintendo's top games are Made in house... More »
Sony has announced plans to cut 8,000 electronics jobs - 5% of the division - as well as shutting 10% of its manufacturing sites.
The company said the jobs would be cut by April 2010 but did not say in which countries the staff would go. Sony said it had been trying to reduce production because of the downturn but warned it still had to do more.
The news came as Japan drastically raised its estimate of the amount its economy shrank from July to September. The Cabinet Office said the economy had shrunk at an annual rate of 1.8% in the quarter, down from its previous estimate of 0.4%.
Investment cut
Sony aims to generate cost savings of about 100bn yen ($1.1bn; £730m) by the end of the next financial year. It will cut its investment in electronic operations by 30% and shut down about 10% of its 57 production facilities.
"The number sounds big, but this staff reduction won't be enough," said Katsuhiko Mori, a ... More »
Not content with the first showing of Uncharted 2, God of War III, Brutal Legend and some new Gears of War 2 stuff, the 2008 Video Game Awards, airing on Spike TV, will also be premiering the first footage of Rockstar’s GTA IV downloadable content, Lost and Damned.
The footage will be shown sometime from 9pm PST (5am BST, 6am CET) on December 14, and, of course we’ll be there with our special early morning news hats on, making sure you don’t miss anything.
Press Release: Exclusive World Premiere of Rockstar Games’ First “Grand Theft Auto IV” Episode to Debut at Spike’s Video Game Awards
NEW YORK, NY, December 5, 2008 – Today, Rockstar Games and Spike TV announced that “Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned” will world premiere at the 2008 Video Game Awards, live Sunday December 14 at 9:00pm, ET (tape delay on West Coast).
Since its launch in April, “Grand Theft Auto IV” has garnered unprecedented praise and ... More »
Kevin Tofel of jkOnTheRun has put together a fairly comprehensive list of what's inside the Vista SP2 update—just as the beta rolls out to MSDN and TechNet subscribers. Here is what users can expect:
• Built-in Hyper-V hypervisor
• Event logging support in SPC
• Fixes for DRM issues from WMP upgrades
• Windows Vista Feature Pack for Wireless
• Functionality to reduce resources required for sidebar gadgets
• Improved power settings for Windows Server 2008
The complete list of features:
Emerging Hardware Support
• SP2 contains Blue tooth 2.1 feature pack supporting the most recent specification for Blue tooth technology
• Ability to record data on Blu-Ray media,
• Adds Windows Connect Now (WCN) Wi-Fi Configuration to Windows Vista SP2,
• exFAT file system now supports UTC timestamps, which enable... More »
Before even receiving a set release date, GTA: Chinatown Wars, the upcoming GTA installment for the Nintendo DS, has joined the ranks of GTA IV PC and Xbox 360 downloadable content as delayed.
At a press conference today, Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick confirmed GTA IV DLC’s delay rumors stating that it may arrive as late as Spring 2009.
Zelnick also stated that Chinatown Wars isn’t scheduled to be released in the first quarter of the 2009 fiscal year (January 2009) as initially expected, but will arrive within Q2 2009, which ends in April.
More to come on this as it's available!
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