Sony spits out how much they've lost on the PS3

[Zeph]

http://videogames.yahoo.com/feature/sony-has-lost-over-3-billion-on-the-ps3/1223467

So what do you think? Will they be able to sell enough consoles to help cover manufacturing and the part of the RnD that isn't pulling licenses from floating point farms? Of course they wont start pulling a profit on the manufacture of the console itself till the near-end of its life. Their only hope is selling enough that they'll have a good enough market to pull profits off of games.

Personally, I think they're screwed. Yes, they have plenty of fans but I dont see how they can cover up such a huge hole. I haven't heard of any exclusive titles coming out that would muster up some more sales for them. Blu-Ray isn't a smash hit like they were planning. Even more, those drives are still ungodly expensive.

[itszutak]

Consoles are always sold at a loss, which the games are supposed to make up for.

Sony's got the first part down, but forgot about the making games part

[Hotrod]

Well, I don't know if they really have a chance to get that money back, but whatever they do, they'd better start making really good games to get more money.

[Pooky]

I kind of feel the same way about the PS3 as Crysis... they make something with obscenely high production values that is only going to appeal to rich people then act surprised when they lose money on it. Seems like they brought it on themselves :\

[Bodzilla]

256mb of memory?
pfft.

thats why developers dont want to touch it.

[Limited]

Ouch, 3 billion. I think they will just call it quits and try to move on, yes they will still sell it but they will assume defeat. I dont know how much sonys worth so how much of an impact 3 bill will make.


Consoles are always sold at a loss, which the games are supposed to make up for.

Sony's got the first part down, but forgot about the making games part

Nintendo Wii didnt, nintendo as a whole makes profits from their consoles, but I know what you mean, PS3 definitly has

[Kornman00]

256mb of memory?
pfft.

thats why developers dont want to touch it.


The PlayStation 3 has 256 MB of XDR main memory and 256 MB of GDDR3 video memory


Graphics processing is handled by the ATI (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATI) Xenos (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenos) which has 10 MB (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megabyte) of embedded eDRAM (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EDRAM). Its main memory pool is 512 MB (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megabyte) in size.

Judging from those wiki quotes and from what i recall, the xbox uses the same memory for everything, including its graphics, so its all the same quantity really

[Pyong Kawaguchi]

Ah, okay, thats why I didnt see any specs On Video Memory for the 360, Isnt the 360 more powerfull anyways in all catagories except the disk drive, proscessor and sometimes in drive space?

[Kornman00]

they use two different disc mediums, so you really can't compare the two in that area. The processors are too, different types (however, both are RISC based IIRC). I can't see why you would want six processors for a game engine in today's generation, but thats just me. You can modify unoffical HDDs to work on the 360, so just because it comes with a 20gig, doesn't mean its "weaker" than a PS3, which costs more for that extra count in gigs.

[Limited]

The two architectures are completely different to each other. Yes PS3 is more powerful, but 360 has more capability to spread the power across.

[klange]

They're both great. I have a PS3 and a 360.

[Mr Buckshot]

I have both consoles too. I love both.

Previously, the PS3 had no "wow factor"...until MGS4 came out. I love that game.

I believe MGS4 has set the official benchmark for any PS3 developers. First and foremost, it actually fills up the Blu-ray disc (mostly with god awesome cutscenes). Second, its graphics are as crisp and sharp and realistic as the best X360 and PC games, though the environments aren't quite on par with Crysis. MGS4 has proved that the PS3 is every bit a powerhouse as the X360.

Yes, all consoles are sold at a loss. Personally, I applaud Sony on their masterpiece...it's physically more reliable than the 360, you can save data to USB keys, and the online play is free. While the PSN's interface does need some work, I have rarely experienced any actual stability issues...proves that a good online service does not need me to pay a cent just to frag my friends. I refuse to subscribe to XBL, because I find that paying my monthly PC internet bill is quite enough.

Sony got off to a bad start this round, because its best games also happened to be multi-platform games (i.e. GRAW 2, CoD 4). But if more first-party titles (i.e. FINAL FANTASY) can meet the standards set by MGS4, Microsoft might actually begin to fear someone.

I can't stand it when people use this "big loss" thing to point out that the PS3 sucks. Yes, it's not a perfect system. But it does offer far more hardware per dollar than the 360, especially with its peripherals. I am still bewildered as to why the 360 wireless gamepad is the same price as the Sixaxis gamepad, yet the Sixaxis comes with a built in battery unlike the 360 gamepad, and you don't need to purchase any play-n-charge kit since it uses a standard mini USB cable.

I don't want this to turn into a comparison thread...just pointing out that Sony's noticeable losses shouldn't be used too often to judge the PS3's overall quality.

[Zeph]

The two architectures are completely different to each other. Yes PS3 is more powerful, but 360 has more capability to spread the power across.

Powerful is a terrible word to compare the two, as it's subjective to what you're trying to talk about. The PS3 has a huge lead over the 360 in floating point capabilities. The 360 has a better rendering solution.