A bit of background:  an XBox 360 Arcade sells for $199; a Wii sells for $249 and a DS sells for $129.   Each of these platforms has a buckload of great games for them.  Contrast that to the PS3.  It sells for $399. (Remember, that’s a price cut from $599).  The PSP Go, Sony’s newest handheld, is slated to sell for $249.  So, in a nutshell, if you want to game on a Sony system, it’ll cost you twice as much.

The stable of games for the Sony platforms is also much, much smaller.  What’s more, you’ll pay at least $10 more for a game on the Sony platforms.  Why?  Because Sony charges a huge royalty on every game made for their machines. After watching Sony’s offerings at the recent E3, one thing is obvious:  Sony has no intention of backing off their current policy of charging extremely high prices for their systems, and for the games that play on them.  And they do not acknowledge that there are fewer good games to play on their systems, either.

Well Bobby Kotick, CEO of Activision, is openly acknowledging that Sony is headed in the wrong direction.  He had some interesting, and very specific, things to say about Sony, the PS3, and the PSP.  Check it:

They have to cut the price, because if they don’t, the attach rates are likely to slow. If we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony…we might want to consider if we support the console — and the PSP too.

..the PlayStation 3 is losing a bit of momentum and they don’t make it easy for me to support the platform. It’s expensive to develop for the console, and the Wii and the Xbox are just selling better. Games generate a better return on invested capital on the Xbox than on the PlayStation.

Mind you, Activision is the biggest game publisher in the world, and he is openly confronting Sony on their obvious, and ongoing, policy of charging more and giving gamers less.  If Activision gets fed up, and stops  making games for the PS3, it would probably spell doom for the console.

[via Kotaku and The Times]

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