Topic: Is Sony losing favor with gamers?

The last few months have probably been the worst, PR speaking, for Sony since 2012-2013...........No Man's Sky faked hype, the PS Plus price hike, a rather mediocre and controversial unveiling of the PS4 Pro, a long running streak of high-profile first party delays following an arguably disappointing first party software output this gen, Bethesda aggressively pointing the finger at Sony, etc.

Question, do you think Sony is in possible trouble of gradually losing favor with gamers? We all saw how fast things flipped during 2013 and the unveiling of Xbox One,......just a year or two earlier Microsoft was the standard for modern console gaming.

There will always be people loyal to Sony so they will be in good shape. The few that cry about this and cry that just complain for the sake of complaining. In the end it all comes down to the sales and if you look at those numbers Sony is in a good position.

@Tasuki:

I see what your saying, however, although Europeans may be different, I don't think Sony really has that hardcore fanbase for their IP's like Nintendo or even Sega-Atlus, and more arguably, Microsoft (IE, I still run across Halo fans, but I've never heard anyone ever say, that Killzone bro, nothing beats that).

Hard for me to say, as I haven't been in touch with the recent happenings lately. Looking around, there does seem to be some discontent, but it also seems people aren't upset enough to stop throwing money at them, as the PS4 Pro kinda demonstrates.

Me personally, I'm no Sony loyalist. Just give good games and I'll buy them. Yeah, I'll get slightly irritated by the many delays and critique their ideas, but the games themselves are what matter to me in the end.

Firstly NMS hype was mostly generated by Hello Games and press, not Sony.
Secondly the Plus price hike was only for America and is at the same price as xbox. A classic case of party's over now it's time to pay the bill.
Thirdly PS4 Pro reaction may have been divisive but the Amazon preorder charts tell a different story.
Forthly Sony delaying first party games tells us two things, one they value a game to be as good as it can be and two are not afraid to change dates in order to give them the best possible chance to succed.
Fifthly Bethesda all off a sudden coming across as the good guys is a bit rich from a company that botched Skyrim on PS3, took forever to fix (If you can call it a fix) and couldn't be bothered to give away or severely discount the DLC that PS3 gamers had to do without for months due their cockup.
And I wouldn't say Microsoft set the modern standard for consoles when they came third last gen and it's global market has been shrinking.

@adf86:

That's cute and all, but your still forgetting that all of this is still putting a small dent in the hardcore gamers perception of Sony, whether it's justified or not

I think the suggestion is that internet buzz is a leading indicator for what future sales will be. If the next gen consoles launched within 6 months, Sony may well not "win" the next round.

But I believe that once the dust is settled, and game after game after game is reported to look and perform better on the ps pro vs the xbox, favour will shift to Sony again before the next gen actually launches.

Further, Microsoft as a company is in real hot water in general. Apple is starting to eat into their corporate dominance heavily, especially with mobile/tablet adoption in business. Google docs and the like is hurting their cash-cow which is to say office, and the fact that they've basically been able to force big business into office upgrades for like 20 years now.

On all fronts MS is hurting badly, and I would not be surprised to see them make some desperation moves, or even something crazy like being bought out within 10 years. So image how it would be if Sony had to compete with Apple (having purchased MS) in the console market instead of Microsoft?

One more thing, I think tablets and consoles doing well in general is an expression of people liking the "boxed product" aspect where they don't need to understand a collection of parts that make up a pc, just get a thing that they know will be more of less problem free and one company supports it.

In gaming terms, when looking for devices people want a product not a crafting system .

@adf86:

As far as mindshare, in NA for sure, and probably to a lesser extent the UK, the Xbox 360 was the core gamers console of choice until at least late 2011-2012. The PS3 had it's following, but the Xbox 360 had captured the public's attention for the most part.

@sub12: A so called small dent is hardly going to change things when Sony has a big foothold in America and a stranglehold in europe and Japan.
And then Sony won it back as their sales proved, xbox gained a lead in America but Sony natural territories caught up once the price went down, 360 only seemed like the core gamers console because the game's press was very pro xbox at time.

@adf86:

I'm just throwing the question out there Alex, people didn't really see the downturn that Microsoft had during 2012-2013 either. Stop being so offended by any criticism of Sony.

@Mega-Gazz: Also I feel Xbox's strategy of releasing exclusives on PC is deeply flawed because their trying to push Windows 10 so much that it may well be at expense of the xbox brand.

@sub12: Name's Adam actually. And I'm not offended, I'm telling you the bigger picture which many don't see because they live in their little bubble of internet to realize how the game's industry works.

The only issues I've really had are the problems with mods with Fallout 4 and Skyrim and the fact that Sony didn't give us the choice to be able to choose if we want to buy EA access, which looks a really good deal for me personally. PS Plus been hit and miss aswell. The Xbox One starts to look a better deal with mod Support for two of my favourite games and being able to get EA access as I surprisingly do enjoy their games and actually put alot of time into them. And the Gold free games and backwards compatibility look better to me too. I can only afford to put time and money into one console so the only reason why Sony hasn't lost me as a customer YET is the fact that the first party games are more interesting to me compared to MS first party games and I have had my PS4 since launch so I've bought quite alot of games for it. But I would say they're loosing my favor and I don't really cry about it...

@PostmanPatinator: i still think that there is a reason the mods aint on PS4,like maybe it caused a security issue in the PS4 firmware they could fix or maybe Bethesda just couldn't get them to work properly

there are MANY reason as to why there are no mods on PS4 and as we haven't heard anything about it i think we should wait and see on that matter

as for EA access yeah it looks like a good deal but you know EA they probably wanted something that Sony was unwilling to give, Just like they did with Nintendo (apparently they wanted full control of the Wii U's online service and Nintendo said No so EA broke off from them, that's still a rumour but knowing EA i actually believe it)

I think it's just a bad PR cycle they're in at the moment — it happens. There have been a few negative news stories surrounding the brand condensed into a short space of time, and PlayStation Meeting/TGS 2016 press conferences could have been much better. I also think to some degree, Sony's been so dominant over the past few years, that there's a sub-section of the core gaming community that's been waiting to give them a bit of a kicking, similarly to what happened to Microsoft with the Xbox One.

I think what's worth remembering is that the bad news regarding mods and whatnot affects communities like ours, but in reality we represent 5% of the PS4 install base, and probably 0.5% of the overall market that PlayStation is advertising to.

What I'm trying to say is that: while it seems bad to us, the vast majority of people don't know/care. And not including mods in Fallout 4 is not going to engage the wider public in quite the same way that, say, speculation regarding Microsoft and blocking used games hurt the Xbox One.

Games fans can be a bit like sports fans sometimes — they're fickle. In football for instance, a player can have an amazing game and all of the conversation surrounding him will be praise. Then he can play awful a couple of days later and he'll instantly be the worst player on the planet.

Ultimately, this little spell of bad news that's surrounding Sony will pass, and I expect them to clean up over the holidays unless the competition have a response that we don't know about yet.

How is the worst? No Mans Sky, whilst a console exclusive, its not exclusive to Sony and a reflection on their development studios. Did you blame Sony for the lack of content in Street Fighter 5? The same principal applies here.

PS+ price hike to he same level as the competition, which, lets be honest is 'similar' in what it offers. I know I may be critical of the IGC but how many games a year do you get offered and how many of those do you need to download and enjoy to 'break even' in terms of costs. PC online costs may be non-existent but they don't get offered up to 6 games a month.

The PS4 Pro was always going to be a 'struggle' to show off. The ONLY people that will have seen the Pro properly are the press. HDR and 4k are certainly not going to be seen on a stream, in photo's etc. Maybe they should have shown it off behind closed doors then and left it for the press to describe. I understand what 'HDR' means, what it can bring to gaming and see where it will be most impressive because I own a HDR TV and have seen HDR content. To others, wide colour gamut, 1000 nits peak brightness, 1bn colours etc is 'meaningless'.

This whole generation has been riddle with delays - not just Sony's developers! The Witcher 3 had a number of delays as did Arkham Knight. Its probably easier to name the games that weren't delayed - although we don't know if they had some internal delays. It certainly isn't something that has only affected Sony Studios!

Bethesda pointing finger at Sony over Mods is not necessary a Sony issue either. Not ALL Mods on the XB1 work and/or work well enough to 'enhance' the game. Sony has 'rules' in place too and maybe Bethesda was trying to bend these for its benefit,

Everything Sony has 'publicly' done has been for the 'gamers'. At E3 they kept discussion to a minimum and showcased GAMES. The PS4 Pro is a console for 'gaming' first and foremost. Sony opted to upgrade or improve all the gaming components. Its about to launch VR - a predominantly gaming peripheral to enhance the gaming experience - the first of any console manufacturer.

Yes I am a little disappointed at the lack of a 4k bluray player in the Pro but it makes NO difference to gaming whatsoever. I would have liked more power in the pro too (who wouldn't) to hit native 4k BUT I would then be disappointed knowing my console isn't getting games/features it could easily run because the PS4 can't run them. I would probably be disappointed that the next console isn't 'much' of an upgrade too when Sony do bring it out. The Pro is a half-way console between the PS4 and the next console - something I expect from a mid-term upgrade.

To me, Sony have concentrated on 'gamers', offering them something new, something no other can yet. That's UHD resolutions and VR. As someone who considers themselves a gamer first and foremost, I don't think Sony has lost favour with gamers at all!

They are getting press coverage, good and bad, but in fairness they do have 2 new consoles and a VR headset out before Christmas. That's gunna be money in the bank.

MS and Nintendo don't seem to have anything to shout about at the moment, good or bad. Just press rumors.

@get2sammyb:

Hmm, I agree with mostly everything you said.............yeah, it's been an accumulation of bad (mostly minor) stories, all in a short time span.......and it stands out given that Sony has been pretty flawless outside of the Vita during the last four-five or so years.

Where I kinda disagree with you is that the core gamers...........don't really matter...........they do, if it wasn't for the core gamer crowd, things would not have shifted the way they did during 2013, we may not be the biggest slice of the market, but we still influence trends, especially in the PS4/Xbox One market.

@sub12: Oh don't get me wrong: core gamers absolutely do matter — we're the taste makers, like you say. The difference is that a lot of these negative stories that have emerged over the past few days are so minor that they're not going to filter out into the mainstream, and the majority of people will be unaware of them.

I'd like to think that Sony has seen the negative response in the core gaming circles about stuff like mods, though, because like you say, it definitely does matter.