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When the PlayStation Now was announced in 2014...

FritzJ92

Member
PS Now during some time was available on Vita, Bravia, Samsung TVs, Blurays players and other devices but they dropped their support there I assume because almost nobody was using it there. Maybe it was too early, back then subscriptions weren't that popular, the internet connection at their main countrys weren't as good and their streaming tech wasn't as good.

According to different related patents and relatively recent statements (a year or two ago) to their investors they are now working upgrading it to bring it to smartphones, tablets and smart tvs, who now start to have way better related tech like wifi 6, bluetooth 5, 5G and so on, in addition to improving the streaming tech itself, to include PS5 games there, improve the catalog and pricing, supporting more countries and it isn't clear but seems they were reviewing its business model like considering to include an Stadia like option to buy games (I assume separatedly from the PS Now sub) for streaming.

I think they are tweaking and improving this business before scaling it up hard to a way bigger, more global mainstream market. Maybe they think still isn't the time and prefer to wait until the related tech in smartphones, tablets, tvs and their streaming stuff itself still isn't reorady to scale, or that they need to rework a bit more their strategy and business model regarding catalog, pricing, etc. before scaling up.

Regarding MS, Sony generates way more revenue, has more subs and pretty likely are more profitable with their game subscriptions strategy (which also includes PS Plus), they are pretty distanced so I think aren't very worried about MS, whose Gamepass numbers didn't increase from January to June and we don't know how it performed from July to October because they didn't provide the numbers. In fact, if we specifically about how many people uses XCloud we have no idea because we never knew even the people who uses Gamepass Ultimate.


He was talking about their long term vision, stuff that they were going to implement over time. If you also include remasters, remakes and collections there are many PS1 an PS2 games. But again, I assume that like supporting phones or tvs he was talking as something for the future that they were going to roll out step by step as they keep evolving it.


I think streaming may start to be important in 5-10 years from now or later. Many countries and even cities and towns in the main countries still have shitty internet connections, routers plus phones, tablets, computers or tvs with crappy wifi.

We only know that PS Now has around 3 million subscribers and have no idea of how many users has XCloud, Stadia, Luna and so on, so it's fair to assume game streaming as of now is too small so it doesn't make sense for Sony to destroy the super successful business they have focused on mostly selling games for their console.

With their current strategy they are making more money than any console maker ever did, so doesn't make sense at all to kill their main revenue source (to sell games) to replace it for something that may or may not work somewhere in the future.


Notice the difference between the 'sustainable' and 'profitable' definitions.


Their main revenue and profit source is to sell games and add-ons for their console, game subscriptions is a tiny market that only generates a small portion of their money. So it would be stupid for them to lose their main revenue source for basically nothing. They prefer to include in subscriptions mostly games that already completed their sales cycle instead.


As of July they had around 18M, basically the same they had in January. In September they stopped sharing numbers, even if I think Halo and Forza will help it to grow again. But this is Gamepass subs, not Gamepass Ultimate subs and even less Xcloud users.


Sony has the money, but they have a different strategy that is more successful and profitable. They generate a shit ton of revenue, have a great growth, are profitable and clear market leaders in most fronts they cover, so have no reason to change their strategy for an unsuccessful/less successful one. They prefer instead to continue being profitable, growing and generating more revenue and software sales than any other console maker ever did.
Sony is the market leader is gaming that’s it. Not most fronts they cover
 

Ozrimandias

Member
When PS Now was announced, you (in theory) could play your Psone, PS2, and Ps3 classics on your PSVita, PS3, Ps4, Smart TV, and PC.

Now, 8 years later Sony dropped the support on Bravias, PS3 obviously, Ps Vita.
You can't play Psone Classics, Ps2 Classics are very limited to a handful of titles.
South America and other continents still can't access to this service.
 

yurinka

Member
Sony is the market leader is gaming that’s it. Not most fronts they cover
Well, they are starting with mobile and PC. They aren't important there and have room to grow a lot in these markets during the following years. Regarding 1st party sales they grew a lot during the PS4 gen, but they're still behind Nintendo. And regarding VR they're kings (because well, they're the only ones xDD) in console but Oculus is selling a lot and I don't think PSVR2 will be able to outsell it.

But as overall gaming revenue, I think they're positioned to continue growing in many areas so they would distant from Tencent as top company in the world including all gaming markets but I think Tencent could purchase any big company to secure for themselve the top 1 spot in revenue.
 
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yurinka

Member
Then he is even more insane. 500 mil. subs at 10$ is 5 billion in revenue per month. That's 60 billion per year just from GamePass. FYI Sony had 25 billion dollars revenue from all Playstation businesses and that was a record. Not counting other revenue streams like selling games, MTXs, HW and accessories.
A lot of people pay way less than that or not pay at all, and part of that money goes to taxes like VAT in many countries. So 500M subs would be less revenue than $5B.

Sony made this FY $3.61B in revenue from their game subscriptions, $6.42B selling games and $8.59B selling add-ons (mtx, dlc, etc). And yes, it was a record year but they are in a growing trend and they expect to continue growing their revenue in the following years.

Now I probably know why Sony marked Days Gone as a failure.
Sony never marked it as a failure.

If Phil goes to Nadella and said "we are building a business that needs 500 million subscribers to reap a huge profit" he would told him to fuck off. Especially since no other sub service is anywhere near 500 million.
Yes, basically this is why many people is skeptical with their big acquisitions+GP focused strategy even if they think their goal to break even may be lower.
 
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Godot25

Banned
A lot of people pay way less than that or not pay at all, and part of that money goes to taxes like VAT in many countries. So 500M subs would be less revenue than $5B.

Sony made this FY $3.61B in revenue from their game subscriptions, $6.42B selling games and $8.59B selling add-ons (mtx, dlc, etc). And yes, it was a record year but they are in a growing trend and they expect to continue growing their revenue in the following years.


Sony never marked it as a failure.


Yes, basically this is why many people is skeptical with their big acquisitions+GP focused strategy even if they think their goal to break even may be lower.
But my point stands. Layden got hit in the head if he thinks GP needs 500 mil. subs for big profit. I think that around 1/10 of this Microsoft can be happy. That would be around 6 billion per year just from GP.

Yes, Sony never said Days Gone is a failure, but did you saw them to say that about any game? Rule of thumb is that if Sony isn't braging about sales it is not worth talking about. Because they love to brag about high sales. And they also refused pitch for Days Gone 2. Why would they do that if first game was big seller?

Only PS fans are skeptical about GPand sub services :)
 

FritzJ92

Member
Well, they are starting with mobile and PC. They aren't important there and have room to grow a lot in these markets during the following years. Regarding 1st party sales they grew a lot during the PS4 gen, but they're still behind Nintendo. And regarding VR they're kings (because well, they're the only ones xDD) in console but Oculus is selling a lot and I don't think PSVR2 will be able to outsell it.

But as overall gaming revenue, I think they're positioned to continue growing in many areas so they would distant from Tencent as top company in the world including all gaming markets but I think Tencent could purchase any big company to secure for themselve the top 1 spot in revenue.
I was commenting about the sentence that Sony is the top of its class in the markets that they compete in. That’s not true. Sony is top only in gaming and image sensors. Everything else they aren’t top or close to in.
regardless the company needs to protect PlayStation because without it everything else goes down.
 

yurinka

Member
I was commenting about the sentence that Sony is the top of its class in the markets that they compete in. That’s not true. Sony is top only in gaming and image sensors. Everything else they aren’t top or close to in.
regardless the company needs to protect PlayStation because without it everything else goes down.
When I said they are an alpha dog in most of their fronts I meant to the gaming ones, since this is a gaming forum and we mostly talk about gaming:
-Revenue for a gaming company
-Revenue for a console maker
-Amounts of games sold for their console
-Best selling console hardware launch aligned
-Amount of GOTY/awards earned
-Console VR
-Game subscriptions revenue and userbase
-Pretty likely game streaming
 
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yurinka

Member
But my point stands. Layden got hit in the head if he thinks GP needs 500 mil. subs for big profit.
He didn't say 'for big profit'. He said "It's very hard to launch a $120m game on a subscription service charging $9.99 a month. You pencil it out, you're going to have to have 500 million subscribers before you start to recoup your investment".

I think that around 1/10 of this Microsoft can be happy. That would be around 6 billion per year just from GP.
Sony already has these 50M game subs with way less $1 or free subs and they made $3.61B in revenue: prices are cheaper in some countries. Some other countries have taxes like VAT so a part of you what you pay, these 9.99 (I think in EU is over 20% in average) goes to some government. Then there's refunds and chargebacks. Then the fee of companies like Paypal who processes payments. Then the cut that goes to 3rd party stores who sell keys for GP months/PS Now month /PSN cash/XBL cash and so on.

Yes, Sony never said Days Gone is a failure, but did you saw them to say that about any game? Rule of thumb is that if Sony isn't braging about sales it is not worth talking about. Because they love to brag about high sales.
They said it outsold all Bend Studio games made since PS1 combined in a few months, which means way over 5 million, maybe around 8. This was before putting it on PC and selling over a million more. Pretty likely is over or close to 10 million copies sold. This isn't a failure at all.

And they also refused pitch for Days Gone 2. Why would they do that if first game was big seller?
They want to have around half of their games under development to be new IPs. When they pitched it they already had in the works Morales, TLOU2, Spider-Man 2, Ratchet, Horizon 2, GoWR, GT7, TLOU remaster, TLOU Factions 2, Death Stranding DC, GoT DC, GoT2 and according to rumors a new Astro, a new Horizon game for VR, a new Wipeout and a squad shooter from Guerrilla (who knows if it's a Killzone or Socom). Plus many PC ports and some remasters more like the Uncharted ones. So I think they may have said: ok, we'll do the sequel but later, now we need a new IP instead as your next project because we have too much sequels in the works.

The codirector of Days Gone who pitched the sequel to Sony said he wanted the sequel to run on Unreal 5. But the complete version of Unreal 5 won't be released -if not delayed- until later this year and as I remember they pitched the sequel in 2019.

Remember also that the other games they ported to PC were big seller games that I understand they saw potential to sell in PC: Horizon, GoW and Death Stranding (a game that is on track to become the best selling Kojima game ever).
 

12Dannu123

Member
Back then I didn't expect Sony to not fully capitalize on the vision of "play anywhere" model with a subscription service. Laptops, mobile, within the TV itself, anywhere... just by streaming the games and boom you're in!

That is the eventual future. We all know deep down that games will be played by the majority streaming to their device of choice.



PS Now was presented in 2014 as the next step in gaming. Why hasn't Sony jumped on this path as much? Xbox may have seen that presentation and said "alright we're making our own service now, that's the future and we need to do it" Microsoft jump of this idea and road those bull horns all the way up till today.

Sony will now have to respond to their response, sometime soon. The foundation is there, they have to commit because their lifeblood will be those services they started so many years ago. Does anyone think Sony will push those services more in this next year than they ever have before? Potentially combining them into 1 service

Phil Spencer, years after this video, will have speeches similar bro Andrew House about "play anywhere wherever on any device you choose"


Everybody has been saying this for years now. Sony was the first to announce their streaming service, they did nothing with their several year advantage and now Microsoft, Nvidia and Google surpassed them in every way.

To say that because Sony is the leader in console sales shows the ignorance in most fanboys and the short sightedness in the company.

Until Sony figures out the logistics of how to do a Cloud Gaming service at scale, they're irrelevant.
 
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Estocolmo

Member
Sony wont invest in PS Now until it’s part of their core business plan for the PlayStation. Until then it’s always going to be secondary.
And yes, Sony can afford to invest in PS Now.
 

ArtHands

Thinks buying more servers can fix a bad patch
When PS Now was announced, you (in theory) could play your Psone, PS2, and Ps3 classics on your PSVita, PS3, Ps4, Smart TV, and PC.

Now, 8 years later Sony dropped the support on Bravias, PS3 obviously, Ps Vita.
You can't play Psone Classics, Ps2 Classics are very limited to a handful of titles.
South America and other continents still can't access to this service.

Crazy the service was introduced during the PS3 era and we still don't have access for it in numerous countries.
 

12Dannu123

Member
Crazy the service was introduced during the PS3 era and we still don't have access for it in numerous countries.

Sony relies on partners for hosting their server blades. This makes it difficult to scale to more countries. Sony was supposably to partner with MS. But there hasn't been much movement since 2019.
 

Rivet

Member
Only PS fans are skeptical about GPand sub services :)

No... A lot of people are skeptical or indifferent about GP, it has nothing to do with Sony. MS just missed their Gamepass growth target (already linked the article but I can do it again if needed), it isn't setting the world on fire right now. It might change with big hitters...

GP is in phase 1 now, when everything is free (upgrade your Live Gold to GP for $1 / month), the only objective is growing the number of subscribers, whatever the cost. GP isn't making money right now, which is fine in this model (especially with MS ultra deep pockets) as long as subscribers grow fast. But people subscribing for free isn't surprising. We'll know later if the model works or not.

I'm skeptical about GP (and other sub services) because gaming is cheap, people lack TIME and MOTIVATION for gaming, not MONEY (social networks are the real competitor actually, and they're winning big time), so gaming isn't really about value, and GP is mostly about value.

We already have tons of great games for free or nearly for free (Steam, Epic, Humble Bundle, PS+, sales of every kind...) that we don't have the time or the motivation to play, nobody needed GP for that. People have wives, kids, social activities, social networks too. Their gaming time is very limited, which makes subscription models lose value. And money never stopped people buying every yearly $70 AAA, otherwise they wouldn't have sold millions each, so money and value aren't really major problems in gaming.

GP is mostly attractive for people like us with tons of free time for gaming, but we're dinosaurs (GAF is ranked #26503 in world websites and dropping further). Most people play only a few games per year outside of Fortnite / CoD / Fifa or GaaS like that. What's the point of GP for them ? For us it's great, but remember we're a very small minority.

And to become profitable, GP will have either to rise subscription price OR keep game costs low (so game quality low too, it mostly goes hand in hand unfortunately). I don't see so many people finding this proposal very attractive on the long run, but I may be wrong.
 
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Godot25

Banned
No... A lot of people are skeptical or indifferent about GP, it has nothing to do with Sony. MS just missed their Gamepass growth target (already linked the article but I can do it again if needed), it isn't setting the world on fire right now. It might change with big hitters...

GP is in phase 1 now, when everything is free (upgrade your Live Gold to GP for $1 / month), the only objective is growing the number of subscribers, whatever the cost. GP isn't making money right now, which is fine in this model (especially with MS ultra deep pockets) as long as subscribers grow fast. But people subscribing for free isn't surprising. We'll know later if the model works or not.

I'm skeptical about GP (and other sub services) because gaming is cheap, people lack TIME and MOTIVATION for gaming, not MONEY (social networks are the real competitor actually, and they're winning big time), so gaming isn't really about value, and GP is mostly about value.

We already have tons of great games for free or nearly for free (Steam, Epic, Humble Bundle, PS+, sales of every kind...) that we don't have the time or the motivation to play, nobody needed GP for that. People have wives, kids, social activities, social networks too. Their gaming time is very limited, which makes subscription models lose value. And money never stopped people buying every yearly $70 AAA, otherwise they wouldn't have sold millions each, so money and value aren't really major problems in gaming.

GP is mostly attractive for people like us with tons of free time for gaming, but we're dinosaurs (GAF is ranked #26503 in world websites and dropping further). Most people play only a few games per year outside of Fortnite / CoD / Fifa or GaaS like that. What's the point of GP for them ? For us it's great, but remember we're a very small minority.

And to become profitable, GP will have either to rise subscription price OR keep game costs low (so game quality low too, it mostly goes hand in hand unfortunately). I don't see so many people finding this proposal very attractive on the long run, but I may be wrong.
And? Service still grew 40% YoY. And also, target growth was made when Halo Infinite was supposed to launch in 2020, so I'm sure Microsoft sleeps well even if reality missed target.

Yes, GP is in phase one, but on the other hand, it grew without single big AAA first-party game. Entirety of growth in last year was carried by third party games in service, which is pretty great if you ask me. If number of subs does not grow with FH5 and Halo Infinite, then we might have a problem.

Not many people subs into GP for years old games which are in PS Plus, Steam, Epic and Humble Bundle. They are subscribing for Outriders day 1, MLB day one, FH5 day one, Halo Infinite day one, Hades day one, Psychnauts 2 etc. (That's why XGP has 20 million subs and PS Now around 4 million)

"And to become profitable, GP will have either to rise subscription price OR keep game costs low..." ehhh, why? I mean sure, price of GP will go up one day, because of inflation etc. But if Microsoft hit a certain threshold, they can fund projects. As far as I'm aware, Microsoft is pretty generous rn with their budgets and I'm sure service didn't hit that threshold. There is literally zero proof, that first-party studios have limited budgets because their games go straight to GP. It's literally the opposite - hence Psychonauts 2, Forza and Halo Infinite. So until Microsoft releases broken cynical cashgrab I'm really not taking this fluff seriously. Because Microsoft first-party games were more broken in times when they were not released into GP.

Only services that risen faster in gaming are PS Plus and Gold because they were mandatory for online play. And since PS Now is pitiful in terms of subscribers, something tells me, that Microsoft is doing things right.
 
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T0minator

Member
Until Sony figures out the logistics of how to do a Cloud Gaming service at scale, they're irrelevant.
Irrelevant isn't the correct word. PlayStation is definitely relevant, especially considering none of their big hitters have really released, sure the launch line up was great and all but the God of Wars, Horizons, and GT7 are all pushing PlayStation higher and higher up the sales charts.

Cloud gaming isn't entirely relevant yet. It's a nice added option...but I don't want to risk the quality of my games even in the slightest...so I'd much rather prefer to download my games.

Adding their big AAA games to the PS services ....that's the key to even bigger growth, that's PlayStations next natural step.
 

FritzJ92

Member
When I said they are an alpha dog in most of their fronts I meant to the gaming ones, since this is a gaming forum and we mostly talk about gaming:
-Revenue for a gaming company
-Revenue for a console maker
-Amounts of games sold for their console
-Best selling console hardware launch aligned
-Amount of GOTY/awards earned
-Console VR
-Game subscriptions revenue and userbase
-Pretty likely game streaming
Those are not markets.
Gaming is once of their markets. So when you say market leader in most fronts, yours amassing all the markets they cover. Yes, I agree they are the market leader in console gaming. But their strategy in gaming can always get better. They could start with fixing their customer service which is terrible. creating an honest refund policy would help.
 

12Dannu123

Member
Irrelevant isn't the correct word. PlayStation is definitely relevant, especially considering none of their big hitters have really released, sure the launch line up was great and all but the God of Wars, Horizons, and GT7 are all pushing PlayStation higher and higher up the sales charts.

Cloud gaming isn't entirely relevant yet. It's a nice added option...but I don't want to risk the quality of my games even in the slightest...so I'd much rather prefer to download my games.

Adding their big AAA games to the PS services ....that's the key to even bigger growth, that's PlayStations next natural step.
And how is this relevant to Cloud Gaming?
 

yurinka

Member
Those are not markets.
Gaming is once of their markets. So when you say market leader in most fronts, yours amassing all the markets they cover. Yes, I agree they are the market leader in console gaming.
This is why I said fronts instead of markets. I said fronts because some of them are gaming markets and other ones are specific areas/segments/KPIs where they have direct competitors and can be compared: other platform holders/console makers/game publishers/etc. They compete in these gaming fronts with other people and in many of these gaming areas Sony is -or seems to be since some of their competitors don't provide the numbers- the leader.

Sony relies on partners for hosting their server blades. This makes it difficult to scale to more countries. Sony was supposably to partner with MS. But there hasn't been much movement since 2019.

All big companies, not only Sony, only own some datacenters and most of their servers are in 3rd party outsourcing datacenter companies who work for many clients, because it's cheaper than to own the datacenters. Regarding country support, there isn't much difference. According to their websites, as of now:

Xcloud is available in 26 countries
Stadia is available in 22 countries
PS Now is available in 19 countries
Amazon Luna is only available in mainland USA

Sony and MS partnership wasn't related to hosting Sony's servers in MS's datacenters. It was to use Azure (it's a software to manage servers) on PS Now and specially partnered to share cloud/game streaming, (server focused) AI and (server focused) semiconductors R&D on both sides to mutually improve their server and game streaming tech.

This year they added 1080p support, last year they released it for PS5 and relatively recently (not sure if a year or two ago) they did supported some extra countries. We know they are working on bringing it somewhere in the near future to smartphones, tablets and smart tvs, to add in the future PS5 games to the catalog, to improve the streaming technology to improve image quality and input lag, even including 5G specific optimizations, to bring it to more countries, to continue enlarging and improving the catalog and weren't specific about it but seems they're working to tweak its business model beyond making some promotions. Jim Ryan said to Nikkei in April that still weren't ready to show their PS5 cloud gaming strategy, but that will be something unique. Sony also recently stated they want to focus on pushing their direct to consumer services as one of their key corporation goals, mentioning PS Now as one of them.

So yes, there's movement. But they are taking their time, because it's something secondary for their gaming business.
 
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Cryio

Member
It's too bad the PlayStation Now app is still the same travesty it was in 2014 and the number of regions is still smaller than XCloud / GamePass
 

Saucy Papi

Member
Man, I tried to play Infamous 2 on PS Now today and it was awful. I was shocked at how bad it played. It's noticeably worse than playing it locally.
 

Max_Po

Banned
I played SLy Cooper Collection on PS5.. pretty amazing .. no LAG.

This varies location to location. I know relatives you are on fucking dialup and satellite back home...
 

Clear

CliffyB's Cock Holster
People need to understand that MS has a massive incentive in GamePass succeeding because, aside from its value to the Xbox division, it also serves as a perfect illustration for the value of cloud services. Meaning long term more clients for Azure.

Its really smart business on Nadella's part, because should MS secure leadership over their competitors (AWS etc.) in that space, it basically sets them up for the future in the same way that Windows did for the OS market. Essentially it boils down to the exact same thing; they want to own the thing that global computing runs on.
 

T-Cake

Member
I stream psnow games from my pc just fine.

This is my intention going forward now. Because of the difficulty in getting a PS5, I've decided to just forego it now. I never buy new games on release, I never buy PS+ as I don't do multiplayer. So I'm pretty happy to wait now until Sony put PS5 blades into their PS Now ecosystem and play any exclusives that don't make it to PC via the cloud. Out of all the services I've tried, PS Now is the most reliable one for me with very little degradation in stream quality or response. Hell, if I can complete Killzone 2 over it, I can complete any game over it.
 

GAF machine

Member
Jim Ryan said:




It seems sony have not fully unvealed there cloud gaming strategy. When Jim Ryan says it will be unique, I wonder if hes talking about content or features or tech? Theres only so much that can be do in cloud gaming. I doubt it will be something like cloud processing.

Personally, I think he's talking about all three wrapped in one place. A VR-supported, physics-based PS Home-like "metaverse" hosted in Azure (or a different service if necessary) that largely centers around social gaming, content discovery and e-sports.

I don't know if this is indicative of feature to come but with regards to e-sports, Ken Kutaragi told Katsuhiro Harada that he "recently" shared an idea with people at Sony/SIE about using severs and HMDs to bring competitive gamers and millions of spectators from all over the world into the same venue, with spectators being able to control their views of the action. I don't know what Ryan considers unique but this seems fairly unique to me.

As for the tech, shortly after PS VR was announced (2014), a patent application was filed for a "game providing system" that consists of multiple "processing systems" (i.e. clusters of server boards with four APUs per board). If you're interested in specifics, entries [0002], [0050], [0051], [0052], [0081] sum up the system as one that distributes physics and individual regions of a 3D scene across all APUs to be processed, then streams the rendered frames out over a network to be displayed on a VR headset.

I presume SIE's social VR tech demo ran on this system. I also presume that Sony/SIE is talking to MS about (among other things) housing a number of similar more advanced systems in Azure's sprawling network of datacenters.

SIE is too heavily invested in cloud gaming and VR for it not to view some sort of "metaverse" as its next target of opportunity. Furthermore, SIE can't afford to ignore trillion dollar companies gearing up to wage a battle of metaverses that will blanket gaming and other vital entertainment interests it has. I think SIE is well positioned to join the coming fray in the next few years. By then, they should be at full tilt.
 
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Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
Personally, I think he's talking about a place. A VR-supported, physics-based "metaverse" hosted in Azure that largely centers around social gaming, content discovery and e-sports.

I don't know if this is indicative of what's to come but with regards to e-sports, Ken Kutaragi told Katsuhiro Harada that he 'recently' (prior to April 2021) shared an idea with "people" at SONY about using severs and VR to bring competitive gamers and millions of spectators from all over the world into the same venue, with spectators being able to control their views of the action (timestamped). I don't know what Ryan considers unique but this seems fairly unique to me. Perhaps this idea will be a feature of SIE's upcoming cloud gaming offering.

As for the tech, shortly after PS VR was announced (2014), a patent application was filed for a "game providing system" that consists of multiple "processing systems" (i.e. clusters of server boards with four APUs per board). If you're interested in specifics, entries [0002], [0050], [0051], [0052], [0081] have them and sum up the system as one that distributes physics and individual regions of a 3D scene across all APUs to be processed, then streams the rendered frames out over a network to be displayed on a VR headset.

I presume SIE's social VR tech demo ran on this system. I also presume that SIE is talking to MS about (among other things) housing a number of similar more advanced systems in Azure's sprawling network of datacenters.

SIE is too heavily invested in cloud gaming and VR for it not to view a metaverse as its next target of opportunity. Furthermore, it can't afford to ignore trillion dollar companies gearing up to wage a "battle of metaverses" that will blanket gaming and other vital entertainment interests SIE has. I think SIE is gearing up to join the coming fray, and by this time next year the machine will be at full tilt.

I think all these companies scrambeling to be the metaverse platform wont work, because they all want control.

To me the metaverse is basically the internet but with a VR interface.
 
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GAF machine

Member


PS Now was presented in 2014 as the next step in gaming. Why hasn't Sony jumped on this path as much? Xbox may have seen that presentation and said "alright we're making our own service now, that's the future and we need to do it" Microsoft jump of this idea and road those bull horns all the way up till today.

Sony will now have to respond to their response, sometime soon.
The foundation is there, they have to commit because their lifeblood will be those services they started so many years ago. Does anyone think Sony will push those services more in this next year than they ever have before? Potentially combining them into 1 service

Phil Spencer, years after this video, will have speeches similar bro Andrew House about "play anywhere wherever on any device you choose"


SIE isn't seen jumping along the path because it's working to build out and transform PS Now into an "open platform" like Gaikai. SIE's in no hurry to respond because the work is a 10-year effort that should come to completion by January 2024.

Another reason there's no rush to respond is that SIE has time on its side since it owns all of Gaikai's patents and the choicest OnLive patents. These patents cover the full spectrum of cloud gaming R&D that happened at various points along the 'cloud gaming hype cycle' up-slope and peak. This means SIE's leadership can drive cloud-gaming in a direction that MS/others can't and execute their strategy at their own pace, as was alluded to after PS Now's launch:

"Our acquisition of Gaikai and our commitment to PlayStation Now is again very much in the spirit of looking at how the distribution method is going to shift over time"... "Our goal, rather than have the future dictated to us is to try and be a pioneer, shaping the way it goes." -- Andrew House

"These strategic purchases open up great opportunities for our gamers, and gives Sony a formidable patent portfolio in cloud gaming," --
Philip Rosenberg

SIE's leadership views cloud gaming as a marathon, not a sprint.
 
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