PlayStation Didn’t Consider Nintendo To Be A True Competitor, And Here’s Why

In response to a former PlayStation govt, Sony didn’t think about Nintendo to be a real competitor in markets outdoors of Japan, with the corporate placing its focus squarely on Xbox as an alternative.

Shuhei Yoshida, who labored at PlayStation for practically 30 years earlier than stepping down this yr, stated on the Equipment & Krysta podcast that PlayStation’s “notion of their competitors is at all times Xbox. They see Microsoft being the competitors as a result of Xbox could be very comparable when it comes to efficiency {hardware}.”

Microsoft makes a “high-end” console with “mature” video games like Sony does, Yoshida says, and Nintendo was seen as “very, very completely different” by Sony.

“Nintendo is household pleasant; video games for everybody; not about expertise, extra about having enjoyable with buddies and households and at all times having a number of controllers bundled with the {hardware}. So inside Sony, even after they do a enterprise evaluation, Nintendo would not present up. They do not embody Nintendo,” he stated.

Yoshida stated Sony was not purposefully ignoring Nintendo when it got here to the aggressive panorama, however as an alternative Sony noticed Nintendo as interesting to a unique kind of viewers.

“They don’t essentially really feel that Nintendo is the competitors as a result of Nintendo is protecting a unique viewers on a much bigger scale. Nintendo is bringing a younger viewers into gaming; and a few of them after they develop up, would possibly graduate to extra mature methods like PlayStation or Xbox,” he stated.

Yoshida went on to say he understood from Sony administration that the corporate at all times had “large respect” for Nintendo, including that Sony higher-ups appreciated to see Nintendo doing nicely as a result of it introduced extra folks into gaming general.

The one market the place Sony did see Nintendo as a most important competitor was Japan, Yoshida stated, and that is as a result of Xbox traditionally doesn’t carry out nicely in Japan. “However outdoors Japan, PlayStation folks clearly see Xbox as the first competitors,” he stated.

In associated information, Sony Interactive Leisure president and CEO Hideaki Nishino was just lately requested concerning the Swap 2’s record-breaking launch, and the manager didn’t sound very involved.

The Swap 2 debuted to three.5 million international gross sales proper out of the gate, and the system bought greater than the earlier record-holder within the US, which was Sony’s PS4.