14 DAY TRIAL // Not just yesterday, we saw Andrew House, the boss of Sony Computer Entertainment, reassure everyone that the company's favorite games and its colorful box art weren't going anywhere. The way he sees things, digital distribution is indeed catching up as far us numbers go, but it's not going to replace the classical distribution system of the brick-and-mortar outlets anytime soon. With that out of the way, House approached a more personal subject for Sony, and that was competition.
Feeling a little more courageous with PlayStation 3 sales back on the rise, despite the recent firmware update sabotaging its own consoles, the SCE boss thought it was time to remind another big console manufacturer who and what Sony was. Despite what you might think, his punches weren't going towards Microsoft and its Xbox 360, but they were aimed at Nintendo.
"I think at a time when we're seeing one of the major competitors somewhat losing a sense of momentum – at least in many of the markets I've looked at – it's gratifying to see a platform that's always had a very significant share of sales go to third party publishers capture that momentum again," House said.
He further added that, "The knock-on effect can only be a positive one if publishers are making up 75 per cent of the sales on a particular platform, as opposed to a much smaller share elsewhere, then that's the platform I think it's in their interests to see succeed – and I think that's the dynamic we're seeing return right now."
When asked to detail which competing company he was referring to, House said that, "From data that we're starting to see, in some of the publicly-released figures, we're seeing a significant year-on-year downturn for the Wii. I think that's just a factor of this Holiday season." The Christmas spirit was supposed to make everyone huddle together over milk and cookies, not kick one's brother when he's down. Sony might have an unpleasant surprise in its Christmas stockings this year.