Regarding Bust A Groove, there actually was a third game. It was called Bust A Groove: Dance Summit (or something like that). I don't think it ever made it to the US, however. There are some good videos of it on Youtube; it looks pretty cool, but looks completely different from the first two games.
I wasn't really interested in this game. I saw a lot of trailers, and some of the ads, and while they looked cute the game just didn't seem that interesting. It seemed like a super-cutesy, generic platforming game. A friend of mine was in the beta though, and I got to play it at his place, and realized:
This game is FUN.
I can't even explain why, which is the funny part. Its pretty simple, but it has a lot of charm and keeps you smiling. I'm definitely going to buy this one.
I'm not sure why you see Sony's reaction as hypocrisy. IMO its simply that they've learned their lesson. Plus, the details of each incident are a bit different, so they can't respond the same way in both.
For R1, the game was already released. They couldn't recall the game at that point, and admitting fault was just asking for the offended parties to demand a recall. With LBP they caught it internally before release, so they were in a position to recall.
Calling it cowardice is basically like saying that Sony should be equal-opportunity bastards: "They offended Christians before, they should offend Muslims now." Avoiding bad press and not pissing people off is just good business.
I'm not saying that any of the new consoles will match the success of the PS2, but they can all sell substantially less than the PS2 and still break 100 million. We're not talking about the 3-4 year time frame that dedicated gamers look at, we're talking about 7-10 years. As for exclusives, all sides are moving towards first-party development, so there's always going to be exclusives to push one console over another.
Long-term success does matter. It costs money for developers to learn how to program new consoles. The longer the console is sold, the more money the developers make from that initial investment. So if a console shows long legs, it is more attractive to developers. This is why we're still seeing games developed for the PS2. It also matters to shareholders. If the company can show a track record of long-running and profitable products, the company is more attractive to shareholders. In the long run that means more to companies like MS and Sony than being able to say "we're number 1" for a couple of years.
If the consoles can sell in the 100 million range for this generation, a 5 million worldwide lead isn't really that big. The PS2 sold well over 100 million, so its reasonable to think that the X360 and PS3 will hit that mark.
Another thing to remember is that the "generations" overlap. It may be 2-3 years before the next generation is announced, but that doesn't mean you stop selling the previous generation (unless MS makes the same mistake twice). So there's still plenty of time left in this generation.
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Nugent's Comments
Regarding Bust A Groove, there actually was a third game. It was called Bust A Groove: Dance Summit (or something like that). I don't think it ever made it to the US, however. There are some good videos of it on Youtube; it looks pretty cool, but looks completely different from the first two games.
I wasn't really interested in this game. I saw a lot of trailers, and some of the ads, and while they looked cute the game just didn't seem that interesting. It seemed like a super-cutesy, generic platforming game. A friend of mine was in the beta though, and I got to play it at his place, and realized:
This game is FUN.
I can't even explain why, which is the funny part. Its pretty simple, but it has a lot of charm and keeps you smiling. I'm definitely going to buy this one.
I'm not sure why you see Sony's reaction as hypocrisy. IMO its simply that they've learned their lesson. Plus, the details of each incident are a bit different, so they can't respond the same way in both.
For R1, the game was already released. They couldn't recall the game at that point, and admitting fault was just asking for the offended parties to demand a recall. With LBP they caught it internally before release, so they were in a position to recall.
Calling it cowardice is basically like saying that Sony should be equal-opportunity bastards: "They offended Christians before, they should offend Muslims now." Avoiding bad press and not pissing people off is just good business.
I'm not saying that any of the new consoles will match the success of the PS2, but they can all sell substantially less than the PS2 and still break 100 million. We're not talking about the 3-4 year time frame that dedicated gamers look at, we're talking about 7-10 years. As for exclusives, all sides are moving towards first-party development, so there's always going to be exclusives to push one console over another.
Long-term success does matter. It costs money for developers to learn how to program new consoles. The longer the console is sold, the more money the developers make from that initial investment. So if a console shows long legs, it is more attractive to developers. This is why we're still seeing games developed for the PS2. It also matters to shareholders. If the company can show a track record of long-running and profitable products, the company is more attractive to shareholders. In the long run that means more to companies like MS and Sony than being able to say "we're number 1" for a couple of years.
If the consoles can sell in the 100 million range for this generation, a 5 million worldwide lead isn't really that big. The PS2 sold well over 100 million, so its reasonable to think that the X360 and PS3 will hit that mark.
Another thing to remember is that the "generations" overlap. It may be 2-3 years before the next generation is announced, but that doesn't mean you stop selling the previous generation (unless MS makes the same mistake twice). So there's still plenty of time left in this generation.
All Nugent's Comments