Sony America Boss Says Gaming Is Like Wine - The Good Stuff Costs More

[JamesBr]

It's easy to disingenuously twist up his words but the point is very valid: You cannot duplicate a full-on console experience on a mobile phone. There are some great experiences to be had on mobiles and tablets and free-to-play, but they can't do what consoles can do. If you want that level of experience, you have to be willing to pay for it - and plenty of people are.

Oh and he's right in that respect, but his analogy is still terrible and comes off as more of that poisonous cost = quality thinking that is driving the AAA industry into the ground. Whether or not that's the intent, that's what it sounds like, and when it comes to PR statements like that, the perception of what you're saying is just as important as your intent because it WILL be interpreted wrong.

 

[Scorpid]

Because they aren't the same, I don't drink wine, I play video games.

 

[ellers07]

While his analogy isn't perfect, I do agree with his overall point. Consoles are specialized gaming machines that provide an experience that can't be replicated on phones and tablets. Luckily there's room for all of these and they do all have their place. That said, who knows what the gaming world will look like in another decade. I doubt these are the last consoles, but the next may be very different machines.

 

[cidbahamut]

The metaphor falls apart once we realize that wine isn't all that great to begin with.

How about an edit. Games are like wine, the good shit takes longer to produce.

This seems like a more apt comparison. How many games have we seen go up in flames because the team had to rush it out the door? (I'm looking at you FFXIV)

 

[EvilRoy]

He's forgetting the other side of the coin - the $10 stuff might not be as good, but enough of it still gets you drunk. There's a store down the road that sells entire liters of Wine for $7-10. I wonder how that fits in to his metaphor...

I guess that depends on what you want from it. Are you driven to sate yourself, or do you want to enjoy yourself?

I may not be a vodka aficionado, but I can sure as hell tell the difference between Medallion, Smirnoff and Grey Goose. And I know which one I drink to get wasted, which one I drink to enjoy, and which one I use to thin the gas in my diesel truck. I think knowing the goal of your night is important on this one.

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

I'm a wine aficionado, and I just bought half a dozen absolutely killer bottles of sav blanc for less than $11 each. I don't remember what the point of this analogy was, but maybe more wine will help!

 

[Psychobabble]

It's easy to disingenuously twist up his words but the point is very valid: You cannot duplicate a full-on console experience on a mobile phone. There are some great experiences to be had on mobiles and tablets and free-to-play, but they can't do what consoles can do. If you want that level of experience, you have to be willing to pay for it - and plenty of people are.

First off no one is disingenuously twisting anything. The guy made a silly analogy that doesn't scan with a large majority of his companies customer base. A gaming console is not an $800 bottle of wine which starts becoming worthless the moment you open it. And as others here have already pointed out, that $800 bottle of wine isn't actually the magnificent experience people think it is. The only real difference is the "buzz" they get from throwing away too much money. Which is a very stupid prospect to many people. What gamers want is a promise of continuing value for their money. Not empty platitudes.

As to not being able to to duplicate the console experience on mobile devices. Right they can't. At least not YET. I'd be willing to bet though that the mobile/handheld industry is going to expand at a much faster rate then the glacial slowness we've gotten from these lobotomized computers Sony and Microsoft keep foisting off on us. Mainly due to the fact these two console companies are locked together like two ancient bull mammoths in a tar pit, neither making any real headway, except for straight downwards, while the smaller independent market companies frolic around the edges, and manage to make actual progress in their endeavors.

All I can say is Sony and Microsoft had better stop acting like they think they're Studio 54 before they go out the same way as Disco.

 

[JPArbiter]

His analogy is faulty. I have been a bartender and a Wine manager at several 5 star resturaunts. the "Good Stuff" is really nothing more then labels you are paying for. Good Wine comes down to personal taste, even the concept of "Pairings" is bullshit (aside from the general rule of whites for white meat and fish, Reds for Beef and everything goes with pork)

 

[JazzJack2]

But dorf fort is entirely free and that is considerably better than anything else released in the past 10 years.

 

[AdagioBoognish]

He's just making a shaky analogy about the leap from the cheap and casual experience of tablet and smartphone style games to a more expensive console game. Everyone who is blowing this out of context and trying to claim he means "expensive=better" for everything is being willfully ignorant. His point is that there's going to be two different market niches and I agree, even if him trying to use such a lavish comparison falls rather flat.

 

[Hero in a half shell]

I suppose that explains why Videogame company executives are all raging morons; they're just drunk on such high quality videogames!

On topic, the main point is pretty correct, there will remain a market for AAA games, alongside the recently emerged casual market. However, part of me thinks this may be said in a bid to justify the huge budgets that AAA games now have (as the point he's addressing is that not enough people are buying AAA videogames to recoup the cost of making them) Which is a whole other kettle of fish involving wasteful spending, overestimating sales, and atrociously large marketing budgets.

 

[00slash00]

Wow. I mean, it's kind of weird that Sony is trying to get gamers to switch to PC and is outspoken about their opinion that Xbox One is the superior console, but there you have it. It's a bold move, let's see if it works out for them

 

[grigjd3]

Jack Tretton clearly knows absolutely nothing about wine.

 

[JakobBloch]

The man is saying if you have a burning interest in something you are willing to sink time and money into it. You are willing to go the extra mile and spend the extra cash for a richer experience. In these cases the richer experience will often be lost on people that don't have the same interest. This is the reason that a wine aficionado can enjoy an 800 dollar wine more than a 10$ bottle of wine, while a non-aficionado might not enjoy the 800$ bottle of wine at all. One of them just wants a bottle of wine while the other wants a different and more rich experience (rich in this case might mean a fundamental change to the wines texture and taste).

The same is the case with games and game consoles. If you bought a console you are already head and shoulders more invested than you average candy-crush player or cookie-clicker (Buying a tablet or a phone doesn't count... you bought that for other things than gaming). If you bought a gaming-PC your are even more invested. If you have multiple consoles you are really invested and want the best in any eventuality and don't want any experience to pass you by.

So why are some of the best and most lauded games in these times actually low priced indies? Simple. Just like there are big wine names that make bottles worth hundreds of dollars there are also small wine-houses that are not so well known but who make a distinctly superior wine. These are the unknown indies for mistake me not only a fraction of the people that play Assassins Creed: Black Flag or GTAV are even aware that Journey exist.

 

[captaincabbage]

Well, as a Dan Murphy's employee in Melbourne with aspirations as a fine wine expert, I can comfortably say BULL FUCKING SHIT.

Seriously, some of the best wines we have in our store are under $15AUD, so the thought that any level of quality comes from a high price-point, especially in the gaming community, is absolutely moronic.

Seriously, the games I've had the most fun with in the last few years have all been under $20AUD, with the exception of Red Dead Redemption, because hell yeah cowboys!

 

[Adamantium93]

Anyone who knows anything about wine will tell you that is not true. Just like any other commercial good, the price on a bottle of wine is more indicative of its label than of its quality. While it is true that good wines are hard to find dirt cheap, there are many excellent wines that can be bought on a budget and many awful wines that live on a fancy name.

I can't help but think video games are a lot like that, especially when many great indie games are so cheap and a lot of the expensive AAA titles are crap.

 

[Dedtoo]

I'm now wondering how Team Fortress 2 fits in here, being free to play, and all...
Perhaps along the line of a winery where you get some for free, if you work for it?
Something along those lines.