wraggster
October 13th, 2005, 18:30
If reports are to be believed, Microsoft's determined push to increase the Xbox 360's popularity in Japan may be paying off, with many Japanese publishers apparently growing weary of Sony's spiralling next-gen development costs.
Japanese website zakzak.co.jp has run an article, kindly translated into English by ps3focus.com, quoting an inside source as saying that development for the next generation of consoles is increasingly "nothing but a nightmare for many Japanese software development companies."
The trouble seems to stem from Ken Kutaragi's insistence that PS3 titles should be markedly different in terms quality to existing PS2 games, requiring significant expenditure to meet Sony's lofty expectations: "Developing software for the PS3 from scratch will require an initial investment of at least 2 billion yen," not including actual development costs, "There are not many software companies that can easily afford that kind of money."
Japanese website zakzak.co.jp has run an article, kindly translated into English by ps3focus.com, quoting an inside source as saying that development for the next generation of consoles is increasingly "nothing but a nightmare for many Japanese software development companies."
The trouble seems to stem from Ken Kutaragi's insistence that PS3 titles should be markedly different in terms quality to existing PS2 games, requiring significant expenditure to meet Sony's lofty expectations: "Developing software for the PS3 from scratch will require an initial investment of at least 2 billion yen," not including actual development costs, "There are not many software companies that can easily afford that kind of money."