Soldato
From the Reg:
No Sony PS3 in UK until 2007 says analyst
Nothing new really, but meh..
No Sony PS3 in UK until 2007 says analyst
PS3 won't reach Europe until March 2007, says analyst
It's been a fairly tough start to the year for both Sony's PS3 and Microsoft's Xbox 360, but it looks like Sony's woe may be a touch worse. Industry speculation that Sony's projected release date for its PlayStation 3 console of "spring 2006" was looking unlikely, turned into open ridicule when a Sony source told a journalist that the PS3s shown at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month were empty cases. Now, US analyst Evan Wilson says the PS3 will be released in summer 2006 in Japan, November 2006 in the US, and March 2007 in Europe, with a million units allocated to each territory.
Sony had promised a surprise in the way the PS3 would be rolled-out. If Wilson is right, the surprise is not the pleasant one some had anticipated - that of a global roll-out, or even Europe coming first, but the normal slap-in-the-face Sony last delivered with the PSP launch. European gamers come last, by a long way.
Microsoft would no doubt be laughing its socks off right now, having predicted a European PS3 launch of 2007, if it didn't have enough problems of its own. Analysts believe the company sold around 1.3 million Xbox 360s before the end of 2005, with some putting a figure of 600,000 in the US. Microsoft has now publicly ditched its target of 3m Xbox 360s within three months of launch, and replaced it with a target of between 4m and 5.5m sold by June. However, ongoing production problems that have left shelves bereft of Xbox 360s worldwide, will need to be solved quickly to meet that target. And Microsoft really needs those sales, as it only has a few months before the Sony PS3 arrives. It needs to sell the Xbox 360 fast in order to build the momentum to face Sony. We will have to wait and see if it can achieve that.
Nothing new really, but meh..