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PS3 to hit U.S. stores on Nov. 18

Sony officials say the much-anticipated game console, originally slated for spring release, will be available in $499 and $599 versions.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published May 9, 2006

CULVER CITY, Calif. - Sony Corp. will launch its new PlayStation 3 console in November, in two versions aimed at keeping the company's dominance in gaming.

The PS3 will launch Nov. 11 in Japan and Nov. 18 in the United States and Europe, Sony officials said Monday night at a news conference.

There will be two versions: one sporting a 20-gigabyte hard drive for $499 and another with a 60-gigabyte drive for $100 more. Officials said they would have 4-million units ready by the end of 2006 and 6-million more by March 31.

"We're really trying to push what this machine is capable of," said Phil Harrison, president of Sony Computer Entertainment's Worldwide Studios.

Sony also showed off the PS3's new controller, which looks similar to the one for the older PlayStation 2 but adds motion sensors to detect six degrees of movement. In a demonstration, the controller was used to pilot a jet fighter.

Earlier this year, Sony delayed the system's release from the spring until the fall.

Most of the more than two-hour meeting was spent showing off new PS3 games, including a demonstration high-definition version of the racing game Grand Turismo and the sword-fighting action game Heavenly Sword.

The starting price of the PS3 is still $100 more than the current top-of-the-line Xbox 360.

The presentation came just two days before the ongoing battle for living room dominance resumes at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, the video game industry's largest annual conference.

Nintendo and Microsoft, with their competing Wii and Xbox 360 systems, plan similar news conferences today.

The Xbox 360 got an early start on the next-generation console wars and has sold 3.2-million units worldwide since it was released in November. But until recently, Microsoft has been unable to meet demand.

Pricing and other details also are sketchy on Nintendo's Wii (pronounced "We"), which uses a unique TV-style remote controller that can be waved around to manipulate action on the screen.

This year's E3 conference comes with the industry in financial turmoil as it transitions from older systems to the new consoles. Much of it has been blamed on consumers' desire to hold out for the PS3 and Wii.

The period has been especially brutal for key gamemakers like Electronic Arts Inc., which recently lost $16-million in its fiscal fourth quarter. EA predicts video game sales industrywide would be flat to down 5 percent in 2006.

According to market research firm NPD Group, overall video game sales dropped 5 percent to $7-billion in the United States last year.

During last year's E3, Sony executives proudly showed pretty video clips of supposed PS3 games but very little in the way of actual game play. The same was true for the Nintendo Wii and the Xbox 360.

Expect a more hands-on approach this year, with attendees finally getting a chance to play games on the new systems, said Doug Lowenstein, president of the Entertainment Software Association, which organizes E3.

"You'll be able to kick the tires and see what's under the hood," he said.

Central to Sony's strategy is to use PS3 to win rapid acceptance of its high-definition Blu-ray DVD technology. In a fight reminiscent of the battle between VHS and Sony's Betamax format, Blu-ray is jockeying for consumer favor over a rival standard called HD-DVD.

At stake are potentially billions of dollars a year in royalties. For every DVD a studio presses in the Blu-ray format, it would owe Sony a few cents for the privilege. VHS vanquished Betamax in the 1980s. Sony views the PS3 as its secret weapon.

Success would help Howard Stringer, the Welsh-born chief executive who took over last year as Sony's first non-Japanese head and vowed to bolster the company's bottom line, which has sagged along with its reputation as a technological innovator.

If sales of PS3 and, by extension, Blu-ray take off, Stringer hopes Sony can ramp up demand for its high-definition televisions and camcorders as well as high-definition copies of movies from its library of 7,500 titles.

At the same time, PS3 would be equipped to take advantage of the shift in entertainment and media toward online delivery.

PlayStation 3 is the third version of the world's best-selling video-game console, which for more than a decade has dominated the $25-billion annual global games market. Since 1995, Sony has shipped more than 223-million PlayStations.

That success has made the PlayStation franchise crucial to Sony's bottom line. In some years, PlayStation has helped smooth out the financial ups and downs of Sony's unpredictable, hit-driven entertainment and electronics divisions.

[Last modified May 9, 2006, 06:31:15]