In my opinion, one of the more important news stories of late is that Final Fantasy XIII will not be released in Japan til *at the earliest*, Spring of next year. This is a nail in the tire of the PS3 lineup, as a possible two year wait for stateside release after system launch is a little scary, particularly because this is one of the few big exclusives the PS3 still holds.

With that in mind, I thought about a common mantra among gamers, that third-party support can often make or break a system. That remains true to a point (for now), but this new info on FFXIII is not without a lesson in the matter, for me.

Here's my point. I think an unnoticed mistake Sony has made with this launch is relying too much on third-party titles. While your system can be viewed as barren with a lack of third-party support, what happens when a system lacks first-party support? Now I know Sony Games Division has plenty of games in development, such as Heavenly Sword (that IS Sony, right?), Eye of Judgement, SOCOM, and Warhawk. Those may be very good games, but they certainly don't pack the wallop of the big franchises. You have to convince people to get excited about those, whereas if I were to say "There's a new Zelda/Mario/Halo/GTA/MGS/Final Fantasy coming out," the name sells the game.

To use Nintendo as an example of this point, look at how many established, successful, well-known franchises they own. When a software drought is imminent, the company usually speeds up development of one of their popular series' current iterations, to keep the system owners appeased.Recently, Mario Party 8 came to put an end (from a sales standpoint) to what many called a drought that started with the release of Super Paper Mario. A month later, Pokemon Battle Revolution will do the same, followed by Mario Strikers: Charged in July, and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption in August.

If I were a Sony official, I wouldn't feel comfortable with the fact that the most anticipated games for their system are completely out of their control.

Comments?

I think for now, 360 by a landslide.

Eventually, probably ps3.

i uh, don't have a cellphone, or an ipod... lol too much gamer. So i kinda want an iphone, my gf would be happy. ps3 i can wait for a price drop.

on the iphone tho, i'd probably wait for a larger memory thing, whats the point of mega video playing if it only has 4 gigs

Sales, mostly, though if you have lots of quality games on your console it's kinda hard to declare it a CLEAR loser...

osirisomeomi

If that's the case, the GC couldn't be called the loser, even tho everyone says it is. Seriously a lot of great games on it, more than most people got around to buying/playing

Falcon Punch!!!

mikl1018

hot dang, pwn.

I mean seriously when I walk into Gamestop theres a whole wall full of PS2 games. Half a Wall of 360 games. Half a wall of PS3 games. Half a Wall of GameCube Games.

And..One small Shelf full of used Wii games.

Its just sad. Plus all the games they have there sucked...wtf Surfs Up? and Happy Feet D:

Dear lord and the graphics are crap. So the wii isn't really for gamming gamming? its for the vc?

DiscoDevistated

Look man, you're a really bad flamer. Its obvious after reading both threads. Leave it to the professionals, please.