Apparently Sony is a little unhappy with how Nintendo and Microsoft are performing in the gaming industry recently, or the company is just lashing out against the competition as usual. Sony PlayStation CEO Jack Tretton recently interviewed with CNN and he had some choice words for his company's two biggest rivals.
"Our view of the 'Game Boy experience' is that it's a great babysitting tool, something young kids do on airplanes, but no self-respecting twenty-something is going to be sitting on an airplane with one of those," Tretton said. "He's too old for that."
The "Game Boy experience" is a reference to Nintendo's DS handheld family, which has sold more than 146 million units worldwide. Sony's PSP is significantly lower at 67 million. Maybe Sony should consider targeting younger gamers as well?
Tretton says his team is excited about 3D gaming (with requires 3D glasses on the PS3), which is finding its way into upcoming releases like Uncharted 3 and SOCOM 4. We find this interesting given that Nintendo recently released the 3DS, the first mainstream gadget that can display 3D graphics without the need for special glasses. Meanwhile, Sony's unreleased Next Generation Portable (NGP) doesn't do 3D. It appears the company simply believes in 3D for the console, but not the portable.
Speaking of consoles, although the Sony PlayStation 3 is being trounced by the Nintendo Wii and the Xbox 360 in sales numbers, Tretton believes the PS3 is going to make a comeback. "They're starting to run out of steam now in terms of continuing to be relevant in 2011 and beyond," he said. "I mean, you've gotta be kidding me. Why would I buy a gaming system without a hard drive in it? How does this thing scale? Motion gaming is cute, but if I can only wave my arms six inches, how does this really feel like I'm doing true accurate motion gaming?"
Sony has been saying this for a while now, but while the PS3 does appear to be doing a bit better than it was earlier, it looks like it will remain in third place for quite a while longer. The gaming giant had a window to catch up to Microsoft, but with the boost from Kinect sales, it's not look so good. After all, the "cute" Kinect was recently crowned the fastest-selling consumer electronic device by Guinness World Records.