A lot of goodies have been coming out of E3–including another 360 price drop. But this one is a major shakeup.
Sony has clutched at a series of exclusive titles to keep sales of their console up. Titles you can play no-where else but on a Sony console: God of War is one of those titles, and titles like Little Big Planet and Heavenly Sword have managed to spark interest in big black. But the absolute monarch of the Sony Killer Ap Title Department has been the core Final Fantasy series. Spin-offs like Crystal Chronicles and Chocobo Dungeon on the Nintendo lineup aside, the promise of exclusivity to the most anticipated RPG title of this generation has had Sony sleeping easy at night, knowing that the moment FFXIII was released, a legion of bishie-loving gamers would gladly plunk down several hundreds of dollars to secure access to the title. But now you don’t need to buy a PS3 if you want to play FFXIII — you can play it on your 360. So that’s one less title that Sony has to say “you need our console.”
As someone who has been miffed at Sony for their obnoxious marketing practices, I won’t lie and say that I’m not delighted at this news. And Sony’s locking up future Rockstar exclusivity doesn’t make me too sad for them — they can have their Grand Theft Auto and I can have my Final Fantasy. Everyone’s a winner!
But what was the reason for this? Is it that Square-Enix is concerned about the PS3’s flagging sales? Is it the constant comparisons between PS3 and 360 graphics on multi-console releases that indicate that Microsoft edges Sony out time and again? Is it the massive before-you-can-even-play-the-game downloaded patches that PS3 games require while their XBox counterparts suffer from “insert disc, play game?”