The Endless PR Challenges Of PlayStation
Public relations is a complicated aspect of business, especially in the video game industry. There are very few things as fickle as the love and affection from the social media gaming space. You can do something right 99 times, but when you make one mistake, it is likely going to be hung over the head of your company for the months to come. This is a challenge that PlayStation has been dealing with since just before the launch of the PlayStation 5. Despite the success of PlayStation during the previous generation, there have been several questionable decisions since 2020 that seem to have left many fans scratching their head.
Why is there a sudden pivot on the opinion of PlayStation in the social media space though? They are still releasing great games for the PlayStation 5, such as Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, Returnal, Horizon Forbidden West, and many more. These opinions are rooted in how important fans were made to feel during the PlayStation 4 generation. More specifically, how PlayStation catapulted itself to massive success using PR to highlight not only their incredible games but the fanbase as well.
The PlayStation 4 A Blow Out Success
The PlayStation 4 was an absolute homerun for Sony selling over 116 million units with a wealth of well-received software. From Marvel’s Spider-Man, The Last Of Us Part II, Horizon Zero Dawn, and a wealth of 2nd and 3rd-party exclusives. The PlayStation 4 brought a massive amount of games to the table that attracted a variety of different gamers. If you asked someone what their favorite PlayStation 4 game was you might get different answers. This speaks to Sony’s dedication to providing game variety to its fans. But there was more than just the games that made the PlayStation 4 stick with so many people as their primary gaming console.
PlayStation’s marketing logo for the PlayStation 4 was “4 The Players”. This crafted a feeling of community between the PlayStation brand and its fans. In an era where many gaming publishers were pushing multiplayer games and games as a service, PlayStation under the leadership of Shawn Layden had a different strategy.
Layden stated in an interview that:
I don’t want to go to those teams and tell them “I read in a magazine that there’s something called games as a service, make me one of those!”. I don’t want to be that guy. So, that’s what we do. We do Horizon, we do God Of War, we do Detroit, Uncharted, and The Last Of Us. These are things we’re gonna continue to lean into very strongly. So I see our content story continuing to play out that way
The line was clearly drawn in the sand. PlayStation would not be chasing trends in order to chase microtransactions in multiplayer/service games. The reason for this was that they knew their fans wanted AAA narrative-focused experiences. This made many PlayStation fans feel safe knowing that the company was dedicated to focusing on these experiences.
It was a strategy that made a lot of sense at the time. Titles such as God Of War (2018) selling over 20 million copies, is indicative of that success. But little did fans know, the time for change was coming. Fast forward to late 2019, as Layden departed Sony just a year prior to the release of the PlayStation 5. This meant big changes were in the wind for PlayStation.
Leadership Leads In A New Direction
With the departure of Shawn Layden, enter Jim Ryan a long-time PlayStation veteran executive who had been crucial to the success of the PlayStation 4 in Europe. Under his leadership, PlayStation appeared to be heading in an almost polar opposite direction set previously by Layden.
While Ryan has had his fair share of PR-challenging interviews, one of the first challenges he and PlayStation faced during the launch of the new console was being one of the first publishers to adopt the $70 USD price tag for first-party games. A topic that is still hotly debated almost 2 years later by fans and pundits alike. While it is important to note they were not the first publishers to adopt $70 games, fans and critics quickly criticized Sony for this move.
The rise in price was attributed to the rising cost of creating AAA games which admittedly are PlayStation’s bread and butter. It would make sense that they want to preserve the profit margins as costs go up. Some fans did not see it this way, which caused a divide within many forums and social media sites.
These challenges didn’t stop with the $70 games either. Unfortunately, next came the paid upgrades to PlayStation 5. While many 3rd party developers as well as Xbox offered free next-generation upgrades to games that had been on Xbox One/PlayStation 4.
PlayStation never really adopted a consistent strategy in regards to upgrading. Some games received free updates, while others charged a small $10 upgrade fee. Then others like Ghost Tsushima got a Director’s Cut re-release on PlayStation 5 with the brand new $70 price tag. All of this became a messy and all-around unpleasant experience for PlayStation 5 early adopters. As the messaging around these releases was muddy and unclear more often then not.
Perhaps the worst part of the upgrade situation was that these were all good games that were overshadowed by bad marketing. Conversations quickly shifted away from what the actual content of the upgrade would be, and would focus more on how much or how players would be able to access the upgrade. PlayStation has an incredible lineup of games for the PlayStation 5, but they need to stop letting bad marketing overshadow them.
Fingers crossed they have learned from these mistakes with the upcoming launch of the PSVR2. Launching the next generation of console VR is a gigantic task of revealing hardware and software. PlayStation needs to deliver a clear and concise message about PSVR2 and show the value of the headset. As well as how they will support the VR community that they have created within the PlayStation ecosystem.
PlayStation 5 Price Hike Hits At The Wrong Time
The price increase of the PlayStation 5 consoles in many regions outside of the United States was a big conversation this past week amongst fans and analysts. The price increase varied from market to market, but the response was almost immediate. As PS5s are still flying off the shelf faster than Sony can produce them. Some fans are voicing frustration that the console still remains hard to purchase while the price just increased in many regions.
What would cause Sony to increase the price of the PlayStation 5? Especially when late last year the company admitted they were past the break-even point with the disc version of PlayStation 5. This price increase is reflective of not only inflation that has driven up the costs of almost everything we consume on a daily basis. But also with the increased costs of production as well as shipping units from factories overseas. It is likely that this breakeven point has been passed by its costs once again. In other words, Sony is likely losing money with every console they sell.
Many fans understandably do not care that Sony, a multi-billion dollar company, is losing money on its newest hardware. However, this loss presents a challenge for Sony. Especially since PlayStation is such a massive part of the company’s business.
In a world where investors get nervous at the slightest shift in the market, Sony cannot risk scaring away investors with hardware profits tanking on a quarterly report. The big three of gaming have seen their financials stagnate after the massive spike we saw at the beginning of the pandemic. Whether it is services, hardware, or software everything is either dropping slightly or increasing in very small numbers. This means there is no rise in profits to offset the increased cost. With how fast the PlayStation 5 is selling out means Sony, as a whole, is at a high risk of losing a lot of money on their hardware. Which is something that almost drove the PlayStation division into the ground back in the PlayStation 3 era.
Even with all of this financial information, it does not soften the blow that fans feel from the price hike. This hit especially hard when Sony’s competitor Microsoft responded in a statement to Windows Central. Xbox clarified that they had no plans to increase the price of the Xbox Series consoles. This continues Microsoft’s consistent messaging of putting their fans first. Consistent messaging is simply something that PlayStation has not had in this generation.
From the $70 games to the $10 upgrades, and now finally the price increase of the PS5. It is beginning to feel like PlayStation is offloading as much of its costs to customers as it can. This is a standard in many industries of course, but it leaves some fans feeling stuck and frustrated. As the price of everything continues to climb, these kinds of small increases across your content and hardware might eventually hit a breaking point for some. It is a risky game that PlayStation is playing especially when its main competitor is constantly marketing about focusing on its fans and delivering more for less with its services.
What Does This All Mean For The PlayStation 5?
At the end of the day, a console is judged by what it offers to its consumers. The PlayStation 5’s value proposition has been great thus far. However, demand greatly outpaces supply at this time. Even with the price hike, analysts maintain this will likely do very little in the short term for PlayStation. In the long term, it is impossible to predict how this might play out. Especially since the PS5 will undoubtedly receive a price drop in the future. Unless they intend to go the Nintendo Switch route and hold the console price firm.
With all of that being said, fan goodwill is an important part of the equation. No matter how good your product is, fans want to feel like they are valued. If you constantly nickel and dime your customer it eventually builds up until they become fed up and will take their business elsewhere. With how hyper-competitive the gaming market is right now, I would be wary of treading on my customers repeatedly. Especially when your competition is knocking at your door with a constantly evolving value proposition.
