leveled its guns at rival Microsoft's Xbox One device and fired until
the chambers were empty.
During a press event Monday night at the Electronic Entertainment Expo
in Los Angeles, Sony hammered home key points about its new gaming
system: Sharing games will be free. If people want to sell used games,
that'sfine. And a near-constant Internet connection, meant to monitor
game usage, won't be required.
In other words, the PS4 will do many things the new XBox apparently
cannot. Oh, and the PlayStation 4 will sell for $399 -- $100 less than
the Xbox One. Both consoles are expected this fall in time for the
holiday shopping season, setting up a battle for the hearts, minds and
wallets of the gaming community.
A big point of contention among gamers is that Microsoft's new Xbox
will require an online check-in every 24 hours (less than
the"always-on" mode gamers expected) and willonly allow games to be
resold at selected retailers. Games may be shared only among alimited
number of friends and family members.
Microsoft's daily check-in is designed, in part,to make sure users
haven't resold, traded in or given away a game they've already
downloaded on their consoles. The idea is to prevent more than one
person from effectively owning a game that was purchased only once.
After rolling out a list of new games, Jack Tretton, president and CEO
of Sony Computer Entertainment America, essentially went down a
laundry list of complaints about the new Xbox, which had been
showcased earlier Monday, and promised the opposite.
Read: Fans air concerns about new PlayStation, Xbox
"In addition to creating an amazing library ofnew titles on
PlayStation 4, we're equally focused on delivering what gamers want
most without imposing restrictions or devaluing their PS4 purchases,"
Tretton said."For instance, PlayStation 4 won't impose anynew
restrictions on the use of pre-owned games."
That announcement got a loud and sustainedround of applause from an E3
crowd not always easy to impress.
"I guess that's a good thing," a smiling Tretton replied.
In game-console terms, digital-rights management is a code that allows
users to access a game's content. It's designed to assure developers
and publishers that only the person who paid for the game, and close
family and friends, can play it.
Sony and Microsoft aren't the ones that would benefit from DRM, or
used-game restrictions. Game publishers want to make sure they are
getting paid for their work, andthat includes the secondhand market.
In the weeks leading up to E3, Microsoft had sought to calm gamers'
concerns with a series of blog posts that some felt nibbled around the
edges of rights-management issues but never offered definitive
answers.
Sony then was conspicuously quiet in what, now, appears to have been
an orchestrated effort to lower the boom at E3.
Witness the "Official PlayStation Used Game Instructional Video"
released shortly after thepresentation. It's 22 seconds long and
features only "Step 1," a man handing a disc to another man.
That cheeky video had racked up more than 1.5 million views on YouTube
in less than 24 hours.
Microsoft did not immediately respond Tuesday to a request seeking
comment. But online pundits were quick to praise Sony for landing some
blows against its rival.
"As crude as it is to declare a company the 'winner' of E3, it's hard
to see Sony's presentation today as anything but a PR coup... ," Kyle
Orland, senior gaming editor at CNN content partner Ars Technica,
wrote Monday.
"Among some of the most influential and hardest-to-please gamers on
the Internet, Sony is now the savior company that can do no wrong.
They should enjoy the ride, which will last just as long as it takes
for them to dosomething wrong."
Writing for Time, Jared Newman takes a longer view. Sony's move is
meant to preserve the future of disc-based games, at least for now,
while Microsoft stands ready tokill discs entirely, moving to an
almost entirelydigital model, he said.
Playing to what's already comfortable for gamers was clearly part of
Sony's strategy, Newman said.
"Sony is just betting that the good will of gamers will be enough to
cut Microsoft's ambitions short," he wrote. "And Microsoft has some
big ambitions, not just to be the best game console, but to serve as
the centralhub of all living room entertainment.
"It's a gambit on Sony's part, one that's going to make the console
wars even fiercer."
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