Speaking to an old friend from Uni yesterday (he works for Sony down in London) – let’s call him Mr. X.
He had some interesting things to tell me. We all know that Casino Royale on Blu-Ray will be the free gift for the first 500,000 PS3 owners to register, a very similar scheme to the Spiderman UMD that arrived after registering your PSP.
He also told me the names of a couple of big companies who have oversold the PlayStation 3. Big, high street companies. There have been 162,000 pre-orders of the PS3 console with all online suppliers. Only a couple of companies have yet to start pre-ordering, in fact I can only think of Comet who are due to start in the next couple of days.
Amazon have had problems with their ordering system and have been strangely releasing pre-orders for around 4 hours at a time, stopping the pre-orders, and then analysing their stats.
If you haven’t yet pre-ordered your PS3 (shame on you) then you may not notice that some UK retailers have already oversold the machine. However, on the retailers websites – where it used to say ‘delivery ON the 23rd March’ the wording has changed to ‘delivery FROM the 23rd March’. Clever huh…
There are only around 15-20,000 pre-orders left. The rest (around 20,000) will be distributed to stores for delivery on the day. Bear in mind that many of these stores (such as Game) have been taking in-store pre-orders so their initial stock is pretty much wiped out.
Stay in the know. My mate in Sony has been supplying information for some websites such as www.ps3pad.com.
(I am really looking forward to the online gaming – I will be supplying my PS3 online name on here after launch date if anybody thinks they are up to the challenge of giving me a game !! )
The PlayStation 3 is the most pre-ordered games console in history according to Gian Luzio, head of Play, one of the internet’s online retailers.
According to figures from his company pre-orders for the PS3 are out-stripping the pre-orders that happened with the Wii and XBox 360 by 6 times.
This will be great news for Sony – who shocked European gamers when they pushed back the PS3 launch date 4 months behind the US and Japan. The European market is the most important video console market in the world in terms of units sold and game sales, however it appears that the threat of the XBox 360 maintaining a significant market position was greater in the US and Japan, and Sony’s move to focus on the US and Japan first was a key strategic decision.
PS3’s are still not readily available in stores in the US, and after the initial launch allocation across Europe next month it is expected that supplies won’t be replenished significantly until late summer and that Christmas could be extremely difficult for wannabe-PS3 owners.
Amazon have sold out of PlayStation’s 3 – in total their website was active for around 10 hours over two days. Woolworths and Argos are near to their limit for pre-orders and are expected to pull sales from their site this coming week.
Readers to this blog will know I have been struggling on my choice of games for the PS3 – which I eagerly await.
A breakthrough was made today when I finally decided on my first purchase – though still haven’t been informed about the best supplier.
Formula One 06 looks like a great racer. I have had an affection for the Formula One games ever since the Amiga Version which arrived on 2 (or was it 4) magnificent floppy disks, was coded by Geoff Crammond, and was technically superb.
I went on a hunt on YouTube (youtube videos often struggle to give you a good sense of the game) but this one was good and made my decision for me.
Wishing I had waited the extra day or so and actually ordered the package with Woolworths that came with this game. Could have saved myself about £15. Serves me right for trying to jump the gun.
Call of Duty 3 is going to be one of those types of games I just love. I really didn’t even need to see the trailer but I did (it is here by the way!)
It looks beautiful. A real graphical extravaganza for the PlayStation 3. A bit of smoke and a bit of flames are the kind of thing that should look remarkably different on the next gen consoles. All those ‘real world’ effects that have always been difficult to animate.
I’ve have officially placed it top of the ‘Wanted’ list. If anybody wants to save me the bother and send me the cheapest internet price then I would be forever grateful.
Back to the UK pre-order frenzy which is really starting to pick up pace and both Woolworths and Choices UK have unveiled their pre-order offers. Woolworths were brilliant during the Wii pre-order campaign – pretty much all pre-orders were fulfilled as they stuck to agreed limits (a bit like Argos in the last post). Choices UK also have a number of great packages for people who haven’t pre-ordered yet.
You can keep up to date fully, faster than my blog anyway, on one of the many PS3 pre-order pages on the web.
Fresh from ordering my PS3 my thoughts are now turning to what the hell I have got planned for the weekend following UK launch on 23rd March 2007.
So I have booked a couple of days leave from work.
I have swapped my weekends shift – which just happened to be that weekend. No chance.
Now my thoughts turn to starting off the Blu-Ray and game collection. I am considering ordering some titles from the US. (I have only ordered the 60Gb standalone console you see).
I need some ideas for games. I want something to show off the graphics (obviously) but gameplay is important. To the PS3 community – I need some ideas!
With the UK release date of the PlayStation 3 heading our way, UK retailers are beginning to offer customers the ability to pre-order their brand spanking new Play Station 3.
Many retailers are offering first come first served offers. You pre-order and then if you’re in the first bunch then you get your hands on the machine. A risk but maybe one worth taking for some people.
However, UK retailer Argos has now added it’s pre-ordering facilities to its website. However, the retailer has already been informed how many of the machines Sony will be shipping to the company, and is taking pre-orders up to that limit ONLY. It says that this method will ensure that everyone who completes a pre-order will be guaranteed their PlayStation 3. As soon as the number of pre-orders exceed their purchase stock they will remove the ability.
It’s a sensible idea, and Argos has tended in the past to receive a fairly substantial allocation of units. I have read articles suggesting they may receive as many as 8% of all UK PlayStation 3’s for launch. I personally like their method, avoiding not only disappointment amongst consumers, but also plenty of problems for their customer service department/bad press etc.
Either way. If you want a PlayStation – I mean really really want one, then they may just be the choice for you.
For what it’s worth – I’ve just ordered mine with them.
