Virtual insanity
Since its release in October, Sony has been quiet as to whether or not PlayStation VR has been a success for them. The general worry was whether or not the current virtual reality craze would teeter out much like 3D and motion controls, and while this still has yet to be disproven, at least Sony seems to have made a dent in the market.
Speaking with The New York Times, Andrew House, Sony Interactive Entertainment’s Global Chief Executive, revealed that PlayStation VR has sold 916,000 units as of February 19th. With Sony’s internal goal of selling one million within six months, this certainly took them by surprise as House initially approached production of the units cautiously. But, crediting games like Resident Evil 7: biohazard, House states average amount of time spent with VR has doubled.
I wonder what this means for the rest of the VR competition. The New York Times notes the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive have sold 243,000 and 420,000 (nice) units respectively thanks to data collected from SuperData Research. Clearly Sony’s household name coupled with the base gained from the PlayStation 4 console have helped in that regard. Either way, it’s great to hear Sony didn’t just put all of their eggs in one basket and throw everything they had into VR. It seems it was a fun little experiment that’s paid off relatively well so far. I wonder if sales can hold up as the months roll on, however. Anything can happen as it’s a crazy world we’re living in.
Popularity of Sony’s PlayStation VR Surprises Even the Company [New York Times]
