Fresh from the ‘PR Lollercoaster’ factory at Sony, the president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe has gone ahead and said that the new 80GB PlayStation 3 won’t hit European territories because, in his opinion, it’s just not worth bringing here. An extra 20GB of hard drive isn’t enough for the SCEE boss to bother giving the European market, a rather shocking attitude for a Sony boss to take.
“If you’re going to double it, it’s worth it. So maybe you’ll see something a little bit later, but 60 and 80, really not much difference,” Reeves said, essentially calling Sony out on a minimal upgrade in the face of Microsoft’s 120GB Xbox 360 Elite. Whether that was his intention or not, his comments seem contradictory to his own company’s efforts and he’s practically rubbished the newest PlayStation 3 model. I don’t know about you, but I’m left seriously questioning just what the Hell is going on over at Sony. It truly is its own worst enemy right now and the corporation doesn’t seem to understand the concept of public perception on any level.
This isn’t the first time SCEE has opened its big mouth and caused a PR nightmare. It was Sony’s loose cannon European wing that kicked off the “price drop gate” scandal which caused internal — as well as external — confusion shortly after the company’s E3 press conference. While that smacked of severe organizational problems and miscommunication within Sony’s corporate structure, this just knocks the madness right out of the ballpark. I wonder what SCEA has to say about Reeve’s claims that the SKU it intends to rely upon in the States has no value.
[Thanks to Joe Burling for the tip]
