Warren Jenson, CFO of Electronic Arts, gave a positive assessment of the game development situation for PS3 games at EA. His remarks were made at the Merrill Lynch Media and Entertainment Conference held in Pasadena, California.
Jenson remarked, "We feel real good about where we are. Relative to where we were with the Xbox [360], we’re further along, but we’re developing for a more complicated machine, [the PS3]."
He then went on to say that EA would be in the forefront of establishing new software for the PS3. "Of all the third parties, EA will have the most exposure to the PS3 launch in terms of its number of titles available, but we feel it would hurt less, from a PS3 shortfall than other [game] companies…given that EA will have a more balanced lineup targeting both current-generation and next-generation platforms over the next two quarters."
Jenson,s statements mimic those of Robert Kotick, Activision,s CEO, yesterday in describing the strategy of continuing to support the PS2 while development continues on PS3 games. The move by game companies to ease into the next-gen market, while guaranteeing revenue from sales on present gen titles, will soften the blow of transition into the next generation. In as far as weathering the storm of smaller amounts of PS3s being available for launch in November, industry analysts believe that this will have a noticeable negative impact on the game industry due to reduced software sales.
How quickly the game industry will recover from the shortfall of PS3s will depend upon how swiftly Sony is able to ramp up production numbers and meet public demand of their next-gen console after the initial launch.
