1UP Celebrates Kutaragi

[bapenguin]

As crazy as crazy Ken was, what he did for the video games industry and Sony is nothing short of amazing. To pay tribute to him, 1UP has written a memorial (http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3159047) of sorts since he's announced retirement.To celebrate Kutaragi's departure from SCE (and from gaming, as it unfortunately seems), we're ready to take a look back at Ken Kutaragi's Greatest Hits, the quotes that defined the "father of the PlayStation." Plus, we debunk two popular Kutaragi quotes, though we desperately wish he actually said them. Maybe, like Candyman, if we say Kutaragi three times in a mirror, he'll appear and say them. Or kill us.

On a more serious note, Evil Avatar member Morangie points out this GamesIndustry.biz article (http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=24620).

We shall miss his quotes for sure. I think Kaz will help fill some of that void. RIIIIIIIIIDGE Racer anyone?

[Morangie]

Before the SDF get here, GamesIndustry.biz (http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=24620) has a slighty more in depth retrospective. :)

[Banacek]

Anyone responsible for giving me the PS1 is alright in my book.

[Headcase]

He brought us the Playstation, and lots of memorable quotes. We'll miss you, Kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaz Kutaragi!

That was completely uncalled for. I apologize.

[Sazime]

We'll miss him? WTF? He didn't leave Sony, he just changed posistions.

[Vanthar]

We'll miss him? WTF? He didn't leave Sony, he just changed posistions.

First they 'promoted' him. Then it was announced he will be retiring for good sometime in June I believe.

[51|RandoM]

Enjoy your 10 year vacation, see you again when it is time for PS4. :p

[Kefkataran]

Patrick did a freakin' fantastic job on that memorial. *sniff* So many memories...

[Reanimated]

Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out, Ken.

[Rafer]

"You can communicate to a new cybercity. This will be the ideal home server. Did you see the movie 'The Matrix'? Same interface. Same concept. Starting from next year, you can jack into 'The Matrix'!" -- Newsweek, 02/00

Wow, Home has been in development awhile I take it...

[Adam Blue]

Before the SDF get here, GamesIndustry.biz (http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=24620) has a slighty more in depth retrospective. :)


The 1up thing is ok content filler, but the quoted link is a good read.

[BrokenSymmetry]

In fact, Rob Fahey's article on Kutaragi (on GamesIndustry and Eurogamer) is an incredibly in-depth and well-written article on Kutaragi's career. The 1up article is just a juvenile piece we could well do without...

[Kefkataran]

Yeesh, lighten up, Adam and BrokenSymmetry. Obviously the 1UP piece was meant to be joking and light-hearted whereas the GamesIndustry article (which, I agree, is fantastic) was meant to be serious.

[Rogue_hunter]

the LA Times business section had a story on this, mostly fluff about how Sony rose to prominence, but then tries to blame everything on him.

[Dirty Harry]

looks like someone set us up the bomb at 1up, that ill teach em the darlings that they are.

[Wolvie]

My fav quote was "We don't care." when asked about the Xbox 360, and the Wii. I bet he cares now huh?

The 1up article is just a juvenile piece we could well do without...

Thats why I don't subscribe to EGM or go to 1up.com... well I do go if they have info I want, and no one else has it. So yeah, almost never.

[Johan]

Before the SDF get here, GamesIndustry.biz (http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=24620) has a slighty more in depth retrospective. :)

The 1Up article was good for a few minutes of laughs.

The gamesindustry article was good for twenty minutes of "wow...I didn't know that" reading. It was VERY interesting. Thanks for posting it!

[JazGalaxy]

The arcticles claims the "everyone will know discipline" quote is false, but I really don't think it is. I remember reading most of those quotes when they were fresh, not reprinted, and I belive the "Everyone will know discipline" one was nearly in the same paragraph as the "peopel will work more hours to afford PS3" one.

[JazGalaxy]

The GameIndustry arcticle is a bit to worshipful for my taste, but basically gets the facts right that peopel choose to ignore.

Kutaragi was never into games.

Kutaragi's success and power at Sony came from the success of the Playstation.

When you then factor into the equation that the Playstation succeeded by happenstance more than any real business skill on the part of Sony, and that The PS2 succeeded because it was just a PS1+1, you get a more realistic picture of the guys contributions to gaming.

Kutragi got the axe because the cloud of success he was riding on for the PS1 has finally dissapeared and it's become obvious that the emperor has no clothes.

[Banacek]

When you then factor into the equation that the Playstation succeeded by happenstance more than any real business skill on the part of Sony, and that The PS2 succeeded because it was just a PS1+1, you get a more realistic picture of the guys contributions to gaming.

Yeah, that's why the PS1 sold almost 110 million units and the PS2 sold 115 million units. Saying that Sony's video game business model was happenstance and not business skill is delusional to say the least.

[shnastybiznastic]

When you then factor into the equation that the Playstation succeeded by happenstance more than any real business skill on the part of Sony, and that The PS2 succeeded because it was just a PS1+1, you get a more realistic picture of the guys contributions to gaming.
Now I love me some Nintendo, And I'm apprehensive at best about the improvements to gaming brought on by the Playstation brand. But The PS1's success is based on happenstance? Can I have some of whatever you are smoking?

[Adam Blue]

Yeesh, lighten up, Adam and BrokenSymmetry. Obviously the 1UP piece was meant to be joking and light-hearted whereas the GamesIndustry article (which, I agree, is fantastic) was meant to be serious.

I was just surprised the 1up article got font-paged over the GameIndustry article(or at all), but Bap was kind enough to fix that for us.

Also, your post is what made me want to read it...and I was just dissapointed.

[Dirty Harry]

I was just surprised the 1up article got font-paged over the GameIndustry article(or at all), but Bap was kind enough to fix that for us.

Also, your post is what made me want to read it...and I was just dissapointed.
EVAV - we know how to shamelessly shill for MS and Nintendo.

[JazGalaxy]

Yeah, that's why the PS1 sold almost 110 million units and the PS2 sold 115 million units. Saying that Sony's video game business model was happenstance and not business skill is delusional to say the least.

Remind me what their competition was again?

Oh yeah, the Sega Saturn that was outselling the PSX 3:1 before Sega imploded structurally as a company, and Nintendo with it's ninty dollar cartridges.

Oh but maybe it's sony's dedication to making games that sold the units? Games like Final Fantasy 7, Grand Theft Auto 3, and Metal Gear Solid. Wait, those are all made by third party developers...

Name 1 thing that Sony did to become the market leader?

Anybody who knows the history of the Sony Playstion knows that it's success has been pure happenstance. Like the fact that the PS2 initially sold with an attach rate of almost 1 to 1 with the MATRIX ON DVD AND NO GAMES.

When a game console's success is things like the fact that it just so happens to be released at the same time as a special effects phenomenon by a seperate movie studio... I think we call that happenstance.

Bad decisions by Nintendo... mismangement on the part of Sega... that's what got SOny to the point it's at now. Now that they are ACTUALLY HAVING TO LIVE BY THEIR DECISIONS, we are seeing what they are worth with the PS3. They're not doing anything different then they ever have wiht PS3, it's just that the competition is actually playing for real now instead of giving sony money hand over fist.

[Banacek]

Remind me what their competition was again?

Oh yeah, the Sega Saturn that was outselling the PSX 3:1 before Sega imploded structurally as a company, and Nintendo with it's ninty dollar cartridges.

Oh but maybe it's sony's dedication to making games that sold the units? Games like Final Fantasy 7, Grand Theft Auto 3, and Metal Gear Solid. Wait, those are all made by third party developers...

Name 1 thing that Sony did to become the market leader?

Anybody who knows the history of the Sony Playstion knows that it's success has been pure happenstance. Like the fact that the PS2 initially sold with an attach rate of almost 1 to 1 with the MATRIX ON DVD AND NO GAMES.

When a game console's success is things like the fact that it just so happens to be released at the same time as a special effects phenomenon by a seperate movie studio... I think we call that happenstance.

Bad decisions by Nintendo... mismangement on the part of Sega... that's what got SOny to the point it's at now. Now that they are ACTUALLY HAVING TO LIVE BY THEIR DECISIONS, we are seeing what they are worth with the PS3. They're not doing anything different then they ever have wiht PS3, it's just that the competition is actually playing for real now instead of giving sony money hand over fist.

I'll let someone else with more time correct you on how you chalked up all of Sony's good business decisions (like courting Square and Konami) as pure luck. Just because your competitors do stupid things doesn't guarantee that you'll be successful. But you're clearly delusional or joking, I just can't tell which.

[Banacek]

Oh, and anyone claiming that the Saturn was ever outselling the PSX, at least in this country, couldn't be any more wrong. Where did you get that 3:1 number?

[JazGalaxy]

It was in Japan that the saturn was outselling the PSX 3 to 1. (which was well before it launched in america. The reason the Saturn lived a much longer and much more fufilling life in Japan is becuase it, out of the gate, dominated in Japan. Sega killed THEMSELVES.) As to where i got the facts, it's a book called "The Ultimate History of Videogames: From Pacman to Pokemon". Amazing read. It highlights the fight between the companies witha completely unbiased look, usually from the employees of the companies themselves. YOu will oftentimes see it cited in videogame magazines as essential reading.

As for "courting square and konami", I'd like to see you back that up with facts. The official word has always been, from all involved parties, that the only reason both square and konami went with the PSX over the N64 was based on the fact that it had a CD drive and the N64 didn't.

After the PSX became the clear leader in the market, developers developed for it because it had the largest installed user base and cheaper development costs. (It costs far far far less to stamp cds than print cartridges) The exact same thing we're seeing now with the 360.

[Banacek]

It was in Japan that the saturn was outselling the PSX 3 to 1. (which was well before it launched in america. The reason the Saturn lived a much longer and much more fufilling life in Japan is becuase it, out of the gate, dominated in Japan. Sega killed THEMSELVES.) As to where i got the facts, it's a book called "The Ultimate History of Videogames: From Pacman to Pokemon". Amazing read. It highlights the fight between the companies witha completely unbiased look, usually from the employees of the companies themselves. YOu will oftentimes see it cited in videogame magazines as essential reading.

As for "courting square and konami", I'd like to see you back that up with facts. The official word has always been, from all involved parties, that the only reason both square and konami went with the PSX over the N64 was based on the fact that it had a CD drive and the N64 didn't.

After the PSX became the clear leader in the market, developers developed for it because it had the largest installed user base and cheaper development costs. (It costs far far far less to stamp cds than print cartridges) The exact same thing we're seeing now with the 360.

I figured it was in Japan. My friend had an imported Saturn, then eventually he got the 4 meg ram cart, which was great for us since we were such big 2D fighting fans. Even the Japanese Saturn controllers were far better than the US ones. I remember working at Babbages at the time, and those units would not sell.

I'm not going to argue with about the Sony thing, because in my mind it's obvious you cannot move that many units without having a good business plan and excellent marketing. You say that those 3rd party companies had to go with Sony because they went with a CD format. Well, that was a business decision on the part of Sony to push for the cd format, even back when they were talking to Nintendo. Sony marketing made it ok for the older males to be into games, and that's one of the main reasons they sold so many units. Again, saying everything happened by chance is being extremely biased.

[JazGalaxy]

Because I'm bored... let's just run down all the different ways Sony has fallen @$$ backwards into success in spite of themselves.

The PSX debuted at the standard console price of 299. This is standard for the industry and what everyone expected it to debut for.

Saturn debuted at 399, 100 dollars more expensive than what people had thought it was gooing to debut for, and outside the realm of industry standard. One point conceded by Sega to Sony.

Nintendo made a console that debuted late, and was sold it's games for up to twice as much as it's counterparts. Also, because the system used incredibly different technology, it cut itself out from being an option for ports. Also it featured a "groundbreaking" controller that made it difficult to play many popular genres of games. 3 points conceded from Nintendo to Sony and we've only just begun.

Sony Marketing-

The PSX debuted with a giant floating scary looking polygonal floating head spouting "ENOS LIVES!" WHen this went over like a lead baloon, they tried to use Sophia from it's hit game (which is now concidered one of the worst games of all time) Toshinden who tried to tell you how sexy she was and how pathetic you are and how somehow in all that you need a playstation. Also, suddenly URNOT(red)E.

These are oftentimes brought up in gaming magazines as being among the worst videogame advertisements of all time. It wasn't until they managed to get a mascot character, Crash, who wasn't even afiliated with Sony in any way that they found a modicum of advertising success. Sony's trend of terrible advertisments (save ratchet and clank) is a problem that plagues them to this day. ("White is coming", anybody? Graffitti walls that people use to write about how the company sucks? All I want for Christmas is a PSP? I could go on and on.)

Relationships with partners-

Sony has been notoriously difficult to work with and it's only gotten worse as the PS2 grew to epic numbers of adoption rates. First Sony put out a moritorum on RPGs in the states, and only repealed it when FFVII did record numbers of sales and then now they have a moritorum on 2D games. It's ironic that Little Big Whatever is their new saving grace when they have sought to destroy every 2D game they have come across. The only reason they are letting it be created is because it began life as an independant game, and may still be if reports are correct.

At the beginning of the PSX life, it's main developer was Namco. Namco is an arcade developer the same as Sega. Sega makes the Saturn. Sega's big arcade hits are Virtua Cop, Virtua On, Virtua Racing (Daytona), Virtua Fighter, etc. Namco's big hits are Time Crisis, Cyber Sled, Ridger Racer, Tekken, etc. These are, for those not keeping track, essentially the same games. The ONLY reason Namco backed SOny was because they didn't see the business sense in releasing their games on the console of their arch rival.

Controller-

Sony's strategy is, and has always been, to copy whatever anyone else is doing and add more. Their PSX controller was a Super Nintendo controller with two extra triggers on it. When Nintendo innovated with rumble, they aped the analog stick and added oen more. They aped the rumble back and added another flywheel. This isn't innovation or business sense, it's petty schoolyard one upsmanship.

Also, much like the name Wii caused a big stink for being stupid, but is now largely accepted and forgotten, the random shapes on the PSX controller was, at the time, concidered baffling and stupid. Much was made of it until it eventually faded into the background and became a part of every day life.

Load Times-

I'll take a second here to rail on something that is a pet peeve of mine but that varies from person to person. The load times on the PSX were absolutely ridiculous and nearly unbearable. Nintendo was right hwen they said that technology wasn't advanced enough to support CD based gaming and that the load times were just too long. Society seemed to feel differently, but even Square has comented in retrospect that they wished they had had to technology to reduce the load times in FFVII even more than they did (that was their biggest struggle they say because Sakaguchi would not accept the inital results they were getting regarding load times). Obviously the world feels differently and so I can't hold it against Sony TOO much, but to me it was a dealbreaker in way too many games to concider it a good decision.

Going the distance-
Once Sega was out of the picture, the only consoles around were Playstation and N64. N64 was a poor system to develop for because of the aformentioned costs associated iwth it, the aformentioned unweildly controller, and because developers were partial to a trick that allowed them to spoof better graphics on a CD based system (ANY CD based system..) than could be attained on the N64. This is what led to the rush of what I'll call Playstion-Era games like Resident Evil, Fear Effect, Parasite Eve, etc... basically any game that featured a pre-rendered backgrounds or MPEG movies as backgrounds and rendered virtual "actors" inside them. This tactic was also usually interspersed with liberal amounts of CGI cutscenes that were rendered on supercomputers and then compressed into video files that could fit on CD but not cartridge. Again, this has nothing to do with Playstation as a system, as the Saturn, Jaguar, and 3DO were completely capable of doing this as well. PSX endured because it was the only sensible system to develop for and it had a large installed user base.

PS2-

I'm getting sleepy so I'll keep this short. PS2 succeeded due largely to hype. A lot of it had to do with the outright lying of Ken Kutaragi and Co. "PS2 will render Pixar Movies" "PS2 is wanted by terrorists to guide missles" etc. A lot of it was due to the shortage of christmas 2000 when it was so scarce as to become mythical. A lot of it was due to, because of it's aformentioned mythical status, with it's becomign a status symbol in the urban community and recieving free publicity in things like rap songs and in television shows demonstrating how it could be used to trick out a car by having it in your gas tank or whatever. Add to this the fact that it debuted alongside The Matrix DVD, which was the first movie that popularized the format, and a hype driven craze in it's own right. As mentioned above it sold on a near 1:1 ratio with the console and many peoplw who bought the games console didn't even buy any games with it.

Sega was gone by this point; dead by it's own hand. Nintendo was still splashing around in it's misguided attempts to cater to young children as the Duplo of the games industry. PS2 rose to unprecedented success by standing on the back of it's previous success.

But then Microsoft came along and did said "hey, we can 'show up' too", and suddenly Sony had a real competitor that wasn't going to mismange itself into Oblvion. But, not only did MS show up, it actualy brought something to the table. The Xbox unit was a great machine built for actual gaming. Faster load times, online, a hard drive, etc. Whereas Sony just took what was on the table and added to it, MS tried to bring new things to gaming.

And with taht, Xbox started eating into Sony's dominance and has not stopped doing so this very day.

Nintendo has also got it's head on straight recently.

And what is Sony doing? The same crap they have always done. They still have their mostly weak first person titles (while I'm not in love wiht God of War the way everyone here seems to be, I do love the Twisted Metal frachise something fierce) and they still have their terrible advertising. They still have their pompous arrogance and hype that includes outright lies. They still believe that thoriwng more crap in the pop makes better soup when it comes to hardware. (YOu can do 3 cores? We do 7! Your console has a hard drive? Ours has a bigger hard drive! Yours cost a fortune? Ours costs 3 fortunes! etc )

I would just like one person to give me something Sony DID to become number 1 in the games industry. And something they really did, please, not something you make up because you hug your PS3 before you go to bed every night and you have a picture of Kaz Hirai on your wall above your bed. Thigns like "Well.. they.. uh... they GOT Rockstar to put GTA on PS2!" or "They lured Square to work on Playstation!" simpy are not true. In fact the opposite is documented many many many tiems, and many developers feel Sony is a pain is hte butt to work with. Of course, these are usually the quotes of developers like Tecmo and others who have jumped Sony ship to work with Microsoft that one hears these things.

[JazGalaxy]

I figured it was in Japan. My friend had an imported Saturn, then eventually he got the 4 meg ram cart, which was great for us since we were such big 2D fighting fans. Even the Japanese Saturn controllers were far better than the US ones. I remember working at Babbages at the time, and those units would not sell.

I'm not going to argue with about the Sony thing, because in my mind it's obvious you cannot move that many units without having a good business plan and excellent marketing. You say that those 3rd party companies had to go with Sony because they went with a CD format. Well, that was a business decision on the part of Sony to push for the cd format, even back when they were talking to Nintendo. Sony marketing made it ok for the older males to be into games, and that's one of the main reasons they sold so many units. Again, saying everything happened by chance is being extremely biased.

The whole INDUSTRY was going CD. Sega CD. Turbographix CD. Neo Geo CD. PC CD. Matsushida M2, Phillips CDi, 3DO. Nintedo went against the entire industry when they went cartridge for the N64. It wasn't Sony being bold and daring and blazing a trail on their own to use a CD for the playstation, there really was no other reasonable choice. Nintendo basically just lost their minds, and few in the industry would say differently.

As for Sony Marketing and making it okay for older people to play games, that work was already being done by Sega with the Genesis who's market was older teenagers and adults. Playstation mainly just inhereted that userbase when Sega self destructed.

[Banacek]

Wow, I'm not that into this discussion :)

[JazGalaxy]

Wow, I'm not that into this discussion :)

I know, like I said, I'm bored. I've been text messaging a girl and typing this hwen I've been waiting for her to write me back...

[Banacek]

I know, like I said, I'm bored. I've been text messaging a girl and typing this hwen I've been waiting for her to write me back...

Yeah, I'm trying to decide if Call of Cthulhu was worth picking up. I really want to like this game but it's starting off pretty slow for me. From the warning I'm hoping it's a Eternal Darkness type experience, but it better start soon...

[zyzyx]

Sony's marketing, at least in Europe, was astounding in the early days.

Exhibit A:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=3dlKTzuA5qg

Exhibit B:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=wpBPi4CjDMQ

Two of the finest adverts ever created, anywhere.

[KingGorilla]

Ah that magical summer of self discovery.

[PXG 360]

Remind me what their competition was again?

Oh yeah, the Sega Saturn that was outselling the PSX 3:1 before Sega imploded structurally as a company, and Nintendo with it's ninty dollar cartridges.

Oh but maybe it's sony's dedication to making games that sold the units? Games like Final Fantasy 7, Grand Theft Auto 3, and Metal Gear Solid. Wait, those are all made by third party developers...

Name 1 thing that Sony did to become the market leader?

Anybody who knows the history of the Sony Playstion knows that it's success has been pure happenstance. Like the fact that the PS2 initially sold with an attach rate of almost 1 to 1 with the MATRIX ON DVD AND NO GAMES.

When a game console's success is things like the fact that it just so happens to be released at the same time as a special effects phenomenon by a seperate movie studio... I think we call that happenstance.

Bad decisions by Nintendo... mismangement on the part of Sega... that's what got SOny to the point it's at now. Now that they are ACTUALLY HAVING TO LIVE BY THEIR DECISIONS, we are seeing what they are worth with the PS3. They're not doing anything different then they ever have wiht PS3, it's just that the competition is actually playing for real now instead of giving sony money hand over fist.

I agree with you, but you do have to give Sony some credit for its success.

PlayStation was a fluke in my opinion. Sega and Nintendo really fucked up big time. Sony pretty much picked up whatever Nintendo once had with the SNES. That also carried over the the PS2. Unfortunately for Sony, its losing the stuff it "stole" and Nintendo and Microsoft are reclaiming it ;)

[Rafer]

Interesting post JazGalaxy, but as Gore Vidal said "It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail."

One thing I strongly disagree with is the dismissal of the Dual Shock controller. When it first came out it seemed just like a SNES controller with two extra sticks, and the right-stick seemed superfluous. But that seemingly tacked on right-stick fundamentally changed how most first and third person games are played. Can you imagine trying to play games today if things went the other way with a single analog stick (like the N64, Dreamcast and PSP), you couldn't play Halo like you could today and 1st and 3rd person games would probably control like Metroid Prime and Resident Evil 4. Even Nintendo has gone and copied the Dual Shock design for it's "classic" controller.

As for the PS1, I recall an executive at Sony contributing their success to out-marketing Sega, as their pre-Final Fantasy VII game library was about par with Sega if not weaker. But your really have to hand it to Sony for making a well engineered console that was less expensive and more powerful than the Saturn (the Saturn was famously poorly designed as it was 2d focused).

As for the PS2, you could make the case that the PS1 was good design and marketing but the PS2 was the fluke. I recall an article calling the PS2 the console that did everything wrong and succeeded (poor DVD player, not much more powerful than the Dreamcast, tendency to break, really weak launch titles).

[Adam Blue]

Great post Jaz...the Dreamcast was something special. If it weren't for the mass to fall for the PS2, Sega would still be around today. Luckily MS was smart enough to pick up where the Sega left off, something Sony was stupid enough not to do...which I think would be an obvious sign for the gamers out there...but they were too blinded by the hype.

[Kefkataran]

The arcticles claims the "everyone will know discipline" quote is false, but I really don't think it is. I remember reading most of those quotes when they were fresh, not reprinted, and I belive the "Everyone will know discipline" one was nearly in the same paragraph as the "peopel will work more hours to afford PS3" one.

The "Everyone will know discipline" quote is made up by the ****** writer in the article linked to in the 1UP article.

I was just surprised the 1up article got font-paged over the GameIndustry article(or at all), but Bap was kind enough to fix that for us.

Also, your post is what made me want to read it...and I was just dissapointed.

Pretty sure bap did it as a nice, light-hearted article and hadn't read the GamesIndustry one. It wasn't chosen "over" the GamesIndustry one, as should be evident by the fact that that one was posted. I'm sorry I liked it while it didn't live up to your standards, but I was referring to it as a jokey, light-hearted thing as well, not a serious look back.