Tuesday, September 26, 2006

One Thing I Forgot (PS3 Related)

I forgot something in my post last night when talking about missteps. I think a major one is that Sony has decided to not put a rumble feature in their controller. They say that the motion wireless controller wouldn't work with a rumble mechanic, but we all know that's hogwash. The truth of the matter is they don't want to pay Immersion Technologies any more money to use their patented rumble technology. Last time I checked the case between them was still in court with Sony attempting again to overturn the lower court(s) decisions toward Immersion.

Bottom line is Sony doesn't want to lose the lawsuit and they don't want to take the way that Microsoft decided upon (which was $26 million and a stake in Immersion). In the end, should Sony lose the lawsuit (which they eventually will probably) they will end up paying a lot more than Microsoft did. In fact, via the last court document Sony would have to pay Immersion over $90 million to settle their lawsuit.

Sony is once again arrogant about the whole thing. I truly believe they think they will win this lawsuit, but chances are they won't. The fact that the PS3 won't use rumble technology should pretty much a be a sign that Sony agrees that the technology is not their own in the first place. Rumble has been a part of console gaming for a while now (probably going close to 10 years) and I would not be surprised if some casual game players get their PS3 and start playing games and wonder where the rumble feature is.

This could come back to bite Sony in the ass, but given time I figure people will get used to the non-rumble feature and everything will be fine. I do think there will be an initial shock of it not being there though. Whether that effects sales or not remains to be seen.