bork depreciation thread

[Great Rumbler]

He's been on straight-line depreciation for the past decade, but with an unexpected impairment this year he's been reduced to salvage value. The hit to our balance sheet means no dividends for our shareholders this year.

[bork]

 

[Skullfuckers Anonymous]

REALLY!? WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU! THIS IS PATHETIC EVEN FOR A MOD TO CALL SOMEONE OUT LIKE THAT RESIGN NOW GODDAMN IT!

[EightBitNate]

REALLY!? WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU! THIS IS PATHETIC EVEN FOR A MOD TO CALL SOMEONE OUT LIKE THAT RESIGN NOW GODDAMN IT!

[bork]

Listen, Rumbler.

This thread's OP is based around discussing difficulty as a means of circumventing poor game design, you do not get to turn it into a battlefield on accessibility for disabled gamers. The thread already has a clear context on which it has been built and you are co-opting it for a completely different discussion.

You know I am disabled as well. Accessibility and the right to have it means the world to both us us, it is our right to exist in this dimension. But THIS is not the thread to fight over it.

You can't quote someone who was responding to the OP and interject the context of the disabled.

Now let me say this of the entire community. Would it be great if people had the empathy to consider US, before they started typing shit about how games should be left up to creators and how every game shouldn't be playable or beatable by everyone? Of course. But they are probably aren't' picturing people who are disabled when they say those things, they are talking about people who suck at games.

Can discussion of games on this message board be moderated as akin to a theatre only having a flight of stairs as entrance? Can it be policy that not considering the disabled before discussing difficulty is subject to action? Please, tell me your thoughts on this.

[bork]

So this thread is somewhat triggering for me lol. Full disclosure, I've ignored it, the OP and Mendinso, and then reverted that decision. We should be able to have discussions without becoming so emotionally impassioned that it leads to disrespectful discourse. I'll preface this by saying I do not have answers to this, nor am I looking to be a conduit to change the world. I'm just speaking to how I feel in the moment after much consideration of even making an actual real post in here.

For the majority here on ERA, gaming is something you do. Whether you enjoy it or not is another discussion, but you at least like to discuss it. Obviously, outside of that realm lies the morbid reality that we all live in. Escapism in games has long been a cherished part of a lot of our lives. I personally, have been playing games since I was born in 91. Played a ton of different titles, haven't beaten all of them, still enjoy it to this day.

To address OP: Should ALL games have an Easy Mode? MY honest answer? No. Why? I'm not the one making the game, I play what was given by the developer, and then base my play-through on what they wanted to make. So if they made it without an Easy Mode, I'm not gonna bash them for that exact reason because it's not something that I personally utilize or use as a critique. For me that's usually what Normal mode is for. However, if they do add one, awesome!

There are so many comparisons to make about how a game having/not having an easy mode is like this or that, as many examples presented in this thread show. Not all examples are perfect, good, 1:1, or even made with good intentions... Which is cumbersome to say the least. I honestly can't stop thinking of comparisons in my head... But I don't want to hark on that.

I think my full opinion to your suggestion is this: If a game is created with GOOD Easy Mode that helps many others to enjoy the game at varying degrees then great! I'm all for enjoyable gaming experience. Regardless, I don't believe a game should be vilified for being inherently hard or ask of its player to get better at certain mechanics rather than just allowing them to bypass it because they are tired of the challenge. I don't think of games an simple products that are obligated to be consumable by the masses. Some definitely are meant for that, but not all. If a director that plots a game design in a way to make certain challenging situations turn into rewarding ones, I don't feel compelled to tell them to make sure its something possible for literally everyone to do. If every dev had to make there games flexible enough that it can be watered down for everyone, it would make gauging demographics and general consensus weird, to to say the least. Consider how certain board games have discretionary age ranges for consumers. Can you be older than 12 and still enjoy monopoly? Of course. Can you be younger and still enjoy it? Yeah. Is the level of enjoyment going to be the same among both parties? No. If a 3-5yo was playing, they may not pay attention the rules of the Banker, or care about paying off property, whereas someone older may be able to grasp those concepts better, and int urn, may appreciate them and the game that much more. Can it be enjoyed differently? Yes. Though their experience isn't the exact same, enjoyment can still be had. But board games are tangible. So rules can literally be adapted based on how you want them to be. It's why we always play with barnyard rules in a game of Uno. Regular playing cards are universally fun, with no age range gating or anything. Can video games, which have to be developed with systems and frameworks and everything else be as explicitly flexible? Personally, right now at least, I don't think so.

I can see, however, the irony of a game that has "bad game design" leading to it being "unnecessarily" harder, even though that viewpoint is inherently subjective. I also understand that not everyone's circumstance permits them to play a game to the accord that a dev may want them to experience it (this is not addressing accessibility for those who are physically or mentally disabled... My response to Mendinso will address that; I mean this more in the sense of like From games not having a pause screen or Cuphead's Easy mode not letting you beat the game). I do not believe it is the dev's duty to make a game befitting of everyone and anyone to play all the time. They control the development process, not I. I don't think Game Design itself, paralleled with the time it takes to make games, would make that feasible. Would it be ideal? Yes. Is it feasible? At the moment, I don't believe so. Can it be something that changes later down the line? Possibly, but I won't claim to know with a certainty.

It is definitely your prerogative to express your opinions on the matter... I honestly just don't see what type of change you want to bring about in a realistic, not idealistic, manner. We can always speak to ideals but that doesn't alone will them into existence. Good that CrossCode had Assit/Easy Mode as an option for you. I can't claim to say that the reason you switched to the Easy Mode justifies it, if after 35 hrs of playtime on normal, the game had not demonstrated enough mechanics to help beat whatever boss you were facing. I don't know if I would call that bad game design seeing that 1) you played it that long without issue and 2) I've never played it, and at this time, haven't seen reviews implying that it had high difficulty spikes mid-game. I understand how that can be frustrating and the fact that Easy Mode assisted you is cool. If you have not already beaten the game at this point, it does make me wonder if later fights will still encumber you in the same manner should you switch back to normal or if you'll just continue on Easy Mode. Most games are made with challenge being a pillar in its development. That's an aspect of gaming that I appreciate, so I personally like overcoming challenge in most games I play. So I wouldn't personally, want to drop difficulty upon a few failed attempts at something. Having the option to do so, does not hurt or affect me, but also doesn't encourage me to profess for it to be necessary.

In a thread I a few weeks ago that didn't gain much traction, I did try to breakdown my reasoning on how discussions that seem to invoke the extreme sides of things often defeat the purpose of even talking about it. So I don't want to fall victim to just blurting out a response. At the end of the day, it would be great if maybe some type of system wide assist mode was placed in console OS's that help play a game for them. This wouldn't be a need for me and would probably push me to rely on people who play games in a similar manner to me for critical conversations on the game, since it would openly muddle discussion online with people, like this. But hey, at the end of the day this stuff is always just meant to be fun. It's not my fight to demand or deny that change. I just came from a time where conquering a challenge in games was expected to hold some back, cheat codes none-withstanding. We've all gotten older though, and this medium still is a lot younger than most other entertainment mediums. I guess we shall see...


To Mendinso: I'll start this with an apology, because I judged you before trying to understand you, and for that I am sorry. For the past few weeks I've seen you post more and more about being disabled and how it affects your experience with playing games. The tone of your post would always rub me the wrong way since they came off so extreme, and sometimes seemingly out of nowhere. Like the discussion in this thread wasn't set for disabled people as framed in the context of the OP, and then in post #3 you turned it into that. So in my shallowness I allowed myself to dismiss what you were saying. However, it kept biting at me. This word Ablelism that I've been seeing used so often in threads your in was new for me. So it caused me to do some research on the term. That compelled me to not stay quiet anymore. It's obvious these discussions affect and upset you, and even attempting to put myself in just a semblance of your shoes helps me understand some of our frustration. I don't think OP is disabled. I don't think that was the point of the topic. But since it's here in the present now, I did want to take a clearer stance.

Accessibility in gaming has never been a concern for me. I don't have any disabilities that cause me to play games differently or change various settings to find enjoyment of them. When a new system comes out, I play with the new controller it comes with. When I buy a game and play, I just play it. The thought of how someone else goes through that process of playing a game never really reaches into my realm or reality. But your points about accessibility are something that have caused me to at least think about them. I know people praise TLOU2 about its options, along with Celeste, and I'm sure other games as well. I wish the world was befitting enough to make it standard that all games could have those degrees of options. It's not something mandated at the moment, at least to the degree that certain other aspects of society are mandated and regulated. All I can say is that it takes time for these things to become universal. I don't know if that challenge will be conquerable sooner rather than later. And indie dev party probably is more tighter and focused and able to adapt certain options to its game. Naughty Dog wants its experiences to be something the masses can consume however they want to, and that is an honorable position. Faceless companies like EA, Activision, Ubisoft, etc. are so big though, that I don't see them adjusting to the demand of flexibility overnight.

For those who are disabled, these are great suggestions and make sense. I do hope it becomes more standard for games to gives option to make QTE's easier or minigames skippable. Your situation doesn't represent the majority, and just like it took time for the world to adapt certain changes, albeit not at a great pace or anything, it is worth discussion because that can lead to potential change. I just feel like on one hand, please don't assume that the majority of posters here are willingly disregarding you and your disabilities. Same goes for those who expressed similar concerns in the thread you created. I can't speak for everyone of course, but my hope in society isn't that low to think that people are thoughtfully making their comments in the framework of disabled people. Again, I don't think that was the goal of the thread in the first place. But, on the other hand, I do think open discussion about this is warranted because awareness of it is lacking severely. I hope you follow-up with the mods about what a reasonable way to conduct that conversation would look like. It just sucks to see you get so extremely flustered and it causes the internet to react like how it does...

[EightBitNate]

Bork also deleted one of his own posts ITT but what else can you do about mod privilege

[bork]

That being the case at all, that I naturally have seen so many topics like that over the years, whether talking about like Federation Force or Amiibo Festival or stuff like "Dexit" in Pokémon Sword and Shield, or the Commander Keen mobile game, or, fuck, recall the time that Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze was announced and so many people just getting mad that it wasn't another Metroid game, forget about "artistic intent" on difficulty, people didn't even give a fuck about what motherfucking video game series Retro wanted to develop a game for, and like so many other things, where people don't much care one way or the other for artistic intent and just want better games or different games entirely, so like, yeah, on top of everything you've mentioned, I just can't help but be skeptical of "artistic intent" arguments for those kind of reasons. Because like, with so many of those things happening over the years, the chance of any given person being the part of any given such "controversy" is low, but avoiding each and every single one of them on top of never criticizing any particular game in any particular way and just actually maintaining artistic intent as paramount in those kind of ways? I can't help but just have so many questions like that whenever that particular subject gets brought up.

[bork]

Bork also deleted one of his own posts ITT but what else can you do about mod privilege

I never fail to be disappointed whenever a thread like this comes up and most of the replies can be narrowed down to "I'm good at hard videogames and people who aren't can always find something else to play".

If you're skilled and love a challenge, congratulations, this thread isn't about you. Still with us? Good, so please make an effort to put yourself in somebody else's shoes. Imagine spending dozens of hours enjoying a game you bought, loving every second of it until you found a challenge you couldn't overcome even after countless tries. Imagine expressing your frustration on a forum and having people tell you some games are not for everyone and you should play something else, that they breezed through it, that it's okay to drop a game you like but can't beat a boss, that you should git gud or some other somewhat polite way of saying "fuck you, got mine".

I do enjoy a challenge. I've beaten every Dark Souls game multiple times, ditto for Bloodborne and many other games in the same genre. I'm currently enjoying Demon's Souls and Sekiro for the first time, and I don't mind beating my head against the wall for hours against a particularly challenging boss. I love hunting for platinum trophies and playing games at their hardest difficulties because I find that satisfying. The same can't be said for my wife, though. She doesn't play for the challenge, trophies or any sort of accomplishment related to difficulty, she just wants to enjoy the story and have fun, and her experiences are as valid as mine. I don't think being stuck at a particular boss for hours would improve her gaming experience in any way, especially considering how she doesn't want a hobby to be a source of frustration. And we're both completely able, so I can't even begin to imagine how much harder it is for people who post on resetera.

Some people are adamant that difficulty is part of the creator's artistic vision or whatever, but people are not equally skilled or abled, so there is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to difficulty. From's approach shouldn't be praised because the "solutions" they offer are patronizing and limiting in their own way (say, forcing a less skilled or disabled player to summon someone else or play as a spellcaster and deal with every threat from afar). The Last of Us Part II's accessibility options should not only be praised but also adopted by every game (yup, every game) moving forward. They're not mandatory for anyone who wants a challenge, and they make games playable to people who literally wouldn't be able to enjoy them otherwise.

[bork]

Ah, this brings up another thing I meant to discuss in my prior posts, but completely forgot about:

The subject of cheat codes.

Now, this might be completely mistaken, and I do apologize if any of it is wrong.

But it's my understanding that cheat codes, back when they originally existed during the days of the NES and SNES and the like, that where a lot of those cheat codes originally came from were that such things were often originally just development tools to test things, look for bugs, easily get to various parts of games quickly in order to do the prior two things, etc.

And that such development tools would be removed, if and when possible. But one if not both of the following things were often the case:
1.) The programming languages many games were programmed in at the time made it very difficult to remove functions once implemented and it's just easier to leave them be and hope people don't find them, and if they do, whatever.
2.) In addition, precisely because of the games being intended for video game cartridges, in addition to online patches and the like not being a thing for years, it was very difficult and costly to update games in general. Which is just one more reason to let things like that be.

For those kind of reasons, in certain cases, development tools were essentially left in particular games, and it was just hoped that people wouldn't find them. But some did. And thus "cheat codes" began. And then, from there, certain developers kept just leaving them in and hoping that other players wouldn't find them in their particular games, others left them in and didn't really care one way or the other, and yet others started seeing "hey, this could just be a cool thing to leave in on purpose, just like, in general/for PR/etc," and so some intentionally started creating "cheat codes" in their games, and that's how everything got started. I could be mistaken, but I believe the history of cheat codes is something to that effect.

It's my understanding that in the modern era, that in the process of developing games, stuff very reminiscent to "cheat codes" of olde are still used.

It's just that modern development tools and programming languages, in addition to patching and updating games being easier in general, makes it waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay simpler to removing that kind of stuff before release, as it was intended to begin with, and so that's one of the reasons such things make it into far fewer modern releases (in addition to not wanting to conflict with stuff like Achievement/Trophy systems on game consoles).

But nonetheless, while I could quite easily be mistaken about such things, it's my understanding that it's nonetheless common while games are in development to use tools reminiscent of cheat codes to test and y'know do QA and the like on all aspects of games. As, after all, it would be quite insane to literally have to play through all of a 100+ hour RPG or MMO to test one specific thing in a late-game dungeon or raid or something.

So, what I'm getting at, would be is at least in single-player games (as obviously stuff like multiplayer is its whole other can of worms that's waaaaaaaaaay more complicated), just leaving some of those developer tools/dev-mode stuff in there, instead of patching it all out before release.

Like, obviously not all of it. Like, obviously people shouldn't have access to the LITEREAL development tools or source code, or things like that as that could cause any number of problems, so I understand being extremely careful with stuff like that.

But leaving like godmode/other invincibility or warping tools or chapter-select/dev-saves and the kind of tools specifically for testing stuff in as accessibility options and the like?

That would be a more fair compromise and way of handling those kind of situations that wouldn't require more work, as those are things that do exist regardless and have to be patched out before release. Obviously entirely like bespoke options and difficulty modes and the like are ideal, but when not possible, something of the sort like that would be a more fair middle ground and address those kind of concerns of needing to devote resources to those kind of things (as it's just using stuff that has to be made regardless).

Now, obviously that's contingent on my understanding being correct, which is may not be, and I also realize that even if it were to be correct, that obviously still wouldn't apply to all games, as development is different for each games. Nonetheless, that's still a way more games could deal with that, assuming that stuff is correct; just leaving "cheat codes"/tools in there instead of patching them out.

[nudemacusers]

bork?

more like bunk amirite

[EightBitNate]

Holy shit.

Are there a bunch of missing pets in this guy's neighborhood?

https://www.resetera.com/threads/analysis-why-does-sonys-operating-profit-forecast-indicate-ps5-will-probably-cost-less-than-499.268251/

I hope it comes out at 599 just for the lulz.

It will be a long read guys

Informations before we start :
Q1 = April-June / Q2 = July-Sept / Q3 = Oct-Dec / Q4 = Jan-March
PS5 = PS5 standard / PS5 DE = PS5 Digital Edition
PS4 sold 4.5m units during Q3 FY13 (Oct-Dec) and 3.1m during Q4 FY13 (Jan-March 2014)
PS4 BOM according to research firm IHS was $372, and higher at $381 once per-unit cost of assembly included
PS4 was sold at $399 and was sold at a loss at first, probably between $40-60, easily offset by the purchase of a game & PS+
We assume here that WSJ (Wall Street Journal), Nikkei and Bloomberg are right with their various reports about PS5
PS5 BOM (Bill of Materials) would be around $450 per unit
Sony reportedly increasing PS5 production to 10m units by March 2021 (end of Q4 FY20), up from 6m previously reported
So with a cost of $381 for Sony's PS4, we can add around $50-60 for additional expenses (inventory, distribution, transport, etc...) if PS4 was sold at a loss at around $40-60
If we follow the same path for PS5, we would add $10 for the cost of assembly with a total of $460 and then $55 for the additional expenses
--> PS5 total cost would be around $515
--> PS5 DE total cost would be around $487 ($515 minus $28 for optical drive)


Now look at the table below, for each quarter, there are some colors (think traffic light) :
Red : Biggest number ever for that quarter
Orange : 2nd biggest number ever for that quarter
Green : 3rd biggest number ever for that quarter
Blue is my own predictions for this current fiscal year
As you can see, for Revenue and Operating Profit, PlayStation saw its 3 biggest results for each quarter during PS4 generation
(except few ones)

You can also see that during Q3 FY13 (PS4 release), PlayStation saw ¥12.4bn Profit and the next quarter, ¥10.7bn Loss

For FY2020, Sony expects ¥2500bn Revenue and ¥240bn Op. Profit

Disclaimer : If you add up Q1+Q2+Q3+Q4 Revenue fo FY2020, you won't have ¥2500bn Revenue but ¥2464bn, I probably underestimated my Q2 Revenue forecast

I will focus this analysis on Profits, but will talk about Revenue a bit too when it's relevant.
I will also explain quarters from previous years to put these into context and to explain why I chose my estimates !

Of course, I will skip Q1 Results because we already had these results some time ago.

Q2 FY20 (July-Sept) :
Q2 FY18 had ¥90.6bn Profit, biggest profit ever for PlayStation during Q2
It had Fortnite + Spider-Man and major releases like Tomb Raider (and annual sports titles)

Q2 FY19 reached ¥65bn Profit with a weaker line up and without first party games
It had Control, MH Iceborne, Man of Medan and Borderlands 3 (+ annual sports titles)

Q2 FY20 will have TLOU Part II spillovers + Ghost of Tsushima success + HZD on PC
+ major releases like Tony Hawk and Avengers (+ annual sports titles)
+ strong F2P (Fortnite, Warzone) and the launch of Hyper Scape

Here is a list of games released during Q2 in previous years
Red titles = first-party titles or major releases

Click to expand...I also expect bigger Revenue from PS Store year-on-year due to :
Digital growth (compared to last year)

• COVID (from countries with still partial lockdown, people who buys more digital now because they changed their habits)
  Bigger F2P spendings (Warzone was not there last year for example, Fortnite is stronger than last year [Epic expect bigger Revenue this year])
  Less people on vacation this summer combined with huge back-catalog available for cheap on PS Store with regular sales

Bigger Revenue from Services too due to record numbers of PS+ subs + growth of PS Now subs too
Previous quarter (Q1 FY20) saw +$100M Revenue year on year and I expect the same this Q2 FY20 due to strong PS+ line up in July/Aug.
And I said strong PS+ line-up because they had record user engagement on social media during their announcements (NBA 2K20/Tomb Raider and MW2 Remastered/Fall Guys), PS+ subs will likely go up quarter-on-quarter and obviously year-on-year.

Here is a table where you can see my Revenue forecast for Q2, it will be, without a doubt, bigger than last year
I expect Software and Services to represent 83% of total PlayStation Revenue during this quarter, where margins are better and therefore better profits (vs Hardware revenue)



If Q2 FY19 without first-party games, without Warzone, with a weaker Fortnite (than this year) and an equivalent slate of third-party releases, reached ¥65bn Profits.
Well Q2 FY20 with all the above-mentioned reasons, makes me think Profits will be better this year.

That would give +¥9bn (+$95M) in Profits year-on-year for a growth in Software/Services Revenue of ¥55.1bn ($540M)
So an operating margin of 16.33% which would be realistic given first-party releases this quarter (Ghost/TLOU2)

For the total results of Q2 FY20, ¥473bn Revenue and ¥74bn Profits would give an operating margin of 15.6%
It was 16.5% in Q2 FY18 (thanks to huge Spider-Man success) and 14.3% in Q2 FY19, still a good operating margin but less than Q2 FY18 due to the lack of first party titles (which are highly profitable)

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Now, we have Q1 results (from their financial results that you can find in this thread) + we have just done Q2 forecast
I remind that Sony expect ¥240bn Profits this fiscal year.

Q1 Profits saw ¥124bn and Q2 Profits would reach ¥74bn = ¥198bn Profits
So at this point, Sony expects only ¥42bn ($393M) Profits for Q3 and Q4 combined

I repost the same table to avoid you to scroll up/down to see the numbers !

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Now Q3 FY20 (Oct-Dec) :
We will start with Q3 FY13 (PS4 release), surprisingly Sony had ¥12.4bn Profit thanks to PS4 release
The amount of games & PS+ subs sold managed to offset the loss for each PS4
Profit also came from cost reductions (PS3)

Q3 FY17 had ¥85.4bn Profit, biggest profit ever for PlayStation during Q3
Explained by big increase for sales on PS Store (+43% year on year) with the release of Fortnite Battle Royale + increase in software units sales + GT Sport release
Combined with huge PS4 sales + big increase in Services revenue (+35%, to reach $600m for that quarter)

Q3 FY18 had ¥73.1bn Profit, decrease but still the 3rd biggest Profit ever for PlayStation during Q3
The decrease is explained by PS4 lower sales (8.1m this Q3 vs 9.0m in Q3 FY17) and promotional prices during Holiday season.
Despite really bigger spends on Store (+52% to reach $3.13B, 2nd biggest spending ever during a quarter on Store behind record Q1 FY20) + bigger revenue from Services (+$100M year-on-year) + Spider-Man keep selling

Q3 FY19 had ¥53.5bn Profit, big decrease due to no Spider-Man and Death Stranding not having the effect Sony expected (as stated in their financials) + big decrease in PS4 sales revenue (6.0m units this Q3 vs 8.1m previous year) and a weaker line up of third party games (compared to AC Odyssey/RDR2/Black Ops 4/Battlefield 5 in 2018)

Q3 FY20 will have the one the strongest Q3 line-up this generation combined with the huge install base of PS4 and PS5 backward compatibility
FIFA is now a Q3 release, unlike previous years
Crash 4 will likely perform very well on PS4 and is bigger than 2019's releases like GR Breakpoint / The Outer Worlds / NFS Heat / Death Stranding
+ likely strong performance of Watch Dogs Legion and AC Valhalla
+ one of the biggest release of the year, Cyberpunk 2077 which will probably make a good part of its initial sales on PS4 (like The Witcher 3)
+ COD 2020 release

Here is a list of games released during Q2 in previous years
Red titles = first-party titles or major releases

Click to expand...For Q3 FY20 estimate, we know that PS5 will have Miles Morales at launch
A game that will be highly profitable, being a first party game

We will assume a $399 for PS5 DE/$449 for PS5 and that it will sell as good as PS4, so 4.5m units
We will now do 2 hypotheses, one with PS5 costing $487/$515 to Sony like I said at the start of the OP and one with PS5 costing $472/$500

Afterwards, another 2 hypotheses with PS5 costing $487/$515 to Sony but one with $449/499 retail price, the other with $499/549
The optical drive would cost about $28 in this hypothesis

Hypothesis 1 : $487/$515 cost for Sony with a retail price of $399/$449
So it would be a $66 net loss for each PS5 sold and $88 loss for each PS5 DE
We will assume that 20% of PS5 sold are PS5 DE so 80% is PS5 Standard (and then 40%/60% for the high range)

20%/80% : (3.6m PS5 x $66) + (0.9m PS5 DE x $87) = $238M + $79M = 317M loss
40%/60% : 178M + 157M = 335M loss

Hypothesis 2 : $472/$500 cost for Sony with a retail price of $399/$449
So it would be a $51 net loss for each PS5 sold and $73 loss for each PS5 DE
We will assume that 20% of PS5 sold are PS5 DE so 80% is PS5 Standard (and then 40%/60% for the high range)

20%/80% : (3.6m PS5 x $51) + (0.9m PS5 DE x $73) = $184M + $66M = 250M loss
40%.60% : 138M + 131M = 269M loss

Hypothesis 3 : $487/$515 cost for Sony but with a retail price of $449/$499
So it would be a $16 net loss for each PS5 sold and $38 loss for each PS5 DE
We will assume that 20% of PS5 sold are PS5 DE so 80% is PS5 Standard (and then 40%/60% for the high range)

20%/80% : (3.6m PS5 x $16) + (0.9m PS5 DE x $38) = $57.6M + $34M = 92M loss
40%.60% : 43M + 34M = 77M loss

Hypothesis 4 : $487/$515 cost for Sony but with a retail price of $499/$549
So Sony would gain $34 for each PS5 sold and $12 for each PS5 DE sold
We will assume that 20% of PS5 sold are PS5 DE so 80% is PS5 Standard (and then 40%/60% for the high range)

20%/80% : (3.6m PS5 x $34) + (0.9m PS5 DE x $12) = $122M + $11M = $133M profits
40%.60% : 92M + 11M = 103M profits

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Before I continue, just take a look at the Network Revenue (FY13/18/19 + my estimates for FY20)
Like before, Red means biggest number but for any quarter, Orange is 2nd biggest and Green is 3rd biggest

With only ¥50bn Network Revenue in Q3 FY13 (PS4 release), Sony managed to have ¥12.4bn Profit during that quarter
And now, during Q3 FY18/19, there are more than ¥390bn Network Revenue, coming from PS Store and PS+/Now
It's almost 8x the Revenue of Q3 FY13

I estimated ¥435bn Network Revenue for Q3 FY20 which would be 8.7x Q3 FY13 Network Revenue
That would also be the 2nd biggest Network Revenue during any quarter
(4-5m PS+ subs in Q3 FY13 vs probably 47m+ PS+/Now subs in Q3 FY20)

--------------------------------------------------------------------

I repost the same table to avoid you to scroll up/down to see the numbers !

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Even with a weak Q3 (like Q3 FY19), Sony still posted ¥53.5bn Profit ($491M)
This Q3 FY20 has a lot more of major third party releases + highly profitable and probably successful first party (Miles Morales) compared to last Q3 (FY19) and next-gen releases should boost spending on PS Store compared to last Q3

Even if Hardware Revenue will increase the overall Revenue from the entire PlayStation division,
(I expect biggest Revenue ever during any quarter for any platform holder with about ¥865bn/$8.08B)
Software & Services Revenue should increase too year-on-year thanks to bigger line-up of third party releases + first-party release + next-gen boost

If we sum up :
Big releases planned for Q2 went to Q3 (FIFA/Cyberpunk)
Bigger releases planned this Q3 (for Sony and publishers)
Bigger Revenue from Software year-on-year due to bigger line up overall
Bigger Revenue from Services year-on-year
Those Network Revenue (PS Store + Services) are 8x higher than the same quarter in 2013

All guesses pointed to a better Revenue for this Q3 than Q3 FY19 but also better profits ! (so minimum ¥53.5bn like Q3FY19)
My forecast would have been ¥70-75bn Profits (if there wasn't any loss due to the launch of a new console)

But I remind you that Sony expects only ¥42bn ($393M) Profits for Q3 and Q4 combined

If we take into account an expected loss of about $317-335M (¥34-36bn) due to PS5 launch (for $399/$449 retail price)
My forecast of ¥70bn Profits would go down to about ¥34-36bn Profits for Q3 FY20

In the table, I forecast ¥29bn Profits to not exceed the ¥240bn Profits Sony forecasted for the fiscal year !

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I repost the same table to avoid you to scroll up/down to see the numbers !

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Now Q4 FY20 (Jan-Mar 2021) :
Q4 FY13 (Jan-Mar 2014) saw ¥10.7bn Loss despite huge PS4 sales (3.0 units) with about 5.7m PS+ subs
That loss shows how weak was PS3 software wise and how low PlayStation Network spendings were
Take a look at the table below to see the Network Revenue during Q4 FY13 (only ¥70bn)
And compare that Network Revenue to PSN nowadays (5x higher now)

Q4 FY18 (Jan-Mar 2019) posted ¥63.9bn Profit, biggest profit ever for PlayStation during Q4
Explained by Fortnite and big releases (AC7, KH3, RE2 Remake, Far Cry New Dawn, Anthem, Sekiro, The Division 2, Metro Exodus) + Apex Legends release

Q4 FY19 (Jan-Mar 2020) posted ¥46.2bn Profit, 2nd biggest profit ever for PlayStation during Q4
Explained by Fortnite/Apex + Warzone release + big Q3 releases keep selling (MW/Jedi Fallen Order) + some major releases despite being weaker (DBZ Kakarot, Nioh 2, KH3 Re Mind, Dreams, Doom Eternal, MW2 Remastered)
But especially major spending on Store due to lockdowns (almost flat from Q4 FY18 despite way weaker line-up of games)

Q4 FY20 (Jan-March 2021)
With a probably big 1st party game planned for that quarter + PSN stronger than ever (Store + Services) + strong PS4 game sales + PS5 games sales, unlike Q4 FY13, Q4 FY20 will be likely profitable (a forecast of ¥35-45bn Profits would have been realistic)

We will assume 3.0m PS5 units sold with the same loss than Hypothesis 1
That would give $211-223M loss (¥22.6-23.9bn)

Overall, Q4 Profits would be ¥11-21bn ($103-196M)
--> In the table, I put ¥13bn for Q4 Profits forecast


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In conclusion, I think I showed why, in my opinion, Operating Profit forecast from Sony definitely hints to a price at less than $499.

You can't have the biggest Revenue ever during any quarter (Q3 FY20), of course inflated by Hardware revenue boost but also with Software & Services Revenue this high (as previously explained/shown) and having not this much profits, especially when you have a major first party planned for launch !

You can't have a record breaking Q1 FY20 with more than ¥124bn Profits ($1.152B) and forecast "only" ¥240bn for the the entire fiscal year when you will post some great profits during Q2 following TLOU Part II/Ghost success, as well as HZD PC release

Q2+Q3+Q4 FY19 Profits reached ¥164.6bn ($1.52B)
Q2+Q3+Q4 FY20 Profits would be ¥116bn ($1.08B) with a better/bigger line-up of first party games, third party games and stronger F2P ?

The only explanation for only ¥240bn (2.24B) Profits is because Sony expect some loss with PS5 launch, and the loss will come from Hardware.
A price under $499 would explain why they expect only ¥240bn ($2.24B) Profits and not ¥300bn+ ($2.80B+)

 

That's not even all the text mark-ups... the OP looks like this:
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Imagine if that person spent as much time playing video games as analyzing whatever that shit is.  Also imagine spending the rest of this page quoting it

It actually looks like we've been talking about more than we have because people keep quoting the text version when they can clearly just erase that part in their quotation.

In fact, the image version of my post already automatically collapses itself, so it's not nearly as bad you make it out to be.

Thought this belonged here

[EightBitNate]

Whoops my bad double post

[bork]

 

[bork]

bork?

more like bunk amirite

Nothing disingenuous about it. People dogpile on easy games and on motion blur and the like, rejecting developers vision but when it comes to asking for easy mode suddenly said vision is important. Lol. It's pure hypocrisy and there's nothing beyond it.

[Cauliflower Of Love]

This will not stand.


The ire you have brought forth.

[Human Snorenado]

Man imagine just not reading or giving a shit about reeeeeeee you guys

feels good

[bork]

Man imagine just not reading or giving a shit about reeeeeeee you guys

feels good

But you're missing out on so much!

Such as:






And:

[Great Rumbler]

lol guys i heard bork died of ligma

[bork]

lol guys i heard bork died of ligma

[OnlyRegret]

lol guys i heard bork died of ligma

lmao, he probably caught sugma too

[OnlyRegret]

Man imagine just not reading or giving a shit about reeeeeeee you guys

feels good

reading 

I just shitpost about whatever people are talking about there

[VomKriege]

BORK RETIRE BITCH SO YOU CAN HAVE YOUR PENSION PAYMENTS AND LIVE A PLEASANT AND FULFILLING LIFE WITHOUT SLAVING FOR UNGRATEFUL EMPLOYERS.

[Cauliflower Of Love]

I stand with Bork.


#

pepsi

[nudemacusers]

bork?

more like

dork

[Cauliflower Of Love]

shut your whore mouth

[bork]

BORK RETIRE BITCH SO YOU CAN HAVE YOUR PENSION PAYMENTS AND LIVE A PLEASANT AND FULFILLING LIFE WITHOUT SLAVING FOR UNGRATEFUL EMPLOYERS.

VomKriege, my friend, I am confused and upset by this post. I don’t know if I am taking the brunt of your feelings which you’ve accumulated across other situations, but I feel like this is a very uncharitable reading of my opinion. I have admittedly not been my softest kindest self (perhaps we are all “covid posting”) but I am struck with confusion over your reaction to my opinion here.

I am not against people playing games on lower difficulties or using modifiers — something I do myself and discussed in my own post. I merely objected to unforgiving generalizations about game quality and the efforts of their developers. I do find it distasteful to accuse creators and testers of ineptitude and failure based on one’s own self-described resistance to difficulty. This is a position I take with compassion and respect towards the people who make games. Not with malice or contempt for any player. Players can do whatever they want, but I feel that it’s disrespectful to the backbreaking labor of creating video games to discredit and demean their work in such broad strokes.

I am sorry this opinion has disappointed you so greatly. I don’t know how to answer to your feelings about it. But you and I are old friends who feel similarly about many things. I am saddened our divergence in this particular thread has let you down to the point of publicly denouncing me. I will think twice before posting in the future.

Please take care.