Sony says: “To hell with you, Europe!”

SECOND EDIT: This gets worse. According to this…

In the U.S., about 400,000 PlayStation 3 machines will be available when they go on sale Nov. 17. About 100,000 will be available on the Nov. 11 Japan launch date. The production problem is causing about a one-month delay that will reduce the company’s supply capacity by about a million machines from the original plan, he said.

People may ask, “So what? People buy it later.” They will lose many sales by this. Also, this is very much a momentum based industry. Also consider how much money was spent on the PS3 advertising blitz. All that money will be wasted. Why advertise a product that no one can buy?

Expect Sony stock to plunge today.

Also expect third party game companies to begin bailing on Sony if these launch numbers are true.

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EDIT: Forbes has jumped on this too. Some of you may go, “LOL, stop acting like a dork when talking about these game consoles Pook, LAWL.” But this just isn’t the video game industry in transition here, it is digital entertainment, the next movie format, as well as that merry ‘top box in your living room’ war Microsoft and Sony have.

Forbes is saying there will be only two million consoles for launch for America and Japan. It will be very difficult to get one. (Reuters is reporting production starts on September 7th. That is not much time to make millions of such a complicated machine.)

Sony’s original plans was to have four million at launch. If they could get three million at launch, they would still launch in Europe. (The Fiscal Year Goals are still the same at 6 million by March but that will be a logistical challenge to meet). But if they can only get two million at launch and that is cannibalizing all the blu-ray parts from the stand alone player production…

I think we’re seeing a similar Xbox 360 production fiasco with the PS3. By the time a PS3 is on the shelves where you could buy it easily would probably be in April of 2007.

The delay also includes Austraila and other smaller countries.

Even worse: Sony of Europe just launched their PS3 website yesterday (with trailers and all ready for the big advertising push)! Oh, they must have just learned about this!

I hear in Europe they were selling pre-orders with those 20 [pound] cds (or so). I doubt you’ll get your money back for them.

To recap how fast these things change:

-at E3 2006, Sony says 4 million for launch, 6 million at end of fiscal year

-a little over a week ago, Kaz still says 2 million before ’07 between 3 territories

-earlier this week, it was clarified to mean 2 million for launch, 4 million before ’07

-now, Kutagari says “a little’ over 2 million before ’07

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The entertainment industry is entertaining to examine the business falls and spikes. But there is no entertainment more fun to watch than the game industry especially at transition. You never know what is going to happen.

Sony has just announced the PS3 will be delayed in Europe until March 2007. That means all those retailers in Europe just got screwed. Nintendo and Microsoft must be ecstatic.

The delay is because of the blu-ray components for the PS3. If they had to take Europe off the list, I wonder how much there will be available for Japan and America for launch. Losing a Christmas season in ANY of the big three markets is very bad. The bulk of game industry sales come at December and November.

But Sony fans should keep their head up. Sony is trying to bring back the UMD with them being cheaply priced. TGS should be big for Sony. There are rumors that the Killzone game will be featured and will be as good as the pre-rendered 2005 E3 trailer.

But also, in other news, Merril Lynch reports that Nintendo stock keeps going up. But it is not just Merril Lynch is saying this, all sorts of groups are noticing what is going on.

Nintendo is mimicking the exact same business and marketing strategy of the ipod. It will be entertaining to see how this strategy works in such a competitive market. Could Nintendo kill off the Playstation as Apple killed the walkman? Very doubtful. But regardless, it will be fun to watch the hysteria ensue within the next few months.