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According to Rod Cousens, CEO of Codemasters, existing consoles are going to see several price cuts over the coming months, and the Wii U needs to be “very keenly priced” in order to compete with them.
“In terms of Wii U, the interesting aspect is timing and price and that has not been announced.” Cousens told MCV.
“Everybody knows it is coming. I anticipate further price cuts on existing consoles prior to Christmas this year, and there’s room for further price cuts next year.”
“So Wii U needs to be very keenly priced – and in the same way that Sony is having to price Vita when the competition is smartphones and tablets. Pricing is critical in a very fragmented hardware space. So I am not sure they are going to be able to come out and hit a premium price point from the outset.
“But Nintendo is smart. It is always innovative. It has demonstrated its breakthrough ability in the past, so let’s see if it can do it again. And the industry should cheer it on.”
Codemasters is working on Wii U versions of both Dirt and F1.
On the Sony side of things, Cousens has been impressed with what he’s seen of the PS Vita so far.
“I think the price is extremely attractive.” he says, “But is Vita the future in terms of portable interactive entertainment? They don’t need me to tell them this, but the competition now is Apple and other tablets.”
“So the question is what is going to make Vita stand out? Partly it is price and partly it is business model. People need to work out how to make money on Apple devices – some can and some can’t. Apple certainly can. Is Sony going to offer a compelling business model, which will attract content, which will then give it some differentiation out there? It will be a huge challenge.”
Of course there’s no figure attached to ‘keenly priced’, but when you can pick up an Xbox 360 for £179.99, you’d imagine a price in the same ball park.
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