Sony has launched a VR Megapack in Europe
After announcing on November 23rd that they were going to launch the VP Megapack in Europe, Sony seems to have delivered on their promise, but not necessarily in a bug-free way.
Numerous comments on the original blog post show that the redeeming codes have some serious issue unlocking the games that were initially intended by Sony in the first place. However, it’s quite obvious that this is something that players were more than happy to receive.
But, here’s the issue. This doesn’t necessarily mean that everybody was happy to get this. Many diehard Sony fans are quite disappointed that Sony is wasting resources on making VR packs when they could simply work on getting more exclusive deals with developers and publishers.
It’s almost impossible to please everybody in the gaming world, and Sony is aware of that, but that didn’t mean they were going to hold off on this decision until 2021. Based on VR headset sales in 2020, this VR pack was a great decision to drive sales from multiple sectors of the company, considering that the early PS5 game-sales are going to be low due to lack of games.
But is this really something that Sony should be doing? Or is there something actually true in the complaints of its loyal customers?
VR is a good decision
No matter what players may be saying, the decision to veer into VR is a positive one from Sony from a business standpoint. It is as guaranteed as the sunrise that VR technology will reach new heights in the years to come. It may even become the biggest gaming sector in the world by the end of the next decade.
Considering the speed at which it has been developing, this is something that can actually happen as manufacturers keep on learning more and more about player preferences. It’s guaranteed that they will nail it sooner or later.
But one thing that Sony is abandoning completely is the mobile market. It needs to have a decent foothold in this niche if it wants to diversify as much as possible in the future. And here’s why.
Simply take a look at what Nintendo Switch has managed to accomplish. Take a look at the number of players playing PUBG Mobile and other popular games. The market is there, the potential is there, and the reputation from the old PSP is still there as well.
It is almost guaranteed that, should Sony announce a completely new and revamped PSP, it will find millions of customers in a matter of days.
Where is mobile most realistic?
The first thing we need to consider is that Sony does not release games from smartphones, we’re focusing on their mobile console or the PSP as it’s better known.
At the moment, the biggest market that Sony could target is Europe, especially Northern Europe. Why? Because data shows that this particular market is slowly but surely moving towards favoring the mobile gaming market rather than the console/PC market. Sure, it’s just a very small percentage right now, but the movement is there, especially looking at Nintendo Switch sales.
But how is this possible? Why the Nordics of all places? Well, there are some explanations for this.
The majority of adult customers in Norway are already heavily invested in mobile gaming. But this doesn’t necessarily mean that mobile gaming in Norway is what we think it is. According to experts, a large chunk of this data about mobile gamers is actually occupied by mobile casinos. That’s right. Thousands upon thousands of mobile gamers in the Nordics are actually gamblers. How do we know this? Well, mostly because gambling is relatively illegal in this region, prompting locals to find as many alternatives as possible. Fearing malware on their PCs, most people try to do this via smartphones, thus counting in the mobile gaming market.
Therefore, if Sony ever wants to find its way into a new region, it really needs to dissect how this market looks like and not take the data as a given.
A step forward
No matter how we look at this decision, it’s obvious that Sony is on the right track for the future. It is preparing its platform as the “pioneer” of mainstream VR gaming before VR gaming becomes mainstream.
This is a sure way to have a large chunk of the VR gaming market within its sphere of influence and absolutely dominate it once it actually becomes profitable.
And who knows, maybe we will see Sony become the biggest company in VR eSports once everything is in place.
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