PS3 "putting up a much stronger battle now," says Fries

In an interview with Gamedaily, the ex-Xbox exec responsible for Microsoft's Rare capture, Ed Fries, has warned Microsoft that PS3's worm is definitely starting to turn.

"I think it's obvious that Sony got off to a slow start; I think they made some pretty big mistakes and they've done a good job in the last year in recovering from those. I think they're putting up a much stronger battle now," he said.

"They've also done a great job in keeping the PS2 business alive, so you've got a lot of happy PS2 customers who are just waiting for the price of PS3 to be right before they switch over. If Sony can keep those guys brand loyal, they will have a lot of people coming over to the PS3."

"It leaves Microsoft in a kind of awkward position because with Sony winning the Blu-ray battle, it's nice to have a hi-def player as part of your games machine, and now that that's the standard I think it's a big advantage for Sony," he went on.

"It kind of pushes Microsoft into a box, where the main the thing that they have [going for them] right now is they can exert price pressure on Sony... I think they can cause Sony some pain by making the 360 a lot more accessible price-wise. So Sony's got the brand on their side and the extra [Blu-ray] capability, but they're always going to be at a price premium versus 360, and a lot of games are available on both, so for many 360 would be the cheaper choice."

In case you missed it, Microsoft announced a price drop in the US this morning, as well as a new 60Gb model.

Full interview with Ed through the Gamedaily link.

By Mike Bowden