PS4 reveal "truly impressive", Xbox 720 will debut April at earliest says Pachter & colleagues
PS4's reveal was "truly impressive", according to industry analyst Michael Pachter and his colleagues at Wedbush Morgan. Pachter sent his firm's report to VG247 this morning, sharing the firm's insight into Sony's event.
In the report, Pachter and the firm said of the PS4 reveal, "Sony has fired the first salvo in the console wars, and should enjoy the media spotlight for at least two months. We were truly impressed by the Sony presentation, and think that the focus on games first was appropriate."
The firm expects Microsoft's next-gen reveal to closely follow Sony's PS4 announcement, "We think that Microsoft is likely to structure its unveiling similarly to Sony’s, but expect differentiation between the two consoles.
"We think that Microsoft’s next-generation Xbox will be similarly powered, will have a comparable first party lineup, comparable third-party support, but may have features that Sony cannot provide (or which it may not be ready to announce).
"We speculate that these include Kinect bundled with every next-generation Xbox, integration of Skype into the Xbox dashboard, greater multimedia functionality (which we have repeatedly said will likely include a built-in television tuner), integration with any smart phone or tablet (“smart glass”), search functionality through Bing, and enhanced Internet access.
"We think Microsoft is unlikely to formally announce its next-generation console until April or later, and the company may wait until E3 in early June."
Returning to the PS4 announcement itself, the Wedbush report also discussed PS4 pricing. Although Sony didn't reveal any solid numbers, Pachter and his team feel that Sony will be realistic, stating, "We expect the PS4 to debut at $399 or $449", and added, "Sony did not show the form factor of its PS4. While this may be trivial to some, we think that failure to display an actual console suggests that the box may not yet be finalized."
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