Key things
- Sony executives doubted the success of the original PlayStation despite it becoming a massive hit because other companies failed to release their own successful consoles.
- Ken Kuturagi faced skepticism from industry veterans about the PS1 release, including representatives at Sony.
- However, the console proved to be a huge success, with the dominance of the PlayStation brand continuing today as the PS5 significantly outsells the Xbox Series X/S.
Former Sony Interactive Entertainment president Ken Kuturagi recently revealed that many people at Sony believed that the original PlayStation would fail. Considering how successful the PlayStation brand has become over the years, this is a rather surprising claim.
The PlayStation 1 was released in 1994 in Japan and 1995 in North America. The fifth generation console competed directly with the Nintendo 64 and Sega Saturn, significantly outperforming both platforms. The PlayStation has sold over 102 million units, surpassed only by the PS2, PS4, Game Boy, Nintendo Switch and Nintendo DS. Its debut also marks the beginning of Sony's dominance of the console market, held by Nintendo for the previous two generations. However, even Sony executives didn't have much faith in this widely successful project for a while.
Earlier this week, Ken Kuturagi was speaking at the Tokyo Game Show when he talked about the major difficulties of entering the console market with the first PlayStation. In 1993, Kuturagi was leading the PS1 development team and they wanted to “share their passion” for the project before it even launched, talking to many people from many countries in the industry. However, the SIE team was met with negativity and many executives told them not to release the console because “multiple companies” had done the same and had not been successful. Kuturagi even revealed that “even within Sony, no one believed we would be successful.”
Ken Kutaragi claims that many people did not think that the PlayStation would be successful
Even within Sony, no one believed that we would be successful.
Ironically, the PS1 was a huge hit and not only did the PlayStation 1 have many exclusive games, but it also won the console war for two generations in a row. Kuturagi stayed with the company until 2007, overseeing the successful launch of the PS2, and left after the PS3 failed to gain the same popularity.
Even today, gamers fondly remember some classic PS1 games like the original Final Fantasy VII, Solid metal gearbox, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Gran Turismoand others. The same can be said for the PlayStation 2, which eventually became the best-selling console of all time.
Three decades after the launch of the PS1 PlayStation the brand remains strong. The PS5 is estimated to significantly outsell the Xbox Series X/S with roughly 61.7 million units sold compared to Microsoft's 28.3 million console sales. A world in which Ken Kuturagi and his team gave up on the PS1 release due to the opinions of executives would probably be a very different gaming market than it is today. Fortunately for all PlayStation fans, they didn't.
PlayStation (original)
The PlayStation, sometimes known as the PS1 or PS One, was Sony's first formal foray into the console wars with Nintendo. It belonged to the fifth generation of video game consoles and locked corners with the Nintendo 64 and Sega Saturn.
- Mark
- Sony
- Original release date
- September 9, 1995
- Original MSRP (USD)
- $299, £299
- Weight
- 3.2 pounds
