Andre Yoskowitz
18 Oct 2009 20:35
Despite Sony's marketing team deciding to change the focus of the PS3 more to the console's movie downloading and Blu-ray capabilities, it appears consumers are still purchasing the system mainly for gaming.
Last August, the NPD Group released a study that showed that about 37 percent of PS3 owners had never once watched a Blu-ray film on their system. The second edition of the study was released recently, and the number hardly changed, moving down to 34 percent.
NPD did note however that the number of PS3 owners watching Blu-ray was higher then PS2 owners watching DVDs at the same point in the console's life cycle.
“It’s at a fairly high level, where it took years for PS2 owners to use [that console] for DVD,” NPD analyst Russ Crupnick added, via VB. “Most PS3 people think of it as a gaming device, but there is a reasonable level of awareness and intended use for Blu-ray.”
The new study gave the following figures to the question of why PS3 owners had purchased the console:
58 percent - Mostly to play games
34 percent - For games and movie, equally
8 percent - Mostly movies
NPD also noted that PS3 owners who have had their machines for a couple of years of more tend to buy more Blu-rays over standard definition DVDs and vice versa for newer owners.
“Newer owners are somewhat more oriented to DVD than Blu-ray,” Crupnick says. “The later you get into an adoption cycle, the more you’re not getting the super aficionado. These are people who are tougher to convince about the benefits of Blu-ray and who are sensitive to price.”