30 years is a long way. For three decades, Sony has been a fundamental player in the video game industry. What started as a console that came out in the midst of a war between Nintendo and SEGA ended up becoming one of the benchmarks in the industry. But the rulers did not always have faith. Shaw Layden, former president of Sony Interactive Entertainment of America, said that the board of directors considered not putting Sony’s name on the console.
PlayStation and the fear of failure in the midst of a war between Nintendo and SEGA
“I remember an early presentation where they brought a prototype PlayStation to the president’s office to see what they were building,” Layden begins in an interview with Eurogamer. “I remember in mid-1994, before launch, I was standing in the boardroom playing Ridge Racer and thinking, ‘Oh my God, this is going to be awesome. But at Sony, I think a lot of the management at the time didn’t take it seriously. They thought, “Oh my God, Sega and Nintendo control this (video game industry). Do you think Sony will come along and split it into three parts?” It was a fool’s errand. I think some even called it that back then. But (then Sony president Norio) Oga-san was a believer. Many thought we were taking a risk. It was an uphill battle to have the Sony name on this machine; They didn’t want to be associated with it.“.
In the end, the plan inevitably succeeded and became an integral part of the PlayStation brand. The games division has become the financial lungs of the Japanese coffers. With his best and worst momentsPS is in its place thanks to its strong catalog and hardware dedicated to video games as its mainstay.
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