Senior Marketing Manager John Koller has had a lot to say about PSP in the past few days. The system, which is now two years old, has seen its share of successes and problems. One undeniable truth has been the lackluster sales of Sony's proprietary movie format, the UMD. Although the format is considered dead by most, Koller claims that the format has "always been a steady growth."
The problem with UMDs, he notes, is the inappropriate selection of movies in its catalog: "There hasn't been the drop off that's been reported. The movies that have had some selling problems, quite honestly would in any environment, are the ones that weren't targeted against that 16-24 year old demo, or even now as we get a little bit younger the 13-24 year old demo. They're not looking for the older catalog late 70s early 80s kind of movies. A lot of them weren't alive then."
Looking at the top UMD movies (pictured, above), it's clear that successful UMD movies target a very specific demographic. However, considering the scarcity of movies in
our weekly PSP releases, it's clear that the format is not experiencing the "growth" that Koller is hinting at. There's more to read at
Game Informer, but note that the interview reiterates many points that we covered
at GDC.
Read more
here.
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