To compound the situation, Sony suffered another setback when it cut in half the initial American shipments of the PS2. The company originally promised 1 million units. But component shortages forced Sony to reduce that figure to 500,000. The installed base will feel a lot more confident going out and buying the PS2 knowing their existing library of games won't be obsolete. A tougher challenge for Sony may be the software question.
Games are what sell a gaming device.
And despite the much-hyped technical superiority of the PS2 console, initial games for it are unlikely to offer the knockout graphics and play that consumers have been led to expect. Nintendo had 'Super Mario 64,' which really knocked people out and got them to buy a Nintendo 64 system. There's really no one killer application yet for the PS2. That's why a lot of pretty serious gamers are saying there's no reason for them to buy the thing now. Although it's typical for the first titles for a new gaming device to be underwhelming because software developers need time to learn how to exploit the new hardware, the complex multiprocessor design of the PS2 could make it an extreme case.