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Molly Smith, Sony Computer Entertainment's PR Director: The View From the Top
by Steven Kent for Gamers Today
Molly Smith, Sony Computer Entertainment America's Director of Public Relations, has the unique challenge of managing communications for the team at the top. Sony's high-profile position makes it an easy target for Sega, Nintendo, and video game industry critics alike.
Molly brings an interesting perspective to this position. Having managed corporate communications for Ocean, the company that gave the world Water World for Virtual Boy, she knows the challenges of being on the bottom scraping for press attention and market respect. Molly's big challenges this year will include helping maintain Sony's sterling persona in the face of mounting fears about video game violence, launching a raft of new software titles, and preparing the U.S. market for the launch of a new game console in Christmas, 2000.
Gamers Today: Exactly how far along is Sony in the development of the next generation PlayStation? Do you have an actual chip set?
Molly Smith: Yes, the architecture is done, and that includes the Emotion Engine which is the core CPU for the unit. The graphics synthesizer and the IO Processor, which allows for the replication of the existing PlayStation architecture, are finished.
GT: So, basically, right now you've got a heart, a brain, and lungs, and you just need to put a circulatory system and some skin on it?
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MS: I suppose; We have a proprietary operating system for the new; or the next generation PlayStation. That's the circulatory system. And in this, the brain already exists. It even remembers how to play its old, original PlayStation games.
GT: Any idea how many development systems are out there?
MS: Well, we are dispatching development kits to some of our Japanese publishing partners first. The U.S. kits will probably start coming our way about June-ish. The system is launching in Japan many months before the Fall 2000 launch for the U.S., so it's imperative that we make sure that we satisfy demand for the kits over in Japan first and foremost.
GT: Any idea how many development kits have been distributed in Japan?
MS: I don't know that at this time. I don't even know how many companies are officially licensed.
I do know that there's a terrible amount of interest and I expect that probably almost all of the companies that are currently developing for PlayStation will be developing for the next generation system. Because of the capabilities of the new machine and what it's going to do in terms of changing the landscape of digital entertainment, new companies that may have not thought of interactive entertainment as a primary source for their business will want to come into the mix.
GT: At one point there were about 300 companies that had licensed the ability to make games for PlayStation, is that correct?
MS: I think there have been quite a few more than that as the years went through. I would have to confirm the official number.
GT: How many games are there for PlayStation worldwide?
MS: There are approximately 2,000 PlayStation titles in Japan, over 600 in North America and 600 in the European territories.
GT: Obviously there is some overlap from territory to territory.
MS: Yes, depending on the title.
GT: Sure. What's going to be the biggest title on PlayStation this year?
MS: I think the best thing about PlayStation is that there are always a number of best things for our system. One of the strengths of our platform is the breadth of our library, so I'd have to say that one of the top picks coming out of E3 (the Electronic Entertainment Expo) will definitely be Final Fantasy VIII from Square Soft. I think it sold over 3 million copies in Japan when it came out in January.
Dino Crises from Capcom will certainly be big. Certainly, from our perspective, GT 2 (Gran Turismo 2) will be big. It's the sequel to the number one selling PlayStation game in North America. Gran Turismo was the first title to hit over 2 million units, and that was in its first year out, which is pretty amazing.
Other biggies for us are going to be Crash Team Racing. It's a really fun cart style game using a lot of the characters from the Crash World over the past three titles.
Another title that we're very excited about is Ape Escape. It's an entirely new franchise for us that was developed by one of our stellar teams in Japan and it got a great response at E3. Ape Escape is going to have a simultaneous release in mid-June in all three territories (Japan, North America, and Europe). This is actually the first time that we've done this. Ape Escape is a pretty vast 3D-platform style game. One of the key things about it is that it's the first title to really effectively use the functions of the dual shock analog controller. In fact, it can only be used with an analog controller.
GT: It's kind of like playing Robotron 2084--you move the main character with one controller and aim his weapons with the other. That's tough to master.
MS: A lot of people are pretty enthusiastic about it. Our sports line up is going to be big, too. Electronic Art's lineup looks great and our own 989 Studios titles look great. As always, the sports category is going to be big on PlayStation.
GT: Does Sony have any kind of philosophy?
MS: I think that one of the refreshing things about Sony's approach to gaming is that our strategy from day one has been constant, and it's remained constant throughout the years. We believe we should have a very strong platform but a ubiquitous box, meaning that the content and the gaming experience is going to make a difference to each user. If you want to look at games as a viable form of entertainment, that which is entertaining for me may not be the same for you . Having a vast library offering the consumer a lot of choices has been very effective for us.
GT: Is Sony at all nervous about having 3 competitors instead of 2?
MS: We came into this market as the underdog, and in 3 short years we are the leader of this industry. There were multiple platforms available for the consumer to choose from when we came in, and I don't see how that's going to change in the future.
Our position is very strong and we are looking to do another industry first. We want to be the first company to have the number one platform on the market and come out with the next number one platform with the next generation PlayStation. (Nintendo dominated the eight-bit market, Sega led the first years of the 16-bit market. If, however, you consider Game Boy a separate platform, Nintendo did in fact launch two industry-leading platforms in a row.)
GT: There's a persistent rumor that the next generation PlayStation will be expensive. I mean, no sooner had you announced the new PlayStation that papers started reporting that it was going to sell for 100,000 Yen (about $800 U.S.).
MS: What actually happened was that an article came out in Japan a couple of days before the announcement. It had some statements that had been misconstrued and, for some reason, this misprint has kind of stuck with us for a while.
We've been very consistent and confident in telling everyone from media to consumers to retailers to our publishing partners that we are an entertainment/consumer electronics company. If any company understands the mass market, it's Sony, and we're going to make sure that when our box is ready in Fall 2000, it comes out with the most competitive price possible.
GT: Everybody knows that Sony's going to drop its price this year. The question is, how much?
MS: Well, we have been the pricing leader in terms of making sure that we had the most aggressive pricing around whether it's for the hardware or for the software. That being said, I think there was a huge expectation from our industry to have us come into E3 '99 and lower our price.
GT: That would have been crazy. My guess is that you will wait until August or September so that you can stick it to Sega.
MS: You never know. The $129 price point has been very good for us and for the industry, and I think that we're pretty comfortable at that price point. Now, is that to say that we will never be able to again pass on manufacturing efficiencies to the consumer? I wouldn't be able to say that.
GT: Do you folks view Dreamcast as a threat?
MS: We're definitely aware of the competitive factors in the environment. It would be silly for us to say that we weren't; but as a threat to our business this year,, I'd probably say no. The type of consumer who they have to go after in this launch stage is very different than the ones we attract at this point in time. We will continue to satisfy the core market with a lot of the software that we have coming out.
GT: Are we going to see PocketStation (the memory card/LCD game for PlayStation) in the United States soon?
MS: PocketStation was released in Japan in January and it's done extremely well. Actually, the interesting thing if you look at the Japanese hardware sell through charts week by week, is that PlayStation and PocketStation have sort of switched in the number one and number two slots followed by, interestingly enough, Game Boy Color, Dreamcast and N64, respectively. Right now we're really focusing our efforts on making enough PocketStations for the Japanese market. When the time's right, we'll bring it over here for the U.S., but until we have enough units to be able to supply the demand there, I don't know when we'll see it.
