PlayStation at 30: How Sony's Grey Box conquered Gaming

Japanese electronics giant Sony is set to celebrate 30 years since it launched the PlayStation console, the little grey box that catapulted the firm into the gaming big league.

PlayStation was Sony's first foray into the world of video games. When it hit the shelves in Japan on December 3, 1994, the company needed to sell one million units to cover its costs.

Ultimately, the gadget became a legend, selling more than 102 million units, helping launch many of the industry's best-loved franchises, and positioning Sony as a heavyweight in a hugely lucrative sector.

"PlayStation changed the history of video games," said Hiroyuki Maeda, a Japanese specialist in video game history.

The little grey box sold 102 million unitsRichard A. Brooks/AFP/AFP

"It truly transformed everything: hardware, software, distribution, and marketing."

One key to its success was broadening the appeal of a pastime that had often been dismissed as a hobby for children.

From the off, the firm clearly wanted to trash this image.

This stems in part from Sony's rivalry with Nintendo, which was already a dominant player in the sector by the mid-1990s but whose games skewed young.

Sony 'humiliated'

The original PlayStation can be traced to a fallout between the two significant Japanese firms.

They had partnered in the late 1980s to develop a version of the Super Nintendo console with an in-built CD player.

But Nintendo suspected Sony of using the project to enter the gaming sector and abruptly canceled the partnership in 1991.

"Sony found itself in a humiliating position," said Maeda, so pushed ahead with the project by itself.

The PlayStation's 3D graphics helped launch many classic titles. AFP

The hardware proved to be revolutionary. CD-ROMs were cheaper and able to store much more data than the cartridges used by Nintendo and other consoles.

To further distinguish itself from Nintendo, Sony courted a young adult audience with fighting games like Tekken, out-and-out horror with Resident Evil and Silent Hill, and military titles like Metal Gear Solid.

Its advertising also followed a more grown-up path.

Hollywood auteur David Lynch was drafted to direct ads for the PS2 launched in 2000, conjuring a nightmare vision of floating heads and talking ducks that was certainly not meant for younger audiences.

"The older audience had better purchasing power than children," said Philippe Dubois, founder of M05, a French association that aims to preserve digital heritage.

The PS2 is still the most successful console in history, having sold more than 160 million units.

The smooth design of the PlayStation controllers set them apart from rivals.AFP

'New sensations'

Over the past 30 years, competition has intensified, and technology has been honed. While Sega and other rivals have fallen by the wayside, Microsoft has entered the fray with its Xbox, and Nintendo is still on the scene with its Switch console.

But the industry is enduring tough times.

During the pandemic, a surge in popularity and investment subsided, and Sony's PlayStation division recently laid off hundreds of workers.

Plenty of analysts also predict that cloud gaming will soon render consoles obsolete.

Sony appears undaunted, though. It recently launched an upgraded version of its PS5 with a marketing push that highlighted new AI features.

Bloomberg has reported that the Japanese firm is also planning a new hand-held version of the PlayStation, which would once again pit it against old rival Nintendo, the undisputed king of portable devices.

The newly unveiled PlayStation 5 Pro Instagram/PlayStation

However, for the purists, few innovations were as great as the original console's ability to handle 3D graphics.

The technology was instrumental in the appeal of classic games such as Tomb Raider and Final Fantasy VII.

"We discovered sensations, emotions that we hadn't experienced with earlier consoles," said French YouTuber and PlayStation enthusiast Cyril 2.0.

He said he had collected almost every PlayStation title released in Europe—some 1,400—and insisted the formula for success was not complicated.

"For consoles, games are still the most important thing," he said