How does any of this address anything.
listen and learn.
The PS2 had massive issues on the hardware side.
Citation needed. do you have specific failure rates for the console? because I'd love to see them.
It was the weakest system other than the DC
It was the strongest system at time of release, and SIGNIFICANTLY stronger than PC was capable of at the same point in time. There wasn't a console released in it's league for 18 months afterwards. You'll notice that wasn't true for any launch after that. PC matched the 360 and PS3, and blows away PS4 and Xbone right now.
it had a poor online system
Everything in that era had a "poor online system" because the infrastructure simply wasn't there to justify the investment. Seganet was a nice try, but dial up internet for consoles was a stop gap effort at best. Nintendo eventually just stopped selling their broadband adapter completely. Only the Xbox really made a good attempt at online, and again that system launched almost 2 years after the PS2.
it was horrible to work with from a developer perspective, and it failed.
Difficult to work with? sure. But those that did got amazing results out of it- and it was notably EASIER to work with than the PS3, Saturn, or Jaguar. "hardest console to work with of all time" is flat out false.
and..the PS2 failed? am I in fantasy land?
I don't see how any games benefited from Sony's approach with the PS2 hardware.
Because from a developer perspective, it is less costly to develop for one target platform with a 150 million userbase than to develop for 3 consoles with a third of that. If the GC or Xbox had taken off instead of the PS2, the result would have been the same. Games highly tailored for one platform, at less cost to developers and less risk.
The PS2 was just in the middle of when growth in gaming was occurring more on the console side than outside of it so it made sense to make more games.
someone hasn't been gaming very long, I see. The largest explosion in gaming occurred a generation EARLIER when Sony launched the PS1. The PS1 sold well over 30% more than the SNES and Genesis did combined, and that's not counting the customers nintendo sold to. The growth of the PS2 was simply organic growth on top of the marketshare and userbase sony established a generation earlier.
To go along with this, it was the only viable system so it received almost all of these games because publishers thought there wasn't a point to releasing multiplatform stuff. If the PS2 had sold 100m, the GameCube 100m, and the Xbox 100m, the PS2 would have gotten even more software since the potential for profitability would have been greater and all three systems would get the same games since they would all be viable.
This comment makes no sense, because the PS2 has more retail software than the PS3 and Xbox do combined, despite selling less consoles overall. Splitting the userbase INCREASES costs and risk for developers and makes game development more expensive, not the other way around.
And even Sony does not pursue social gaming because they don't care about growth and just want stability, future systems could still be harmed by lack of competition. Consumer disinterest is something they would have to fight against, but if there's 130m-150m traditional console gaming consumers and a large chunk of them will buy the system regardless of price (up to a point) or innovation, console price could rise while fewer interesting features are added. This would be due to having a somewhat captive audience due to lack of alternatives. And when you can increase price, you increase profitability. When you can cut R&D costs, you increase profitability.
Is this english? this is borderline nonsensical. Your analysis here ignores that even if the Xbone tanks completely to WiiU levels, Sony will still have the PC as a primary competitor. Social platforms are completely irrelevant to the strategy and audience sony is pursuing with the PS4.
