Philips Magnavox Videogames and the Entertainment Revolution Trigger Happy - Manual (Page 18)

Trigger Happy
20
renting movies. Total videogame software and
hardware sales in the United States reached $8.9
billion, versus $7.3 billion for movie box-office
receipts;
2
$6.6 billion of the videogame receipts were
from software sales, retail and online. How did this
strange invasion happen? How did this stealthy virus
insinuate itself into so many homes?
Well, one company has done more than any other
over the last six years to stake out videogames’ huge
place in adult popular culture: Sony, manufacturers of
the PlayStation, the unassuming gray box that
reinvigorated my own interest and that of so many
others. The last time they counted, Sony had sold five
million PlayStations in the UK alone. “The focus for
the brand,” explains Guy Pearce, Sony’s UK PR
manager, “is eighteen to twenty-five. That’s the age
group we aim at, and always have done.” One in every
four U.S. households owns a PlayStation.
Sony’s initial stroke of marketing brilliance was to
release an early game, 1995’s WipEout, with a
thumping techno soundtrack featuring well-known
electronic acts of the caliber of Orbital, Leftfield and
the Chemical Brothers. The success of this product had
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2 Wall Street Journal, April 28, 2000.