The fallout from the PSN hacking attack now has some official results with roughly 90% of PSN users have returned back to PSN, Sony posting its worst financial loss in 16 years, and the calling for the current CEO to step down.
While 90% of PSN users have returned, Sony did not state if the stat meant 90% of the accounts have been reactivated or if 90% of the actual user base returned. Sony has about 70+ million PSN accounts but only 50+ million actual users.
The financial mess of the hacking attack along with the recent earthquake and poor showing from other divisions in the company resulted in the 3rd year in a row the entire company generating a loss. The losses also ended up being the worst losses for the company as a whole in the last 16 years, even topping the $3+ billion lost in 2006/2007.
The push to remove Howard Stringer as CEO of Sony revolves mostly around the slow response to both the shareholders and customers which in turn negatively hurt the company's stock and image. Sony's stock has dropped roughly 30% since the incident with shareholders giving Stringer a vote of "no confidence."
Stringer's job has been in jeopardy the past few years with former Playstation boss, Kaz Hirai seen as the favorite to replace him. Even though Hirai tenure with the Playstation division usually results in big annual losses, the company still feels his presence and dealing with the media would be much better than Stringer.
Stringer recently blamed the PSN hacking attack due to hackers not wanting Sony to be allowed to ""Protect its IP" instead of the actual reasons being the removal of features and the arrogance of the company to both hackers, users, and customers.
http://www.giantbomb.com/news/most-p...adership/3434/
http://kotaku.com/5816092/sony-says-...protect-its-ip
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Quick News Round-Up:
1) Pac-Man's creator Toru Iwatani stated in an interview that he feels the games of today do not have that same special feeling of games in the past that remain special decades after they were released.
Quote:
"When you look at games coming out today, it's doubtful that any of us will be talking about them in ten years' time," Iwatani told Game Career Guide.
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"I think more thought needs to go toward how games present themselves to the user, to how they can be made more fun," Iwatani said.
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2) The newest game in the Tribes series called Tribes Ascend will be a free-to-play game with only load-outs and weapons being part of the paid section of the game.
3) Valve's attempt to "relaunch" Team Fortress 2 with the free to play scheme appears to be working out very well as the game officially replaces Counter Strike as the most played game on Steam in terms of total players, servers, and players per day (peak).