Shuhei Yoshida Talks PS3 Struggles and How PlayStation Survived

Former PlayStation boss Shuhei Yoshida has opened up about the tough times faced by Sony during the PS3 era. In a recent interview, Yoshida shared how the company was losing $1 billion due to the PS3’s struggles but managed to survive thanks to the booming sales of Sony’s flatscreen TVs at the time.

Yoshida recalled, “The second year of the original PlayStation was very hard,” adding that during the PS3’s launch, he feared the PlayStation brand might be finished. Despite the significant financial losses from the PS3, Yoshida credits Sony’s TV division, which was thriving during the same period, for keeping the company afloat.

“The TV group was making enough money to cover the losses from the PS3 and we were able to survive. But that was the most difficult time,” Yoshida explained.

The PlayStation 3 was further hit by a PlayStation Network outage, which lasted for months, creating significant internal challenges for Sony. Yoshida mentioned, “It’s unbelievable how hard that was internally,” and jokingly reflected on how many gamers were forced to do homework instead of playing online.

Despite these setbacks, Sony’s PlayStation recovered with the release of the PS4, which helped it regain an edge over its competitor, Xbox. The transition from PS3 to PS4 marked a major turning point, with many gamers making the switch from Xbox 360 to PlayStation 4.

Looking back at the PS3’s development, Yoshida reminisced about the motion sensor in the PS3 controller, which was introduced at the last minute, adding that the development teams were only notified of the new feature shortly before E3.