🎮 Sony: The Shortest Keynote In History

📜 Sony E3 Keynote - 1995

Here is the entire text of the speech, verbatim, with specific words and phrases highlighted for semiotic analysis below:

1️⃣ What was happening?

The birth of the Sony PlayStation, a fifth-generation console, is a story of some of the greatest corporate backstabbing and secret espionage ever recorded.

In the 1980s, Sony executive Ken Kutaragi (who is now called ‘the Father of the PlayStation’) believed so strongly in video games and the technology behind them, that he started working secretly with established video game giant Nintendo to supply them with sound processors for their Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). Although he was almost fired for conducting business secretly, it was Sony’s then president Norio Ohga who recognised the passion and grit within Kutaragi and allowed him to continue.

A joint venture between the two companies followed in 1988, where Nintendo contracted Sony to develop CD-ROMs for the SNES, tentatively titled SNES-CD. Meanwhile, Sony was keen to use their video game knowledge to produce their own SNES compatible Sony console, playing both SNES cartridges and the new CD format.

Just before the official announcement of this new console with Nintendo in 1991 at the Las Vegas Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Nintendo’s then president Hiroshi Yamauchi decided that the original 1988 contract was unacceptable, specifically because it gave Sony (who possessed a larger research and development division than Nintendo did at the time even though Nintendo was far away the largest name in gaming) all control and earnings over Nintendo games published on the SNES-CD format. Nintendo then cancelled their contract with Sony without telling them.

Sony learnt about this change two days prior to CES 1991. Despite Sony’s failed attempts at reconciliation with Nintendo, the Sony team announced their partnership with Nintendo on the ‘Play Station’ on day one of the event. On day two, Nintendo announced that their partnership with Sony had been terminated and that they were now working with Philips.

Furious, Sony decided to build their own console without partnering with Nintendo. Three years later, in 1994, Sony launched the PlayStation in Japan to stunning success. Key to this success was Sony’s focus on 3D gaming on CD-ROMs, something that was unheard of in the gaming console community at the time, and the console’s positioning towards teenagers and young adults, significantly older than Nintendo’s target audience.

In 1995 both Sega and Sony decided to leverage the first Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in Los Angeles to announce their consoles (Saturn and PlayStation respectively) and corner the lucrative and influential North American market. Sega, who had rushed the launch and production of their console in North America and Europe to beat Sony, announced that the Saturn would cost $399.

Next came Sony’s reply.

2️⃣ Who wrote this and to whom?

The speech delivered by Steve Race, who was leading the PlayStation launch in North America, was likely written by him himself. The audience for this keynote was not only the people and media in the room, but also competitors Sega, Nintendo, and the industry at large.

IMPLICATIONS

🫱🏼‍🫲🏽 TRUST: Then and Now

At launch, the PlayStation sold more units in two days than the Saturn had in five months. Game developers trusted Sony’s technology more than they did other companies as Sony had helped to develop the CD-ROM, and with the PlayStation had made the technology mainstream for data storage. Customers were more likely to buy a PlayStation because not only was it cheaper, it also had a very edgy and rebellious (sometimes controversial) marketing campaign that positioned itself against all other competitors. Steve Race’s one-word keynote perfectly encapsulated Sony’s upstart and belligerent response to the industry.

👑 POWER: Then and Now

At the end of it’s cycle, the PlayStation had sold over 100 million units worldwide, cementing Sony’s win of the fifth-generation of consoles, while setting up the industry nicely for Sony’s next console, the PlayStation 2 (the best selling video game console of all time). Meanwhile, Sega exited the console market and now focus purely on game development. Nintendo also almost went bankrupt before bouncing back several years later with their runaway home console success the Wii (though they saw more success in the handheld gaming market).

Even a later entry from Microsoft with the Xbox in 2001 could not shake Sony’s stranglehold on the video game console market that exists till today and that extends into games, popular culture, and other emerging tech. Here’s a statistic that puts it into context: the lowest selling PlayStation (PlayStation 3) still sold more units than the highest selling Xbox (Xbox 360).

WHAT WOULD YOU DO?

It’s May 1995. You are leading Sony’s PlayStation launch in the United States, and are charged with announcing the new console at the inaugural E3 amongst cut-throat competitors and ex-partners.

The world’s press is there, wondering why Sony, a company that has never made video game consoles before, wants to enter a market with razor-thin margins and a hostile history of companies going bankrupt overnight because of wretched products.

Tell me your reasoning. In next week’s issue, I’ll highlight the most thought-provoking responses.

NEXT WEEK ON SIGNPOST

Next week is the last issue of the Texts That Shaped The World series. We’ll look at the iconic keynote from Macworld 2007 that gave us the device that literally changed the world — the iPhone.

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