PORCast

The long awaited first person shooter for the PlayStation 3, Killzone 2, will be releasing shortly and might have a lot more meaning than most people think. If Killzone 2 does not fly off of the shelves, as well as sell many consoles, Sony would be faced with many problems making it almost impossible to catch up to the Xbox 360. So what does Sony need to do to make sure that Killzone 2 is this successful?

First of all, they need to make sure that they advertise this game almost too much. Killzone 2 has been in development for around four years now and needs to do very well. Without proper advertising, this would cause all the hype as well as hard work to be thrown away. No matter how good the game is, it requires effective advertising and marketing to make sure it sells like it should. For example, Metal Gear Solid 4 is arguably the best video game of 2008, but if that is the case, why has it only sold just fewer than four million copies? It is not because of the number of consoles sold, but the lack of effective marketing. Killzone 2 will be released on February 27th which is a couple weeks after the super bowl. So what Sony needs to do is buy at least two or three commercial spots during the super bowl to advertise not only the system but the game. An effective advertisement would be an advertisement for the PlayStation 3 but featuring pure game play of Killzone 2, LittleBigPlanet, and Metal Gear Solid 4. If they could create an advertisement that featured game play of all these titles as well as explain the system to the general public, this would surely improve the game sales, along with the console sales.

Second, Sony and Guerilla need to make sure that once the game launches, there are no problems with the game PERIOD. I’m talking about lag-free online game play, bug-free, and including all the features that the PlayStation 3 is capable of like trophies, in-game music, and in-game screenshots. They also need to make sure that the online is just as good as the campaign and will provide much entertainment for months to years. They need to make it easy to get a party together that way it is very easy to hop into a game with one of your friends instead of having to deal with error messages and other possible issues.

Last, Sony needs to be sure to put a demo of this game on display consoles in every store. They need to make it so that someone can go into the store, play Killzone 2, and be able to justify paying the extra $200 for the PlayStation 3. They need to make sure that people see this game for themselves and see just how amazing this game has turned out to be. This would definitely show consumers advantages of the PlayStation 3 and make them want to buy it. This would also improve game sales massively and would allow for a huge community to start and bring more folks in.