Harrison: We didn't steal Nintendo's idea

May 31st, 2006, 15:59 Posted By: wraggster

Nintendo's UK boss David Yarnton recently lashed out at Sony's new motion-sensing PS3 controller, saying that - in regards to Nintendo's own unqiue Wii controller - Sony "didn't innovate, they copied."

However in an interview with Spiegel Online (a -shock, horror - German website), Sony Computer Entertainment Europe's Phil Harrison today struck back at the claims. Our CVG translation droid was duly warmed up and given a fresh dollop of oil and it reported the Sony boss said: "In a way I understand why people say [we stole Nintendo's idea], but it is a little stupid, if you forgive the remark."

When we brought the PlayStation to the market in 1994, we introduced real time 3-D graphics for the first time," he noted. "When Nintendo launched its N64 in 1996 it also had 3D graphics, did we say, "Nintendo stole our idea!"? Obviously not. Such innovations become possible because of a combination of technology, cost and manufacture capacities."

He continued: "We've been working on [motion-sensing technology] for a long time and Nintendo has certainly likewise already been working on something similar. The difference between our strategy and that of our competition is that our controller is still similar to the Dual Shock, the industry standard controller. I estimate that nearly 400 million Dual Shock controllers have been sold worldwide."

When asked how many PS3 games would use the motion-sensing function in its first year, Harrison said that he thinks "all games will use the function somehow." Harrison continued, "If you play a platform or soccer game now, you move the controller around," he added. "Now for the first time we can use both the primary input, executed by the analog sticks, and at the same time use the movements that the player makes as a secondary input. That is an important advantage, which only the PlayStation controller has."

So there you have it, according to Sony it was all a big coincidence and the conspiracy theories are all a load of rubbish. Now let's wait and see what Microsoft has to say about their online service...

Via CVG

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