With the PlayStation and PlayStation 2, Sony achieved unimaginable success. Both systems completely dominated the market, crushing competitors from Sega, Nintendo, and even Microsoft—whose investments in the Xbox were incomparably larger. From the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s, over 200 million consoles from this series were sold, so expectations for the next generation of PlayStation were truly enormous.
In the meantime, Microsoft and Nintendo had completely changed their strategies. While the giant from Redmond was determined to release the Xbox 360 as early as possible at any cost, Nintendo, with the Revolution (later renamed Wii), introduced an entirely new concept that was met with great enthusiasm. Thanks to the continued strong sales of the PlayStation 2, Sony could afford the luxury of being the last to enter the market.
The PlayStation 3 had its first official presentation at Sony’s E3 conference on May 16, 2005, but only a non-functional prototype and a demonstration video were shown—one that later turned out to be entirely pre-rendered, serving merely as a projection of the platform’s potential graphical capabilities. A year later, the final design of the system was unveiled, and it was announced that, similar to the Xbox 360, two models would be available. The more affordable version came with a 20GB hard drive and a price of €499, while the higher-end version offered 60GB of storage and several important features such as built-in Wi-Fi and a card reader—but cost €100 more. This business move was considered very risky, partly because all historically expensive systems (NeoGeo, CD-i, 3DO) had sold extremely poorly and were quickly abandoned.
However, Sony’s biggest gamble was the inclusion of a dual-speed Blu-ray drive. In addition to drastically raising production costs, this format was still in its infancy and faced serious competition from HD-DVD, which Microsoft strongly supported—even releasing an external HD-DVD drive for the Xbox 360.
Although Sony had announced that the PS3 would launch almost simultaneously across all regions, production issues caused delays. The system officially debuted in Japan on November 11, with just over 80,000 units sold that day—many of which quickly ended up on eBay. Six days later came the U.S. launch, but due to extremely limited stock, the same thing happened again: a huge number of consoles appeared on eBay, fetching prices as high as $2,000 each!
Finally, the most interesting event for us — the European launch — took place on March 16, 2007, and it was highly successful. According to the prestigious Financial Times, as many as 600,000 units were sold within the first two days. Among the several dozen launch titles, NBA Street: Homecourt, Resistance: Fall of Man, and Virtua Fighter 5 stood out.
The PlayStation 3 is an extremely complex system from a hardware standpoint, a statement that primarily refers to its seven Cell processors (six of which are available for games, while the seventh is reserved for the operating system) and their synchronization during operation. Although many experts predicted this would pose a major challenge, Sony essentially applied the same concept used with the PlayStation 2 — providing development teams with powerful hardware whose full potential would only be realized after several years. Because of this, it’s no surprise that during the first few years, games developed simultaneously for both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 generally looked better on Microsoft’s console, showing smoother frame rates, cleaner images (due to more aggressive use of anti-aliasing), and even higher-quality textures. The system has a total of 512 MB of memory, divided into 256 MB of so-called “main” memory and 256 MB of GDDR3 memory dedicated to NVIDIA’s RSX Reality Synthesizer graphics chip.
The best demonstration of the PlayStation 3’s graphical capabilities comes from its exclusive titles, which had no real equivalent on competing platforms. Games such as Metal Gear Solid 4, Uncharted, and the Gran Turismo series are prime examples. Gran Turismo 5 became the most anticipated driving simulation of all time, brilliantly showcasing the power of the PlayStation 3 — although it was only with the sixth installment that its full potential was truly realized.
From a software standpoint, the platform was equally interesting. Instead of a simple BIOS, the PS3 featured its own operating system known as XMB (XrossMediaBar), which also appeared in a slightly modified form on the PSP. In addition to a host of expected options, this interface allowed users to connect to various Internet services — from regular web browsing and Facebook to accessing the PlayStation Store or PlayStation Home. Most importantly, however, the PlayStation Network was completely free to use, unlike Microsoft’s Xbox Live service. New versions of the XMB firmware were released quite frequently, continuously expanding its features — making a broadband Internet connection practically essential.
During its first year, the PS3 faced very serious challenges. Despite being sold below its real market value (independent research showed that manufacturing the console cost over $800!) and having highly advanced hardware, critics didn’t see that as justification for its high retail price, and most consumers chose to wait for a price drop. Sony’s strategy essentially came down to simply surviving in the market until the decision to pursue uncompromising hardware would finally pay off.
Thanks to the victory of the Blu-ray format, a price reduction, and the release of many outstanding (and exclusive) games, the situation began to change significantly from 2008 onward. By November 2, 2013, over 80 million PlayStation 3 consoles had been sold. With a steady stream of high-quality exclusive titles being released even in late 2013, Sony ultimately managed to overtake rival Microsoft in total system sales by the end of this generation.
However, the PlayStation brand’s popularity had suffered considerable damage and was far less dominant than during the golden era of the first two generations — when it faced virtually no real competition. It was now up to the PlayStation 4 to restore Sony’s former prestige, while the third PlayStation would remain relevant as a last-gen system for several more years.
DualShock 3 Controversy
After the first images of the PlayStation 3 system were released, the Internet was flooded with extremely negative comments about the new controller design (even Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima voiced his dissatisfaction), as it strongly resembled a boomerang. The wave of criticism forced Sony to abandon this idea and return to a more traditional design — but this time without vibration and under a new name: SIXAXIS.
Although Sony explained this decision by claiming that the DualShock’s vibration would interfere with the new motion control system, it later turned out that the real issue lay elsewhere. The problem was actually a patent dispute that Sony had lost and was unwilling to pay licensing fees for.
Fortunately, the story ended with a compromise: starting in late 2007, the DualShock 3 went on sale, bringing back the beloved vibration feature. Since then, it has been bundled with every PS3 Slim console, restoring the controller to its classic form and feel.
Backward Compatibility
Unlike Microsoft, Sony announced from the very beginning that the PS3 would be able to run more than 95% of PlayStation 2 games. The first models of the console achieved this through hardware-based emulation, which was later replaced by software emulation, and eventually removed entirely. In addition to the goal of reducing production costs, Sony justified the decision by explaining that backward compatibility is most important during the first year of a new console’s life cycle—when the software library is still limited.
In later years, some classic titles from the original PlayStation were re-released on PS3 as downloadable PSN games, while several major PlayStation 2 hits made their way to the PS3 in the form of remastered HD collections.
PlayStation 3 Slim
Ever since the PlayStation 3’s launch, there had been ongoing speculation about a slimmer version of the console and how Sony would manage to reduce the impressive size of the original model. The PlayStation 3 Slim was officially unveiled on August 18, 2009, featuring one-third smaller dimensions, lighter weight, and lower power consumption. The transition to a new manufacturing process also resulted in less heat generation and quieter operation.
The hard drive capacity was increased to 120 GB, though the system’s design received mixed reactions, and users were disappointed by the removal of support for installing GNU/Linux. Still, the most important factor was its highly attractive price of €299, which ensured a fantastic market reception.
By October 2009, Sony also released a 250 GB model, priced at €350, further expanding the PS3 Slim lineup and solidifying its success.
PlayStation 3 Super Slim
Somewhat unexpectedly, at the end of 2012, Sony once again repackaged the original PS3 hardware into an even smaller and more affordable case, creating the Super Slim model. The smallest PS3 to date, including the hard drive, weighs just over 2 kg and is 25% smaller than the previous PS3 Slim model.
The most distinctive feature is its top-loading Blu-ray drive with mechanical sliding doors, reminiscent of retro consoles and DVD players. Despite its reduced size and simpler appearance, the Super Slim retains all the functionality of its predecessor, including built-in Wi-Fi, optical audio out, 3D support, and more.
The Super Slim is available with various hard drive capacities, and there is even a budget version without an HDD, featuring 12 GB of internal flash memory. Thanks to numerous bundle packages with popular PS3 exclusives, this version of the system still sells well today and is expected to remain on the market for several more years as a last-gen budget console that still offers a very playable gaming experience.
