smork
12-08-2006, 12:23 AM
I'm back in Malaysia again for a few months and I've been keeping an eye on how the next-gen battle is shaping up locally. Of the 3 major consoles, only PS3 has an official Malaysia release, with the other two only getting a Singapore release. MS has refused to officially release the 360 (as they did with the first XBOX) until Malaysia does more to crack down on piracy.
At this point in time, console gaming in this country = PS2, and mostly PS2 pirated games, which are cheap and readily available. The 360 has been grey-market available since release in Singapore, and is sold in most shops, but mostly with a mod chip and pirate games. I know from my visits that the officially released XBOX and 360 are much more popular in Singapore than here.
I've been most curious to see how Wii vs PS3 plays out, since GC was almost non-existant here and PS2 was so dominant. So far, and somewhat strangely, the PS3 is available almost everywhere for around the actual retail price. You can go into most any shop and find at least one console and a few games for sale. The one shop I spend most of my money at had 7 on hand, last I checked, mostly the 60Gb version.
On the other hand, the Wii is selling for about 2X actual retail (a little over US $500 everywhere I've checked) -- and that's if you can find them. That's not to say nobody's been getting them, apparently they've been flying off the shelves at 2X the price. The same shop I saw the 7 PS3s I mentioned above had been unable to keep the Wii in stock. The clerk told me she had sold 6 out of her 6 she had that day, and this was mid-afternoon.
I guess I'm not surprised that the PS3 isn't moving locally as it's priced well over 50% of the average local office worker's salary (not including games), when a PS2 can be had with a pile (pirated) games for less than half the price. What surprises me is the robustness of the local demand for the Wii when the GC did so poorly (though the GBA and DS are dominant).
At this point in time, console gaming in this country = PS2, and mostly PS2 pirated games, which are cheap and readily available. The 360 has been grey-market available since release in Singapore, and is sold in most shops, but mostly with a mod chip and pirate games. I know from my visits that the officially released XBOX and 360 are much more popular in Singapore than here.
I've been most curious to see how Wii vs PS3 plays out, since GC was almost non-existant here and PS2 was so dominant. So far, and somewhat strangely, the PS3 is available almost everywhere for around the actual retail price. You can go into most any shop and find at least one console and a few games for sale. The one shop I spend most of my money at had 7 on hand, last I checked, mostly the 60Gb version.
On the other hand, the Wii is selling for about 2X actual retail (a little over US $500 everywhere I've checked) -- and that's if you can find them. That's not to say nobody's been getting them, apparently they've been flying off the shelves at 2X the price. The same shop I saw the 7 PS3s I mentioned above had been unable to keep the Wii in stock. The clerk told me she had sold 6 out of her 6 she had that day, and this was mid-afternoon.
I guess I'm not surprised that the PS3 isn't moving locally as it's priced well over 50% of the average local office worker's salary (not including games), when a PS2 can be had with a pile (pirated) games for less than half the price. What surprises me is the robustness of the local demand for the Wii when the GC did so poorly (though the GBA and DS are dominant).