PSP scope to be defined post-Q4

As studios release range of titles for format

By Susanne Ault -- Video Business, 9/9/2005

SEPT. 9 | The holidays could prove a watershed in the market development of PlayStation Portable.

Many retailers, including Wal-Mart, are devoting more space to studios’ non-game titles. But store heads want a surge in Sony PSP users, hopefully via PSP hardware gifts, before they crown the format a success.

Aiming to recreate DVD fortunes, studios are pumping out PSP titles in every conceivable large and niche genre, including films, TV shows, anime and music. At this point on PSP, such studio contributions more than double the available straight game content.

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is launching on Nov. 15 the first hybrid PSP disc, holding both the film Stealth and the game Wipeout Pure, priced at $39.95. Orders are due Oct. 13.

But collectively, title sales make up a slight percentage of store business. A cream of the crop title might sell 500 copies at a mid-sized chain. An average title could move 100.

Amazon.com reports that Buena Vista Home Entertainment’s Lost TV DVD set was its top seller on the title’s Sept. 6 street date. The Lost PSP title ranked 14,000th for the day.

Retailers including Fred Meyer, Wal-Mart and Best Buy are not buying all of the roughly 200 titles currently available. A number of music PSP titles, including Eagle Rock Entertainment’s Aug. 30 release Up in Smoke Tour, haven’t been picked up by Wal-Mart or Best Buy.

“[PSP is] doing OK, but it’s an incremental business,” Fred Meyer senior DVD buyer Randy Schaaf said. “We don’t stock all the titles, and we buy them light. Unless the player population grows tremendously and sales really explode at Christmas, we won’t look at it [as a critical store product].”

Researcher Harris Nesbitt anticipates 3 million PSP users by the end of 2005. That suggests between 600,000 to 700,000 PSP hardware systems should sell this fourth quarter.

On average, people are buying 2.7 PSP titles (including games) per system, according to NPD Funworld. Today’s leading handheld system, Game Boy Advance, enjoys an 8.9 title to one player ratio.

Store owners are wondering why few summer blockbusters are slated for simultaneous release on DVD and PSP this fourth quarter. Such day-and-date bows, including Buena Vista’s Sin City and National Treasure, are proving stronger sellers than catalog PSP releases.

“I’m looking forward to more day and date releases for the A titles,” Tower national DVD advertising manager Terrel Porter-Smith said. “We need Warner to get in the game with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.”

At this point, Sony is one of the few studios to slate DVD/PSP bows for all of its major end-of-year titles: The Longest Yard Sept. 20, Bewitched Oct. 25 and Stealth Nov. 15.

Fox has slated a DVD/PSP bow for Robots Sept. 27, Mr. & Mrs. Smith Nov. 29 and The Fantastic Four Dec. 6. But there is no day and date for holiday biggie Star Wars: Episode III—Revenge of the Sith.

Warner has heavily hinted but not committed to retail about entering the PSP title game. It has already announced DVD-only street dates for Batman Begins Oct. 18 and Charlie Nov. 8.

“Not all the studios came to DVD until the second or third year,” Sony DVD president Ben Feingold said. “But starting at the end of October, many retailers will be opening up space, and there will be increased visibility to the space. We think the PSP player [and new titles] will be very hot items for Christmas.”

Feingold promises a hefty TV and print advertising blitz for its innovative Stealth PSP title.

Bright for the system’s future, studios should start fashioning the same financial incentive programs for PSP that have spurred DVD growth. Retailers appreciate studio support in creating sales and rebate offers.

“For the fourth quarter, one of the things we’ll be looking at is getting behind very traditional programs,” said Daniel Silverberg, Buena Vista’s executive director of new business development. “It could happen that [PSP] is normalized to DVD.”

Buena Vista’s holiday pushes are the 10th anniversary edition of Toy Story DVD/PSP on Sept. 6 and catalog PSP The Incredibles on Nov. 15.

New Line Home Entertainment will heavily blast its Oct. 4 Elf PSP, which will be tied to this year’s launch of the Elf DVD as a perennial Christmas catalog film.

The studio also thinks the gift-giving time will usher in a fresh, younger PSP crowd.

“Many PSP players are mid-20-year-olds,” New Line marketing VP Justin Brody said. “We’re going down to a lower age bracket by throwing in Secondhand Lions [Oct. 4] as a PSP title.”

Certain retailers are improving PSP title merchandising.

Studio sources said Wal-Mart is opening up an additional 4-feet PSP film display area. And retailers, including Wal-Mart, Target and Hastings Entertainment, increasingly are presenting PSP non-game titles out of glass cases and more like regular DVDs.

In the beginning, most software titles, including the films, were treated as games and kept in locked areas. That can work to curb theft but also customer curiosity.

Hastings also is transferring its PSP films into its DVD section by fourth quarter. Many retailers stock PSP software in games, but studios prefer when there is some film product additionally located in DVD racks.

“With the amount of selection there is, there is more reason to buy the films than the videogames right now,” Hasting director of marketing Mason Goodfellow said. “But it will take this holiday for them to really stand their ground. When it becomes more mainstream, there’ll be more chance for extra income.”

Also assuring, anime has surprised retailers with its prowess on PSP. Manga Entertainment’s Ghost in the Shell currently ranks among Amazon.com’s Top 25 non-game PSP titles, beating many big studio films.

“Nothing [for PSP] has popped into Amazon.com’s overall Top 100 titles,” said Doug Thomas, the sites managing editor for DVD North America. “But I’m happy to see things other than full-length films going onto the format.”

Still, Thomas is hunting for that true hit PSP title. He wants a studio to roll out a high-profile film exclusively for the PSP.

“Having more day and date is good, but we haven’t seen anything for PSP only,” Thomas said. “We need a killer app to really push the format. That could be exciting.”