At a press conference held today at Sony’s headquarters in Minato, Tokyo, CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment Kazuo Hirai announced that the Playstation 3 had been a ‘disappointment’ to the company and production of the gaming console would halt with effect on 30 May 2009.

( Read the rest of the entry after the jump! )

In front of an audience of 200 journalists and game developers, Hirai first started the conference with a Powerpoint slideshow highlighting the technological breakthroughs of the Playstation 3 console, paying particular attention to the bluray player onboard.

“The ability of the PS3 to play bluray discs was our intention from the start of the development phase – we wanted to make the perfect home entertainment system which would deliver the best picture quality on high definition televisions. And we achieved our goal.”

The invited audience had no clue to the true intentions of the press conference they were attending; they were invited on the pretext that Sony was announcing a new add-on to the PS3 console. Naturally there were a number of bewildered looks when Hirai commenced the conference in an awkward fashion.

Hirai ended the slide presentation and paused for a moment before continuing to speak.

“It is unfortunate that the PS3 did not achieve our second target – to be the number 1 console on the market. The pS3 had its advantages [over the Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii] but these were overshadowed by its flaws.”

The Playstation 3 is Sony’s third gaming console and was the company’s answer to the ‘next-gen’ console war which broke out among the three largest console manufacturers in 2006. Since its release in Japan in Nov 2006 and subsequent international release by March 2007, the Playstation 3 had been struggling to live up to is reputation of its predecessor. However it still managed to sell 21 million units worldwide as announced in February this year.

The PS3 sold decent, but not well enough according to Hirai.

“We did not have enough big title games to compete with the Xbox, and our targeted audience did not include the ‘very-casual’ gamer, which turned out to constitute a good fraction of the entire gaming community. We needed something to be our trump card, and even Home was not sufficient.”

At this point, journalists were expecting the revelation of a new feature or gadget as the lights dimmed in the conference theatre. Rumours had surfaced on the net a week prior to the conference that Sony was to release an exclusive 3D interactive device along with the development kit for game developers to enhance the gaming experience on the console. A single spotlight shone on the speaker.

“Ladies and gentlemen, as CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment, I announce to you..the termination of the Playstation 3.”

There was a loud a gasp in the audience followed by murmurings and camera flashes. Hirai proceeded to break up the commotion.

“It breaks my heart to make this announcement to all of you. The Playstation 3 had been the company’s weapon and pride for more than two years, but the truth is we just aren’t meeting our own targets. In the end it was a huge disappointment for Sony.”

“A month after Microsoft’s financial announcement, we were still 7 million units short of the Xbox’s sales. Our exclusive game developers had been working behind schedule for their titles to be released this year and we had already suffered the loss of a few exclusive rights which we enjoyed in the past with the Playstation 2.”

Kazuo Hirai was lamenting the fact that the big names like Resident Evil, Ace Combat and Final Fantasy, all which had been part of the Playstation exclusive line-up, had ported their games over to Microsoft’s Xbox console. Resident Evil 5 was released on both consoles in the US on March 13, and the upcoming Final Fantasy XIII game is expected to arrive next year.

It had been rumoured that the legendary game developer and creator of the Metal Gear Solid series Hideo Kojima was looking into game development on the Xbox console, after years of speculation that MGS4 could be released as a port.

Hirai set the date for termination and also laid down the plans for the company.

“The last PS3 console will be made on May 30 2009, after which production factories will close as we evaluate the console’s problems. The PS3 development team has already started work on designing a new console, but everything is at the very beginning stages of development at this point of time.”

“I would like to thank everyone here, and to our fans out there, for their undying support for the PS3 console. We have let you all down, but we will bounce back strong, I promise.”

The CEO proceeded to praise his rivals, something which had been unheard of.

“I asked my nephew what was his favourite game last week and he told me it was Raving Rabbids [on the Wii]. I asked him what about any Playstation 3 games and he shook his head. Just the other day I saw my son playing Resident Evil 5 on the Xbox. I asked him why didn’t he play the PS3 version, and he replied ‘I want to play online with my friends’.”

“Sometimes I can’t even motivate myself to switch on the PS3 console, except when it is to watch The Dark Knight on Bluray. I’m a busy man and when I actually do have time for a game I don’t think playing Metal Gear Solid 4 is practical. Fifteen to twenty minutes spent on a relaxing bowling game [Wii Sports] gives me a better experience, I have to admit. I think this is where Nintendo succeeds. It makes the most of my time invested on playing their games.”

“The Xbox has lots of fun titles, but I would still choose the Wii as the king of the consoles. You don’t have to look at the sales figures, your enjoyable experience is enough.”

During the Q&A session, a reporter from CNet asked, “If you had to list down the biggest flaw of the PS3, what would it be?”

Hirai replied, “We were too arrogant, and ignorant.” Not making reference to the console itself, but instead criticizing the marketing strategy employed by Sony.

And with the conclusion of the conference, a chapter on Sony’s profilic gaming achievements had been closed.