*Disclaimer - This article is an editorial. This article does not represent the views, values or feelings of DPAD or GotFrag.com or any of the network sites or their staff.

Coming from someone who will not put a Playstation 3 on his Hanukkah list, will not stand in line in the cold, risk getting shot at or mugged, or attempt to sell it on eBay for profit; I am still sympathetic to this Sony flutter.*

Don’t get me wrong, I am not turning into a bleeding heart Sony guy. All the chaos and disruption over the country shows how die-hard fans are about the Playstation 3 is pathetic. I do not believe that this is the greatest piece of equipment ever to grace our dear Earth; I refuse to confuse greed and exploitation with thrill and excitement over something new. Tell me, with a country like Japan having the same shortage of units with a more hardcore gaming culture, why did they not show the violence that America did? If it was so cutthroat, by the time PS3 launched in America, we would just finish drying our eyes as the animals fought across the pacific.

Some fans camped out for days for a PS3

So what is happening now? Microsoft is over a year ahead and selling pretty damn well. Nintendo is smiling, shipping 150,000 – 200,000 nearly flawless units to the U.S., and more across the globe. Meanwhile Sony is telling the world to "back off" for a moment. Frankly, they have every right to say just that.

Sony is no stranger to tough business situations; they’ve been in the biz for a long time. Sitting at the top of the board in Japan is a very old brain trust that wants to see their baby branded into every man, woman, and child across the globe. Now they’re struggling to see where they hiccuped. After this Playstation 3 launch, they may realize that their proprietary Blu-Ray player [although a commendable risk], did not necessarily become the smoking gun that they were looking for in order to sell their next-generation system.

Did they consider that their new system has a giant “Playstation” written across it? How about the fact that they have not a new (not newer version) Playstation unit in years? How about having the largest fan base in the world, most units sold in the world? They had the market, but they didn’t perform. The system being launched would have sold itself.

How do you figure Apple continuously sells and dominates the mp3 player market with their iPods? They get newer, cooler, sleeker and what else? They work wonderfully.

It bothers me that Sony furiously spent time, effort and money into their beautiful new system, but stumbled during the busy holiday season and could not get one in the hands of their millions of fans. What do we see instead? We see people exploiting others on eBay. We see people selling the console for five times its value, so Mr. and Mrs. John Doe can't please their kids. We see people getting trampled in line, shot, or robbed at gunpoint. It is sickening.

To potentially add insult to injury, what if Blu-Ray doesn’t take off? And all the Playstation 3’s Blu-Ray functionality is rendered an expensive mistake? Maybe then we’ll add it to the list of proprietary Sony goodies like their Memory Stick Pro Duo’s, Minidisk Players and i-Link cables that can frustrate us, but be there for us when we’re ready for something new.

In the end, Sony will succeed. Why? They bring a unique balance to the console gaming world. They’re huge. They know for the most part what they’re doing. The tripod of console kings keep each other in check, on their toes, and are always changing. I’m certain Microsoft and Nintendo would love to see Sony tank, but inside they know that if that happens, the smaller rivalry will be just as fierce. In the meantime, give Sony some extra time to flex their muscles with tons of games, armies of fans and a nice shiny black box to play with for the next five years.