Cliff Edwards

Sony Corp.’s PlayStation 4 has won the initial skirmish over next-generation video-game consoles by exploiting the weak spots in Microsoft Corp.’s plan for the Xbox One: price and used-game policies. In dueling press conferences this week at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, Sony and Microsoft each made their pitch to the serious gamers whose opinions set the trend in the $37 billion market for console-based video games and hardware. Then customers were able to start reserving the new console of their choice. The result has been a rapid shift in expectations for the two machines, with Sony...

Sony on Monday unveiled the PlayStation 4, its first new console in seven years, taking the battle to Microsoft with a lower-priced machine, original content and fresh titles as it targets a return to video-game dominance. The PS4 will cost $399 in the U.S., 20 percent less than Microsoft’s Xbox One, Sony executives said  at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles. The machine, with sharp edges and blue highlights, allows unlimited used-game sales and doesn’t require an Internet connection, a contrast to two unpopular Microsoft features. The console is crucial to Chief Executive Officer Kazuo Hirai’s plan to...

Gun-toting fighters take a back seat to Microsoft Corp. and Sony Corp. this week as the console makers battle to show they’ve got the best plan for selling pricey machines in the age of cheap play on phones and tablets. Both present today at E3, the video-game industry’s annual conference running through June 13 in Los Angeles, with the $67 billion game market in the grip of two-year slump. Consumers have cut purchases of consoles and costly packaged games for inexpensive Web-delivered titles like Rovio Entertainment Oy’s “Angry Birds,” defined as more casual, mobile and social. Microsoft’s Xbox One...

Microsoft Corp.’s full-length, Hollywood-style movie based on the next “Halo” video game will skip the big screen, streaming instead on Google Inc.’s YouTube before heading to store shelves as a DVD. The Redmond, Washington-based maker of the Xbox console, promoting the November release of “Halo 4,” has taken the unusual step of creating its own 90-minute movie, at a cost of almost $10 million. Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) plans to release weekly installments of “Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn” on the Web before offering the game and DVD, a move that highlights the influence of new media, including promotional options...