PlayStation Move bests Nintendo Wii in content, precision, Sony says

The PlayStation Move motion-control system will go on sale this fall. Sony exec Peter Dille says he expects gamers to migrate 'naturally' from the Nintendo Wii to the Move.

On Wednesday, Sony took the wraps off the PlayStation Move, a motion-control device touted as the natural successor to the top-selling Nintendo Wii. In a series of demos at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, a team of Sony developers put the Move through its paces – steering Sackgirl through a series of pitfalls (see PlayStation Move video below) in "LittleBigPlanet," hunting terrorists in "SOCOM," and brawling in a game called "Motion Fighters."

The PlayStation Move, which will go on sale this fall, is a peripheral for the Sony PlayStation 3, a system popular with so-called hardcore gamers. By introducing Move, Sony hopes to broaden the PS3 audience, much in the same way Nintendo attracted swaths of casual gamers with the Wii. And the price is pretty right: The Move system, including the motion controller, a game, and the PlayStation Eye sensor, should sell for $100.

The centerpiece of the Move is the black controller, which appears to be about the same size as the Wiimote. Over at USA Today, reporter Mike Snider generously describes the thing as a "wand-like motion remote with a lighted ball on top." To this blogger, the Move remote looks a toy flashlight. (Sony says it will sell Move remotes with bulbs in a range of colors, from sky blue and light green to pink.")

Gamers control the bulk of the action by aiming the brightly-lit ball in the general direction of the screen; there's also a separate "Subcontroller" for scrolling through menus, selecting weapons, choosing building materials, etc.

Speaking at GDC, Peter Dille, senior vice president of marketing for Sony Computer Entertainment, acknowledged the Move's debt to the Nintendo Wii.

But he said that the more precise Move would appeal to both casual gamers and committed gamers looking for superior gameplay. "The migration path from the Wii household to the PlayStation 3 household is a pretty natural path, partly because of the experience that you can get on the PlayStation Move but also because of the content that we find on PlayStation 3," Dille said, according to the AP.

Check out the Monitor's breakdown and comparison of the PlayStation Move, Nintendo Wii, and Xbox 360 Natal here.

PlayStation Move video:

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