DigitalBattle.com

Recently US-based company Qualcomm Inc. unveiled the Zeebo, essentially their plan for benefiting from burgeoning economies across the globe. It’s a home gaming console that takes the same general approach as Nintendo’s Wii; utilize less powerful yet far more affordable technology and you can get thrifty shoppers on board. One of the markets Qualcomm is hoping that the Zeebo will catch on in is India, whose relatively insular economy is doing well in the current financial crisis.

Unfortunately a writer for GamingIndians says that they’ve got pretty much no chance. He cites one of the biggest reasons as price. Though it’s relatively cheap at around $174, the PS2 is only $125 in India and Sony has just announced a price cut of $25 or so (which some are suggesting is directly in response to the Zeebo).

Another big issue is the digital distribution model. Apparently this hasn’t caught on in India; people are much more comfortable going to a store and exchanging cash for an actual physical item. An interesting offshoot of this is that part of the appeal of the PS2 is piracy. Indian gamers (I’m taking all this information from the gentleman’s blog entry, no flames please) are reluctant to buy a console that doesn’t give them the option of playing cheap, pirated copies of games. The games themselves are an issue, with the Playstation having a huge back catalog of games, more being developed currently and general recognition (all gaming consoles are called ‘Playstations’ much as many MP3 players get called iPods).