Sony to focus on family market in 2012

Sony has revealed plans to aim the PlayStation 3 at a "younger demographic" in 2012.

In an interview with Official PlayStation Magazine UK, European PlayStation boss Jim Ryan said that the move is linked with the console's new lower price point.

"If you look back at the history on PS1, PS2 the vast majority of the business that we did on both those platforms was done at the sub £129 price points. Now we've only got to £199 in the UK a couple of months back so you can see there's still a lot of PS3s potentially to be sold," Ryan explained.

"I think you'll see us taking the console more towards a slightly younger demographic. More family market."

The recently-appointed SCEE boss was keen to point out that the new strategy would not affect the core gamer.

"The core gamer will absolutely not be neglected. There's going to be tons of great stuff for the core gamer but from our own studio, third-parties there's some quite interesting stuff happening in a number of areas which would allow us to open up a market that we accessed pretty successfully on both PS1 and PS3 but haven't yet got to on PS3."

The latest statement echoes comments he made in August about PlayStation 3 sales needing to improve in the UK.