The PS2 is the world's biggest-selling home console, and was a huge commercial success for Sony's PlayStation brand. However, its launch was a little more fraught than it needed to be, according to former Sony Computer Entertainment Europe president Chris Deering.
Speaking to Simon Parkin on the My Perfect Console podcast, Deering has revealed that the console was initially supposed to launch with a Sony-made sound chip, but plans changed at the very last minute in a rather embarrassing episode for the "Father of PlayStation" Ken Kutaragi.
Kutaragi, as we all know, spearheaded the idea of Sony making its own chipset to power the PS2, known as the Emotion Engine. Even now, Deering is amazed that this happened. "They actually built a chip factory in Nagasaki," he tells Parkin. "They worked 24-7 for 13 months, from a plot of land to a completely functioning chip factory."
Having seen this, the team behind the PS2's sound hardware was apparently inspired to do the same thing with the console's audio chip. "I don't know if I'm revealing any mysterious, deep, dark secrets," says Deering. "It's so long ago now that's just ancient history – but the people that designed the original Emotion Engine, their counterparts in the sound department said, 'We want to do our own [chip] also.' So [Ken] said, OK, go for it, guys."
Deering says that Kutaragi contacted Nvidia, which was originally supposed to be supplying the sound chip, and said its services were no longer required – apparently cancelling an order of around four million chips (Deering identifies the chip as the 'GeForce 8', but we're assuming he's getting things mixed up as that series didn't arrive until 2006 – after all, it has been over twenty years). "We weren't the most popular customer at Nvidia," he adds with a laugh.
However, disaster then struck. "About nine months before the things had to be in stores, the guys from the chip design group in Tokyo came into Ken and said, 'We cannot tell a lie; it doesn't work,'" explains Deering. Kutaragi's reaction was one of astonishment, but he had to find a solution. "He has to call up Nvidia on bended knee, saying, 'We need four million [chips], I'm sorry, we were stupid, our bad, whatever it takes, we'll move on.'"
Nvidia's response was less than ideal; the company told Kutaragi that it had originally intended to construct a special facility to make the chips, so Sony would have to settle for the previous generation of chips instead.
None of this impacted the fortunes of the PS2, but Deering admits that the confusion caused Sony to lose money. "Even though it was a success, it had a less-than-optimal sound chip. And as a result, we had missed schedules and very high air freight costs and other knock-on effects."