There's no doubt that Microsoft's Xbox 360 will
have the price advantage this holiday season, and if you were hoping to see a bona fide price cut following Sony's introduction of the
$399.99 80GB PlayStation 3, you'll probably be waiting 'til late 2009. Speaking at the Gamer 3.0 conference in London this week, Sony's own Ray Maguire was quoted as saying that the pressure for a price drop from consumers was always there, but given that it "has a business to run" and shareholders to please, it probably won't be decreasing the PS3's price before the end of 2008. He also stated that "at the moment, there's a market place for the PS3," and that "the price of the console [won't] be an issue at all." In all honesty, he's probably right -- after all, this
will be the first holiday season where Blu-ray isn't competing with some
other physical HD format, and c'mon, you know you'll pay a premium to dabble in
Life with PlayStation.
[Via
PS3 Fanboy]
posted October 29th 2008 4:08AM
Exactly. This is called "Business" guys.
Just watch and learn on how the PS3 will outsold the 360 this holiday.
Let's watch and learn how you get downranked to oblivion.
@Phil
Actually I disagree with you Phil. The marathon analogy does not apply because after all PS2 created it's massive growth (vs GC + Xbox) by having a great console released early with a marathon of great games out by the time Xbox and GC came out. They lead it from the beginning and just kept leading. They built a great consumer base and grew it out to last so long. It turned out none of the "extra features" of GC or Xbox (superior graphics + online play) were able to beat out Sony. Now the competition is very strong, they are making a big mistake.
@Krystian
Next time you reply to a post, please press "Reply" button, its there for a reason...
In addition, it clearly does matter when you sell during the lifecycle as the sooner you sell a console, the more likely the purchaser will be to buy more games (at a higher price). Those that buy PS2 now get excellent value and bargain priced games. Also, the more consoles sold early could mean more profit per console, as per Nintendo Wii. Also, the more consoles sold early the more upsell opportunities exist, be it Live, PSN, accessories or what have you. Also, the more consoles sold early the earlier developers will take the platform seriously and focus it's efforts on it. Also, the more consoles sold early the more likely it is that your competitors won't be able to encroach on your market share. Also, the more consoles sold early the more momentum builds up for the brand. Also, the more PS3 consoles sold early the more likelihood there is of Blu-ray taking off. Also, the more PS3 consoles sold early the more likely purchasers will migrate to PS4 early during it's lifecycle.
Wether you agree with some or all of the above, there are plenty of reasons why Sony should be doing more to sell more consoles as early as possible. If I have to wait another 12 months for a significant price drop, I might as well wait until they release a Slim version at $200 AUD. I've been a die-hard PS3 fan for the last few years but now I'm thinking that I might as well stick with my Wii and PS2, and perhaps pickup a low-cost DS or 360 until the PS3 gets sensible with it's pricing.
Sony has the best machine, but the pricing is screwing things up. They've gone from dominating the market (PS2) to becoming an also-ran. Sure they're not going to go bankrupt quite yet, but they have been seriously marginalised whilst against relatively weak competition (Wii based on old tech, 360 having so many issues). On top of that, we're stepping into a world-wide recession and it seems that we've perhaps seen the best of what the PS3 has to offer, or close to it, and it aint that much better than the 360 frankly.
Also, the Aussie dollar has fallen so much against the greenback that even another significant price drop in the US would be unlikely to be passed on over here. If the Aussie 360 prices get in line with US 360 prices soon, I'm getting one. And I hate the things.
Its a shame, Xbox is having a hell of a Christmas this year, I wonder if the good ole UK Sony loyalty can survive.
@ ajc
Re-translation: you think we can can lose that much money so soon while we are consistently seeing our marketshare being eaten away by MS and some Japanese retro 80s gamin outfit who get away with re-making the same 6 games every few years, whats their name...oh...yeah Nintendo!
I don't give a damn what they think or who they please! I want a price cut on a holiday!!!
After Sony's last price drop of the PS3, their sales rose nearly 200%. Sure they have a business to run, but they can't really think that price is not an issue with consumers. Price is one of the biggest things people look at. Sure, to myself, and most of you other Engadget readers, we know how much more power the PS3 has over the competition, or who has more quality games, or what is the best value, etc. but to the average consumer, its hard to pick out these differences. Especially those parents who buy systems for their children. If the child doesn't specifically demand the PS3, there's a good chance that parents see all gaming systems as fairly similar and won't see the value in spending much more than the rest of the systems. The only thing that people can really see without research is the advertised pricing. I can't Sony's PR strategies and their BS, beat around the bush answers. Most people still don't see the value in Blu-Ray either, or even really know what it is. Now that standalone players are nearing sub-$200 prices, with most reaching this price point by christmas, Sony is going to start to lose that sales edge of having the blu-ray player built in at a lesser price than competing Blu-Ray players.
I recently picked up an Xbox w/ the $30 dell coupon for a grand total of $182 after taxes. I figure the money saved by buying used AAA titles on the Xbox, it will have paid for itself. For example, I bought Bioshock for $30($60 plus tax for PS3), Lost Odyssey, and Mass Effect all for ~$30 each.
However I do fear that the development of games for the PS3 might be hampered by the Xbox's DVD limitation. I wasn't feeling the 4 discs Lost Odyssey comes in, it would have fit in one nice blu ray on the PS3. They weren't kidding about the noise of the DVD drive either. Oh, accessory prices SUCK! $100 for a wifi adapter? Common now, I ended up running an ethernet cable to my desktop and bridging the connection.
With the credit crunch and all, I dont think many people will think of consoles this year. And definitely not at the price the PS3 is selling here in Europe. 400euro are way too much if you compare them to XBox360's 199.
Its going to be a mean xmas.
@Krystian
Well, we'll agree to disagree. In my opinion, the success of any product is based upon its sales over its entire lifecycle.
Let's come back to this in say, 6 years.
Sony have a lot of room to manoeuvre with regards to price. We'll see one early next year.
I'm not saying price is'nt important, far from it. For example, the local Curry's electrical retailer reopened recently after a re-fit and they held a discount day. PS3's were £190 (normally £299) for the day and the store sold out 500(!!!) PS3's in one day.
Just an example of the staggeringly huge, untapped next-gen market.
It is all far from cut and dried.
Even so, it would be extremely stupid to announce a price-drop in advance, because everyone would obviously not buy them now and wait.
I'll tell you a couple reasons why PS3 is a value compared to Xbox:
1. Best first, second, and 3rd party games
2. Non-proprietary hard drives
3. Free online
4. Every PS3 has a hard drive (a big plus for developers)
5. PS3 has very reliable hardware (no breakage problems like Xbox has had)
1. you have to be retard
2. i will give you this one
3. free online just sucks compared to live.
4. developers hate programming for the PS3
5. to be honest my PS3 and Xbox have both been sent for repair.
What has that harddrive for every SKU done for us? Mandatory installs?
re: B
I think your question was rhetorical, but I will answer it anyways. When every SKU has a hard drive, software publishers/programmers can release larger patches, bug fixes, and downloadable content. Without knowing that every SKU had a HDD, they would be forced to keep those file sizes much smaller to allow for the smaller memory sticks.
And by the way, mandatory installs are a good thing because they reduce read (load) times post-install.
re: giulioup
If you think the Wii will still be selling this well in 2010, you're dellusional. Meanwhile, the other two consoles will be sporting IPTV functionality via Netflix online, downloadable HD movies, downloadable game trailers, downloadable FULL games.
Oh, and did I mention Xbox and PS3 have more than 1 game that supports online multiplayer.
Sony are a bunch of Douchbags. Lower the freaking price. Not that I really care, I already have one and $399 isn't that bad of a price. However, I know people that want one, that don't want to spend $399. Seriously, would $359.99 put you out of business or eat so much into your profits that you will die a slow and horrible death? No. It will actually do nothing.
True, you sold the PS3 at a loss for the longest time. Now you are making a profit, and by now you already more that broke even. At $359.99 you still make a profit and you can even increase your sales by dropping it such a little amount.
Sony, you suck gangrenous donkey balls.
Am I the only one who thinks this makes no sense when Amazon has the PS3 Metal Gear Grey Bundle for $400 real soon???.... Doesnt really add up.. I smell a price cut regardless. They won't survive this christmas without one. Must of the large titles this winter have been on Xbox or on both systems. The average consumer will choose the xbox over the ps3 this years holiday thats for sure. Sorry Sony :-\....
but I'm broke ..
this is suicide for sony. the 360 is even outselling the ps3 in Japan. this has never happened. playstation 3 was the cheapest bluray player on the block and now you can pick them up a standalone for less than $200 and probably less $175 by the end of the year. this is not good news for sony.
300 notes (the ones with a Queen's head on them) is too much for me. Sorry, Sony, I remain unconvinced that the PS3 is worth this sort of money, particularly when you have competitors selling similar products for a much lower price. Given the current recession I can safely say that my wife would not be impressed if I spent this sort of money when we already have a Wii from last year.
That makes the deal recently featured on TechDealDigger.com look even better. It was $339.99 for a PS3 80 GB from Dell. http://www.techdealdigger.com/deals/sony-playstation-3-339-at-dell-home--home-office/4726
man it really bums me out to see how Sony's PR fails to turn their bad rep around. Out of all 3 systems so far I use my ps3 much more often than wither competitor, and I haven't had any unreliability problems.
"and c'mon, you know you'll pay a premium to dabble in Life with PlayStation."
$250 is the magical price point for me. I don't care about 80GB hard drives, and if you try to tell me that it's justification for a higher, check neweggs site for HDD prices and try to tell me that again.
Even though you can buy a 360 for $199 only an uninformed person would buy one, or someone replacing a broken 360 not covered by the RRoD warranty. The 360 arcade is a terrible system for $199 because to get any of the advanced functionality of the 360 you need to spend a whole lot more on accessories. You need a hard drive for the 360 and a lot of people need a Wi-Fi adapter. It is the same knock on Sony but the Arcade only comes with a composite cable for video and no netwrok cable. At least they added a wireless controller. The 360 pro is really the only starting option for anyone wanting to buy a 360. The Elite isn't really worth the extra cash.
The Xbox 360 is running out of steam. Unless something major happens this is probably going to be the last big season for the console. Microsoft's year over year sales have declined since launch and it is a hardcore system. Microsoft's new family push means that it will put less resources towards the hardcore audience and alienate the hardcore base. Microsoft doesn't care one bit about anyone that bought a 360, they only want the money. The 3 year warranty wasn't created becuase Microsoft cared about the consumer, it was created to stop a recall. So far the strategy that Microsoft has run with failed to put the overall XBOX division in the black and that is why they are taking a Wii approach from here on out.
Disagree if you want but take a look at the new Xbox experience and marketing push. Does that really look like the same company that made a console to play Halo? Even the Gears 2 commercial makes it look a lot more friendly than it really is. I'm sure a lot of parents would watch that commercial thinking the game really isn't all gory and violent. Then watch in horror when they see the actual gameplay. At least Dead Space shows that it is going to be a bloody and violent game.
As for Sony, it does have the best hardware and $399 is a good price for what they give you. It is the only platform with a standard hard drive, wireless, and HD drive all together. The problem is that the competition is cheaper. The PS3 also offers a wider variety of games. The 360 may have Gears and Halo but the PS3 has good shooters as well. Nearly all 3rd party games will be multiplatform from here on out and the PSN has shown itself to be a better network title platform. Add an extra year to the game library and the PS3 easily matches the game library of the 360. A lot of people like to forget that the 360 has the advantage of an extra year, which really didn't put out a lot of good titles.
On overall merits the PS3 is the best console and the most forward looking. The BluRay drive is a great addition and doesn't hold the PS3 back like the DVD drive in the 360. There is a reason why Gears and Halo3 were short games. You can't add more unique levels if you don't have the space.
The biggest problem with the PS3 is that it is a bit too forward. The PS3 should have actually launched last year with a huge built up library and a better GPU. Microsoft's rush and Toshiba's insistence on trying to market HD-DVD really did hurt the PS3. In the end Toshiba clouded the marketplace with a product that had no chance of winning the format war and pushed off adoption of a HD standard and kept HD prices from falling due to volume. Microsoft rushed development and made a piece of junk hardware wise.
This generation is kind of a writeoff generation with bad hardware from Microsoft and an out of place console from Sony. That is why the Wii is running away with sales. Not enough people cared about the 360 and not enough people were ready for the PS3.
Is the price point really that bad? I know we go over these comments but they still stand true ...
1) Kid wants a new game console
2) Dad/family wants a new DVD/BD player
= PS3. This was how I made my decision and in the end much more flexibility than 1 other console plus a new player.
Yes, it is that bad.
@Phil
Please do not repeat other's people posts, especially when they're useless.
"I repeat, sales over a products LIFETIME are how we deduce whether a product is successful or not."
So you think that while the PS3 is lagging behind the other consoles (PS2 and Wii), at a certain point not only it would match their numbers, but actually sell much more, and end up beating PS2 sales?
You realise that that would mean 20 millions consoles a year, steady for 7 years, starting about now? And that neither the Wii, probably the fastest-selling console of all time, nor the PS2, the best-selling one, haven't made that numbers?
All I can say is "LOL".
Maybe if Sony brought back the crippled/ghetto PS3 as I use to call it, then maybe they can have an el cheapo system like the XBox 360 does. I originally had the watered down PS3 with no Wifi card, multi-card reader and smaller hard drive. After having it a week, I realized the Wifi was a big deal for me so I returned it for the 60GB version and have had it ever since. Quality wise, the PS3 is much superior to the xbox because I bought both systems about 2 xmases ago and the 360 has visited the repair center more than once. I will probably have to goto my friends place to play gears of war 2 when it comes out depending on how fast they return the 360. Also the lack of Wifi on the 360 is really a pain in the ass to say the least cause I'm not spending $100 for a wireless card. Finally, the Wii was fun the first week I had it and when people visit, but playing it alone becomes a chore. I really wish they made a regular controller for when you dont want to wavee the wii-remote and the nunchuck around. Also I hope the next iteration of Xbox and Wii do away with the region locks as PS3 has done with BD. There are some Japanese 360 and Wii games that i would like to play but to have to buy a dedicated console for that is also out of the question. That in short is my impression on all three consoles.
@Phil
"Who knows? Like I said, and will repeat for a third time: Sales over a products LIFETIME are how we deduce whether a product is successful or not."
Sorry for sounding "somewhat disrespectful" again, but you're repeating the same thing again and again without understanding the implications; you're just stopping there.
To sell better over its lifetime, the PS3 has to match and beat Wii's numbers, which is, in your own words, "a phenomenon". Either the PS3 becomes "a better phenomenon" and sells more than the Wii, or it loses the "marathon", because its position is, right now, at a great disadvantage.
There is no need to wait 6 years. If the PS3 keeps on selling at this pace in the near future, it will never, ever reach the others. The probability is already very low; the more time passes, the lesser the probability. If Sony doesn't cut prices soon and the PS3 doesn't become a "phenomenon" overnight, it will soon need to sell 25 million consoles a year, then 30, 35, and so on, with the probability of "winning" ever decreasing and equalling that of the world exploding now, in this precise moment. Did it explode?
Of course, we could wait 5 years and 11 months and then you could say, "Who knows? Maybe the PS3 will sell 60 million units in this last month."; I think this "kind of reasoning" more than deserves a "highly disrespectful" insult.
Dear Engadged commenting system: **** you.
ow no.....
They almost had me until bluray players dropped below 200 bucks, now I'll just wait and get one of them when they around 150.
I'm sure Microsoft is cheering at this, the 360 will once again top the PS3 this holiday season.
I own 3 PS3's, I have one in my bathroom, one in my bed room and one in the living room. I also have a Wii, and an xbox360. I like the wii, just because it doesnt have the big shinny graphics doesnt mean anything. I still play PS1 games now and then, graphics dont mean crap especially with these new machines, they all look the same. At least the wii makes you get off you LFA's instead of trying to defend a company, you are all corporate slaves. I cant wait for apple to come out with a gaming system though!