Slashdot Mirror
Possible PS2 Price Portent Pondered
Londovir writes "Could Nintendo soon be sharing shelf space at the $99 rack? According to an article on IGN.com, an internal source at Target claims to have received printed fliers with the Playstation 2 listed at $99. If you remember from an earlier story from September, it was an advance newspaper ad from Target (again), as well as a leaked scan of a Wal-Mart ad, that told the world about the GameCube's price before it happened. Given how the GameCube is outselling the PS2 & XBox - would a price drop so low be so unexpected? One last tidbit to contemplate: Sony is ready to roll the manufacturing plants for their smaller 90 nanometer PS2 CPU. Maybe that price drop isn't so unbelievable after all..."
Now I can play more Tekken! Wheeeee!
"During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act" -- George Orwell
Will it include the network adapter still?
1. Even if they give them away for free, I don't think I'll play on a console : I'm used to playing with a mouse + used to switch between work & play for 5 minutes of fun between hours of stress. So I'll play on my PC for quite some time to come.
2. Folks who bought a PS2 at $499 must really feel screwed now. And they say Apple has large profit margins !
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
Rolling out PCs^H^H^Hgame consoles and selling them for several hundred $ below cost
- and some information on how much a PS2, a GCN and a X-box costs to produce would be intresting.
...no?
Look, dropping the PS2 to $99 would probably cause Sony to make almost nothing on the hardware, if they aren't losing money at that point. There's also no need to jump down to the Game Cube's level, as they'll still outsell both Nintendo and Microsoft, even at a higher price. Hell, the number of people who have to rebuy a PS2 to replace a dead one probably outnumbers the number of people who picked up a GCN at its new low price.
Besides, the new wave of consoles are coming in 2005 or 2006...do you honestly think Sony will keep it at $99 or less for 2 or 3 YEARS before their new system?
In other words...no.
Sony is ready to roll the manufacturing plants for their smaller 90 nanometer PS2 CPU. Maybe that price drop isn't so unbelievable after all..."
Not sure that makes a whole lot of sense, considering that the cost to run a 90nm process is quite expensive. The smaller processes like that get much more expensive, and I can see little reason (other than experience, maybe) for Sony to change the process on a chip whose specs are not going to be changed, either. Unless, of course, they plan on using it in another product.
Sales of the GCN are just a blip for the moment. There are lots of people who already have a PS2 or XBOX who are interested in the GCN simply because it has some really nice games. I know, I have a GCN that I bought just for Rogue Squadron II. However, as the PS2 is still the most popular system with the greatest selection of games it makes no sense to drop the price yet.
Now the XBOX is a different case entirely, it really needs to be cheaper.
I suspect Sony will keep the price where it is in the run up to Christmas and then drop it early next year.
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
If the PS2's price drops, then xbox will be the only expensive console making xbox the apple (even though it's made by microsoft) of video game systems. that would probably hurt sales alot...
People don't buy PS2's or Gamecubes because of price, primarily. They're geared at completely different markets. The Gamecube is the 2-16 year old market. The PS2 is an older market. It's all about the games. I wouldn't care if the Gamecube was $5. I would never buy one because the game selection is primarily for little kids (Mario, anime, silly Japanese shit, etc.). People who want a PS2 will buy a PS2.
Is the Nintendo GameCube or the Sony Playstation 2 going to be $99? Really badly written article. If the PS2 is going to be dropping to $99, why is Nintendo sharing space at the $99 rack? If the GC is dropping to $99, why are you talking about the PS2?
... and that's I, for one, welcome our new Playstation overlords...
As far as PS2 functionality Goes, it's almost as good as an X-Box. A box for $100 bucks that plays DVD's and some great Console games will surely outsell gamecube. A Gamecube can do one thing, play gamecube games. People want that Multi-Function crap if they're going to shell out for set top boxes.
PS2 + Linux Kit + USB Keyboard and mouse gives a socially acceptable Linux machine in the front room 300. Now thats something to smile about :)
Rus
Cheap UK and US VPS
Wrong article buddy
Before: PS2 + 5 top games ($49): ~$400
After price drop: ~$350, which is only 12% lower.
Now if they lower price of the games to $20-$25 it will make a big difference.
What's the point? You can buy a *value* desktop that is more powerful, and has REAL 3D support for the same price.
Disgaea was the first PS2 game to tempt me to buy one. But if Sony is going to drop the price on them by about half in a few months, I can hold off until then and play lots of Viewtiful Joe instead. Thanks Sony!
Ita erat quando hic adveni.
It's hard to see how Microsoft can get the XBox to profitability. The original game plan was that decreasing electronics costs would eventually make the XBox profitable at the original price point. But Nintendo and Sony aren't letting Microsoft maintain that price point. They've pushed the price of game consoles down from around $300 to $100. Microsoft was losing money on every unit at $300; it's worse now.
The only way Microsoft can make money with the XBox is if they achieve market dominance and pricing power. That's not happening. They've found themselves in price competition against larger competitors with lower costs, an unusual position for Microsoft.
Microsoft is trying to design a lower-priced XBox 2, which might bail them out of this hole. But that's still some time away.
Surely sundered sanity seizes sovereignty soon!
If Sony does this (somehow I doubt it, although a drop to $150 wouldn't be unexpected), MS has got to drop. Imagine picking up what's essentially a computer in a box for $99.
:)
To be honest, as a geek, Xbox has become my favorite plaything. The games have started to get very good (I've been playing Panzer Dragoon and Voodoo Vince pretty much non-stop) and, when you're ready to hack the system, all the parts are there. I actually have two: one legitimate one I use on Xbox Live and another I've sacrificed for hacking. Hard drive, Intel processor, networking, nice video: card all for $100? I'll pick up another.
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
I'm not going to say that I'm certain it's going to happen, but it's very likely. I was reading in a recent wal-mart magazine that the prices on PS2 and XBox's would be dropping--though I didn't have a certain price. Now, the main reason, I'm thinking, is probably to do this in time for Christmas, so it'd hafta be going on soon. Basically, I'm just agreeing with the "rumors" in the article.
I can own all three systems for $300 and the next generation consoles are no where in sight. Can't think of a better time to buy.
Seriously I don't even buy games on release dates anymore. Wait a couple weeks and it's down to $39. Wait a year and it's at $29.
I've wanted a ps2 in my home for a long time. They sell it for 99 and they'll get one in my home along w/ FFX, Kingdom Hearts, the network addapter, maybe EOA, and the Dvd player stuff.
I do security
It seems to me that using new hardware would increase the price of production as opposed to decreasing it. Does anyone have any figures?
M: The principle's the same. The Mohammedans don't come 'round here wavin' bells at us! We don't get Buddhists playing bagpipes in our bathroom! Or Hindus harmonizing in the hall! The Shintos don't come here shattering sheet glass in the shithouse, shouting slogans-
W: All right, don't practice your alliteration on me.
Hear hear! Yes, you are right. I also will never buy a console for the following reasons...
1. Graphics are inferior.
2. No mouse control.
3. Inability to mod games.
4. Investment in console is not an investment in PC hardware upgrade or other PC games.
5. Consoles depreciate faster than PCs.
6. Inability to store several games at once?
7. Internet gameplay almost impossible without service, even if free, is monitored.
8. Inability to easily run servers.
9. Requires development license for developers.
10. Poor games. Except for Halo, Most games are arcade style with very little emphasis on visualization/realism technologies that made PC games so exciting...ex, Half-Life2.
11. Developers are "trapped" by the console's limited OS infrastructure.
12. Consoles are "toaster" technology that doesn't impart any requirement for the user to "learn" anything new. A "cattle for slaughter" mentality from the huge Microsoft and Sony corps.
Probably plenty more that I have forgotten!
Just say "No" to consoles!
+2
You are right. The PS2 is for the older market. Including the pussy whipped married guys whose wives want let them spend $200 on a console but MIGHT let them spend $99.
If the next generation of game consoles came out at $150 price point?
You know how quickly they could saturate the market? Would the quikness hurt sales? I mean if PS3 came out at that point and Xbox2 was $300+ which one would you get?
This would certainly help to have a huge user base to buy games which iirc are the main source of revenue and profits.
-- taking over the world, we are.
I work at a Zellers store (Canadian equiv. of Target/Wal-Mart etc.) and just went to a seminar held by Sony to help area stores sell their crap better and to show off new stuff like the EyeToy.
There were a ton of questions about stuff, of course someone asked what Sony's response to the Cube price drop was. They answered that there were no plans to do anything about it as the Cube is aimed at a very different group of people (ie kids).
I also haven't heard anything from the Sony rep. in our area who I'm pretty good friends with, or in upcomming fliers.
It could very well be true of course, just nothing that's passed my way has mentioned it.
This is the same argument almost every time a video game console story appears on the Slashdot main page. "NOOOO...Mouse, blah, blah"
Okay, so this is slightly offtopic but...
Monster Hunter for PS2 is like a multiplayer morrowind meets rune game that has USB kb support. Finally networked games worth playing on a console. =)
Of course they are going to lower the price. They want to stay competitive. They did it with the PS, I have no doubt that they will with the PS2.
Mod this man up!
I remember when I used to play Doom, then Quake with the keyboard. Everyone around me was saying try the mouse, but I didn't think I would like it so I kept on playing with the keyboard as I knew it like the back of my hand. Then, after months and months of just getting blasted by my foes on the game I decided to try it. Man, what a change! Instant 360 degree rotation! I was fragg'n with the best of them. I'll never go back. Sometimes you just gotta' try new things.
+1
GCN selling at $99 is putting it as a temporary loss. Nintendo is not losing too much money to make it a dangerous thing, in fact, they could make it profitable again in the next manufacturing round.
.18 micron process and that can be dramatically improved now.
.09 micron console so easily. Microsoft OTOH has not been able to make the Xbox much cheaper, they were supposed to show an "Xbox-lite" smaller console this year at E3, but the event came and went without any sign of it. Still, Sony and Microsoft may need to follow suit, if only to keep sales strong.
The GCN was designed from the very beginning as a low-price machine. The ATI and IBM chips are very well integrated and have a lot of room for costs reduction. At the time of launch, they were still made using a
Many regarded the GCN's production halt as a sign of weakness, but this has been a normal move since the first NES. I can certainly see a more integrated GCN motherboard (can the thing be even better? It's already incredibly tiny and simple), maybe even putting everything on one die, just what ultimately happened with the SNES. Slashing costs even further is possible because the TSOP technology used is far chesper now than in 2000 when the GCN's spec was frozen.
For Nintendo, this is something they had planned for so long and it's finally paying off. But Sony and Microsoft have much more to lose if their price point got to that low level.
Sony just launched the SCPH-50000 model a few months ago, so I don't think they can roll out a
This Christmas season suddenly seems a lot more interesting and leaves me wondering about the next one... Historically these price drops happen only when the next consoles are around the corner, which is definitely not the case here.
- Otaku no naka no otaku, otaking da!!!
(and by bringing this up 'how to be modded as troll'.)
Take every possible chance to slam the Xbox, even if the article isn't specifically Xbox related:
1. tell everybody how it loses money on every unit sold.
2. Evil Empire microsoft bad, evil empire Sony good.
3. fail to realise that they ALL have their good and bad points, and there are still people futzing around with the Atari 2600, dreamcast, et. al. And when (if?) one of the three players fails, hey CHEAP GAMES!
BTW, The judges are docking you points because you fail to mention the URL for that Game shop owner (who's name escapes me at the moment, you know the one.) and that comic making fun of the Xbox controller's size.
Sheesh folks, MOVE ON! At $200 or less for Any of these things, buy one of each or don't. (And try not to think your allowance is going to several multi-billion dollar conglomerates that LOVE you either way you go.)
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
like taking candy from a baby
Yeah, really a kid's game. I know the primary market is still fuzzy friendly games, but there *is* a decent selection of 'adult' games on the GC (and it looks hella better than PS2 or Xbox). Is Rockstar releasing the next GTA for all 3 consoles?
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
Do you believe in restricting independent amateurs from making console style games because they can't afford the 5 or 6 figures USD necessary to buy a legitimate development kit for GameCube or Xbox? Or are you willing to that the best console game pad is compatible with PC games through a $16 adapter?
Will I retire or break 10K?
That's all I have to say, it's been pointed out ad nauseum...
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
If you look at the financials for hardware expenditures and profits in the GC division Nintendo was making a hefty profit on the GC hardware before so they may not be incurring any losses at all while at the $99 price point. In addition Nintendo was farming out manufactoring to China which was expected to cut costs.
--- I do not moderate.
64 players is a lot. 24-32 is decent.
How do you expect to fit 32 players into a room in a single-family residence? How do you expect to have players' parents approve of disconnecting their consoles and TVs and LANning up? Oh, you mean Internet play? Many areas are still not wired for residential high-speed Internet access, and satellite still has too much latency for real-time gaming. (Civ and Tetrinet are turn based so they don't count.) Even in areas wired for broadband, most minor children's allowances are not large enough to afford upwards of $400 per year for broadband.
Will I retire or break 10K?
(but only if the TV is standing close to the computer)
When I lived at college, my TV was 200 miles away from me because I didn't have space in my dorm room for a dedicated TV, and a good TV input card (i.e. not an ATI TV Wonder VE) was too pricey for my budget. I survived the first two years of college with PC games and emulated console games, adding a GBA at the start of my junior year.
Will I retire or break 10K?
in my country (in portugal) and he said that in a month the ps2 would decrease the price a lot.
They're releasing their "new version" of the PS2, the.. PSX, I think?
I've got over the confusion of IBM PS/2 vs. Sony PS2, but I call this new Sony hardware the "PS2vo" because Sony itself used the name "PSX" for a PS1 in the old form factor (picture). A Google Images search for "psx" turns up only one picture of a PS2vo and lots of pictures of PS1s.
Will I retire or break 10K?
That's cool, but you must admit... why would a Sony employee disclose a strategic price drop to a Zellers employee? Messages and techniques, I can understand, since you have to train in those. But a price drop? No prep required. When it hits you, you'll know. No training necessary.
Per a recent interview with the head of marketing at NOA, they still are not losing money on the consoles and "refuse to ever sell hardware at a loss." Just so ya know.
It's nice that they're droping the price of the console, but that's never really been a problem as far as I'm concerned. What good is a console (any console) without a good selection of games? At 50 bucks a pop, it's expensive to build up library of games.
When they drop the price of new games to the $10-$20 range, then I'll get another console. (I have an Xbox because I was able to get games at $10 each.)
"Those who would sacrifice essential liberty for temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Nobody outside of slashdot cares about Linux on the Xbox. Hardly anyone cares about the Xbox having a hard drive. It's all about the games. Halo sells the Xbox, Final Fantasy and GTA sell the PS2, and Mario and Zelda sell the Gamecube.
I can trade in all my Mediaplay points and get me a PS2. I love competition.
alliteration is the repitition of consonant sounds. assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds. if you're gonna go for highbrow humor, get it right :)
How in the PS2 now? Almost 3 years old (In the US). Based on previous game consoles, that means the PS2 is nearing the average lifetime of a console (which is about 3~5 years).
Regardless of sales and the numbers game, Sony is under pressure to continue the impression that they're dominating the market. The gaming industry may be big business, but as it is the gaming industry is a harsh, demanding market with little room for failures or mistakes. (Sega being the biggest example) If Sony was to lose footing due to the PS2's weak hardware (expansions don't really count) and fails to bring the PS3 out in time to compete, Sony will be in huge trouble.
Christmas will be here in less than 3 months. What more can I say?
Seeing as Gutenberg made his press in the middle of the 15th century and that the first ads weren't printed until mass literacy came around, we haven't been exposed to flyers advertising stuff for 9.99 and 99.99 until very recently - maybe a few decades. Ditto for the TV ads.
But your point is correct - people don't want to buy something that costs $10.00. They want it for $9.99 - maybe because it has less digits.
One store has them locally. And only in one place, where they dumped the new pallets.
This unit is pretty nice.
Maybe Target is blowing out the old units in preparation?
Pedants typically read.
Breakfast served all day!
Phantasy Star Online is, by all accounts, highly dope. Although its netplay is more in the Diablo II mold.
Smaller == cheaper.
You put more parts togehter and thus have fewer packages and pins. Chips go in in price with die area, pins and of course packages cost money too. You can reduce the cost of all these.
Also, smaller processes use less power. That means a smaller power supply and smaller fan too. That also reduces cost.
Smaller is cheaper in electronics very nearly axiomatically.
I'm not sure I understand how buying a usb adapter for my controller allows independent amateurs to make console games without paying licensing fees.
I didn't say "console games." I said "console style games" (emphasis added). Targeting a PC with a console controller connected through a USB adapter lets amateurs develop and publish PC games that use a console-style control paradigm.
Will I retire or break 10K?
It's called modding
Note the circumvention ban in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Note the "non-US citizenship" condition I mentioned and the lack of the United States on the map on the front page of thefreeworld.net to which I linked.
welcome to 2001.
Welcome to 1998, when 17 USC 1201 was enacted. Region lockout is a technological measure that "effectively protects a right of a copyright owner" (section 1201(b)) to restrict imports under section 602.
Will I retire or break 10K?
I wonder whether the price drop might be related to the reported introduction of the new model in the U.S. soon. Perhaps they're lowering the cost on the old model to clear stock on it more quickly? Or maybe they're going for a two-tier pricing scheme: $179 for the SPCH-50000 and $99 for the older version.
If they drop it to 99, that also puts it into direct competion with many dvd players.