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PlayStation 3 Pricing Revealed?
Jakhel writes "IGN has up an article on PS3 pricing information. Apparently it comes straight from Sony officials. From the article: 'According an article published in the May 17th edition of Japan's Mainichi Shimbun, the PlayStation 3 could be one of the most expensive mass-market videogame consoles ever created. Officials from Sony apparently told the newspaper that PlayStation 3s would sell in Japan for "less than 50,000 yen each." That translates to about $465 US dollars.' So I guess they will be around $464.99 in the U.S. (plus tax of course). Granted, it does come with DVD Hi Def support out of the box, but is that enough to justify it's nearly $500 pricetag?" Commentary on this development available at GamesIndustry.biz as well.
Judging based on processing power, thats a bargain. It would cost in excess of $2,000 to get a comperable PC system. (Which don't even exist yet)
The "mainstream" console players, however, may find it harder to justify the higher price tag. Especially if the XBox 360 retails for a couple hundred less.
I'm sad to say that even with a $150 price difference than the expected price of the Xbox 360, the PS3 sounds to be a lot more bang for the buck. It's like comparing the DS to the PSP. I've owned both and frankly I wish I'd of saved my $150 from the DS to buy more PSP games.
that means LESS than $465. It is probably just someone saying the equivalent of "my car cost less than $100k." True statement, vague though.
I don't expect to see the PS3 come down at $450. If I were a betting man I'd say $299.
There is no way to justify paying that much money. I'll just wait a year or two.
If it comes out for more than $400, I'd be surprised. They need to be more competitive with the 360. I don't mean that in a nice way. This is a 1 on 1 battle all the way, the Revolution is merely a supplemental gaming platform. Sony simply has to shoot for the moon on the price and only be marginally higher than the 360, no matter how much they lose per unit.
schild
editor, f13.net
I can't wait to see what the Xbox 360 and Revolution will be priced at.
:)
Microsoft may just sell the 360 for cheap and loose money just to get people to "switch" to their console.
This comes from someone who owns all 3 current consoles and a DS and is looking at the PSP
A psychopath can't tell the difference between right and wrong. A sociopath knows the difference - he just doesn't care.
Didn't the PS2 have a hefty initial pricing to only be lowered drastically soon after? (I could be wrong, I'm not a big gamer).
You can expect to pay maybe double what you used to for foreign produced goods. It may not be obvious just yet, but that paycheck you get is now worth perhaps half what it used to be a few years ago due to poor economic policy in the US. Now that there is a stable alternative to the dollar (the euro), expect it to drop even more. The US economy is huge, so effects take a while to propegate. you will notice it first on imported goods, then local goods, then you will hopefully still be able to pay for food. I sure hope you arn't paycheck to paycheck right now with no ability to cut back.
Sony will match wahtever the Xbox comes out for. Both M$ and Sony have bottomless pits of money so they don't mind taking a hit on the harware. The problem for Sony may be when the PS3 come out at the same price as the Xbox and M$ slashes the price a week later just to stick it up Sony's ass. Either way, mass market consoles are not going to sell for more than $400. and even $400 is a lot for little johnny to hit his parents up for. It's going to be interesting.
IIRC, the PSP costs significantly more than it should if you just convert currency, so maybe the PS3 will be more
on the other hand, they have made a lot of money on the sale of the PSP unit, so they can afford to loose money on the PS3. Considering Sony's game library size, it would probably be a good idea
By reading this, you have given me brief control of your mind.
Last time I checked, the standard for the media wasnt passed yet. How are they pulling this off and what will I do with this box once there is a standard?
Perhaps the high price tag will make parents realize that the $600-ish (CDN) would be better spent perhaps getting their kids sport equipment or even just getting them outside.
Parent 1: "Oh yeah? Well, my $600 bought my kid an extra 100Kg! Can you beat that?"
Parent 2: "Aww hell, I could only afford a $20 NES system that he doesn't even play. He's lost 60Kg just by playing outside! Its awful!"
...either this is solely hype building. ie sony - "its gonna cost a billion dollars, and will eb a million times better than anything ever before" and so the consumer gets hyped for it, then when they actually sell it at £349 everyone goes out and buys this bargain. The other possibility is that it will retail at around this price, and sony will expect the playstation brand to carry it, which it probably will. (goes and pre-orders a revolution)
oxymoron of the day - Xbox gamer
No way would I afford that. I earn a decent wage, have a decent amount of disposable income, but with a family, I can't really justify that sort of money, BEFORE SPENDING ON GAMES, for a hobby I can only do for a few hours a week.
Yes, its worth that much. It appears as if the PS3 will be much more than a videogame console. It will allow burning DVDs, let me access the Internet while I'm playing a game, play video and audio over the network, and more (or so I've heard.)
Perhaps they will have a stripped down games-only version later.
The PSP costs $100 more than a Nintendo DS. I will not be to suprised if the PS3 costs more than the XBOX even $150 more. You do get more power and features, so it will not be a suprise to pay extra for it.
I would also imagine that the next Nintendo will be less expensive than the other 2 systems.
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Early adopters get screwed, that's just how it is. I got an Xbox as soon as it arrived in Britain, and it set me back #300. Even with the mass quantities in which these new systems will be produced, they're still going to cost an incredible amount, and it shouldn't be surprising if prices were up a bit on the launch prices of this generation.
What's scary is the potential cost of games, and how that affects pricing. If a publisher puts $15m in a game over 2 years of development, they'll be reluctant to put it on the shelves at less than $50, and it would be more likely around $60. So in order to keep that down, MS would have to offer them another way to make money... Say hello to Xbox Live and paying out small, almost unnoticable, sums of money for new content, where the only cost is the human one - developers hammering out as much as possible to pay back that $15m they 'owe' the publishing house, in pennies and dimes.
This comment was formatted for readability, but I forgot the line break tags
If that's true, I promise you that the PS3 will lose first place in the next-gen console war. The Playstation brand had made it as far as it has because the system has been relatively accessible AND affordable. Does anyone really expect the average joe (or jane) to pay $150 more than the price of the (probably good enough) 360? Parents (and a lot of gamers like me) are going to barf at an almost $500 price tag. This would be a stupendously dumb move on Sony's part.
Remember when the psp was said to be around $400-$700? It came out as what? $250? I suspect the PS3 will come out in the $200 range. When numbers are given out this early, take them with a grain of salt.
The only way I can think of they could spin a $465 system is if they go for the "entertainment centerpiece" angle. People *might* be more apt to buy it if they think of it as a quality DVD player replacement + game console. Or at least I would... My DVD player is muy mal, and my wife likes the PS-style games (at least compared to what's out for Xbox), so as a total replacement it might fly.
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
just as with this generation, the max price of the ps3 will be xbox price + $50. simple as that. anything else would be suicide.
It doesn't take a genius to figure out that Sony will be walking into Halo 3 AND an X360 price break. They've also walked themselves into that awful controller.
Now with a handy, more-relevant counter argument on the horizon we can all quit talking about how the Dreamcast failed because it was first to market.
The pricing of the Xbox and PS3 are going to be very high, and the intended audience (which were the 20 somethings last round) are now all 5 years older, probably have families now (amazing even gamers manage to procreate), and are not going to have the time or money to splurge on these consoles. What will happen, is that they will grab a revolution for a more normal price, a couple new titles, and download a few oldies and enjoy gaming again.
After covering videogame news for years I know this all to well, because it is my story as well as most of my friends who are all 25ish. We don't care about extra polygons anymore, framerates, spending hundreds a month on gaming... we just want a good solid gaming fix in our free time with new and innovative ideas that we haven't played 100's of times before with lush new graphics. Sure the new 18-23 crowd will eat the xbox and PS3 up and be all over each bit of news and spec. but I think the true hardcore oldschool gamers are going to opt for a Revolution.
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
I think i will wait till 2007 to get my next gen consoles and probably get all 3 for around 500 with free games.
Its never a good idea to buy them when they are first out as within 6 months normaly the price will half.
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
If Sony really wants to eat everyone for lunch, they'll use these extra few months after the XBox comes out to polish up an emulation layer so they can charge more for the machine because it'll do double duty. Play XBox and XBox 360 games as well as all the PS, PSII, and PSIII games on one box *and* play HD-DVDs. Throw in gamestation compatability and they could shut everyone else down.
Yes, I've read through the specs. It would be difficult - not impossible - but very, very difficult to emulate the XBox 360 on the PS3 with an acceptable quality.
But imagine the rewards of doing so...
</pipedream>
Note: It may be impossible to do in a practical time frame and amount of resources, but I still claim it's possible. I doubt the inverse is possible - the XBox 360 playing PS3 games.
-Adam
This was the first thing I thought. Even by the time its released next spring, it will be a bargain compared to general-purpose computers of comparable power.
I, for one, will buy at least one of these...
Okay, start starving, cut food money and save it in the bank. Eventually you'll reach that amount by the time PS3 comes out.
On the plus side, you'll lose weight before you gain even more.
"After covering videogame news for years I know this all to well"
You think sales are going to dwindle because you and your friends are getting older? That would probably be true if no children where born after you and your friends. That is not how it works however, and the population continues to grow (albiet slowly now in the states). That only means that the market is growing, (past customers plus new customers coming into the age group). I think that you will be surprised if you look at the real numbers. The percentage of youngsters (and you are still one in my eyes) in that 18-23 age group who will pruchase is always growing. The later age groups do slow, but surprisingly at the same rate as the death rate for the group. That is tantamount to saying that these consoles and games do not lose customers to anything other than death. Console and Game sales have do nothing but increase, and at a fantastic rate. Now even faster than Hollywood with more total revenue. I find your prediction of failure surprising and unsuportable in the face of the facts and history.
So, what, a movie, nice dinner and a love hotel then? Yeah, I think people over here can afford it.
If we're going to play with psychological barriers, let's do it in context. 50,000 yen is $467.434. 45,000 yen is $420.660. 40,000 yen is $373.905. Let's say our major psychological barriers are at 10k yen increments, and our minor ones are at 5k yen increments.
From that perspective, it seems likely the Japan price point will be between 40,000 to 50,000 yen, ($375 to $465) or, more likely, between 45,000 to 50,000 yen. ($420-$465)
But you also need to think in a cultural context. Do Japanese consumers comfortably pay more for technology? (Specifically, gaming technology?)
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whatever they charge they better release MORE good games for it... all these years that the xbox/ps2/gc have been out and i've only found myself wanting to play 3 of the games??? (all on xbox)... hardly a reason to pay even a $100 for any of the consoles right now, i doubt the 'future' will be any more 'interesting', for me. maybe the next round the consoles will overwhelm the pc, but for now, i'll put up my pc against what any console can offer.
sigs suck
The specs I saw claiming 2 tflop (!?) per PS3 are just a tad over the top. They're essentially making the claim that they can deliver the equivilant of a $3 mil super computer I manage for what, $2.5k?
Three orders of magnitude less expensive in two years? I don't think so. Processors don't move that fast. I could maybe see 20 gflop but even that's pushing it.
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Obviously this something that only Haliburton employees will be able to afford.
Is your terror cell living in terror? Is your safe-house not so safe? If so, read the New York Times, the jihad journal.
you read through the specs? awesome. I did that too. the xbox 360 has 3 processors, so obviously it's three times as fast as the ps3, which means that the ps3 could never emulate the xbox 360. how's that for reading through the specs, huh?
seriously: the three consoles will be so close performance-wise that none of them will be able to emulate the other one.
oh yeah, because microsoft would NEVER sue them for emulating the xbox and 360 on the PS3.
..plus that would be Sony shooting themselves in the foot.
Example: EA wants to develop Madden 2007. They look at doing a PS3 and Xbox360 version, but then realize that the PS3 can play an Xbox360 version. So they only do an Xbox360 version (with a sticker that says you can play it on the PS3).
Eventually everyone only develops for the Xbox360 since they can "kill two birds with one stone" that way.
SYS 64738
If you release it at $200, everyone will buy it for $200, including the folks who would have paid $500. So you relase it at $500, then when sales drop you figure you've tapped that market and you lower the pricepoint to get all those willing to pay $400. Then when sales dip you reach out to all those willing to pay $300. It's only after you've sucked those dudes dry that you lower the price to $200. Even if your cost to make it was $100 all along. Especially if your cost to make it was $100 all along.
If all this should have a reason, we would be the last to know.
Its been done in the past. The colecovision had an adapter to play the current markets leader's games. Atari wasn't so happy, but IIRC Colecovision won the lawsuit.
These pretzels are making me thirsty.
Well, it jsut goes to show, it's really a computer. Even at ~500 it's still cheap for the processing power it seem you are going to get.
However, given the history of consoles, it's probably going to come with some DRM/Official games only nonsense... would you buy a PC under htose terms?
Nobody cares that much about the falling US dollar, until they need more and more of them to buy a playstation...
That's where I draw the line. Get Greenspan on the phone!
=P
e.
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The 3do was $700 US when it wa first launched. Adjusted for inflation, it has an even higher price. From Answeres.com, "the 3DO console itself was priced at $700." - http://www.answers.com/topic/the-3do-company-1/
Choosing the lesser of two evils is a choice for evil.
That's why they lost a couple of billion dollars. Sony deals in volume, so losing $100/unit on 50 million consoles ($5 billion) is not going to happen. No matter what you hear, nobody sells consoles for a loss (unless it's just a few cents from distribution) except MS. At $5/game royalty, that's REAL hard to make up. (MS lost $35 per unit initially, and they were not selling 7 games per system to make it up.
People who think they know everything really piss off those of us that actually do.
Troll .. but just in case you are really that dumb - the PS3 has a single slab of silicon running at 3.2ghz. That slab of silicon has 8 Processing cores. Its processor is significantly faster than that of the XBox 360's combined.
If cell really does live up to its promise everything else will be dead in the water - that however remains to be seen...
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This is elementary marketing, you _must_ have run into it before. When touting your own product you want to make it seem as cheap as possible, so you pick how much it costs (or how much you think it will cost) add a tiny increment, and say it costs less than that...If Sony _knew_ they were going to sell it at $299 they would be saying "less than $300" (or whatever the yen equivalent of that is.) The fact that they're not saying that indicates they think there is a reasonably strong possibility that it will cost more than that.
However, that mainly applies to a released product. Prerelease, demands of marketing can be offset by a desire to keep competitors off-balance. When the PS1 was introduced, Sony tacitly encouraged speculation that the US price at introduction would be $399. Sega, anticipating that there would be room a two-tier pricing structure for videogame systems released the Genesis 32X expansion at $160 and the Saturn at $400. When the Playstation was actually introduced at $299, it both greatly undercut the Saturn and encouraged sales by coming in at a price well below what consumers had been led to expect. Sega had to reduce the price of the Saturn, to compete, greatly straining Sega's finances, and was still unable to match the Sony's heavily subsidized price point. This left no market for the 32X, which was ultimately abandoned by Sega, hurting the company's reputation and further damaging them financially.
The average price of an 1100 square foot home in Japan is over $350,000.
The average price of an 1100 square foot home in the United States is a shade over $210,000.
That suggests that prices in Japan are about 166% higher than those in America. What happens if you take the $300 price tag of the PS2 and add 160% to it? WHOA! You get $480! That's almost exactly 50,000 yen!
Mark my words, the thing will debut at $299.99 in the United States.
"I have never won a debate with an ignorant person." -Ali ibn Abi Talib
Play XBox and XBox 360 games
I have a feeling that MS would darken the sky above you with lawyers if you tried that.
Off topic, Flamebait, Troll. Your pick.
They are just pushing that edge more and more. $450 bucks seems like a lot for a game system but I remember buying my NES for $199 and Genesis for $299 when they came out. When the Atari came out it was around $199 and after adjusting for inflation that made the value of the Atari (in todays money) like spending around $500 bucks back in 1980.
BR> People will still get it. They hope it wont cost that much but if it does they'll pay for it one way or another.
My Xbox Live Gamer Card
Personally, I hope the model that was displayed at E3 is the "Server" edition of the PS3. I remember reading a rumor awhile back that Sony planned on releasing two versions of the PS3, "client" and "Server".
The Client was supposed to be the bare bones game console. And the Server was supposed to be this uber media hub. I cringe at the thought of paying $500 for a gaming system. And I don't think Sony has done a good enough job to convice people that their next system can be more than just a gaming and movie watching system.
I hope Sony does a better job at describing the non-gaming functions of their system.
Go Gusties
2 words.
Fuck That!
"A learning experience is one of those things that says, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.'" - DNA
50,000 Yen is a lot of smackers. It's about how much the PSX (DVD recorder et al) is going for now.
One thing to keep in mind is that with Sony being THE name in electronics in Japan, they can charge alot more for their stuff. Play stations 2s still go for around 17,000 yen here ($170), while the new mini PS2 is almost 20,000 yen ($200).
I'd expect to see a lower price on the PS3 when it comes stateside... Maybe 350 or so. Which is still a hell of a lot of money...
Guess I won't be upgrading all my systems like I planned.
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Nothing can be done before the tremendous power!
RabidComics
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Remember when Nintendo and Sony broke up and Sony began development on the PS1? Sega was working on the Saturn, and Sony pulled a huge publicity stunt by pricing the PS1 at $300 (the Saturn was going to be $500 or so). Thus, Sega had to price the Saturn down to $300 to compete, thus losing money on each console (one of the only consoles to ever do this at launch). Now that Sega's out of the way, Sony can go and price their PS3 at an outrageous (for a console) price of $500.
How ironic...
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
Do you really think Microsoft of all corporations would allow Sony to get away with something like this? They'd go more berserk than the **AA's have.
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
Sony will float rumors like this up until they set the price at $300, so the brainwashed masses will think they're getting $465 worth of technology for $300 and flock to it.
You obviously aren't reading up in the emulation branch of technology. Gamecube has some somewhat playable titles on emulators now. How long has that taken?
While Sony is claiming that the PS3 will be amazingly powerful, and the current specs look better than Microsoft's, emulation is no small task. Two pieces of hardware with two entirely different archetectures, there is no simple way to take something in the same format and make it playable on two different architechtures.
Sure, this would yeild great profits and whatnot, but if Sony is able to emulate Xbox360 in under 6 months. Then I bet I could find you a working emulator made by bored programmers in 2 months.
Despite being improbable that Sony would attempt this, its rather fantastical and I would hold it as impossible.
Sure, you can wait till the first, or second price drop in a console, to buy it. But by then you're already behind on the times, probably a good handful of games to play which means you're always going to be several games behind, etc
I won't buy these super over hyped consoles simply cause I can feed my family for half a year on $500...Let alone blow it on 1 console. Not keep in mind if I wanna play games that aren't ported to PC or Xbox2 or Revolution I gotta buy those individual systems...you're looking at an easy $1500 for 3 systems, 1 controller each, no memory card each, no free game each...
Aw Frell this
Tell me, how the fuck is the PS3 a revolution? It's the same old shit with more gloss on it. Driving the same generic cars around the same generic corners, popping the same generic caps in the same generic hookers. Same shit, only the corn is better rendered. I've been playing Doom since Doom, and since then, it's gotten old. Zooming into first place with seconds to spare was fun the first time, but somewhere between Pole Position and Need for Speed Underground 2, it got old. Want photo-realism and smooth framerate? Go outside. It's a lot cheaper, and it doesn't have all of those cumbersome buttons that we both know that you loathe. You'll be getting yourself some fresh air, and you'll be doing the videogame industry that we both grew up on a favor.
Also,
everyone does.
Very rarely can I say that I have been genuinely offended by something somebody said, so consider yourself privileged. It's not really the fact that you assume that myself and everyone else agrees with you that pisses me off, so much as the ignorance within that. To put it bluntly, it pains me to think that people like you are allowed to walk the earth freely. I like to think of myself as a relatively nice guy, so I'll just leave it at that.
Anyone remember what the price was for the PS2's Japanese launch?
As I recall it was substantially more than what it sold for in the US a few months later.
I sure hope they have a strong lineup...because after paying anywhere near that price for a console, they better have something worth playing to back up the price.
Flat Screen TV for F
The laser lens had better not crack from overheating, I better not have to update any drivers, and by God the square button had better work.
Yes, I've read through the specs. It would be difficult - not impossible - but very, very difficult to emulate the XBox 360 on the PS3 with an acceptable quality.
Have you any idea what it takes to emulate something? My old Pentium 75MHZ or whatever could barely emulate a ~3MHZ NES. Im sure there's more involved aspects than just the CPU regarding being able to emulate a console, but you gotta be stupid to think that the PS3 could emulate the 360 with an acceptable quality. I doubt it would even get 1 Frame per Second going...