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Sony Rejects PS3 Price Cuts
Despite hopeful comments by analysts, Sony has gone on the record (again) saying that it has no plans to cut the PS3's pricetag any time soon. Next Generation reports: "'PS3 prices and shipment plans for the future should be determined by market trends and competition. Sony currently doesn't have any specific plan to cut the PlayStation 3's price.' Analysts believe a price cut is inevitable, as the company struggles to catch Microsoft's early lead with Xbox 360, and the $250 Wii continues to sell as many as can be produced. However, Sony's plan has generally been to hold tight and hope that demand for Blu-ray drives will increase, by the end of this year." Relatedly, the company has outlined releases for the second quarter of this year on the PS2, PS3, and PSP systems.
Consumers reject Sony.
dig in your heals and hope no one catches on to that fact...
the preceding post was not spell checked... suck it.
cutting the price at this point wouldn't help game sales enough to offset the extra loss they'd be taking on each unit, because the library is still pretty sparse. might as well suck it up and sell whatever units are selling. when the really good games start coming out later this summer and fall, sales will pick up and I wouldn't be surprised to see a november cut of about $100
God Fucking Damnit
Of the 134 words in the summary, 24 were not part of a link. I'd post something constructive, the I could bare to rear more than 10 words of the summary (and we all know the golden rule about reading TFA). Sheesh!
They keep playing the old its my toy and if you don't want to play by my rules you can't play with it... But they don't seem to notice that not many people are willing to play with their toy based on their rules. This includes both game makers as well as customers. Over all I keep hoping that they will see the light and the ps3 will take off with both good games and good price... but untill then I will just keep what I have.
love the taste, hate the texture
Wait for demand for Blu-Ray drives?
Is there any demand, whatsoever?
Hell - demand for HDTVs isn't even all that high.
Regardless, I can watch HD movies via Comcast on demand, download them via XBox 360, or to a PC.
I have no problem at all getting HD content onto my screen.
Why should (most)people care about plastic discs anymore?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
I don't understand why people are confused about the lack of a price cut announcement.
You don't tell the public that a poorly selling, expensive product is going to be $100 cheaper next month unless you want even lower sales for the next month. Lower sales for that month means even lower numbers of customers looking to buy software for the machine.
The announcement of the PS3 price cut will come the same day as the PS3 price cut (see PSP price cut as an example).
Consoles don't usually bring in revenue, no, but the PS3 is estimated to cost $800 per unit to get out the door but it's selling for $600. (The $500 model is discontinued.) Typically, the cost per unit is considered proprietary information so it's only an estimate. This means it's hard to pin down but I do believe this is the highest net loss per unit of any console ever. If they already have to sell a bunch of games and accessories (X) to break even, if they drop the price by another $100 they'll just have to have an average of each user now buy (X * 1.5) games and accessories.
They're bleeding on PS3 right now, so should they bleed more? I guess someone crunched some numbers and came to the same conclusion you did.
Putting on my tinfoil hat, I'd say these rumors of price drops that simply will NOT die are a combination of 1 part wishful thinking, 1 part wanting to make existing owners panic, and 1 part of helping to stifle sales as consumers who are on the fence about pricing would most certainly not want to buy if they anticipate a drop.
More Twoson than Cupertino
I've gone for the full 1080p setup over the last few months, which includes a PS3. Last weekend we had a few people round and spent a bit of time playing Gran Turismo HD and Motorstorm. Two of the guys have 360s and were pretty impressed by the jump in graphics quality. GT plays properly in 1080p, and although Motorstorm only runs at 720p, it is really breathtaking. I can't fairly comment on Xbox360 quality because I've never seen one hooked up properly - the PS3 looks rubbish connected through SCART or component at 576i resolution, and for Xbox360 that's the only setup I've seen. So my unfair comment is that really the Xbox360 is half a generation behind Sony/Nintendo. Other consoles that have tried the same thing have started well and kind of fizzled out once the competition got going.
:(
I know a few people thinking about getting a PS3, and it's not really the price issue that's holding them back but the content. Gran Turismo and Grand Theft Auto are two of the big games people are waiting for. Also a lot of places are still price gouging - the games seem to be £35 online but £50 on the high street. Some decently priced Blu-Ray movies would also be good. I found Tesco are selling them for £13 now, but most retailers are still around the £25 mark. Unfortunately I can't find Casino Royale or Planet Earth in stock anywhere
You don't tell the public that a poorly selling, expensive product is going to be $100 cheaper next month
Generally you have the right idea but PS3 sales are actually not all that bad - it's currently at a higher sales rank than the 360 on Amazon, and has been since March 23rd when Amazon finally was able to keep stock around.
I think you are right about the day of announcement of the PS3 price cut, but would further predict that it will come the day after the day Microsoft announces a 360 price cut, which will of course be same day Microsoft also cuts prices. Sony and Microsoft are waiting til one does a cut before the other one, and both are enjoying higher profits (and unknoably lower sales) as a result.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The editors don't even write the articles, they just click an extra button in firehose and fill in the "from the $department dept." field. Sometimes they stick a breezy little comment in.
Basically, it's digg with less content.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
This isn't news. But several other things are also true. Among them:
Sony completely fucking blew the PS3 launch. There are simply not enough games that people actually want, and the price is astronomical so many people decided to wait for more games to be released. But the result of that is that there are less PS3s sold. Developers want to make games for consoles that people actually own, so they will be less inclined to make PS3 games. This won't result in many games being cancelled, but it will result in less games being exclusive to the PS3 - the installed base is less than any other console for which people are still making/selling games, so making a PS3 exclusive is guaranteeing that your profits will be reduced. Since there are less games, and less exclusives (which have traditionally been strong selling points - for example zillions of people bought the PS2 just for Tekken Tag, Gran Turismo, or a Final Fantasy title) this means that less people will want to buy the system.
If you can't sell games, you're not going to make the money.
Also keep in mind that Nintendo makes money when they sell game consoles. They don't lose it. So even if they sold less units they still wouldn't be losing money on consoles. This is why there's room in the industry for first place, second place, and Nintendo. But if Nintendo takes first or second place, I think there's distinctly less room left...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"