Playstation 5 [PS5] [Release November 12 2020]

Marketing has to be fool proof.
Sony was by tradition, hitting the right price and performance combination.
PS1, PS2 and PS4 managed to sell their selves at launch as the most powerful gaming machines at an unexpectedly lower than anticipated price.
The PS3 was the only console that was trying to convince the consumer to buy one with complex messaging. Sales started to peak after cutting non gaming features to reduce price and with heavy emphasis in game exclusives.
The value is there, but people need to be able to understand it

And they understand best games and good price.

 

There is also Cerny’s statement that they only included 825GB of storage as they were focused on finding the right price point (paraphrasing). Which can be interpreted in many ways.

429-479. Last call.

 

The number of active users are tied to the number of units sold. Sony will want to sell as much as possible and make sure they are active.

 

This is the current landscape for us in Canada, Sony has not really been aggressively reducing their stock yet. On the flipside X1X sells at 479 with game as a bundle and X1S sells at 379 with game as bundle and MS has been aggressively trying to remove these items out of stock (likely because their naming is confusing AF)

This is why I was surprised to see the Series S and X at the price points they were at. This also why I think a 399 PS5 is completely viral.

 

Right, but selling consoles isn't their number one priority and not at all cost. Sony will use a price that makes them the most money in the long run and not to win a console war. 300-350$ is ridiculous to suggest imo.

 

I think sony should pricw match Series X. It reinforces the idea that they are in parity, instead of saying (hey, it's a bit less hw, but it's a bit less money, heh, please buy me)

They can ajust price in the future if needed, but I doubt sony will have amy trouble selling PS5s during the first 6-12 months.

Specially with the meagre amount of next-gen-only games on X compared to PS. For the first year, I think PS5 will be the only machine with software out that clearly says "here, THIS is what next gen is."

 

I never talked about selling consoles for the sake of selling them

 

Pretty obvious (though you really, really never know anymore) that this is the way to go. Matching the X in price would market the PS5 as being on the same level.
The only real thing that may give them grounds to price it lower would be that it has a smaller SSD. But then again it’s faster. So yeah, I think it’s 499.

 

Let's keep it rolling. It's entertaining, if nothing else.

 

The price of SS and SX are exactly what most were expecting based on the off the shelf tech included in those machines : Cheap SSD controller + Zen 2 + RDNA2 + GDDR6.

Usually you need viral price like you said when you either think it's not going to sell well or the brand is not known by the public. This is not the case here. Playstation is the market leader, their next gen console is the most hyped next-gen console and they know they are going to sell everything they produce for months, if not years.

And besides, they have repeatedly said (and applied with PS4 and Pro) that they are not anymore interested into selling consoles for the sake of it.

 

There's really no reason for the PS5 with BluRay to sell for less than the same $500 of the SeriesX.

Why would they do that?

- Their marketshare and mindshare is nothing like it was back in 2013 when the PS3 was tied to the X360. Not only because the PS4 outsold the XBone by over 2:1 worldwide and their attach rate is much higher, but just comparing the number of youtube views between PS5 and SeriesS/X announcements shows the difference in popularity between the consoles. The DualSense presentation video has more views than the SeriesS announcement.
- There's no perceptible difference in visual quality compared to their competition so far (sorry 8TF github gang, better luck next time).
- The perception of Sony's 1st party being stronger is higher than ever, especially after the Halo Infinite disaster.
- Gamers with high-end PCs have decreasingly small reasons to invest in a new Xbox since they can get their Microsoft 1st parties without the console.
- The PS5 is most probably not substantially cheaper to manufacture than the SeriesX, if at all.
- The DualSense is probably more expensive to manufacture than the new Xbox gamepad.


Sony's executives have said several times that they won't focus the PS5's retail price on how much/little money they ask for the console up front, they'll focus based on perception of value. They already have that at the same price as the SeriesX, and they'll probably have that even if they ask $50 more.


The only factor I see that could force Sony's hand are those SeriesX/S leasing options, but that would only get Sony to implement a similar program. It wouldn't change the PS5's retail price.



BTW, Amazon UK will start selling a PS5 Wall Mount in November 19.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08GCVT3K4/?tag=b3d-21
Could mean something, could mean nothing.

 

I don't think it matters how much Sony peg their initial prices at, they're going to be sold out everywhere regardless.

The onous is on Microsoft to undercut Sony. They're really pushing different options too; budget next-gen and surprisingly good value high-end hardware.

I'm yet to be convinced that the Series S will make any significant sales ratio towards Microsoft. It'll obviously have at least a little impact, but nothing major. People interested in Xbox will buy one or the other, I don't see sales being taken from Sony.

Edit: PS5 digital 400 and disc version 500

 

That can't be true.
If you own 99% of the market. Your next go around you either pay oodles to keep ti all or you lose some.
PS4 owns too much of the market, more than 2:1. If 360 : PS3 was ~ 1:1, then they essentially took 50% of xbox's population.
It's very difficult to keep those numbers up consistently considering that so many came from Xbox. MS is likely going to claw back marketshare as as result of the re-purchasing into a new generation. There has to be a song and dance of people making switches, there is always a churn percentage and a gain percentage. When you have very little, you only have so much to lose but you have so much to gain.

tldr; it is very difficult to squeeze water from a dried sponge. And very easy for a dry sponge to soak up more water. It's increasingly more expensive for Sony to gain even more marketshare over last generation than it is for them to lose some of it.

 

I'm expecting the same difference as this gen: 2:1 Sony. There. I said it.

 

It'll be 1.75:1. We should want xbox to take some of the market back.

 

It will?

 

You could expect it, I wouldn't bet on it. There's no reason to expect the same outcome.
They are certainly not starting out the same. For starters there is already a stark difference on how people feel about the hardware and price points for the new hardware compared to TV TV TV/Kinect.

Just off the launch itself, I wouldn't bank on the numbers being the same.

But usually when you increase spend, you should expect to have an increase in customer base. If MS is going up in console sales, in a fixed pie scenario this must imply Sony must lose some. If MS consoles are being picked up as secondary, the ratio will change.

 

People dismiss this but as somebody who only recently upgraded from a compact corner media centre to a large media centre, size is an issue. I could never had fit the original Xbox One in my corner media centre - that and the PSU? Never going to happen.

This year, I planned ahead. There is room for both PS5 and Series X. The X will, just, fit underneath and the PS5 will stand proudly in the corner, towering over everything in the living room, like a monolith dedicated to Mark Cerny.

 

It will be 2.23:1, there I said it