Sony France: PS3 intial price range forecast "499-599 Euro"

Yeah, Blu-ray is not due in Europe till Autumn IIRC, and AFAIK no pricing has been announced by anyone for hardware or movie titles.

 

Apparently some journos followed up on this with SCEE, and a german rep gave this response:

"During a wide ranging interview/discussion on Europe 1 radio last night,
Georges Fornay, Managing Director of SCE France discussed the PlayStation
3, amongst other new consumer technology products.
Reports on the web suggest that he might have indicated a price for PS3
around 500 Euros or between 499 and 599. This is a mistranslation and/or
misunderstanding of the discussion, which was actually focused on the
relative value of PS3 as a Bluray Disc player.

Referring to a previous discussion about the roughly $1,000 price point of
BD players, the interviewer asked whether a price point of around $500
(dollars, not Euros) was about right for the PS3. Mr Fornay explained that,
with BD and HD functionality, PS3 at this price would be cheap for such
functionality, but that current video games machines were significantly
below this price.

At no time did he suggest or indicate a specific price point for PS3, and
any reports that he did so are incorrect.

He summarised by saying that PS3 would be expensive when one looked at the
price of a video games machine, at far below 500 Euros, but extremely good
value when looking at BD and HD technology inside.

No official announcement has yet been made on the price of the PS3."

In other words, he didn't say nearly as much as was originally reported. I knew he wouldn't just come out with a figure like that himself..

 

Though if PS3 is more expensive than typical consoles and cheap as a BRD player, that'd place it in the Eu 500-1000, which is about what the translation was saying. No pricing was given, but a higher price, minimum of 500 Eu, was inferred.

 

Could you give a link to the source? Needed for posting the correction on other forums. Thanks.

 

GAF will have to do for now:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=3070221&postcount=244

It seems legit. Basically a mail from SCED asking people not to circulate these rumours, and to verify information with SCED before publishing, and encloses SCEE's statement on the matter.

I guess it depends if they're referring to their own record, or their competitors. Basically all this tells us is that it'll be something more than the price of a typical videogames console (which is..? 360 Premium? Or PS2 at launch? Or..?) and less than a BD player.

I still do think $500+ is most likely, but this information doesn't really bring us any enlightenment..

 

This is what Sony does every time they launch a game system. Convince everyone it's gonna be ridiculously expensive, then when it launches for the normal price everyone goes "WOW what a deal!"

Not that it won't be a great deal, but these comments with regards to price should be taken with less than a grain of salt.

 

I can accept a price of 450 euros(for the premium with a hard drive of course) but anything above that is a steal.Sony has a lot to gain from the blue ray format so they shouldn't present that as an excuse if the ps3 ends up being too expensive(which it won't but still....).

599 euros for a gaming console is unacceptable and it's not even a money thing for me.

 

Jeux-France has updated its article with SCEE's clarification:

http://www.jeux-france.com/news15148_la-playstation-3-autour-de-500-euros.html

A babelfish of their statement

Very enlightening But in the context of the transcript below, they do clarify that it'll come between the typical videogames cost and the cost of BD player...which doesn't really tell us much new.

Here's the babelfish of their transcript of the question..in question:

 

that way you'll be even more impressed when they announce the $399 pricepoint (without HDD of course )

 

The PSP was priced very competitively compared to what the competition was offering.

 

Well, it was 66% more expensive, IIRC, than DS. Which if we applied to 360 premium would make PS3 over $650

 

There is also a much bigger jump in technology between PSP and the DS than between Xbox 360 and PS3

Not to mention it's coming out a year after the 360. I don't see why this thing has to be so much more expensive, but I guess Blu-Ray drives and Cell aren't as inexpensive to manufacture as we were lead to believe.

 

i doubt it'll be that high, sony pr machine at work again

 

Well..If this thing is 500 or more here in the states..I will pass it up for sure.

I just don't care enough about blu-ray to pay that much for something I just want to play games on. I don't even use my 360 as my primary dvd player.

 

you're right console dvd players have never been good quality, i doubt sony will put a high quality BR in ps3 to reduce costs

 

So in actuality, he really said its somewhere between €300-1000 euros? Heh.

 

Stupid ass Sony reps.

Why would you mention a price range at all knowing that the internet would turn it into stupid theories about how it is now a set price or complain about how it isnt.

Damn armchair quaterbacks and Area 51 nutjobs.

God I hate the internet sometimes.

 

Principally I agree. If sony feels that they need to majorly push the BR format and use the PS3 to do it, they should also stand for its costs. But still, IF the cost of a BR drive is actually $100 more than a DVD drive that would be quite a bit of money for them to suck up and would make them effectively have maybe twice the amount of money the loose per console compaired to MS. I don't think they can afford that.

Yep, 599€ is to much, but I think 499€ is kind of OK. That is what consoles have costed before at launch, so it shouldn't be a surprize, but sure when you have a competitor that is 100€ lower things do change...

 

Its called hype and Sony are the masters of it. Sony is basically getting free marketing from the internet and the people who seek news about PS3.

 

Back to square one...

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=15937