It seems that the backlash against the PlayStation 3's high price is continuing to resonate across the industry, as CEO of the newly formed Tecmo Koei has joined Activision in voicing his desire for a PS3 price cut. Kenji Matsubara claims that he has constantly asked Sony to lower the system's price, but to no avail.
"Whenever I discuss this with Sony reps I always ask them: 'Please cut the price', but I don't have a clear view on Sony's situation," confesses the Tecmo Koei boss. "Yes, from a publisher's point of view we would welcome a price cut for PS3, and we are waiting, definitely.
"It's definitely a way of boosting the PS3 market, but it's Sony's strategy and I don't know their cost structure. Sony introduced cutting-edge technology in the PS3, that's why people in the industry accept that the PS3 cost is so high, but we'd welcome a price cut."
Slowly but surely, Sony must be feeling the pressure mounting. The platform holder doesn't seem to care what customers think, but now that publishers are starting to mutter rebellious things, it's almost do-or-die time. There's no question that a PS3 price drop is now an imminent necessity -- but can Sony afford to cave on this issue before it's comfortable?
Jim Sterling serves as reviews editor for Destructoid.com, head of the Podtoid podcast, and produces a number of news stories, original features, one-of-a-kind videos. With his passionate argumentative style, controversial opinions, harsh delivery, and dedication to brutal honesty Sterling is a name that you can't help but recognize.
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Contest:
9:00 AM on 07.04.2009
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Here in Norway new games cost up to 90$, just for some hours of entertainment, no thank you. (Yes I know about buying online, but that's not the point).
Sony is not (hopefully) stupid, only they know when they can drop the price. If they have a price drop planned in November (just an example), they can't just change the date of the price drop just because some say please. They'll have to prepare for it anyway. But there is no reason not to drop the prices on the games, as they are not affected by production costs per unit.
@Strandi
Games have always been expensive it's just the way it is. If you think about it you pay a tenner for a DVD and it gives you 1-3 hours entertainment, and generally games give you a lot more is it's all relative.
But in saying that 90 euros (you guys are on the Euro yeah?) is a hell of a lot but then isn't everything really expensive over there like Booze and Cigs?
I do agree game prices are too expensive, especially when MW2 for the PC is going to cost $60 for the STANDARD edition. That has to stop.
I think you'd be missing the point of what they've done so far.
Sony's plan thus far has been to upgrade the drive and keep the price points identical. So the 20 is now the 80. Still at the same price point and they're manufacturing the same hardware at the exact same cost to them. Sony actually needs to drop the fucking price point and quit playing this drive upgrade game.
I have no doubt in my mind that we'll be doing this again when Sony "drops" the price. If there's a Slim coming, it'll at most take a $50 drop (but I'm not holding my breath), they'll bump it to 120GB, and the high end model will go to 200GB.
And that way, Sony gets to live in their little world where their shit don't stink for another year.
BTW, Jim it was nice to meet you. Enjoy Texas.
I introduced Bleh and Coon to "You're in the Movies" last night and we enjoyed the fuck out of it.
Make everything free. That would be swell.
With love,
megaStryke
Kris S: Movies are a lot cheaper, and I only buy movies I know I like, and those movies I have watched countless times. And no, we don't have euros, only NOK, Norwegian Kroner. Killzone, inFamous, Gears 2 cost around 500-600KR, which is 80-90$. But yeah, everything is expensive in Norway.
Konrad9: 1$ = 6,4kr right now.
Say a game costs 60$ in US, that is 381kr.
New games in Norway costs 599kr, that is 94$!
Of course, there is games that is cheaper, but if I want my inFamous fix, there is no other way, then buy at that price, or borrow from a friend. Or buy over the internet, but that is another topic.
Also: The PS3 costs 628$ now here in Norway, at it's cheapest. But I'm ok with that, since that thing actually have some hardware in it, and it's going to last for at least 5 years. A game is a matter of hours, depending on replay value. But I guess we got higher salary in Norway or something, I don't know.
i still thinki sony isnt making much money on ps3 atm (if ant at all)
although i agree that the ps3 is expensive and dont own one myself.
It's not that bad, works out to about £50-60 which I remember paying for N64 games back in the day O_o
Games here are mostly £39.99 new, the odd one is £49.99 but normally drops quite quickly. Mind you I'm not the richest person ever so I would struggle with the extra £10-20 a time, would be used games all the way for me..no exceptions!
@Midgetsnowman: I won't be surprised when console starting prices hit a GRAND (I'll just flip my emo switch on). I'm not even surprised by stuff like this "60 campers fighting over 10 systems." I gotta say, some people are no better than rats on a sinking ship.
@megaStryke: Yes free, please let us enter the Star Trek age...
"No money? You mean you don't get paid?"
"The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We wish to better ourselves and the rest of humanity."
- Lily and Picard (Star Trek: First Contact)
I think it's sad that we're still arguing about the price of the PS3 when I still will end up spending more on my 360 to get it working with wireless connections, rechargeable batteries, and a decent HDD (Yay! Proprietary BS drive!).
The only reason Activision wants the price of the PS3 to drop is so people will spend that unspent $100 on one of their peripheral-based games. The only reason Koei is saying the same thing is because they're lemmings.
PS3 price drop won't see drastic increase in third-party game sales since most of the people who would buy it already own a 360 and will likely continue to buy third-party games for that system.
If the economical tides were better maybe they could afford to start loosing more money making them and selling them cheaper. But for them to see a nice bump in sales, they need to go from 400usd to 300usd.
Maybe at the end of the year, who knows, is the complicated experiment of cost-cuting in production.
Is a good BR player I will give you that.
Losing, not loosing.
Sorry, huge pet peeve.
Sony keeps the high price just because they want to wipe their asses with money, ignoring the consumers' wishes. Denying the fact that they are already losing money per console sold, a 100$ price cut means they would lose additional 100$ per sale. Software sales can't cover that up.
So instead Sony gives the PS3 more value, at the same price tag, by including games in bundles. I think Sony knows what they are doing, whether we like it or not.
A bundle with Killzone 2 and inFamous included at 399$ is kinda like a 100$ price cut.
But I'm no business expert, so that thought could just be a bunch of crap.
Please lower your prices so everyone can buy your cars.
Yours with love,
Takeshi
Here in Brazil a PS3 is around R$2200(US$1100) and games that have been launched recently are around R$230(US$115).
So shut up.
Difference between Sony and Ferrari is Ferrari don't give a shit if normal people can't buy their cars whereas Sony need poor people like me to buy their console.
sorry, didn't know there was a more expensive country than Norway. I guess a comment can be informative after all. But seriously, that sucks!
The 360, even the Wii is no more expensive than the ps3 if you want these things to work at full efficiency.
Nintendo: hey Nexus you like ou system, our online bites so you better get extra contollers, did I mention they come in two pieces that are 30$ each.
MS: hey nexus thanks for buyin a 360, don't worry about that 20 gb harddrive we will over charge you for a bigger one in a future, did I mention online is 50 bucks a year, oh you want wi fi 100 dollars please, oh and your unit doesn't come with an hdmi port because were the HD console of the future. And try to ignore those red lights for about a month or so, don't worry people yelling it no longer exists over the internet will make the time pass that much faster.
Sony: hey nexus your gonna pay 600$ for this, the development of the system will be slow and steady you know like always been the past two gens, its equiped with a new format to avoid the running out of space issue were gonna go through soon so you don't have to worry about gimped games, wi fi and hdmi are built in and even though were Just starting the psn we have a commited team devoted to it and it will truly turn into something amazing, and free too. Basically were gonna give you all your gaming needs For the next ten years and give you the option of upgradidng your HDD cheap so you never have to see our asses again.
MS and nintendo aren't any cheaper, there just better at hiding their expenses, but I like my bill upfront not in bits and pieces.
Yes, I agree, but again, some users don't need all that.
If a guy want to buy a DVD player, JUST for playing DVD's.
The salesman might say "This player is just twice as expensive, but it can also play DivX files!".
Some people don't need that, so there is no reason for buying the expensive one. I want a lot of features, so I prefer the PS3.
But you tell go ahead and tell a family with a standard definition TV that they need a PS3 instead of a Wii, if they only wants to play Wii Sports.
But yeah, a lot of products have many hidden expenses.
There are certain things people can't buy. Ferrari's, washing machines or consoles. Which is perfectly normal. Mind you, it is accepted for common goods. "I can't buy that expensive but awesome washing machine. I'd best be starting moaning about it on the internet and throw in a couple petitions while I'm at it." People don't act that way with products like that. They suck it up and buy something else.
But if it concerns a console (preferably a Sony one as it seems nowadays) oh boy, people throw a hissy fit and demand a price drop. And start yelling Sony's marketing sucks! (Which is different from this discussion but I wanted to mention it because I think it's pretty sad to hear people complaining about marketing while they know everything there is to know about the console. So how's that bad marketing?)
To sum it all up, there are two options for a consumer.
Get over it or save up.
Yes, it's that easy.The PS3 is worth every penny. I know, I bought it day one for 600 Euro's.
Yeah people can save up $400 or so to buy the damned thing, but then they don't have any money to any games (unless there where bundeled in). So where does that leave the publishers for the games you might ask? High and dry.
But also with a price cut of $100, they break the "$400 is too expensive, now $300 is acceptable" mental barrier as well. See Sony would potentially make more money buy selling the console at a lover price point. For example: 100 PS3s sold at $399.99 would roughly bring sony $40,000, but if they where to drop the price to $300 and sales went up by a 100 units then there looking at around $60000 they made.
So basically in the long run, they might actually be better off selling at a lower price (and BD drives have gone significantly) to make up for the lack of profit.
"Yeah people can save up $400 or so to buy the damned thing, but then they don't have any money to any games"
a 360 pro costs $299 and live (in Canada) costs $60.you can't tell me that $40 would break your wallet. $40 can buy a used game at best. and it's not like people would be dumb enough to buy a console with no game. what would be the point?
And they would know that how, we have done nothing but bitch about the price even when they lowered it to a price where the 360 was at one point ( and there were no complaints about the 360 then) and we still complained.
And sell software, perhaps for 3rd party devs this would be good, but every gaming site I seen has in some way or form raged on sonys exclusives, don't get me wrong there's only one game to date I felt they did flawlessly( killzone 2) but every exclusive they have released raked over the coals harshly, and frankly at times I felt the so called errors where just BS ( but I'm not even going to go into thatan because apparently if you do your a fanboy, somthing that's another problem, you can't say anything remotely positive about a system without the word fanboy popping up)
Add to that a general media that can't even get simple facts right( while sony the company took a loss the games division pulled a profit, of couerse however that's not what got reported, sonys doomed,sonys doomed,its the ps3s fault), people who still think blu-ray is useless even though production costs for multiple dvd disk is through the roof while BR would fix that.we've done nothing but demonstrate our ignorance.we made up price cut rumours left n right and halted the sales of current units so what's to stop us from complaining a 100$ price cut isn't enough and starting the chain all over again.
You have a public that knows little, a ignorant media that will say anything for hits(even though sony denied the slims existance we sure won't will we), actual fanboys that won't even give the ps3 a shot to begin with and there supposed to chance a price cut on THAT.
I'm sorry as a business man if you came into my office and told me that I'd tell you your out of your damn mind.
Its ironic but all this bitching and moaning is probably producing the opposite effect and causing sony to become more reluctant to cut the price.
That doesn't make sense at all. So people can save 400 bucks and not buy games? Saving money is saving money. People aren't going to save up for a car without tires now are they? So why would you save for a console without games. It's all about priorities. Haven't got enough money to buy a console? Then don't! Or do, like me and eat peanut butter sandwiches for a month. Breakfast and supper.
I agree with Nexus here. We never hear complaints about the 360 pricetag. Which is rather strange it you think about it. There must be a shitload of people that can't afford a 360 or even a Wii. What are you gonna do about that? "But those are a lot cheaper!" Indeed, but still out of reach for certain people.
Don't get me wrong here. People can hope for a price-cut. Nothing wrong with that. I'm hoping the same for all of them. But demanding it, like so many gamers do is preposterous.
thank you for showing what a lot of people seem to lack this gen. Comman Sense.
Thing is though I'm complaining about the price in this country not the US where the price is alright.
Nexus you can defend Sony all you want but they fuck us over left and right here. $400 there £400 here, PSPgo will be $250 and £250. They have tried to say it's due to tax which doesn't work out there would still be a £70ish difference on the PS3. Then they tried to say it was because of the higher cost of living here - staff costs etc - which I'm presuming they mean London as Americans seem to think the whole of the UK is London and even then it makes no sense. But more recently they admitted that we - and the Europeans - are more likely to buy thing's at a higher price point which is fucking fantastic if you're in the better off half in the country, not so good if you're not.
I get it from a business point of view, they made a machine that makes barely any profit so they sell it at the high price point where the currency is stronger until everyone who can afford it has bought it. Well from a business point of view Sony, it's 2 years since launch, the 360 is still outselling you 2 to 1 here so it's time for a price drop if you care about getting your product in to peoples homes. And speaking of Home, thought that was how they were planning to make the money? To make the bucks from it they need a higher install base so why not just release a slim version at a lower entry point and then fleece everyone on Home?
And as for you prattling on about how much the 360 + Wii are to be 'fully optimized' don't speak so much shit. If your buying a 360 now you can get an Elite for £200, if you bought one at launch you can sell yours for £100-150ish and pay £50-100 for the upgrade - STILL MAKING IT CHEAPER THAN THE PS3! And that's if you even need the upgrade, I was more than satisfied with what I got because I use it to play games, not a multimedia hub, that's what my PC is for and i don't have an HD tv.
You win on the RROD front and Live though :)
@Takeshi
I'm not demanding a price drop, I am just hoping for it because I want to STFUAJPG! :)
Tell you what though, I've said my piece and I won't mention a price drop again.
When I said " Americans seem to think the whole of the UK is London", I know Sony are Japanese but it was an American rep I think who said it when the US got a price drop and the UK didn't. Like I said, the price is fine for you guys!
You guys always get skull f*cked in prices so I won't even touch that but I will say this I'm not defending sony so much as pointing out our own ignorance , even the fact that you said it the 360 is outselling it 2 to 1 is disturbing because it just isnt true. We have told half truths and whole lies to the point where its getting disturbing and makes me question wether the people who say this are either bias or didnt bother to go find the actual facts and just starting spitting sh!t out. the ps3 is selling well, it pulled 24 million units in 2 years even at the higher price point and is still selling well, thats why they won't lower the price , and every media outlet saying their doomed and need to cut the price just isn't paying attention, saying it is not gonna make that price cut come faster, it just makes us look like idiots. this recession mentality to some people was a licence to be fools for some and its beyond irritating because all its done is make people question our intelligence.
Also yes I like fully optimized shit because I kinda don't like half assed consoles, if that many Wii games required the use of multiple remotes then it was optional in the sense that inflated tires are optional to drive a car. If the 360 was a machine I new would come out with better versions of in the future I would have waited instead of losing money on trade ins only to wind up with the shit I should have had in the first place only 50$ cheaper than a launch ps3( and my house is wi fi and I dont even have that 100$ adaptor), but since its useless ' optimization shit' I guess you won't mind footing the bill because I would be happy to send them to you.
From your own country I think I do apologize though, 2-1 is a rough estimate, a 100,000 behind or so. I'm not ignorant, I read MCV and other trade publications even the financial bit in newspapers (ie Nintendo starting to struggle selling consoles). Thing is though it's not just media and all the other conspiracy theorist that's saying it, it's now publishers that are behind the price drop. It should make you wonder, who's wrong, EVERYONE else or Sony?
Also just a little tid-bit at the end, how long was it before Sony changed SKU's and price from launch? Look at my avatar and my favourite games, I'm not a Sony hater but they are turning Activision-esque in pricing policy, and alienating certain segments of the market.
Sure they could swap the blu-ray drive for a DVD drive, strip out the wifi, take the rechargable batteries out of the controllers, swap the cell for an old pentium chip, charge for online, have it made by hamfisted chinese children with the shittiest soldering known to man, and sell it for £150....
But then it'd just be an Xbox 360.