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Pachter: PS2 Price Drop In 2007, PS3 To Drop For GTA IV

If they drop the PS2 Price at the start of November SONY could really steal the holidays and take some of Wiis media thunder. The Wii most likely be low in stock and could be outsold. Retail outlets usually advertise the hell out of price drops so sales would be grand for the little machine that could.

Sho_Nuff82 said:
In what world will the PS3 ever cost less than the Elite? Use your brain McFly.
huh? He didnt actually price the Ps3 higher than the Elite. Sony is the master of price reductions though and will CELL and Blu Diodes getting cheaper by the minute, I don't think 50 dollar difference is far off (between the Elite though).
 
JoshuaJSlone said:
How is this supposed to be taken? Clearly there's a dropoff (of much more than 10%) if directly comparing PS3 to PS2, but if we do something like comparing PS2+Xbox+GCN+GBA in mid-2002 to PS3+X360+Wii+DS in mid-2007...

Wii 2007 is doing better than PS2 2002 was.
X360 2007 is doing better than Xbox 2002 was.
DS 2007 is doing much better than GBA 2002 was.
PS3 2007 is doing worse than GCN 2002 was.
I would also think the continued sales of PS2/GBA this year are better than the continued sales of PS1/GBC in 2002.

So that doesn't make for a 10% decline either. What is it?

Why are you comparing DS's third year to GBA's second? And Xbox 360's second to Xbox's first?
 
Question: If you're Sony and you're bleeding money and solid PS2 sales are propping your gaming business up, why the heck would you drop the price?

Answer: You wouldn't.


This is a bunch of hot air.
 
PistolGrip said:
If they drop the PS2 Price at the start of November SONY could really steal the holidays and take some of Wiis media thunder. The Wii most likely be low in stock and could be outsold. Retail outlets usually advertise the hell out of price drops so sales would be grand for the little machine that could.

they also need to push SingStar & Buzz
 
LiveFromKyoto said:
Question: If you're Sony and you're bleeding money and solid PS2 sales are propping your gaming business up, why the heck would you drop the price?

Answer: You wouldn't.


This is a bunch of hot air.

its not like the ps2 is selling out, besides, im sure theyd still make a profit on each system at 99$
 
PistolGrip said:
If they drop the PS2 Price at the start of November SONY could really steal the holidays and take some of Wiis media thunder. The Wii most likely be low in stock and could be outsold. Retail outlets usually advertise the hell out of price drops so sales would be grand for the little machine that could.


huh? He didnt actually price the Ps3 higher than the Elite. Sony is the master of price reductions though and will CELL and Blu Diodes getting cheaper by the minute, I don't think 50 dollar difference is far off (between the Elite though).

i dont think people in the market for a wii care much about the ps2. it really is all about the controller. these are people who play the wii for themselves at a friends house and want some wii sports of their own.
 
Blasphemy said:
In a world where MS eats $1B for crap hardware and Blu-Ray wins the HD format war...a fantasy world I know.

I don't think the A plus B in your argument necessarily equals the C you are postulating.
 
Even if GTA4 slips, MGS4, LittleBigPlanet & Killzone 2 will still be there. These will all be multi-million selling games.
 
LiveFromKyoto said:
Question: If you're Sony and you're bleeding money and solid PS2 sales are propping your gaming business up, why the heck would you drop the price?

Answer: You wouldn't.


This is a bunch of hot air.

because the PS2 is their best weapon against the Wii, I said that before this gen started and I still believe that, their revised PS2 also has wider margins so there's plenty of room for a price cut
 
PS3 price drop next year makes sense. But this year I think they won't pass on any buck they can make with the PS2(and the PSP), which may include not dropping the price just yet IMO. It's still selling and I think it will continue to sell at the current price, so there's no real reason to drop.
 
Rocksteady33 said:
Why are you comparing DS's third year to GBA's second? And Xbox 360's second to Xbox's first?
The way he talks about "cycle-to-cycle" is ambiguous, but with wording like that it seems to make more sense to compare entire generations than individual consoles. Were I to use GBA's third year and Xbox's second, however, it wouldn't really change overall results; GBA would be a little stronger, Xbox a little weaker.


I did make a pretty big flub, though. Wii 2007 is doing better than PS2 2001, not 2002 when it was over 400K every month after the price cut.
 
Link316 said:
because the PS2 is their best weapon against the Wii, I said that before this gen started and I still believe that, their revised PS2 also has wider margins so there's plenty of room for a price cut
methinks the ps2 needs a waggle wand to make a dent in the wii.

people have seen and known about the ps2 for years and its not like people are getting the wii just because its cheap.
 
-COOLIO- said:
its not like the ps2 is selling out, besides, im sure theyd still make a profit on each system at 99$

In an average month you can conservatively say they'll sell 200k in the States. Math time: 200k x $30 = $6 million per month. That's $72 million dollars in a year in the US alone that a price drop would cost Sony, not even including the holiday bump which actually makes it much more than that. When you consider how much it would cost them worldwide you start to get the real picture.

Now figure out how many extra PS2s they have to sell at $99 to make up that lost $72 million +. The answer is more than they could. A price drop is what you do when you have to because sales have started to trail off, not when you're going strong and rely heavily on the revenue that still-healthy console is bringing in.
 
Geezer said:
Quick question, does the 80GB Motorsotm bundle include an extra Sixaxis?
No. It's basically a console cheaper to produce bundled with MotorStorm.
They aren't really focusing on it to sell (though it doesn't hurt obviously, more profit) but just having it there so folks won't have an excuse ('oh they cheated me out of a 80GB console') when the 'final' sku comes around. There will always be enough of that one around until they dry out the 60GB one out and when the final sku arrives they stop packaging the MotorStorm bundle.
 
watership said:
FFS.

You know it's his job to say things like this, right? He's not talking to gamers, he's talking to investors and they tend to listen to him more than a thread on GAF.
actually, if you watch the latest Bonus Round episode with Pachter and Pidgeon, Pachter mentions that his job is specifically regarding stocks. This other prediction stuff he does is pretty much for fun and just speculating. He mentions NeoGAF two or three times as well regarding the attention he gets here.
 
Wollan said:
No. It's basically a console cheaper to produce bundled with MotorStorm.
They aren't really focusing on it to sell (though it doesn't hurt obviously, more profit) but just having it there so folks won't have an excuse ('oh they cheated me out of a 80GB console') when the 'final' sku comes around. There will always be enough of that one around until they dry out the 60GB one out and when the final sku arrives they stop packaging the MotorStorm bundle.

Who's to say it's the 'final' skew? What about when ShockAxis comes out?

Or perhaps a PS3lite?
 
YYZ said:
actually, if you watch the latest Bonus Round episode with Pachter and Pidgeon, Pachter mentions that his job is specifically regarding stocks. This other prediction stuff he does is pretty much for fun and just speculating. He mentions NeoGAF two or three times as well regarding the attention he gets here.
Hence he craves the attention you guys give him. Makes his dreary stock job more worthwhile when it gives him a platform for the fanboys.
 
Luckyman said:
Why do i think LBP will have problems to crack more than a couple of hundred thousands..

yeh i dont think it will be multi million at all. depends on the # of people with PS3s at the time i guess.
 
ComputerNerd said:
Who's to say it's the 'final' skew? What about when ShockAxis comes out? Or perhaps a PS3lite?

Well, obviously I'm speaking about next year and not forever.

- They don't want the MotorStorm bundle to be too appealing or else they won't sell out of 60GB's

- They can't go through a invisible upgrade to a console that does software BC only, that's why they have to go through this sku mess + introducing the new controller as standard (that's why Europe won't bother with a 80GB as the HDD size/optimal buy in price is hardly the #1 issue issue)

- ShockAxis will come with the 'final sku'
 
I hope he's right about the PS3 drop. I'm planning on getting a system early next year. It would be nice to only have to spend $400 or so.
 
Wollan said:
No. It's basically a console cheaper to produce bundled with MotorStorm.
They aren't really focusing on it to sell (though it doesn't hurt obviously, more profit) but just having it there so folks won't have an excuse ('oh they cheated me out of a 80GB console') when the 'final' sku comes around. There will always be enough of that one around until they dry out the 60GB one out and when the final sku arrives they stop packaging the MotorStorm bundle.

Well I am not so sure that the 80gb(90nm)PS3 is ANY cheaper to produce than the 60gb(90mm) sure they lose ONE piece of silicon that maybe cost $20, but with the bigger hard drive it's pretty ~/~, put me in the no $499 80gb this year camp, they are going to have to pull ALOT more savings out of the PS3 before they go $399 so maybe it MIGHT look like the $599 bundle and a gameless 80gb for $549 followed by a E3 2008 announcement of the 80gb going to $449
 
LiveFromKyoto said:
In an average month you can conservatively say they'll sell 200k in the States. Math time: 200k x $30 = $6 million per month. That's $72 million dollars in a year in the US alone that a price drop would cost Sony, not even including the holiday bump which actually makes it much more than that. When you consider how much it would cost them worldwide you start to get the real picture.

Now figure out how many extra PS2s they have to sell at $99 to make up that lost $72 million +. The answer is more than they could. A price drop is what you do when you have to because sales have started to trail off, not when you're going strong and rely heavily on the revenue that still-healthy console is bringing in.

Hold on there. Sony also collects lisencing fees on every game sold. If that's $5 per game then they could also make up the 72 million dollars per year by selling 14 million more pieces of software. Which would imply that each new owner bought 6 games for the system. Now this isn't necessarily plausible either, but a combination of increased hardware AND software sales may make it more profitable.

Basically:

Attach Ratio * $5 * PS2's Sold + Profit Per Unit * PS2's Sold = Sony's PS2 profit.

The only thing that decreases with a price cut is the profit per unit, and everything else will go up.

Edit: not sure how much PS2 fees are right now.
 
The whole issue solely comes down to that they need the console to do software BC from one point going forward.
(So they can drop the PS2 ram, silicon, motherboard revisions..etc and keep tuning that)

If it wasn't for that this whole thing would be invisible. No sku mess, no HDD increase (yet)..etc. It all comes down to that consumers will know if they changed BC to software only so they had to make this big deal out of it.
 
We'll see if the PS3 will get a price drop in early 08 based on their holiday sales. Keep in mind Sony still loses a ton of money on PS3s. The 600 --> 500 drop was primarily because sales were non-existent. I don't think their aim right now and the foreseeable future is to match the 360's sales, because it's just too large of a hill to climb at the moment. If the PS3 sells 170K-200K at $500, Sony may just have gotten themselves a little bit of breathing room.
 
spwolf said:
considering how well PS2 sells, I doubt it...

yah I know, imagine the sales spike at 99$.

by the way how much profit does sony make off ps2s now? It should be a decent amount right?
 
PistolGrip said:
If they drop the PS2 Price at the start of November SONY could really steal the holidays and take some of Wiis media thunder. The Wii most likely be low in stock and could be outsold. Retail outlets usually advertise the hell out of price drops so sales would be grand for the little machine that could.

No. PS2 has amazing penetration already and consoles bought during the holidays are bought as gifts, usually. Shoppers during this season buy things that they, if they're buying it for themselves, or the receiver don't already have. You can say Sony shot themselves in the foot when they named their new system PS3 which easily distinguishes the PS2 as old.

360 core will more than likely be the alternative if a Wii can't be found.
 
Why do i think LBP will have problems to crack more than a couple of hundred thousands..

MaX_PL said:
yeh i dont think it will be multi million at all. depends on the # of people with PS3s at the time i guess.
You guys haven't met the Sony marketing machine yet huh. This is not Viva Piñata. LBP will easily sell over a mil worldwide. Just the fact that they will localize the crap out of it would help it break those numbers.
 
GDGF said:
Throw enough shit at the wall and some of it is bound to stick.
Precisely. I suppose he's hoping everyone will forget the majority of times when he's totally wrong with his predictions when one of his random statements is proven correct.
 
radjago said:
PS2 Holiday Bundle: $119 with a pack-in would be the way to go.
Actually SONY Should do Buzz and SingStar bundles for 129.99 during the holidays here in the states, to strenghten the Singstar and Buzz brands.
 
chespace said:
Everybody should wait until spring 2008 to buy a PS3.

Yea, I'm waiting until at least $399, possibly even $299, all depends on how long I can go until I'm willing to give in.
 
Well if the 60 gb unit runs out in the fall as Sony stated, does anyone really think that they would keep the 80 gb at $600 as the entry point for PS3? I doubt it....I would think they drop that to $500 to capitalize on holiday sales.

A $500 80 gb unit with Motorstorm is an attractive package to sell during this period. Going up in price during the holidays while 360 goes down tomorrow doesn't make any sense.
 
PistolGrip said:
You guys haven't met the Sony marketing machine yet huh. This is not Viva Piñata. LBP will easily sell over a mil worldwide. Just the fact that they will localize the crap out of it would help it break those numbers.

You mean like how they did with Hot Shots Golf 5?
 
Here let me spin this another way.

People listen to Pachter because he presents a number of outcomes. Yes one could say he's throwing shit on the wall to see what sticks, but at the same time he's not supposed to be some fortune teller.

A number of people who buy stock in game companies don't particularly follow every piece of news that floats in, thus Pachter is there to explain what things mean and what could happen. He's not going to sit there and just make a single prediction, because if that one fails he will lose whatever credibility he's built up. It's better to play it safe and look at all of the possible options and to give investors a pretty good idea of where they should be putting their money.

Pachter is just doing his job really. He's not about to lose it by making a bunch of claims. Most GAFfers here won't even bet their account on their predictions, so you see how that goes.

Oh and yeah where's that junkwaffle picture?
 
Guy Legend said:
Well if the 60 gb unit runs out in the fall as Sony stated,

There's over 1 million of them still sitting in Sony's warehouses waiting to be shipped to retailers. There's no way that Sony sells out of the 60GB PS3's before late November or December, and that's way too late to drop the price. Spring price drop for the 80GB is the earliest that makes sense. It also fits in well to get more people to buy the PS3 for GTAIV instead of necessarily opting for the cheaper 360.
 
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