If you look at the pricing of most of Sony's latest new tech, it tends to be at the very upper end of the pricing spectrum
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The Times : Sony is considering pricing PS4 "at about £300"
- Thread starter maquiladora
- Start date
If you look at the pricing of most of Sony's latest new tech, it tends to be at the very upper end of the pricing spectrum
BibiMaghoo
Member
So much this.
I paid £460 at launch.
£300 would make this day one for me. I would never pay as much as the PS3 at launch ever again.
balladofwindfishes
Member
All that cheering sure translated into sales, right?
Yea just realized it...case still stands tho
Nonsense, the Vita is a great price for the hardware ....... too expensive for the library of games it has.
Also the 3DS was the same price until Nintendo dropped it after the Vita price reveal.
RibbedHero
Member
Actually, if I recall correctly the exchange rate at launch was 1.95ish, so £425 would've been $830. A difference of $230 from the US retail price (sans sales tax)!!!
Now that was overpriced.
Lol, that's a really shitty and childish argument ......... not much of an argument either.
MikeE21286
Member
Yeah, it's part of their downward spiral
They began pricing themselves out of the market around the mid-2000s in almost all their devices. As a result they lost HUGE amounts of money. In order to recoup these losses they needed to focus on profitability. As a result, they continued to price their products high while increasing margins. Nobody bought their products, again, because they were priced high. And so on it goes.
I understand that they (internally) view themselves as a luxury brand with a name attached to them. However, they should not let that get in the way of being successful. It's really a double-edged sword.
balladofwindfishes
Member
Now THIS is revisionist history. They lowered the price because the 3DS had piss poor sales. Consumers won't pay 250 for a handheld system. This had been demonstrated by two different systems in this generation alone.
Sony doesn't care if a couple hundred people on a message board think 250 dollars is fair. The market spoke and they said it's too expensive. If it were a fair price it'd be selling better than the joke it is now.
That's nothing to do with what you said. The vita wasn't like the ps3 price.
And this is why they are becoming ever more entrenched in debt, people don't buy high prices products anymore unless they are phones.
Sony need to remind themselves of what they did right with PS2.
Consumers line up to pay $329 for one.
All hail our Apple overlords and bow down and tremble before iOS.
Just exactly what latest tech is in the upper end of the pricing spectrum? And don't bring in the 4K TVs because they are made for the premium market. Their latestes high tech device, Xperia Z, is priced a bit below iPhone 5 and around Galaxy S3.
balladofwindfishes
Member
I said Sony made the same mistake they made with the Vta/PSP with pricing as they did with the PS3.
Somewhere along the line you pulled Neogaf enthusiasm into it. I don't see how that matters at all. Nobody cares what people on a message board think if it doesn't translate into sales.
Yeah, and I paid around 600 EUR I think? Price is not an issue, I'll pay 600 EUR again for that new console feeling and smell.
To be fair, a lot of it is due to the yen's value over the last 10 years. It's dropping again now.
And it also looked like a dated bit of kit next to the Vita especially when at price parity.
The 3DS was overpriced, the Vita is not ....... it's still too expensive for that market though, you are right on that point.
Too much of a kids dominated market, 3DS caters to that more readily than the Vita, whose more mature target market is especially in the pocket of Android and Apple devices.
Yes, a TV. Usually the centerpiece of the living room. You're comparing a video game player to a television?
Sony needs to worry about the mass market, not the tech and gaming enthusiasts.
Apple is basically the #1 brand around. Everyone loves their stuff, so they can get away with a higher price. You're also comparing computers that are used for anything from gaming to work, to a video game console.
PS3 was $500/$600 last gen. It was the cheapest (and best) blu-ray player and was riding off of the PS2 success. Still didn't stop it from being an absolute disaster at launch.
Everybody is constantly talking about the death of console gaming. When dedicated consoles are on the verge of struggling for their own existence, should they really be having such an arrogant demeanor as to ignore history?
Pai Pai Master
Banned
I'd do it again for PS4 if necessary. I am your worst nightmare, $299 hopefuls.
I think price is only part of the reason for Vita's sales. It's easy enough to believe that the audience for dedicated handhelds has contracted, and more of the remaining headspace is occupied by the 3DS. A lower price would help the Vita, no doubt, but I don't think it would be a miraculous recovery.
DidntKnowJack
Member
That's not the point. You implied that they pulled another $599 with the Vita. They didn't. They priced it at a point that got people excited, unlike the PS3 where everyone knew immediately that they had fucked up.
You can armchair quarterback the success they'd find with the Vita now, but they priced that hardware in a competitive manner. Nintendo got smart and dropped the shit out of the price of 3DS, which ended up deflating the Vita hype. But at the time of it's reveal, their initial price point was solid.
And surely the PS4 will launch with better games than the PS3 did.
balladofwindfishes
Member
The vita isn't overpriced but is too expensive for the market it's in...?
You contradicted yourself in the same sentence. The "fair price" is judged by the market. It has nothing to do with the sum of the components of the hardware. Consumers don't care about that at all.
If it got people excited, it would have sold better :/
I don't really understand what's so hard to understand here. Everyone on the planet could love a product, but if nobody buys it, then it's not fairly priced at all. Unless forum hype somehow translates into sales, then it's meaningless to even bring it up.
MikeE21286
Member
and that the 3DS and smartphones exist
Lagspike_exe
Member
I really, really doubt they'll launch below $399. It would most likely mean a loss and MS would match the price, rendering it useless from a sales perspective. MS can bleed much more than Sony at this point. $399 is the optimal choice.
£300 is about where it needs to be to be viable, especially in the currently anemic UK games market. People are afraid to spend money on "toys" nowadays, and that's what consoles are - toys for grown-ups. So, any console purchase has to be "worth it" to be viable. (I think that's one of the main contributors to the Wii U's current failure to fly off store shelves - it just isn't "worth it" yet to the average consumer.)
Not to mention it hovering just over Wii U's price. If this is true, Nintendo WILL have to heavily slash Wii U's RRP - and I'm talking by an insane amount, like 33% - 50% off - to remain competitive. 20%? That barely covers our VAT, mate.
As such, I'm not going to believe this until it's announced.
Not to mention it hovering just over Wii U's price. If this is true, Nintendo WILL have to heavily slash Wii U's RRP - and I'm talking by an insane amount, like 33% - 50% off - to remain competitive. 20%? That barely covers our VAT, mate.
As such, I'm not going to believe this until it's announced.
He clearly meant the price is worth the level of technology, its still too expensive for the average consumer.
So if Bentley make a car that doesn't sell, it's automatically overpriced? I don't agree. Maybe the competition has something better, or the market has changed.
you are completely wrong. They lost huge amounts of money because they didnt make any products that they could sell at high price premiums anymore. As result of no premium highly desirable products, they had to lower their margins.
Companies that are successful currently dont make money on their cheap products but on their premium ones. Right now nobody makes money on making cheap stuff where you compete with gazillion small Chinese factories.
Yes, because Sony always delivers on launch.
Sony at PS3 launch is much different then Sony now First Party wise. They can still fuck it up though.
I could see the Wii-U premium model for £199 if the PS4 is £300, maybe £250 if the PS$ is £350.
If ti goes above that, no-one will buy the PS4 anyway.
They don't, but the PS3 launch lineup was particularly bad.
It's not a contradiction, the value in relation to the components etc is what I base my opinion on the Vita not being "overpriced" in relation to not overcharging for the item and the components it contains.
Too expensive is in relation to how much people are willing spend on the device, the market.
It's not a contradiction at all.
They already have.
God of war would have been a good launch game.
The last of us, a new IP.
Sly 4 PS4 missed that opportunity as well.
Odd I thought Sony made a shit load of profit last gen when the ps2 became affordable/cheap.
Marketing
JonathanEx
Member
I wonder if the "about £300" is an American price, straight converted, rather than speculation of the UK retail price?
wat. They have a bunch of studios that have said jack shit in a while and many of their studios have two teams like SSM, and ND.
BattleMonkey
Member
Sounds good. Show me some good games for launch and I'll be in for that.