Would the PS5 be priced at $ 600?

Well, yesterday I asked the above question about whether a high price of $ 600 would “do” the Xbox Series X, and I had people ask me if the opposite was true. Would the same price risk in the same way when launching the PS5? I thought I would explore the question today.

My general feeling is that between Sony’s current gen lead, Microsoft losing Halo and Series S and PS5 underestimating a potential $ 600 Series X, so yes, that price would probably be pretty devastating for Xbox.

For Sony though I do not think that a I’m good price, I think they take less risks higher than Microsoft would be in the same situation. But why? A number of factors.

I do not think you can underestimate Sony loyalty at this point among PlayStation owners. Those who have invested this past generation in a PS4 seem to generally feel that they have gained tremendous value year after year for their money from must-play exclusives, and between a cheaper launch ($ 400 against Xbox One at $ 500) and all those games, Sony maintained a 2: 1 sales lead over Xbox the entire generation, and even the One X that arrived with a clear edge of power did not change that dynamic.

As such, I think Sony fans would generally be more willing to pay $ 600 for a PS5 compared to Xbox fans, as potential buyers will be asked to pay $ 600 for a Series X, and that is even though if the Series X was more powerful. That is a solid position to be in.

But then there’s another factor, the idea that if $ 600 is the absolute limit for any new gen console, then at least one PS5 version has got to be praised below. While the Xbox is split between the Xbox Series X and the Xbox Series S, even if that price gap is $ 200, that is to say. a Series X at $ 600 and a Series S at $ 400, the tradeoff is performance. You lose the power edge not only to the higher system, but probably also to the PS5.

But Sony’s two PlayStation models? The only tradeoff is a disk drive. So if the maximum price for a PS5 disc is $ 600, then the only digital PS5 that I think will be hugely popular, has got to be priced below that, at $ 550 or $ 500, likely. So while the Series X could potentially hit $ 600 in many analysts and fans’ minds, it’s pretty close. impossible to suggest that at least the digital PS5 will be priced so high.

I think at least some people would think twice about the PS5 versus the Xbox Series X choice if the PS5 was $ 600 and Series X was $ 500. That situation would mean you get a more powerful console for $ 100 less and the biggest games on the market right now are shared third party titles like COD, Cyberpunk and Assassin’s Creed.

And yet, even, Sony can still make the argument about exclusives like Miles Morales and Horizon Zero Dawn in 2021. Xbox has Halo Infinite in 2021, perhaps, although everything we hear about that game suggests unusual development that raises questions about the final product. Microsoft may put a greater focus on first-party games and upcoming titles like Fable and Avowed look great, but those are not much more than title cards at this point, still many years away. Sony fans, meanwhile, can pretty much bank on things like God of War 2 and the upcoming Naughty Dog project that is coming and going. And that might be worth an extra $ 100.

Finally, PS5 has the added selling point of … being kind of a mandatory purchase in ways that Xbox Series X is not. Microsoft has made it clear that its exclusives, such as Halo Infinite, will continue to work on Xbox One for at least the next few years. And even if that stops happening, Microsoft will also be releasing all of its games on PC as soon as they arrive. Sony, meanwhile, does not seem to worry about asking people to buy a new console to play the latest games, nor do they release any exclusives on PC in anything that approaches a short time window. Microsoft may be playing the “pro-consumer” card here, but the fact is, it makes the Series X less of a required purchase than a PS5 at baseline. The fact is that you can buy a PS5, buy a Game Pass for PC, and literally do not need an Xbox.

To be clear, I actually do not think any of the consoles should be priced at $ 600, and I believe $ 500 for both the Series X and PS5 is the right price, with some deviations allowed (maybe disc PS5 at $ 550 , Series S at $ 350-400, etc.). But out of both consoles, Sony was able to get away with a higher price point than Microsoft at this point, even with a less powerful system. That’s how strong their position is now.

Follow me on Twitter, YouTube en Instagram. Picking up my sci-fi novels Herokiller en Herokiller 2, and read my first series, The Earthborn Trilogy, which is also on audiobook.