PS3 to Sell at Over $800 in UK

joe 155 writes "The Register is reporting that ' the PS3 will cost £425 in the UK - over $800'. SCE UK Managing Director Rat Maguire said: 'I don't think it's an expensive machine - I think actually, it's probably a cheap machine. If you think a Blu-Ray player by itself might be £600-700, and we're coming in at just £425, it's a bargain.' Can a console really be viable at this price?"

Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Basically, they're claiming that the PS3 is a good value because it costs less than other Sony products with some of the same features? How does that follow? Maybe the other products are just even more overpriced.

Re:Typo of the Century!

[gEvil (beta)]

While it is certainly a humorous gaffe, I think it's part of a larger marketing ploy by Sony. Over the next 6 months, we are going to be bombarded with quotes saying that 600 bucks is "really quite cheap." The thing is, knowing how much the average consumer thinks about things, this Jedi mind trick will probably work. Come November, you'll see lots of people stating with perfectly straight faces that "600 dollars for a console isn't expensive."

Re:Change Your Ads Then!

[Anonymous Coward]

"They can't.

I don't think Sony is capable of NOT trying to control a format"

http://www.bluraydisc.com/ [bluraydisc.com]

How exactly is Sony trying to 'control' the BluRay format when it is controlled by all of these companies:

        * Apple Computer
        * Dell
        * Hewlett Packard
        * Hitachi
        * LG Electronics
        * Mitsubishi Electric
        * Panasonic (Matsushita Electric)
        * Pioneer Corporation
        * Royal Philips Electronics
        * Samsung Electronics
        * Sharp Corporation
        * Sony Corporation
        * TDK Corporation
        * Thomson
        * Twentieth Century Fox
        * Walt Disney Pictures
        * Warner Home Video Inc.

"WHY they need to control a format is up for grabs -- it's possible it's just thier culture, or the dogma handed down by the leaders that has been followed for decades. But this is the exact same thing as Beta, MD, Memory Sticks, and UMD -- all of which failed to get any support outside of Sony products."

Sigh...

"The PS3 is simply thier attempt to get an installed base of Blu-Ray players, fast, and beat out HD-DVD."

Because everyone knows that a product can't be more than one thing...

"the Xbox 360 has, somehow, been less successful than the original Xbox over there."

The 360 has been less successful than the first Xbox in every region it is selling in...

UK pound

[tronbradia]

Stuff is mad expensive in the UK, that's just how it is. You go to the UK all the prices are pretty much the same number as here, just in more expensive money. Currency exchanges aren't based on actual relative cost of living. They're an arbitrary figure derived by negotiations between investment banks. The dollar is doing particularly shitty these days because investors are freaked out about the wacko politics going on down there. I live in Montreal though I'm American, and I was shocked to see that stuff is actually less money here than at home (Seattle) even though I'm paying in (once significantly devalued) Canadian money. Housing in particular is dirt cheap by comparison. Since I've been here, the Canadian dollar has increased dramatically in value, but prices for things that you buy in Canadian stores haven't changed to make up for the difference in exchange rate, though I'm told American prices are inflating somewhat these days. The fact that £450GB costs $850USD emphasizes how worthless American money is these days, not how expensive the PS3 is in the UK.

Re:PS3 to Sell at Over $800 in UK

[gormanly]

Actually, it's not over $800 at today's rate, but still...

• US prices: $499 ; $599
• Eurozone prices: $637 (€499) ; $765 (€599)
• UK prices: Not available(!) ; $798 (£425)

F and off, Sony. It won't sell to me and (i) I have plenty of cash and (ii) I love my PS2 and would have paid £350 without a moment's thought. No-one I've talked to on this is prepared to pay, and we're all late 20s and early 30s gamers with good jobs and no kids. They're not going to sell these at that price...

Re:Change Your Ads Then!

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally I feel this works to my benefit because with BluRay fighting HD-DVD it's likely that neither will win and DVD will stay

Personally, I suspect that neither format will be adopted but not because of the format war (and also not because of another format appearing) but because the factors that led to DVD being adopted are no longer in place.

Even though it was initially released in 1997, DVD adoption in the mainstream market began in 2000 before the PS2 was released; this adoption was caused by the movies that were apearing in theaters and on tape soon afterwords. In the late 90's the movie industry had a lot of reasonably good big budget movies that were being produced where there was a lot of special effects being used; these movies were visually impressive and entertaining,and many people wanted to see them (The Matrix, The Fifth Element, Saving Private Ryan, Gladiator, etc.). People started to buy DVD players and Surround Sound systems in large quantities because they wanted the theater experience at home; even though the cost was quite large a family of four could save money by buying this set-up in a year if they went to a movie together once a month.

Today, more and more big budget movies are doing worse and worse at the box office (and on DVD) because people are growing tired of the same special effects and tired plotlines. How many times can you can you see ancient greece before it gets old; how many space battles do you need to see before they all look the same; and how many monsters does it take before you start calling them "Generic monster #3". The movie industry is going to change in the very near future, they are going to reduce the budgets of their movies and focus more on Drama then on Special effects; if you're watching a movie about a Pimp gone Rapper or about two Gay Cowboys do you really care about the resolution that much?

Re:Expect the Playstation to underperform.

[be-fan]

There is one thing you're neglecting, however. The cheaper console does not necessarily win. It's content that's the ultimate arbiter of the winner. Unlike the previous shift, from Nintendo to Sony during the N64 versus PS1 contest, you're not seeing a mass defection of content providers away from the PS3 to the XBox 360. Moreover, I'd argue that much of the 360's potential head start has been squandered by an underpowered library. It's not unusual to see a crappy set of launch titles on a console, but with the 360, it won't be until this summer (6 months after the console's launch), that games start coming out for the 360 that are actuallly worth having. If Sony has a decent launch lineup, this advantage of the 360 could be mitigated.

Now, Sony does certainly have the ability to muck up the PS3, but its certainly not decided. Remember that this game is still Sony's to lose. The installed base of PS2s is more than double that of the Gamecube, XBox, and 360 combined. Over the next two years, the console with the largest installed base, and the one generating a substantial portion of the revenue in the industry, will still be the PS2. This is a decisive advantage for Sony, one that isn't going to be overturned lightly.