Metro RF: The PS5 price hike is the final mistake for Sony and the PlayStation

[Sleepy Brown]

The PS5 price hike is the final mistake for Sony and the PlayStation – RF​

I think when people look back at this generation and try to pinpoint where exactly Sony went wrong, they’re going to zero in on PlayStation 5 price hike that was announced this week. As the cost of living crisis gets worse and worse it takes a special kind of business person to think that raising the price of their luxury goods is the answer. People can’t live without heating; they can live without a PlayStation 5. Especially when there’s a cheaper alternative just desperate to take over.
I’m no fanboy, but Microsoft must be rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of Sony being forced into raising the price, as they almost immediately announced they aren’t going to follow suit. Microsoft are rich enough that they can take a hit, but Nintendo has said they won’t raise their prices either and they’re smaller than Sony.

The absolute worst thing though is the fact that America isn’t getting a price rise. Does that mean that the rest of the world is paying to keep their prices low? If everyone had a price rise, would it have been a smaller one overall, because it would’ve been more spread out? It stands to reason it would’ve but of course Sony will never admit that.
For years, decades really, Sony has been hyped up as this marketing genius, aloof from the games industry so that even when they mess up, like with the PlayStation 3, they still look like the classy one. That’s partly because Microsoft has always seemed happy to be seen as the loud, crass American newcomer but all this year it’s Sony that’s looked like the one without a clue.

Not only has their communication been bad but they’ve made it seem like they actively hate talking to their fans. That and the way they ‘promoted’ the PS Plus revamp made that seem like something they were being forced to do and didn’t want to talk about, like a kid with their chores. Everything, including the price rise, is announced via glib little PlayStation Blog updates that try to get away with saying the least amount possible.
Microsoft has Phil Spencer and Nintendo has Miyamoto and the other developers, but there’s no public face for Sony. Just Jim Ryan, who’s a terrible public speaker but who seems to be behind most of these changes. Or at least Sony only started acting like this once he took over.
It’s 11 months since we’ve seen any new gameplay footage for God of War Ragnarök and yet it’s out in less than three months. And that’s their big game for this year. We haven’t even seen any gameplay footage for Spider-Man 2 or Wolverine and that’s literally all the games we know they’re making. They must have more, but they can’t be bothered to tell us about them. Again, not even Nintendo is this bad.

The only thing they have wanted to talk about is PlayStation VR2. A VR headset that’s almost certainly going to be well over £400. In the middle of a financial crisis, just after a price rise. I mean, they didn’t know what the situation would be like when they started making the headset, but they sure did when this week they started saying it’ll be out early next year.
This has gone beyond Sony arrogance and into something much more dangerous for them. They seem to have gone completely insane and not only do they not have any obvious game plan but they don’t even seem to be trying. If they don’t realise that increasing the price of the PlayStation 5 before Christmas, thereby making the Xbox Series X/S seem even more appealing, is a bad idea I don’t know what to say.
Sure, they might have made a little less money without the price cut but at least they wouldn’t have been exposed for being out of touch and dangerously self-destructive. I really do worry that they’ve completely lost it and that this is the beginning of the end.

Source

Pretty much spot on.
But it's not really a "mistake". Sony knows what they are doing. It's their current plan.
PlayStation can't compete anymore. And SIE/Jim Ryan knows this. This is the reason why Jim Ryan is preparing SIE and PlayStation to become a 3rd party publisher, releasing PlayStation games on PC, Mobile, next-gen Switch and Xbox.
The PS5 will be Sony's last console.

The signs were all there:
10€ for cross-gen upgrades.
80€ for games.
80€ for remakes of PS4 remasters.
550€ for a PS5 console.
No communication at all with the PS community
Barely any showcases anymore (all hands on the GaaS deck / No-shows during E3 time, SGF, or Gamescom)

They are milking the PlayStation community dry one last time.
- SIE and PlayStation can't compete anymore. Sony saw how Microsoft acquired publishers. And MS will buy more publishers after the Activision-Blizzard deal goes through in a few months.
- Nintendo is dominating with the hybrid-console model and their powerful IPs.
So Sony is focusing on Live-Service games now, to sell microtransactions on all platforms in the near future (PC, Xbox, Next-gen Switch and Mobile). To become a 3rd party publisher like EA or Ubisoft.
This is Sony's future. Jim Ryan knows this. And he's preparing SIE to drop out of the console race next gen.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Sony is doomed TM

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

The only one trying to compete is MS. Sony is the market leader. Sony is doing the things necessary to keep it that way.

 

[Sleepy Brown]

Sony is doomed TM

No but they are going 3rd party soon.
Which makes sense. Sony doesn't have the money or talent to compete with today's Microsoft and Nintendo.
And Jim Ryan realized this and started the "change".

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

No, but they are going 3rd party soon.
Which makes sense. Sony doesn't have the money or talent to compete with today's Microsoft and Nintendo.
And Jim Ryan realized this and started the "change".

MS just spent 100B to be on par with PlayStation. Sony has the talent and infrastructure to be on top for many generations.

 

[Old Gamer]

Feels like 2012.
Propaganda and astroturfing at an all time high.

 

[Darth Vader]

PlayStation can't compete anymore. And SIE/Jim Ryan knows this. This is the reason why Jim Ryan is preparing SIE and PlayStation to become a 3rd party publisher, releasing PlayStation games on PC, Mobile, next-gen Switch and Xbox.
The PS5 will be Sony's last console.

Sony can't compete because the supposed competition is so shit they are being outsold and have no games.

 

[Darth Vader]

Feels like 2012.
Propaganda and astroturfing at an all time high.

He's absolutely paid to write this shit

 

[Hezekiah]

Bloody hell, people reaching for every source possible.

The Metro is the absolute gutter, they always seems to focus on sensationalist headlines whenever I see it pop up in my Google Discover feed.

The proof is in the pudding though, and we will see if PS5s keep selling out almost instantly, and Sony games keep selling 10m+ copies.

 

[Pamello)]

No but they are going 3rd party soon.
Which makes sense. Sony doesn't have the money or talent to compete with today's Microsoft and Nintendo.
And Jim Ryan realized this and started the "change".

I've never heard more bullshit in my life

 

[azertydu91]

Feels like 2012.
Propaganda and astroturfing at an all time high.

Man I remember how the press was before the ps4/Xb1 reveal was (some of iteven after btw) you had headlines everywhereabout how the ps4 would get obliterated by Xbox....

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

Talk about idiotic hyperbole. These guys have no idea how the business market works. This is just more overly dramatic, exaggerated fearmongering for clicks.

You don't have to like the price hike; I don't (tho I'm not affected). But I can understand why they're doing it, and as long as the content and value is there to command demand, it won't have a big effect on overall sales outside of something in a margin of error, if even that.

In a worst-case, if sales dip a little in certain foreign markets, that just means more supply for NA where, again, no increase has taken place. Why do people stop thinking with common sense and logic when Sony and anything even remotely negative is involved?

No but they are going 3rd party soon.

Sony doesn't have the money or talent to compete with today's Microsoft and Nintendo

Sony doesn't have the money or talent

 

[Bryank75]

Funny, this comment / reader contribution is far better written than the Forbes contributor article I posted.

It gets right to the heart of my issues with Sony and PlayStation right now.... the lack of communication, the self destructive / insane moves they've been making.
It makes little to no sense....

Jim already increased game prices and put games on PC.... but as I said many times before nothing will be enough for Jim Ryan and he will keep looking for things to increase until he has run everything into the ground.

However I do not agree with @Sleepy Brown on Sony going 3rd party.... they make no money on their games, so if the platform goes, so do the games and everything else.

They might make some overprices monitors and headphones for you but that would be about it.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

 

[Papacheeks]

The PS5 price hike is the final mistake for Sony and the PlayStation – RF​

Source

Pretty much spot on.
But it's not really a "mistake". Sony knows what they are doing. It's their current plan.
PlayStation can't compete anymore. And SIE/Jim Ryan knows this. This is the reason why Jim Ryan is preparing SIE and PlayStation to become a 3rd party publisher, releasing PlayStation games on PC, Mobile, next-gen Switch and Xbox.
The PS5 will be Sony's last console.

The signs were all there:
10€ for cross-gen upgrades.
80€ for games.
80€ for remakes of PS4 remasters.
550€ for a PS5 console.
No communication at all with the PS community
Barely any showcases anymore (all hands on the GaaS deck / No-shows during E3 time, SGF, or Gamescom)

They are milking the PlayStation community dry one last time.
- SIE and PlayStation can't compete anymore. Sony saw how Microsoft acquired publishers. And MS will buy more publishers after the Activision-Blizzard deal goes through in a few months.
- Nintendo is dominating with the hybrid-console model and their powerful IPs.
So Sony is focusing on Live-Service games now, to sell microtransactions on all platforms in the near future (PC, Xbox, Next-gen Switch and Mobile). To become a 3rd party publisher like EA or Ubisoft.
This is Sony's future. Jim Ryan knows this. And he's preparing SIE to drop out of the console race next gen.

Wtf did I just read?

God I feel like people have been drinking water from Flint Michigan.

I hope you get thread creation taken away for a while until you can actually talk about topics with knowledge/receipts instead of pulling nonsense from you’re ass.

 

[Sleepy Brown]

The only one trying to compete is MS. Sony is the market leader. Sony is doing the things necessary to keep it that way.

The marketleader is Nintendo.

 

[Old Gamer]

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

The market leader is Nintendo.

The market leader of fisher price toys.

 

[laynelane]

This has gone beyond Sony arrogance and into something much more dangerous for them. They seem to have gone completely insane and not only do they not have any obvious game plan but they don’t even seem to be trying.

What an incredibly professional assessment to make. It doesn't sound at all biased or hysterically hyperbolic. As for your pet theory that Sony can't compete and is going third party:

 

[Rivet]

No but they are going 3rd party soon.
Which makes sense. Sony doesn't have the money or talent to compete with today's Microsoft and Nintendo.
And Jim Ryan realized this and started the "change".

If anybody could go 3rd party, that's not Sony (the leader by a country mile, 2021 revenue is $22.67 bn vs Nintendo $15.79 bn, not even close), it's Xbox. Game Pass to this day is a failure : it missed its latest MS target and they only sold 13 million consoles until now vs 21 million PS5 despite massive PS5 shortages, that's very very far from what they need to turn profit on Game Pass, let alone turn the profit they need to make it interesting for Microsoft. It's not looking good right now.

Still, if GP doesn't turn a hefty profit in a few years, MS would be more likely to try to sell everything and give up with the Xbox brand than going 3rd party. That's what their shareholders would ask them to do. Remember GP was a last ditch effort to finally make something valuable from the Xbox brand. They're in for big margins, MS doesn't care about low margin businesses (because their other businesses have big margins, so low margins effectively make their shareholders earn less money).