Perhaps if Sony can drop the price by 50 dollars this Christmas, and by another 50 around spring, then that could spur demand. But going a full 100 dollars this Christmas would not be very wise, since like Hirai said, there's not much content to back it up.

Price does matter. I know 10s of people(including me) that would buy PS3 instantly if price was lower. I live in Europe BTW so you can imagine how expensive it is for us.

Of course he's not going to say anything pre maturely .. That would only slow sales down to a crawl...

i would expect to see it the first week of October, or the first week of November.. This way they can talk about how much sales have increased in the month of the cut..

It will happen. Hell we all already know about the 40 gig SKU coming real soon.. They simply can NOT only have the 80 gig version only on shelves...

Funny thing is.. My freinds are now looking for PS3's here, and you can not find any 60 gig models anywhere, so they are waiting for the new SKU.. I believe that this is the reason why sales are a bit slouched these past few weeks..

Sony is a sneaky company Kaz continued to mention that a price cut makes no sense without good titles.Well Metal Gear Solid 4 is a big good title and rumors are it could be released in 2007.If they cut the price when MGS:4 comes out it would definitely sell PS3s.I still have a feeling despite whats being said by Sony that there will be a price cut this holiday.I think it will be a spur of the moment type thing.Sony likes surprises.

If there is a price drop, it would probably occur in the US or UK as the PS3 is beating out the 360 in Japan. Which makes me wonder why people would think that Sony would announce a US or UK pricedrop at the TOKYO Game Show? If a price drop should occur it will probably be announced outside of TGS.

they could go for a new bundle with metal gear and the price drop about october just in time for christmas and after some of the halo3 excitements worn off

If Sony did it now, I think it would be a mistake.

Think of the headline, "PS3 price drop does little to strengthen demand as Xbox Halo 3 frenzy continues"

To all the people who bought the last 2 and their friends who enjoyed watching before, Halo 3 is going to sell very well and its better to leave it be from a Sony perspective.

Sony has some great franchises to come and the situation will be just as reversed during that period too.

Sony did however, keep TGS perhaps a little barren of new info but they gave more than a few reasons to keep potential buyers happy at their decision to keep waiting on the fence for a reason to buy and there are alot of those judging by overall sales this generation so far.

This guy cant even decide what the PS3 is. Pricing should be last on his mind

And do something about it. I agree with most of you guys that sony really needs to drop the price. I believe their initial plan of marketing the PS3 as a media hub and so deserved to be priced higher than most gaming device is backfiring. I agree that with what the PS3 has inbuilt is worth more than its being currently being sold but that mind frame is not revelent to people that just want a gaming device priced at gaming console price at an acceptable range of 300-400 max. I still maintain without a doubt that PS3 will succeed eventually but if they lower the price this year then that will put them in a much better position for 2008 when they will really start dominating with established PS franchise start appearing and the migration of the massive PS2 fanbase.

-----At most 20% Console Market captured sofar-------------------------
--------Console war far from over ------------------------------ -------

14.1
This guy cant even decide what the PS3 is. Pricing should be last on his mind

No. Pricing should be the FIRST thing on his mind. Because the price is the sole reason why the PS3 isnt sweeping off shelves like it should.

I've given up on 2007 in terms of expecting a Sony fightback. I'm not interested anymore, I'm just shutting up and playing my games.

Yes the PS3 would sell well if cut down to $400 but Sony would be taking a £1.1billion dollar deficit for cutting the price down again. Without the content, games like MGS4, FF13 and KillZone 2 for starters, he does not believe that Sony could recuperate enough financially.

So he is thinking to wait until those titles are going to come out, then cut the price to cut down loss and maximise profit (sales). 2008 could be a runaway train for Sony in that regard.

This is why he is not willing to cut the price at the moment.

They barely announce anything long before they actually do it (except games). Think about how stubborn they kept quiet about Dualshock 3. We never know what they will announce in the next couple of months.

Sony is in a very hard spot. As consumers everyone would like to see the price come down but think of the loss sony will be taking if they drop the price. I do believe isupply once said it costs $800 plus to make each ps3. Sony is subsidizing their hardware by ALOT of money. We poke fun at the ps3 but all jokes aside the hardware is very impressive and unfortunately impressive comes at quite the price. So if Sony doesn't lower the price then demand doesn't grow (no huge games until 08), if they drop the price they take an even bigger hit in terms of loss per console and who knows..might be forced to charge for the psn (just an example) or something to make up on the losses incurred. Double that with the fact that the HD format war isn't going to go away anytime soon, Halo 3 is upon us, the Wii craze, most ppl don't own HD hardware to truly take advantage of what the ps3 can do and most importantly how do the majority of ppl (not us harcore gamers) justify paying $659 for a gaming system? A price cut and some big games are vital to sony at this point. It's pretty interesting to see how 08 turns out.

It makes no sense to do it now. You can only lower the price so much before you are giving them away at even more of a loss. Why do it now before the PS3 has had a chance to mature with it's titles. PS3 owners just need to sit back and wait it out this holiday.. But in 08 there will be a bunch of new titles and THEN a price drop and Sony will be off to the races.. No worries the PS3 hasn't even begun to hit it's stride yet. News media love to give everything a doom and gloom outlook, that's how they get hits. It's definately not as bad as many of these folks make it out to be.

Sony will be fine. Uncharted over halo for me, UT3, GTPrologue, Ratchet, Haze, Warhawk, Heavenly Sword, Sigma, Time Crisis 4, Singstar, Eye of Judgement, wireless Rockband, multiplats, Folklore. The blu ray market will help tremendously. People buy at xmas for the immediate spring also. Sony fans know what late winter/spring has in store. Sony should be safe.

Despite how you feel about the TEMPORARY PRICE drop, you can get your hands on a PS3 for $500 at best buy if you want one. So don't pretend you HAVE to pay $600. U can use the same bluetooth headset on the PS3 as you do for your phone...so no HAVING to buy more MS accessories. Wireless connectivity out of the box, no subscription charge. I would imagine the people on this forum claim to be hardcore gamers, so why the narrowsightedness about the price. Yes, the initial hit will hurt. You can't get online with a brand new xbox for less than 400 with a 1 year live subscription. That's not a huge price difference considering you get RELIABLE hardware.

Even if Sony drops the price, people will STILL find some $hit to whine about. Don't claim to be a serious gamer if you can't foot the bill for
the extra 80 dollars. I have a hard time believing any of you xbox fans never owned a playstation at one time or another and now since M$ is doing well you just jump on the D1ck like M$ is giving you a discount?

How is that different from a groupie???

I only have XBOX 360 because MS abandoned the xbox and only made the games they felt were popular backward compatible. I play ps3 quite often at friends houses. Both systems are worth the money. I will get a ps3 when more games come out. It's not about the hardware...its about the games.

was XBOX360 hot before gears game out...Call of Duty??? Blazing angels??? DOA??? Cooling fans, scratched disks, RROD? You roll the dice every time you turn it on. Even if you get it fixed, you still have to wait and speak to customer service INDIA while they troubleshoot your problems in broken english (ive done it).

I will give M$ and Nintendo this, they have sony scared as hell and we probably wouldn't see a price drop this soon without a good war. Sony may be a bit arrogant, but microsoft played dumb and tried to blame the Hardware failure and disks scratches on consumers until they were about to get smacked with a class-action lawsuit. So no company is without faults.

So to me, anyone who doesn't need mommy to buy their games and pretends to hate a system when they really just cant afford it will win out this gen. by having access to the best games on all platforms.

F-ck a monopoly.

But you get what you pay for.
just ask the cheap x360 owners they pay less and get and a towel wearing POS.

...60GB supplies haven't been depleted? Seriously... STFU. Sony has to wait at least a month after Halo to drop its price, and also wait till 60 GB console is depleted; or at least to small levels, so that they drop the 80 to 500, the 60 to 450, and the 40 to 400.

and it's a lot easier to put out great titles than to lower the price (financially speaking). They just dropped the 60GB to $499 two months ago, so a second price drop would probably just diminish consumer confidence. Unfortunately, gamers and analysts alike were anticipating a price drop announcement (especially with the 40GB rumor) and most people have held off from purchasing a PS3 until that price drop occurs.

We still have one more event, Gamers Day in October, but really I don't expect them to make a price drop until Spring at the earliest. Depends on how the software/hardware sales for the system look this holiday season.

Basic business practise.

* They have set a target of 11 million by march so obviously there's a major price cut coming.

* Special package deals will keep sales respectable until Christmas.

* major AAA titles are also coming in 2008 so they need a console base of 11 million+ for better game sales & profits.

* They are likely to still be making losses on "older" consoles so need to recoup/or reduce the losses by keeping the price high as long as possible - run out the old stock of consoles & controllers.

* the game library is currently still small so again no need to reduce price - ie. still continue to recoup/reduce losses on each console sold.

* Even at the the high price the Ps3 is selling at about the same rate as the xbox but a year behind - again no need to reduce cost as the AAA have yet to come.

* By Christmas quality games like R&C, HS, UT3, Uncharted, Haze, COD4, GTPrologue, Warhawk, Singstar etc will be available for current owners and potential buyers.

Then bring on 2008 with the arrival of rumble, Home, Little Big Planet, MGS, FF, GT5, Killzone 2, The Getaway, etc.

It's obvious that 2008 is the year when everything is going to change in favour of the Ps3.

i own a ps3 and am very happy with it. but, for many people, it's just too expensive. if sony wants continued success over its rivals, they need the price to be 399$. just that simple. put out a system without wi-fi and reduce hard drive to 40 gig. it's the right thing to do for all the ps2 owners out there who can't afford the current price.

Maybe it would be stupid to drop prices now since they already losing money on ps3. Best time to drop the price or introduce 40g would be November to December. Or they could drop the price of 80g next year Q2.

Now that Jim Ryan is gone just need to remove Herman Hulst from his position! And maybe give Shuhei the position he deserved.

This gen hasn't been the best for games, last gen consoles are still out there and now there's been talk of the PS6 and Xbox Two for a year or so. Many games this gen will be ported to next gen and the cycle will continue. The re-release of the Neo Geo AES+, games on cartridge for £70 ($95), gaming is going back in time. Gaming has gone pricing mad with the high cost of games, consoles and controllers. The men and women at the top are clueless.

It’s always interesting to hear behind-the-scenes stories like this, especially involving veterans like Shuhei Yoshida and leadership figures like Jim Ryan. That said, there are usually multiple sides to decisions at that level. It could be less about not “listening” and more about differences in long-term vision for PlayStation. Yoshida played a huge role in shaping the brand, so whatever the reason, his impact is undeniable.

If true, and I'm inclined to believe it is, it goes to show that Sony lost their way when they became more western/didn't respect the PlayStation origin story. Andrew House and Jack Tretton did great work, but they also didn't try to fundamentally change the PlayStation DNA. Ryan oversaw the death of Japan Studio and a live service direction.

I already figured this, good lord imagine if Shuhei took over instead, would've been a platinum era 😩

I miss the first three generations of PlayStation. The way they turned PS3 around, we knew they meant business. We were all worried for a bit there around launch. Eventually from 2008 they started shifting slowly. But since Yoshida was fired, it's never been the same. Still enjoy my PS5 daily. I got a backlog dating back to PS2 lol So I'm fine but new games aren't as appealing anymore.

It seems like we were thrown on to the worst timeline possible where everything is too expensive and the wrong people were put in positions that makes the world a shitty place. We could have had Shu as the head of PS but we got the shitty alternative. Same goes for everyone in power around the world. Doesn’t matter the company or country the majority of us got the shitty picks and the world is declining like never before. I do think PS can come out of this because of their studios, talent and IP but they need someone more in touch with gamers leading things like Shu was. They’re still the best place for console gaming imo but it could be much better than it is especially without the massive live service failures. The rest of the world I have a lot less hope for right now. Hopefully the pendulum swings back towards the good ole days but I’m preparing for the worst.

There goes illuminati distraction story

So now there's certifiable proof that Ryan was in fact "fired", as opposed to when it was first announced that he "retired", in order to save face.

There's another guy who recently "retired" as CEO of another large gaming company, after doing a dismantling job as lead for well over a decade.

seems legit, the business man, fires the one who has ideas to move the business forward.

Jim Ryan is the reason why we are entering year 6 since the PS5 launch and many of us don't feel like the PS5 has gotten started as yet.

I hope going forward, we will see a return to form.