Europeans aren't price sensitive, yes right. During these hard times with people losing there jobs left right and centre people aren't price sensitive and are going to stump up a small fortune for a games console/blue ray player. How dillusional are these guys surely??

a price cut is ridiculous quite frankly, for £300 your getting the best blu ray player on the market (BD 2.0, wireless, ethernet) a multimedia powerhorse (divx,mkv,xvid) USB, wireless, ethernet, and of course it plays games too, lol the xbox costs £200 factor in a wirelesss module and thats £260, so for an extra 40 quid your getting a console twice as powerful, with more features, and free online play. it's a no brainer really.

.. Dont be an idiot mate. Why you even mentioning the Xbox? Get a grip kid. Christ sake.

More to the topic, Mr House is being a tiny little bit unrealistic here, "aren't price sensitive" Erm newsflash, Europe are very price sensitive at the minute my friend.

I'm baffled to say the least.

@elliott: i have a PS3, but what if you don't have £300? if you have the choice of a Ferrari over a Volvo it's no brainer, but that doesn't mean you can afford a Ferrari. and also to justify the BR player you really do need to spend another £300 on a TV.
personally, having had a 360, i think the PS3 is worth the money. the issue is a lot of people just don't have that money.

i also think there is a price drop oin the pipe line and i expect it to be later this year. what Sony can't do however is announce there'll be a price drop late '09 cos nobody will buy one between now and then.

i'm happy to wait for the PS3 to come good, and i'm also happy that i paid for the PS3 when it was BC and my sweet TV. i think i've actually played as many PS2 games on my PS3 as i have PS3 games. but what i'm also going to do is upgrade the HDD to 360gb and install linux and turn it into a modest PC, and i'll probably get play TV at some point - even tho it's not the best PVR on the market, it's cheap and does get firmware updates. all in all that's quite a lot of money to get the most out of your PS3, and between HDDs, PVRs, TVs and all that jazz, i'm approaching 700-800 quid. i could have gotten a good PC for that price, but i wouldn't have games like MGS4 (i'm an MGS fanboy) and the eagerly awaited titles coming out this next year or so. but as i have BC PS3 i can also play ALL the old PS1 and PS2 games, and i have a BR player.

what gets over looked with the BR player is that every PS3 game is on BR, which gives it A LOT of scope, but i personally think that unless you're playing BR games, it's a rip off for movies.

anyway, PS3: expensive, but not over-priced. and EVERY consumer is price sensitive (stoopid)

@Tom £300??? Yeah from a bloke in a pub who happens to have picked one up from the back of a lorry. You need at least £800 to get a really good HD t.v. To be honest I would recommend the samsung led 7000 series and they cost £1400. My t.v. bought 2 years ago cost £1300 why because it was the first 40" 1080p t.v. sold by samsung. @jimothy AH was only defending the cost of the PS3 and a could comparison is the 360 which IS an inferior product. I'm not saying it's a bad product, and yes i'm envious of some the games it has but, the PS3 is a great value product. The nay sayers need to get a grip on what's truth and what's fiction. In all fairness price is the last thing i consider when it comes to gaming because it is my main hobby. I already have ordered the batman collectors edition. 'Nuff said

a price cut would be great for consumers and the retail as you would see a suge in ps3 sales, although ive sold 2 this morning, simply because of the first party games, like infamous,killzone 2 etc,
i think price cuts only happen when there is no choice or the hardware it self becomes cheaper to produce, if sony are loosing money selling the ps3 they will hang on until q4 i think,

Elliot your post is a no-brainer. Many (admittedly not all) gamers want a games machine first, and extras after. Both leading consoles have those extras, with the PS3 having a bit more. Many people don't care about this, they just want to play games.

Activision have famously said they will consider dropping the PS3 if they don't drop the price in Europe (the most expensive PS3's in the world). Sony have now said they won't drop the price, even though they could. So potential PS3 owners are now faced with higher costs (including games on the PSN shop) and less games.

Over to you, Bobby.

You can get a standalone Bluray player for 100 quid now. it's not the great reason for the high price of the ps3.

The real reason is that Sony don't want to lose more money than they already are by lowering the price of the PS3.

Any statements from them are just PR bluff.

I think you're all missing the point. Sony need to recover losses from R&D etc.. The price now isn't based on the current cost of components, they need to make the money back which was lost in the past 3 years!
They have a profit and loss timeline which they need to stick to.

@link: this is totally irrelevant to the topic so sorry but my TV is a 32" 1080p LG 32LB75 which cost me £460 18mnths ago. and given that my eyes work and i don't live in an aircraft hanger, it suits me fine. regardless of who has a more expensive TV (otherwise known as a smaller penis) either way it can be an expensive hobby and right now most people don't have the kind of money either myself or Link seems to have spent on a PS3 and all relevant peripherals.

end of the day, there are more people who want a PS3 than there are people who can afford a PS3, and Sony can't afford a price cut ATM. it's kinda catch 22 but i think they have the brand power and quality to pull through this. hopefully they'll learn lessons for the next PS.

and my TV rocks.

Reading the interview itself, Mr House also seems to think the global recession will see a turnaround this year. There's a man with his finger on the pulse. What's he been smoking?

@Johan, I take it you've heard the phrase 'cutting your losses'? Sony are likely to lose money on the PS3 no matter what. Cutting the cost of the PS3 would sell more and mean they lose less. Leaving it at the price as it is is clearly not working.

It's business and a successful business has to be flexible to adapt to changing times.

Well, I paid £425 for my ps3 and for that I got a 60gb ps3 (with bc), a copy of resistance, casino royals on bluray, a goody bag and a tshirt. Oh yes, and a 46 inch tv!! Not a bad deal...!

However, even if it was just the console I was willing to pay for it at the time because I spent so much time gaming. Not saying I would now and actually I'd like to see my console supported better by the industry which if it was cheaper it would be. They are becoming a very blinkered company (see price of PSP go) and it is worrying.

good point about the PSP GO!
i would never pay that much for it, and i don't know many people who will.

i do think Sony will have some great titles this year and the next, a decent firmware update that actually makes a difference, loads of PSP support, hopefully the motion controller won't be a complete waste of time (reserving judgment here) and there will be a price drop as well. the issue is can Sony hold their own until they deliver on all of this? especially as Nintendo and MS make the most of their affordable products.

Is PS3 a sleeping giant or a knackered fatty? my money, quite literally, is on the former.

I've been vociferous on this subject before, and have always been astounded by the fanboys who defend anything to do with the PS. Get a life boys, it's fairly clear to see that Sony regard Europe and especially the UK as ripe for more exploitation because of our consumer culture.

I'm sure it's very easy for House to state that we are less concerned about cost when he's going home every night to a multi-million pound mansion, while employment threatens to reach 10% in the UK.

This isn't about 'my console's better than yours', this is about a multinational corporation exploiting a market that they misunderestimated in the first place.

@Elliot - "for an extra 40 quid your getting a console twice as powerful"
Since when has the PS3 been TWICE as powerful as the 360?

- No offense but your argument is pretty flawed. Pretty much the only thing worthwhile that the PS3 does over the 360 is play BluRays.
And even that uisn't much of an achievement - as analysts are predicting that BluRay will start to die down within the next few years - what with legal downloads on the increase and Australian scientists developing a "Super DVD" (holds something crazy like 500 movies).
The 360 has an upscaling DVD player built in, which means that watching DVDs on the 360 (on an HDTV) is better compared to normal DVD players. And DVD prices are so damn cheap it's almost shameful when you see an old DVD movie for £5 and then the BluRay version for £25.
BluRay isn't that much of jump from DVD (not like VHS to DVD anyway) and I can't see myself buying any Blu Ray movies until they drop down in price too. (And yes I have a Blu Ray player - got it free).

ANYWAY - onto the main topic point.

I can understand where Sony is coming from. They of course need to make a profit and if they can't justify dropping the price of the console any further, then they really shouldn't.
However it's clear that consumers want/need a price drop to warrant the system's purchase.
Frankly I think it is up to companies like Activision to stop threatening and take proper action.

If Activision actually did stop support for the system, then Sony would be forced to take a step back and think "Shit, maybe we should drop the price and push more for higher system sales."

But if Activision (like loads of other publishers) just say "PS3 needs a price drop" and don't do anything - then Sony aren't going to bother lowering price points.

yeah well fanboy or not, for one reason or another (or both, or many) people aren't buying PS3s in the numbers Sony wants them to. i guess the issues are price vs. value (of course) and preference (not everybody wants a PS3).

i do think the PS3 is worth the money, and i am a fanboy, but it's not me buying one that's the issue. the only way Sony are going to see a change in volumes is by either dropping the price or improving the service.

with regards to Europe, Alex is right. especially given the serivces offered on PSN NA and Japan.
in Britain, compared to the rest of the world, you get inferior services for a higher price and that does kinda grate on me. until Sony change that, they're still gonna struggle with sales in the EU.

and i think everyone agrees House is wrong about the EU not being price sensitive so we don't really have to go over that again.

The phrase "European gamers aren’t price sensitive" can loosely be translated to mean, "we can shaft them continuously with higher prices for our hardware, and they'll just keep buying it". Anyone remember how we got the short end of the stick with the overpriced, cut-down launch console?

@Elliot: You meant to put [sarcasm] tags round that didn't you?

Twice as powerful as the 360? Not on this planet.

Multimedia powerhouse because it can play DivX? Yeah, sure.

Best Blu-Ray player on the market? Nope, not the cheapest either by a very long stretch. It's also region locked for DVD playback, something most stand alone BR players no longer suffer from.

And what has the Blu-Ray player brought to the PS3, mandatory installs on a console for the first time ever! And all because the drive was designed to play films, more than it was designed to move game data. From a gamers perspective, it was the worst thing Sony could have added to a games console, because it wasn't game console spec hardware. Play MGS4 and tell me any different, that game was a disgrace of platform optimisation, a shambles.

Also, why did you factor in the wireless module for a 360, yet neglected to factor in HD cables and a headset for the PS3? Was that the only thing you could think of to use in an argument, because the 360 comes with everything else already... including a bigger hard drive?

You don't need wireless to access the internet, you DO need HD cables to watch the "True HD" console in "True HD" though. I mean, how else can we play all those 120fps, 1080p games without them? I mean, christ, you can't even upscale some of the games to 1080p even if you want to, put LBP in your PS3 and force it into 1080p, then sit back and admire a "simple platform game" having to run at 576p. And of course, we'd need 2 HD cables, one for each HDMI socket... oh wait, we didn't get them. Still, at least those paying £300 are getting as much as the initial buyers did aren't they, because Sony would never remove features to give us a price cut would they?

It's this kind of pathetic fanboy nonsense that makes the developers that this site is aimed at, get completely fed up of coming here. I know for a fact that any serious story is going to have people like you spouting fanboy rubbish all over it. We're developers, we don't give a damn about fanboys, we work on ALL consoles as a living, we pretty much buy EVERY console released, pretty much ever. You won't find us saying "meh, I'm not working on that console, it's not as good as [a n other] console.", so why do you think we want to see this type of comment on this kind of story?

You think you're going to say "it's twice as powerful as a 360" and we're going to say "of course it is" because hey, we're all sure you know more than the PS3 and 360 devs don't you? Try IGN, Gamespot or Gametrailers, you're comments are more suited to those sites, the kids on there love a good fanboy comment.

You can pull any console to bits, more so the PS3. Yeah, its biggest problem is the price in the UK. It's at a decent price in the US and Japan but not in the UK/Europe. Basically, Sony put too much into it and to think the main reason to own a PS3 is to play games. When it was released, it was £425, it's now £300 so there has been a price cut. Sony can't keep selling it at £300, and they rekon it's going to last around 10 years like the PS1 and PS2 which isn't going to happen. The Xbox 360 had a 1 year head start, the PS3 hasn't caught up yet. The Dreamcast was released 1 year before the PS2 and it went on to overtake the Dreamcast and I think back then the PS2 was £300, Dreamcast was £200 so price wise, that didn't come into it. But the market is different now. The 360 and Wii are under £200, that's realistic. Hardly any PS2 owners have moved over to the PS3 so what does that say? I'll wait for the price drop. It's got to happen at some point.

Here's proof bobby kotick was wrong, My PS3 has given me 2 years great service. It died tonight. I Blame the intense heat. I have given it a tough ride over the last month. With Infamous and Ghostbusters taking up a lot of my time. I'm off to buy another console! £300 well spent

@22: Do you not get a 3 yr warranty with the PS3?

As much as everyone - even, I suspect Sony - would love to see price cut in the PS3, at least Sony have been consistent in their message - they said some time ago that the price wasn't going to fall and they have stuck to that.

Compare that with Nintendo actually putting up the wholesale price of the Wii and I don't think Sony have treated us too shabbily at all.

I do think they've made mistakes though - dropping PS2 backwards compatibility being the main one because it severs that link, that natural progression for the less hardcore gaming crowd to upgrade from a PS2. Now, brand loyalty aside, they might as well buy a 360.

But leaving all that aside, I really don't think price is a much of an issue as some people think. Any games console is a "luxury" purchase - even all those people out there who set out to buy "a Wii Fit" (surely the most casual of casual gaming purchases) need £250 in their back pocket to fund it, yet you can realistically get a PS3 and a game for £280.

Homes increasingly have HDTVs, so Blu-ray will look ever more attractive as time goes on - we're a long way from proper streaming of HD movies in the UK so I think the likely death of physical media is being grossly over-exaggerated.

But I think what will help Sony out in the end will be its games - the quality first and second party system exclusives that are only recently starting to arrive for the machine. Gran Turismo 5, God of War, Last Guardian, Uncharted 2 - these are all games that will do something to lure over those who are still holding out against buying the console, whether they be 360 owners or PS2 owners who are yet to be convinced.

A price cut would definitely help, but I think Sony will be banking on its games lineup over the next 12 months to really drive sales. A price cut before Christmas (timing is key) will just be the icing on the cake.

Honestly I was considering getting a PS3 at the moment but Sony has now just put me off.

It's for the best, really. I had these moments of amnesia but I can always rely on Sony to remind me why I don't buy their stuff.

Sony looked to be doing so well at E3 then they come and crash all our dreams..Sony needs a price cut to even compete now..Whos going to buy a PS3 game you can get on Microsoft for cheaper!. and with all these new fancy blu-ray players out whos going to want a PS3 now?? how can that guy brag on bout the blu-ray player.

In this Economy where people will be planning to stay in more Sony could really benifit from a price cut here atleast if they stuck thier console at a reasonable price people will take a look at them aswell.

Sure they need to earn money back..but keeping the console the way it is aint going to work xD

My opinion - Activision should have stopped all together instead of just saying they was..maybe that would have shocked Sony

But - manufacturers have historically made money not from the consoles, which function as loss leaders, but the game licenses. More consoles = more game sales = money for Sony etc.

Now they are saying the consoles have to make money? Does not compute.

This generation Sony have played bad card after bad card and this shows no signs of stopping. The PSPGo price point is bad enough, but refusing to drop the price of the PS3 when they have a rumoured slimline model in the works is just foolish.

I'm not a PS3 owner as there has not been enough triple A exclusives (although I want my Naruto and Initial D games) this generation to get me excited enough to spend £300. Now, if they were to bring that price down to about the £220 price mark I would expect to see a significant surge in sales of both Blu Ray and PS3 titles despite being the 'dead period' of summer time.

I believe Sony have just gotten cocky over the years and they think they can do no wrong but eventually it will come back and bite them big time and will hopefully bring them back down to earth.

I brought my PS3 on launch day, and I have regretted it. Sure i got a copy of casino royale on blu ray which regardless of naysayers of Blu Ray it is a great format, if far, far over priced for the disc and packaging. My PS3 hasa 60gb HDD has full functionality of what the PS3 was envised to have, has PS2 backwards compatibility, regularly plays the likes of Fire Pro Wrestling Returns and Virtua Fighter Evolution. But my PS3 is largely ignored over my 360 and Wii. If I see a multiformat title that i desire, do i choose to buy it on PS3 or 360? Usually its 360, unless there are more functions, and exclusive stuff on the opposite number. The reason comes down to XBOXLIVE. Which is seen a major part of the 360 experience, therefore most users have a headset, ok not all use it. but on PS3 virtually no one has a headset. How can you play a tactical title with no strategy? how can you have a bit of smacktalk when no one can do a come back? The PS3 does have some excellent exclusive titles. If you have the money, buy them, all if you have a choice, 360 will satisfy more needs and gaming niches, But buy a Wii as well down the line.

"Now they are saying the consoles have to make money?"

Yes. Nintendo always make money on their hardware - they'd rather sell 25million gamecubes and make cash on each one than lose the 4 billion MS lost on selling a few more Xboxes, Sony kept the price of the PS2 higher than the competition for all it's life. I'd bet MS are by now making cash on or breaking even on the 360.

Sony don't have the cash to sub the ps3, the Wii means that uptake of the competition will be slower and MS releasing first meant that Sony were robbed of a couple of years of massive profit.

Finaly, there's almost certainly a new ps3 on the way, certainly cheaper - why kill the stock thats in the shops right now and in warehouses by saying "year, we'll drop the price in 3 months time".
Admit nothing until the new consoles in the shops and the old stocks cleared.

http://confluence.public.thoughtworks.org/display/~buy-xanax-no-rx - xanax http://confluence.public.thoughtworks.org/display/~buy-tramadol-no-rx - tramadol http://confluence.public.thoughtworks.org/display/~buy-valium-online - valium http://cgi3.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&userid=buy-ambien-online-without-prescription-buy-ambien-10mg-5mg - ambien http://cgi3.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&userid=buy-xanax-online-buy-xanax-2mg-1mg - xanax http://cgi3.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&userid=buy-fioricet-online-without-prescription-buy-fioricet-cod - fioricet http://connections.blackboard.com/people/50273d6fc2 - tamiflu http://tapestry.formos.com/wiki/display/~buy-tamiflu-winthout-prescription - tamiflu http://boinc.vanderbilt.edu/CSB/view_profile.php?userid=5324 - ambien http://confluence.public.thoughtworks.org/display/~ativan4r5r - ativan http://confluence.public.thoughtworks.org/display/~buy-ambien-without-prescription - ambien
yours erasure concluded office chairs trillions utilise