Sony is raising the price of the PlayStation 5 by £90 in the UK and by $100 in the US, in a dramatic hike it says is due to “continued pressures in the global economic landscape”.
The gaming giant said the changes, taking effect from 2 April, would see the recommended price for retailers of its PS5, PS5 Pro and PlayStation Portal handheld device rise around the world.
It comes less than a year after the company hiked the price of the disc-free PS5 Digital Edition by £40, citing “challenging” market conditions.
Sony said the increases were “a necessary step to ensure we can continue delivering innovative, high-quality gaming experiences to players worldwide”.
The changes will see the recommended retail price of the PS5 to £569.99 in the UK - a 19% increase.
The PS5 Digital Edition will cost £519.99 (21% increase), while the PS5 Pro will be £789.99 (13% increase).
The PlayStation Portal will go up by £20 to £219.99.
Gaming industry analyst Piers Harding-Rolls, of Ampere Analysis, told the BBC there was “some inevitability” to Sony’s latest PlayStation price hikes.
He attributed it to a broader “supply chain shock” incurred by rising prices for random access memory (Ram) and storage - both of which are intrinsic to building consoles.
Both components are in high demand as more data centres - the huge banks of computer chips which power AI - are built around the world.
“With no sign of prices easing largely due to demand for AI infrastructure, Sony will have made the move to protect its slim hardware margins,” said Harding-Rolls.
“It wouldn’t be a surprise if Microsoft and Nintendo followed suit in the not-too-distant future,” he added.
Concerns over soaring Ram and storage costs loom large in the gaming sector.
Valve, the company behind PC games store Steam, said the issue meant it had to revise the launch date and pricing of its PC-console hybrid announced late last year.
Harding-Rolls added a further wave of inflation expected as a result of the US-Israel war with Iran could “compound the effect of the component price increases” and add to an already “difficult position” console companies currently find themselves in.
“This may have had an influence on the scale of these price increases,” he said.
In the US the PS5 console will now cost $649.99 (£488), while and in Europe it will cost €649.99 (£563) from 2 April.
Some people have reacted angrily to Sony’s pricing changes.
“€650 for the 5 year old console base console is just insane,” wrote one user in comments beneath Sony’s blog post announcing the new prices.
Another described the move as “disgusting” and said “prices should be going down not up this late into the generation” of the console.
“The only generation that the console prices are going up and not down,” added another user.
The announcement comes amid continued struggles for the video game industry, which has in recent months seen a slew of sudden developer layoffs, service price increases and controversial leadership changes.
Fornite-maker Epic Games became the latest gaming firm to announce job cuts on Tuesday, saying it was laying off 1,000 employees because a “downturn” in use of its massively popular online game had left it spending more than it was making.
Source: BBC
--Agencies
