It's not a matter of "can they afford it?" so much as "do they need it?"  Bundling something as costly as Natal with every SKU is effectively a price cut.  Plus, they could probably ride the launch of Natal just as well as they could ride a price cut through the holidays.  Might as well save the price cut to be used in 2011, and make an extra $50 on every system sold this year.  They'll probably have a better 2010 holiday than 2009 due to Natal alone.  Cutting the price would probably only lose them money this year.

It'd be like saying Nintendo should've launched at $199 from day one, because we all know they could've easily afforded it. 

I don't understad this 3D thing, first they say you need a special TV which Sony will deliver later this year and they will be pretty expensive and on the other hand we will soon buy Batman GOTY with 3d support even on X360...

@makingmusic476: But you must remember that they won't sell every X360 Slim with Natal bundled, you will buy Natal if you want to but without it the SKU will be cheaper than 300$, I think it will be 250$.

I won't underestimate the Xbox360 slim like I did with the ps3 slim.

That'll just be the crappy old school blue and red specs style 3D.

Sony's pretty much going for Avatar quality 3D in your house.  It'd be cool, but I'd grudge having to fork out for yet another TV.  It'll be big in a few years time though when the prices come down.

Why would you say that they won't sell Natal with every new 360 and contrary to analyst predictions?  IMO, for Natal to succees they MUST sell every new 360 with it.  With that said they will likely drop the price and include Natal ending up with the current price point we have now. In addition, the release of a slim 360 will offer too many console sku's and I'd expect them to drop one of them keeping it at only 3 max.

how the FUCK is natal going to increase hardware sales? the current 360 owners will be in to it but will people actually buy the console for it? i dont think so. same with the PS move which sucks even more. anyway yea is the slim confirmed or something? microsoft have a lot of cards this year with the slim (maybe) and price cut, that will drive sales! but sony do have counters, they have the biggest game of the year releasing in GT5, some may argue but GT5 is undoubtedly the biggest game of this year. only one game comes close and that halo reach but GT5 takes it cause its popular not only in america but everywhere in the world.

As long as Sony has Kevin Butler there's nothing to worry about...

MS and Hardware go so well together... Let's see that they don't fuck this one up. I can't see how a slim is the answer for MS. I mean Sony brought out the slim on every gen. But MS need to do their own thing and not what everyone else does. MS needs to innovate, not rehash the same old package wrapped differently.

I'm curious as to what you mean by main title?

Looking at PS2 best sellers Gran Turismo is the only big title left from the top 10 sellers on PS2 not yet released. Obviously Medal of Honor and Need for Speed don't sell as much as they use to.

Either way I don't see a price cut to $150 and slim revision still beating the PS3 constitently world wide. But thats just me.