The Australian dollar is worth more than the US dollar. If any currency is "wallnuts", it's the US one. And then you have to factor in sales tax separately, over there, whereas all costs, including taxes, are included in the Australian price.

There are these guys called L-A-W-Y-E-R-S.

The exchange rate tells nothing about the strenght of a currency. And by calling it wallnuts I meant that to people outside of Australia $AU 400 is as clear of a message as if I told you that PS4 is going to cost 1500-1600 PLN. Let's stick to US $ or Euro, currencies that tell something to everyone.

Free while under contract is interesting, though for something like this you'd normally expect $100-$200 initial payment. Let's go with free though. If it was for 2 years $20 a month would cover the console, $480. So it would have to be more than that to include paperwork, processing, and profit. $30 month giving it a final cost of $720 and Sony can probably cover them for 2 years of plus while they are at it and even throw in a couple games for early adopters since PS+ won't be offering much for PS4 games at first.

If the console is expensive and that is what they are trying to do to make it more accessible that's fine, but a pay in full option needs to remain. Say it's $500 with no added games or PS+ months. This method could really let Sony jam a lot of hardware power into their system. Make that payment plan option a $200 down with $20 a month might be better and that comes out to $680. That's not a bad deal. Lessens the initial blow to that "magic" $200 number and throws in enough benefits to make the $500-$680 leap worth it. Because 2 games and $100 of PS+ thrown in is just about the same as buying it in full. It would allow for an expensive console to seem less expensive.

it's not as installment payment isn't already possible at retail without any extra charges or maybe few percent so yeah, everyone who wants that can already do that?

hopefully they would provide an option for people who would rather pay upfront.  I know I'd go with that one, but I would rather just have everyone stick with the traditional pricing than this subscription crap.

i agree although to both i'm not sure free is an option.  would have to be a fairly steep monthly payment to get back the money in 2 years (i don't expect a longer term).  i have to imagine this would be tied to ps+ and live so they've have to add this to that fee.  maybe $100 down but i'm not convinced of free.

anyways, just my opinion.

yes and they will have all these extra work to do that i believe sure will happen alot...

Yeah. Would be irresponsible not to provide the possibility to buy it the traditional way.

The thing is, when you buy in installments, you get to know the real price you're paying. When you buy on a contract, you don't really know how much you pay for the thing and that's the whole beauty of it. People love to fool themselves and here they could fool themselves that they are just paying $99 ;)