Will Sony pull off a PS3 price cut?

[TheCompletist]

Yeah, I'm thinking about Q3 2009 too.

People laugh at the 10-year plan, but Sony have always intended the PS3 to be around for a long time. Everyone knows Sony lost $3b on the console in the beginning, and they know that they sold hardly any consoles early on. But think about it, if PS3 had come out selling like hot cakes, the massive loss per console would truly have bankrupted the company. It follows that they must have known they would start slowly, and would lose a lot of money that would take time to recover. Their security blanket would have been the belief that if anyone started a new gen in, say, 2012, the PS3 was big enough to compete credibly. Because it will have to.

Furthermore, if an Xbox Mark 3 were to be released in 2012 and fail to outshine the PS3 convincingly, suddenly the roles from this gen would be totally reversed as Sony would then have the install base advantage, cheaper price advantage, and console whose slight inferiority was nullified by everything being multi-plat. (On the other hand, a Wii HD in 2012 could give Sony conniptions).

My point is, the PS3 has a long road to hoe, and its price won't be brought down prematurely. Its sales would be considered completely satisfactory anyway, and despite the fanboy prism, that doesn't change just because the 360 cuts price and passes it. IMHO, since the first price cut things have actually been going pretty much to plan. I still believe the "Year of the PS3" will come, but anyone who expects it before 2011 is kidding themselves.

Oh, and it'll never catch the Wii. Might get close, though, in the distant future.