PSP pricecut making a difference?

[elprincipe]

albionus said:
I'm still not clear on this price cut, is it permanent? I thought I had heard it was just to clear out the core packs to make way for a new pack at the old price. Something of a spike is to be expected, the GameCube saw a spike when it was lowered from $150 to $100 though it didn't last long. It's sales in the US haven't been bad and a 32% spike still puts it a good deal below the DS. The big thing to watch for I think is if the lower prices causes it to start selling games. That's been the PSP's real weakness.

I believe the price cut is permanent.  It isn't a pack now anyway and wasn't at $199, it was just the "core" system (the pack was the original configuration it was sold in, for $249).  

As for sales, PSP actually has been doing fairly well against DS in the U.S.  Of course, in Japan the DS is annihilating it and in Europe it is also being soundly thrashed.  But in the U.S. it is doing fairly well and moving a good deal of software even without the mega-hit games DS enjoys (other than GTA:LCS...even GTA:VCS has only 1/3 of the sales of GTA:LCS, check out the numbers on this site).  Unfortunately, Sony made big mistakes with PSP, including the "value pack only" approach at first, UMDs and long loading times among others, that have hurt the system's reputation among hardcore gamers IMO.