SocialistSlayer said:
its just so crazy to think 1 year ago, to get an xbox one you would have to spend $170 more, $500 total, and you wouldnt get a game and $50 coupon. the console has essentially dropped $200 in less than a year. im pretty sure thats unheard of. but it seems to be a very good, albeit desperate move by ms. Sony should have definitely done the temporary price as well. The consoles 2nd Christmas season is a very crucial part of its lifecycle. These early years it is critical get get people to adopt your console, so later on, others buy it to because "everyone else has one". (like what happened with 360 to ps3). if ps4 would have dropped price this christmas, people would continue to buy it in droves over the xbo, leaving little reason to get the xbo over it. then put the price back up in january, without loosing customers in the holiday season like they will now. and then "everyone" will still have a ps4, so long run sales, and profits would be even greater than the short term greater profits that not dropping the price will have. its going to be a snowball effect. i still think the ps4 will win longterm in the US, but this season they had a chance to shut the door, and they missed it. they are letting xbo get back in the game. MS will be gaining the critical early adopter that will influence others to get it later down the road. if sony sacrificed some profit margins on the ps4 this christmas season, they would have gained a lot more sales, and importantly shutout xbox sales. then down the road they would have more than made up the lost potential profit, by have even a larger market share and the snowball effect of everyone buying a ps4 because everyone else has one too. very dumb on sony's part |
At the first bolded. If you think this is temporary I have a bridge to sell you. Half of the reason MSFT are in this Xbox mess is because of their PR. After the holidays announcing a price increase would effectively destroy the goodwill they have built up and worked so hard for the last 8 months. They may have said temporary to begin with but it is only so they can announce a "second" price cut when they say its permanent for more headlines and exposure, its very transparent.
As for the second bolded. I know in todays age of twitter, facebook status updates every 2 seconds, amazon hourly sales rankings extrapolation it can be hard to grasp the macro view of what is happening. The bulk of console sales do not happen in the first year. Ever. Sony is finally playing it right and not overreacting to the echochamber of online forums and is priming itself for a longer run. The most frustrating thing about this generation is the absurdity in which people place emphasis on weekly sales when discussing the "generation". For fucks sake we have people making estimates, claims and extrapolation on hourly sales at a single online retailer in a single region. People need to step back and take a deep breath outside of the echochamber.
