Xbox Boss Expects PS4 Price Drop In US

[Arkaign]

Regarding the whole 'price cut' vs. 'new SKU' disagreement. On purely technical terms for retailers/manufacturers, sure, you can deny price cuts.

However, from the consumer perspective, the chief overriding factor is 'cost of entry'. The cost of entry for Xbox One has lessened considerably since launch (unless you want Kinect, which was poorly received this gen and virtually irrelevant now).

Now many models/configurations will be available over the lifespan of a given platform in most situations. The differences between them are minor at best in the eyes of consumers unless there is something BIG missing or gained in what you get.

Virtually nobody cared about PS2 backwards compatibility (probably because 800 million PS2s existed, and everyone had one lol). Nor was a bunch of USB ports or memory card slots really interesting to very many people with the early PS3s either. So cutting that stuff to make cheaper SKUs didn't make a significant or even notable difference to the VAST majority of PS3 buyers who just wanted to play the big games. This is very similar to X1 Kinect vs. X1 DisKinect.

If the feature(s) aren't relevant to the consumers at large, but they can now buy it cheaper, then in THEIR EYES : it's a price cut.

On the flip side, releasing a severely crippled variant of a product like the PSP Go (can't play disc games, doh) has to be looked at significantly as a unique product, and not as a 'price cut'. Remember the rumored 'discless' Xbox One? Let's say that they actually released that this holiday season for $199, with a 500GB HDD. That wouldn't count as a 'price cut' in the minds of consumers because most people still prefer to be able to buy games in stores, collect/trade/sell them freely, etc. Whereas Kinect was a niche novelty thing that a fraction of people cared about, being able to go to Gamestop/Best Buy/Wal Mart/Friend's House and get a game disc to bring home to slap in and play is still the defining console experience for the average consumer.

It's all semantics, but in the end the most important thing to consumers is :

Cost of entry for their desired result.