Is the market ready for a $500 console yet?

[danasider]

I'm going to say no.

Sure, the people on this site and other video game forums know what we'll get. Personally, $500 for high specs is worth it to me.

However, it seems that the general public isn't budging on console price points.

Console Launch Prices-
PS1 - 299
PS2 - 299
PS3 - 499/599
PS4 - 399

Notice the only system which didn't completely annihilate the competition was PS3 and a huge reason for that was the launch price.

And then we look at the competition. Nintendo always has been at the forefront of innovation, but innovation is only a piece of its strategy. Its biggest hits console wise were both innovative AND inexpensive (the motion gaming of the Wii selling at $250 and the combination handheld/console Switch coming in at $299).

I think it's worth it to Sony to keep the fans happy and maybe even sell at a small loss in order to not be so behind in terms of tech. I don't think the competition will be investing too much into tech that Sony will be way behind (unless we're comparing PC to console which appears to be a bigger disparity in tech with each generation). Console buyers seem to care most about influx of great games and preserving value from what I've seen of the last few generations, so I don't think Sony should raise the price now that they are ahead.