We wont know because of this. Its very odd that the moment the Xbox, PS5 and NVIDIA 30 Series were up for Pre-order, they instantly sold out. That's because the systems didn't actually sell out, they were sold to bots which the scalpers go resell at a higher price. Sure, technically the stores have been cleared of stock which is technically selling out, but moving stock from one retailer to another retailer (Scalper) isn't exactly telling us the true story with this new gen.

The article i linked to BlaLod is just one scalper who brought over 3500 PS5s by using a bot generating system to clean out stores in the UK to just resell back to the public.

Instead of blindly praising these events, we should be questioning. These consoles aren't really sold out, you can easily find one on Ebay or Amazon for more than twice the price brand new. 

Is the argument that previous generations when we said that a console was sold out there weren't any available on ebay or sold at a premium on amazon? Because it seems like an odd statement to make that "These consoles aren't really sold out, you can easily find one on Ebay or Amazon for more than twice the price brand new." because I'm pretty sure that's always the case so under that logic nothing has ever truly "sold out".  

Comparing the past to the presant is a very odd comparison on your end. Year by year we continue to become more digital friendly. 2013 is not 2020.

When a console generation starts off with an all out digital pre-order system like we just had, it has made a massive difference between the average consumer getting a system vs a bot/scalper, something we didn't have to worry about back in 2013. I would bet that we have more bot/scalpers today than we ever have had in the last 10 to 20 years. Of course you could always find a console on the internet in previous generations however not at this rate of this gen, bot/scalpers have cleaned out the stores before people could even walk into one. People couldn't even place a pre-order on pre-order night due to the high demand and quantity these scalpers have brought into.

Rich isn't the best source of information however he hits the nail on the head with this one and explains it a lot easier.

That's not one scalper. It's an estimate of all the consoles scalpers got a hold of in the UK. I was wondering what you were driving at with your initial post, thinking you may actually be saying the reason for the sellout was due to scalping.......PUUHLEAAESSE. People are constantly trying to get a hold of them. I would be shocked if say, 100,000 units are in the hands of scalpers worldwide. I mean, to go even further, and say 200,000, which is an overly generous figure, that's less than 10% of the window for estimated sales. How you can think those wouldn't have been sold is beyond me. There's no basis to be making such a claim.

Yes. You want to be that guy. You always try to put a negative spin on positive PS news and topics.

I don't make the news, just reporting whats being said. I can say this, in Australia the same issue has arose, no stores have stock but you look online and the stock is on 3rd party sites. Besides i never said it wouldn't have sold out, i just said we wouldn't actually know. Scalpers are buying into thousands and thousands of stock. Also what figures are you going by? How do you know how much stock the scalpers have brought into? 

Did you not hear the issue with pre-ording the systems? Did you not hear all the complaining that people couldn't place a pre-order on pre-order night? Hmmmmmmmmm i wonder why.

Just 1 UK scalper group managed to buy 3500 PS5s, having more stock than some actual online retailers. That's just one group in the UK.

Yes we can be sure. It would have sold out anyway even with no scalpers. Again if people weren't willing to flock up to buy the console for 500 how would scalpers be able to sell them for 1000 or 1500? Please explain it.

And on your need to not invent stories but just report the news so people don't celebrate the launch (why shouldn't they?) did you do the same on the Xbox launch thread?

Its the scalpers who cleaned out the shops with the botting systems on pre-orders. The stores have already made their sales to these scalpers, which isn't to actual customers so their is a fair amount of systems sitting in peoples basements waiting on those unlucky buyers. If you feel the need to praise, than go for it, as for me, i am far from gullible to celebrate something i see as a major issue in. Again its quite odd that both the PS5 and XSX sold out super fast as well as those $1000 GPUs from Nvidia.. all in the same year. Again don't hate the messenger, no one wanted to bring it up in here so i through i will. People celebrate figures that aren't exactly morally true while the world burns behind them. So be it. Ill prefer to look into why all these high tech entertainment is selling out super faster than actual human reactions can order in on.

The same concept applies for Xbox as well. I haven't praised Xbox for their launch either. Id expect the next Nintendo system to also sell out super fast as these bots will try to clean out pre-order stock just like they did with the PS5 and XSX.

Yes be stubborn and don't reply to the question, if people weren't looking to buy PS5s to the point of sold out why would they pay 3x the price from scalpers?

Do you know that in Japan they have something much more robust against scalpers that is a lottery system and there were cases of people getting 50 tickets and not being granted none? Sure there is scalpers over there as well when you look their ebay. But to pretend a System that in 2013 sold out as well in launch (for 4 to 5 months it was sold out, do you think scalpers had been stockpilling for that time?), was doing over 10M per year, sold over 1M in BF in USA alone (was that scalpers years after the launch?) wouldn't be able to sell 2.5M on launch of successor? Is that really what you think?

Ok you weren't praising Xbox, but have you gone to the thread "to not be that man"?

Don, its an obvious answer, People aren't buying the consoles from the scalpers, or not majority of people. That doesn't matter anyway because the consoles have already technically sold so its already counted as a sale because the scalpers have brought them and horded them.

To be perfectly honest Don, i havn't been paying attention to the Xbox forums, and i couldn't care. I only heard about this news recently and this is the first article i found.