Well it is now (better performing) for 1.5x the price, 3 years after the PS5 launched.

Upgrading is not necessarily cheaper. A 4060 costs less than a PS5 yet only has 8GB RAM on board instead of 12GB on the 3060 (NVidea ugh). The cheapest 4070 12GB card (looking on Newegg.ca) is still more expensive than the ps5 (CA 805, PS5 is CA 650, PC was CA 1000)

The 3060's cheapest price is currently CA 410. So yeah if you already had a PC you could now upgrade a 1060 to a 3060 for 2/3rds of the price of a PS5. Yet if you also need to upgrade the SSD, CPU, PSU or RAM, you can easily spend more than a PS5 together.

Better performing depends on the game and level of optimization. The advantage of consoles is that all the settings and profiling has been done for you and the game optimized for the fixed hardware. It just runs. Same on PC is you're well over the recommended specs, yet on my 1060 I now always have to find the right trade offs between fps and fidelity.

One thing is certain, games are cheaper on PC. But it's not cheaper hardware wise. A console will give you roughly the same steady performance for 7 to 10 years. You can use a PC for that long as well without changes, but you either need to spend a lot more initially or more over time to match performance with consoles.

Anyway performance and fidelity mean little as the most fun I've had this year is with PSVR2 (which albeit twice as sharp as PSVR is really still only about DVD quality) and TotK at 900p30 on the Switch. And equivalent quality VR is definitely more expensive on PC and more hassle.

For me online shifts the cost analysis.  $80 a year for online for 7 years is $560....  that is likely a nice GPU upgrade in 3 years.  Pays for itself since Sony (and MS) charge for online.  RTX 4070, over 20 tflops, is $570......  Sony and MS are making online play expensive.

My intent is not to discourage nor influence console gamers.  I'm just giving my opinion which is online charge by Sony is way too expensive.  It will likely shift my next gen decisions.  

I was waiting for a slim or pro version of the PS5 before jumping in this generation, but I'm now seriously considering getting back into PC gaming after a 20 year hiatus and making a transition away from consoles (including Xbox). I'm no longer happy with making compromises to my gaming experience, and now I have to pay more for a lesser experience? Nintendo and Xbox will soon follow with its price increases, and the cycle is not going to end.

The idea of carrying my full library with me and only upgrading my hardware occasionally was something backwards compatibility was starting to provide for me on the consoles, but PC just does it better. Not to mention, backwards compatibility isn't always a given on consoles.  I may have to wait longer for some games to release on the PC from console ports, but the amount of games that are gained that aren't available on consoles far outweighs that.

In the long run PC gaming should be the less expensive option (for me, I game on all platforms and purchase and average of 80 games on each), whilst providing the superior experience in performance and options.  

 I also have yet to enter here, but I think I'll start from page 1 and make my way through it, trying to get a feel for how much things have changed in the last few decades.  I'm going to have a lot of questions and hopefully the answers I seek are contained within.  

True. I don't play online anymore though and have been topping up ps+ on BF for 50$ a year. (CAD 60) Dunno what the new price will be on BF, the only reason I still have ps+ is because my kids do use it to play online.

Actually I can see the price going up in the transaction history
11/2022 CAD 59.31
11/2021 CAD 52.73
11/2020 CAD 52.73
11/2019 CAD 52.49

It's going from CAD 69.99 to CAD 94.99 with tax that's over the psychological $100 barrier... If it's the same reduced discount as last year, CAD 80.50. I already hesitated at CAD 60, If it's CAD 80 for BF I'll skip the year, maybe that will send a message to Sony... I'm subscribed until August 2025 anyway, figured last year to pay the 60 dollar since everything is getting more expensive. The discount used to be 25% at BF, was only 15% last year. Tightening the belt at every opportunity :/

As for games, I just grudgingly payed CAD 105.64 for BG3 (CAD 93.49 before tax) is what games are up to here already. Standard edition... And no physical release :( And that makes PC cheaper in this case, CAD 79.99 on Steam. Afaik Both Valve and Sony take 30%, so dunno why its 17% more on PSN.

Yes and No

The cheapest version of gamepass is like $20 less than the cheapest very of PS Plus.

But the highest tier of gamepass costs more than the highest tier of PS Plus

I wish they'd just allow us to play online without subscribing .. Not everyone plays those pl plus games.

I miss those days when jack tretton was against the paid online model.

Agreed.  I have little interest in the majority of free games.

The bigger issue is I play souls once or twice a month online.  I'm a low online usage gamer....  $80 is absurd.  

The whole point was to have a $1100 budget and see what you get with it. The fact that you're not starting from scratch with your library makes your points invalid but cool to see you jump on PC's defense so fast without understanding the initial discussion. You new at reading?

Thank you!!!! That's all I've been trying to say but some reason people are so quick to jump on PC's defense. 

I already understood whatever everyone else was saying and agree with them but they've been missing my point lol

They're not in the business of selling things at cost. Sony exists to make as much money as possible.