I believe the rumour right now is $400 and I seriously doubt Sony will make another $599 mistake again.
I can definitely see the next PlayStation being $400 but won't be surprised if Microsoft undercuts them by $50 and has a separate budget SKU costing $300.
I seriously doubt that the new consoles will cost $600 in this kind of economy. $400 is probably the highest they could go, in this amateur guesser's opinion, and even $400 might be a bit too much since most people are still pretty happy with what a 360 and PS3 can do.
I expect both Microsoft and Sony to have a two-tier model, like Nintendo did with the WiiU. A Premium model with all the bells and whistles and a basic model with somewhat limited storage (probably around a quarter or a third of what the Premium model has). I'll say... $399 for the Premium option, $299 for the basic one.
If those specs that came out of China are right Microsoft would probably be taking a loss with anything under $700 (roughly). That said, consoles are usually sold at a loss and it would be stupid to stop now, what with the economy and all.
In a two tier market approach we have seen this generation, following the prices practiced this generation. Although I wouldn't dismiss PS4 being sold at a cheaper price from the start, as to boost initial sales, with possibly 499$ for the premium models.
I believe the rumour right now is $400 and I seriously doubt Sony will make another $599 mistake again.
I can definitely see the next PlayStation being $400 but won't be surprised if Microsoft undercuts them by $50 and has a separate budget SKU costing $300.
Unless Sony undercuts them and includes a year's worth of Plus with it because there's no way in fucking hell MS will ever make XBL part of the SKU.
I believe they will have a 400 model and The One You Want for 500.
I also think they'll look at the phone plan idea, you know, "Buy a 3 year plan at X dollars a month and get a Nextbox for 50 dollars!" Because that shit works. That shit got 650 dollar iPhones into people's hands.
Unless Sony undercuts them and includes a year's worth of Plus with it because there's no way in fucking hell MS will ever make XBL part of the SKU.
That's true, right now Sony are in a great position to dethrone XBL as the online service of choice and providing a year free with the system will certainly go a long way.
@Brodehouse said:
... I also think they'll look at the phone plan idea, you know, "Buy a 3 year plan at X dollars a month and get a Nextbox for 50 dollars!" Because that shit works. That shit got 650 dollar iPhones into people's hands.
Microsoft tried that last year, selling the 360 for dirt cheap on a contract, It seemed to work well for them so I would be surprised if they didn't launch with a similar offer this time round.
I think US$400 to US$600 is a sweet spot for pricing but I wonder if Microsoft's pricing of their Surface tablet is any indication of their thinking. The Surface Windows 8 Pro tablet cost $899 for a 64 GB version and $999 for the 128 GB version. That is a lot of money for a tablet especially when you could get an iPad of Kindle Fire with better ecosystems and cheaper cost. Components for a tablet and console are different but if MS refuses to sell the console at a loss they may charge more than people are willing to pay. I just hope they give it to consumers straight instead of nickel and diming consumers with add-ons like the WiU.
Well Sony did get bit with their $599 price tag of the PS3 way back when so they at least know what the ceiling is for how much consumers are willing to pay. I'm going to predict that the most we'll see for either of those consoles is $549 because Sony at least will try and ask for it.
I expect a two tier system. $399 intro system, enough to get your foot in the door, but once you start playing 2-3 games, you'll need to upgrade or manage the onboard 16 gigs of storage or whatever'll come on it.
$599 for an upgraded model with larger storage. You'll eventually buy into this, anyways.
@djou: Note that the Pro is really a full laptop crammed into a tablet so comparing it to the Fire or the iPad is oranges to apples (heh)...a more direct comparison is the RT (which is priced much more in line with the iPad - and, yes, does have a much less robust app selection)...
That said, I think the new consoles (next next gen? Ugh. Howsabout we call it "Gen 8"? Not much better, but less confusing) will run $400 min to $500 max (not counting "deluxe" editions)... and, yes, there will be a contract version of the NextBox cause I'll bet it'll sell gangbusters.
@OldGuy: Yeah, the Pro is basically a laptop in tablet form. That's why I bring it up as an analogy. I wonder if MS will come out with a $800 console (the deluxe version you mention) which they will claim as a high end PC. Maybe specced like the 8 core, blah, blah, blah dev kits that have been floating around. The Pro tablet, offering the full Windows 8 experience and the high end Xbox, offering the same but really just being a game optimized PC.
I'm pretty sure it'll be the same price point like the current gen consoles were when they were first released. Maybe even a little more perhaps? Until we know the specs, all we can do is predict. Hopefully, we'll hear something about this stuff at E3 this year.
@sevvagon: The only chance I think the next xbox is cheaper is if they do some kind of $299 version that then requires you to have XBL to have for 3 or 4 years.
Don't be surprised if it's $499 otherwise. Personally I'd hope so if that means they went with higher specs, especial if it's going to be around as long as the 360/ps3 were.
I also think there will be a $99 - $149 version of some type of xbox branded device, but that will basically be Neflix/other apps and some XBLA only.
I think sony will go a little more conservative on the hardware so they can hit the $399 mark. They know they can't have what they did with the first year or two with the ps3 again, sure everything worked out in the end but today's sony is in a much worse position now. There was some interesting rumors about the whole weird Omniviewer thing, which than would be a $499 bundle, plus that backwards compatibility would be a $99 add on that would contain parts of the cell that were needed. So with that rumor the PS4 does hit $599 again, but you know RUMOR. A very crazy one at that.
Reading through this thread makes me think you guys aren't very good at consumerism. The two numbers I'm seeing most are $400 as the low and $600 as the high. It's like the $200 in between aren't possibilities. The one you want is going to be $500 or $550. Neither of them will go as high as $600 because of what happened to the PS3. They won't be as low as $400 when iPads and iPhones are $500+. They see their products as at least comparable to that in terms of quality & quantity of content, services and hardware.
The price that millions of people are willing to pay for an iPad every year easily sets the bar for what people are willing to pay on an electronic device, especially when you take into consideration that this one will likely last 6-7 years instead of the 1-2 year shelf life that most people seem to give their touch devices.
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