I know we’re going to be getting new consoles this year, but that’s about all I know. There’s details on each, yeah, but the things like a release date and price are yet to be determined. And while normally we’d expect these things at E3, that hasn’t always been the case. And especially now with Sony saying they won’t be at E3 or even have a press conference, it puts their reveal up in the air.
I’m okay with this. They’ll do it on their own time and that’s fine. Microsoft has done this as well, so to speak. I think we got a ton of details about the Xbox One at a special event in May of that year (boy did they push that whole TV aspect) before E3 and then they used E3 to highlight the games. I’m not sure Sony has ever done anything like that but it seems this will be the year they do, since they won’t be at E3. Now the fun part is when. Who shows their hand first? Release date isn’t so much of an issue as price. Being first on the shelf doesn’t really mean anything if you aren’t the cheapest on the shelf. And honestly, if ANY of these companies are looking at a five hundred dollar price tag, Nintendo is going to look awfully good at $300 come the holiday season for parents. Which, by the way, is all I’m considering here. The die hards and enthusiasts, they’ll be out in full force for the console of choice they want and price be damned. But the holiday season and sales, when the kids are asking for a new game console and parents look at the options – that five hundred dollars will NEVER win over something less than that. I get that Nintendo is an outlier, but five hundred may be a bridge too far for a lot of families.
Five hundred, so far, seems to be the cap on a price people are willing to pay for a gaming console. But that’s hard to tell, really. When the Xbox One was released it was five hundred and Sony was four. People went the cheaper route. Had Sony also been five at the time, I don’t know what would have happened. The first SKU’s of the PS3 were in the six hundred dollar range and that was a disaster.
This part of the new console release cycle is always my favorite. Who pulls the trigger first and what happens when they do?
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