It was inevitable wasn’t it? The PlayStation 3’s sales have been poor and sooner or later, Sony had to do something. Said poor sales can be attributed sloely to that whopping great price tag. It may be the most powerful of the current consoles. It might have a full internet browser and motion-sensinng controllers. It may be the world’s cheapest Blu-Ray player. But the simple fact of the matter is; people will not pay £425 for a games console.
Some of them did of course, myself included. And barring the lack of great exclusives, we’re all jolly happy with it. PS3 owners, however, are in the minority, and Sony have finally cottoned on to this fact and worked out why. So they took action, and slashed the massive sum of money to a much more wallet-friendly £299. But what Sony giveth with one hand, they taketh away with the other.
The PS3’s price has been dropped to Premium 360 level, but £125 isn’t all it’s lost. The main and most obvious loss is the downgrading of the 60GB hard drive to 40 GB. It may not seem a lot, and it is still double the size of the Premium 360’s, but lest we forget that the Elite 360 has 120GB. And that’s now three times more than the PS3’s.
Also, you know those memory card slots concealed by 0that flap on the left of the console? Well, they’ve gone. Remember how the 60GB version had four USB slots? That number has now been halved to just two. It’s not a really, really big problem unless you want to hook up an Eye, MP3 player and charge a controller at the same time. But if you really had to do such a thing you can buy a USB Hub to give you more slots than you will ever need.
These changes, disappointing though they may be, are not all that surprising. However, there is one other change to the 40GB PS3 which is a surprise, To cut costs further, Sony have removed the backwards compatability. Sure, the BC on the 60GB version may not be that great at the moment, but to have none at all? Don’t go trading in your good old PS2 yet.
Having a PlayStation 3 in shops for only £299 is a reason to celebrate. However, if these hardware and software cuts seem too drastic, but you are considering splashing out on a PS3, hurry. Once supllies of the 60GB PS3s run out, you won’t be able to buy them. The 60GB version by the way, has also had its price slashed. You can now buy them for just £350.
Still not sure about purchasing one? Well, the price drop isn’t the only thing Sony have been workin on over in Tokyo. They also announced that their controversial SixAxis controller will be getting rumble. Superb, eh? But don’t get too excited. We won’t be seeing the new pad over here in Britain until at least Spring next year.
Don’t be predicting a winner just yet. This console war is just getting started.
