PlayStation 5 Pro goes on sale, will gamers pay hefty price to play?

The PlayStation 5 Pro hits shops on Thursday with a price tag that has raised eyebrows among gamers, but growing sticker shocks in the tech industry have yet to deter consumers.

The upgraded version of Sony's flagship gaming console retails for $699.99 in the United States—$250 more than the previous PlayStation 5 model.

It will cost an eye-watering 799.99 euros ($860) in Europe, 250 euros higher than the older version, and almost 120,000 yen ($780) in Japan, where Sony is based.

A visitor takes a photo of the new Sony PlayStation 5 Pro during the preview day for the annual Tokyo Game Show which was held at Makuhari Messe in Chiba City, Chiba Prefecture on September 26, 2024.AFP

"I don't think I'm going to buy it. I don't want to spend amounts like that to buy a console," said Hideki Hasegawa, a 45-year-old entrepreneur in Tokyo. He recalled when consoles "didn't cost more than 30,000 yen." The PlayStation 5's Pro version, which was released in 2020, allows Sony to integrate improvements that allow games to run faster and with better graphics.

"Simply put, it's the most powerful console we've ever built and a worthy addition to the PS5 family," PlayStation's lead architect Mark Cerny said at an event in September. However, the higher price "looks challenging from a marketing perspective," said J.P. Morgan analyst Junya Ayada. Analysts said Sony had failed to boost flagging sales when it released an upgrade to the PlayStation 4 in 2016 at a higher cost than the previous version.

New technologies

Sony is not the only tech company making consumers pay for their latest devices. "It's a broadly similar trend across all device types, whether it's phones, video games, AR glasses, or smartwatches," said Jack Leathem, an analyst at Canalys, a firm that analyzes the technology market.

While Apple kept the price of the iPhone 16 unchanged from the iPhone 15 when it launched in September, the $799 starting price is much larger than that for flagship smartphones five years ago. This trend is similar to that of Apple's competitors, such as Samsung, which has begun selling foldable screen phones like the Galaxy Z Fold 6.

A white DualSense wireless gaming controller is shown for the PS5 console. AFP

"These are new market entrants that are bringing in new technologies, which will usually mean that comes with a premium price," Brian Comiskey, a specialist in the evolution of technology at the Consumer Technology Association, told AFP.

Rising prices also reflect an increase in the cost of raw materials, said Leathem, pointing to soaring prices for rare earth minerals like indium and yttrium. Integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into devices has also had an impact.

"These companies have to make a profit," Leathem said. "And they're having to sort of balance off the sheer volume of money they're investing in AI and new technologies by increasing the price of the device as well," he said.

Tech in installments

But rising prices do not seem to be cooling consumers' ardor for the latest tech products. According to Canalys's figures, nearly 310 million smartphones were sold in the first nine months of the year, a five percent increase from the same period last year. For Josh Lewitz, an analyst at Consumers Intelligence Research Partners, "there's definitely been a sort of a ratcheting up of what price is possible for a phone."

Visitors look at the new Sony PlayStation 5 Pro during the preview day for the annual Tokyo Game Show which was held at Makuhari Messe in Chiba City, Chiba Prefecture on September 26, 2024. AFP

But consumers are also holding onto their devices longer, and in many markets, including the United States, operators are offering clients the possibility of paying for the phone in instalments. "That has made the relative price difference less important," said Michael Levin, a Consumers Intelligence Research Partners analyst.