Industry giant Sony is rumored to be planning a major announcement tomorrow: Naturally, people are expecting a price cut for the PlayStation 3.
Hey, have you heard? Gee golly whilikers, that Sony PS3 sure is expensive! I bet Sony is going to cut its price any day now! Yep, any day now – just you wait!
It’s the same old song-and-dance: Sony’s big, glossy PS3 is in last place worldwide for this console generation, partially due to its high price – which, combined with a lack of early exclusives, led to a poor reputation that might not be entirely well-deserved at this point. So, naturally, analysts have been predicting a price cut for the machine for months on end, even after SCEA VP Peter Dille effectively told everybody to get bent.
But what’s this? Sony is being rumored to make a big new announcement tomorrow, Tuesday March 31st. While the news reportedly came from SCEA, UK reps were unable to confirm or deny rumors, reports CVG. Of course, saying “no comment” isn’t necessarily indicative of anything – it’s the standard response whether a rumor is true or a hoax. If a company flat-out denies when something is false, then saying “no comment” automatically marks a rumor as having validity.
While it’s hard to imagine a significant Sony announcement being anything other than a price cut for their console, there are a few other options. For one, Sony could finally be ready to talk about the oft-rumored PSP2. On the other hand, they could simply be ready to talk about some of the big titles expected to launch this year, like God of War 3 or MAG … although to be fair, saving an announcement like that (or the PSP2) for the week after a major industry trade show seems kinda counter-intuitive, no?
Furthermore, it was only last week that Sony revealed it was willing to compromise on the PS3’s price point by slashing the cost of the PS3 development kit by 80%. If Sony is planning a cut for the PS3, that would also fall neatly in line with analyst Michael Pachter’s prediction back in January that the company would lower the 80GB PS3’s price by $100 in April.
With all the information, we can’t really definitively say that the announcement won’t be a PS3 price cut, true. We also can’t definitively say that the announcement won’t be a surprise revelation that Sony is actually a race of mutated lobster-men who are trying to conquer the surface world via subliminal messages in their videogames. Personally, I’d put those odds at about 50/50.
Update: Nope, it’s not a PS3 price cut. In a statement to Joystiq, Sony confirmed that it had no plans to slash the price of the machine anytime soon, and certainly not tomorrow. As the Joystiq piece points out, though, he didn’t say anything about a drop in price for the aging PS2.
It’s possible that this was all a misunderstanding and/or rumormongering. Or, it’s possible that there is still an announcement planned for tomorrow – but whatever it is, it won’t be about a cheaper PS3.
