It seems that all the hype about the Sony PS3 hasn’t turned into sales here.
Australia has only just got the console on the 23rd March (yes, the PAL version with the PS2 compatibility hardware removed) and signs were everywhere ‘Midnight launch!”, “ Preorder Now” , “Very limited stock”…that was Thursday..on Saturday when I was in Target (Dept store) they were beaming over the intercom that they have discounted the price of the PS3 (already, just two days after launch!) and there are plenty of consoles in stock. Other stores around the place seem to have plenty of stock as well.
Maybe the crazy price of AUD$999 is the real problem here – I don’t know what Sony were thinking with that, compared to US and Japan prices.
I have to add that the Wii broke all records here for console sales in Australia.
It is very frustrating that we pay a premium on most things like this in Australia – everyone is out to get us. Seriously though I think Sony may have overestimated the consumers’ willingness to pay a premium price for a product that is more than a games machine. The Wii seems to be doing so well because it just plays games and does it well. people in Aus don’t seem ready to pay big bucks for the built in hidef dvd player etc. I would buy one if it just played hidef games and was priced accordingly.
I agree with you Coach.
It seems that maybe Microsoft will go the same way as Sony. They are releasing a new xbox360 – it has HDMI and a bigger hard-drive (120GB) and will be only about $30 less than the PS3. That is in the US so I am guessing it will be $899 here , way too much. And no mention that it has HDdvd built in…crazy price me thinks!
It’s sad to see Sony falling away as they are.
They have been bringing some flak on themselves however. I wrote an article about it here:
http://www.davidairey.com/blog/how-sony-killed-their-brand-a-case-study/