- Sony is expected to make a significant PS5 announcement this month, according to a PlayStation official speaking to Bloomberg following the company’s earnings call.
- Sony already announced that it will hold a State of Play event to talk about PS4, PS VR, and PS5 games on August 6th, but said it won’t include price, date, or preorder information.
- One analyst expects the standard PS5 will cost $500, and the PS5 Digital Edition will cost $400.
With less than five months to go until 2020 is over, we still have no idea how much the PS5 and Xbox Series X are going to cost. Reports have suggested that both consoles could top $500, but we have not heard anything from Sony or Microsoft, and neither company has even offered a timeframe for when we can expect to learn more. But with both consoles on track to launch this holiday season, announcements are undoubtedly imminent.
In a report about Sony’s quarterly earnings on Tuesday, Bloomberg cited a PlayStation official who said “Sony’s next announcement regarding the PlayStation 5 is tentatively scheduled for this month.” The report didn’t include any other details about the announcement, but the implication seems to be that the announcement will be on the same scale as the Future of Gaming event that showed PS5 games in action for the first time in June.
If you follow gaming news closely, you likely know that there is already a PlayStation event scheduled for this month. On Monday, Sony announced that the periodic State of Play live stream returns on Thursday, August 6th “with a focus on third-party-published games coming to PS4 and PS VR.” The stream will last for over 40 minutes, but Sony made it abundantly clear that we are not getting “any updates around hardware, business, preorders, or dates” on August 6th. In other words, this clearly isn’t the announcement that Bloomberg is referencing.
Earlier this week, we noted that PS4 and Xbox One preorders opened in June of 2013 before launching in November of the same year. We are four days into August of 2020, and all signs point to the PS5 and Xbox Series X launching in November. The pandemic forced both companies to adjust their plans on the fly, but it also looks like each company is waiting for the other to blink first. Sony undercut Microsoft’s $500 Xbox One with a $400 price tag for its PS4, and that one decision had a monumental impact on console sales over the next seven years. Microsoft doesn’t want to make the same mistake again, while Sony doesn’t want to trade places with Microsoft.
That said, with the global economy in shambles and so much uncertainty in the weeks and months ahead, there are plenty of consumers who need to know how much money they should set aside for a new console this holiday season. Macquarie Capital analyst Damian Thong tells Bloomberg that he expects the standard PS5 to be priced at $500 and the PS5 Digital Edition to cost $400, but the uncertainly is definitely beginning to wear on fans.
