$100 Playstation 3 Price Cut: It's Official

I always feel bad for the executive mucky-muck forced to counter media innuendo with dithering rebuttals, only to see rumor become fact a day or two later. Here we are, 48 hours later, embracing another abject lesson in the ephemeralness of public relations. Did anyone doubt it would happen?

You may have seen the original Circuit City rumor, then witnessed Sony's tepid denial, so the only news in Sony's official pre-E3 confirmation today is the announcement of a new 80GB PS3 to backfill the 60GB model's spot, due in August for $599 and bundled with Evolution Studios' off-road racing game MotorStorm. (Sony actually announced the 80GB model back in May, but limited to the Korean market.)

Price cuts are always happy news, but in the 60GB PS3's case, the question remains: Will $100 really help?

I don't know, but let's be frank -- the Xbox 360 isn't selling well enough at $400 to justify its rather high price tag. On the other hand, should we have expected more from a company (Sony) that was already taking a bath on its hardware at the $600 price-point? You have to give Sony points for slicing its pricing by one-sixth only eight months into the PS3's life cycle. Has any major console manufacturer ever dropped its pricing that quickly?

Let's talk metrics. The Playstation 3's greatest financial liability is almost certainly its all-or-nothing integration of Blu-ray. High definition TV was introduced in the U.S. in the 1990s, fought for niche acceptance during the early 2000s, and according to a recent report by the Consumer Electronics Association, will only reach 36% or 52.5 million total U.S. homes sometime next year. Only 44% of those owners receive HD programming, however, with a substantial number in that group still confused about how HD (multiple resolutions, upscaling, etc.) actually works. Factor in consumer reluctance to upgrade perfectly good looking DVD collections plus the uncertainty of Blu-ray vs. HD-DVD, and the mass-market appeal of a $500 to $600 system to the audience that put the PS2 over the top still seems dubious at best.

With the now-$500 60 GB Playstation 3, you get: a 60GB hard drive, a Blu-ray player, HDMI (nominally better than component, but absent from a surprising number of slightly older HDTVs), Bluetooth (another debatably durable standard), integrated 802.11g wireless (sorry, no 802.11n option), and a flash card reader for anyone who's ever bothered using this feature on a game console before. Lots of extra oomph you may or may not need (now or ever), in other words.

In the old days, the magic number for a games-only system was around $120-$130, and that typically included a game or peripheral. These days you pay at least $400 for a basic "next-gen" system, factor in extra peripheral expenses, online subscription fees, broadband ISP and wireless router costs, and if you really want to take advantage of your console's extra oomph, whatever you need to spend to spec out a decent HDTV and full Dolby 5.1 setup (receiver, speakers, wiring, etc.). No system prior to the PS3 has required so many considerably more expensive extras to get full investment returns.

In an official blog post last night, Sony PR lead Patrick Seybold hyped the 60GB PS3 price cut but focused more on the 80GB model and bundle game. While $600 is more than I'll ever pay for a game console, I'll give Seybold bundle props. MotorStorm really is a terrific racer, and the most enjoyable rally/derby I've played in years. On the other hand, it's also one of the only games I've held onto of the dozens I've played...and that brings us back to Sony's biggest problem: a dearth of compelling games.

First, ignore numbers like "120 new titles," because no one -- Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, etc. -- ever hits those numbers. Second, apply science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon's pretty reliable adage that ninety percent of everything is crap. Third, when you're on the verge of buying, weigh primarily what you can see and touch, i.e. what's actually on the shelf. Heavenly Sword and Lair may look enticing, but (a) the gaming press hasn't yet worked out how to write proper hype-free previews, and (b) remember Lionhead Studios' Fable? 'Nuff said. Being enthusiastic is not the same as being well-informed, and you wouldn't buy a house without giving it a thorough walkthrough, right?

But let me end on a slightly more positive note. If you're committed to Blu-ray -- and I'm not saying you should be -- but if you are, the $100 price drop puts the 60GB PS3 on par with the cheapest standalone Blu-ray players on the market, making it a steal of a deal in that market and relatively speaking. With all Sony's recent PS3 updates and HDMI improvements, I can't imagine a better way to get true 1080p going if you have the rest of the hardware to boot. So for that niche demographic, there's never been a better time to buy a PS3.

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