Today the world erupted when pricing for the next generation consoles were announced. Many sprung to declare victory for PlayStation 4 as they announced what appeared to be a cheaper price. Let’s get something straight, Sony have used a sleight of hand to grab the headlines.
In Australia, the PlayStation 4 will sell for $549.00, while the Xbox One will sell for $599.00. At first glance, clearly PS4 is $50 cheaper, but those who’ve been in the game for a while, will look a little deeper. We need to compare Apple’s with Apple’s and to do that there’s a significant piece of the puzzle missing.
Every Xbox One will include a Kinect which clearly adds to the overall price of the console purchase. This is required because the realities of the new features can only really be recognised by utilising Kinect features like voice and video support.
PlayStation 4 however will not include their next generation PlayStation Eye (aka Kinect rippoff). The real price comparison for the next generation consoles only really becomes clear once you include the cost of this.
Engadget report that the ‘optional’ PlayStation 4 Eye is a US$59 add-on. That’s likely to be at least $99 by the time it hits Australian lounge rooms. I say ‘optional’ because it’s likely most of the PS4 functionality will also leverage Eye technology and really leaves it less as an optional purchase and much more like a mandatory one.
This leaves the final cost in Australia like this, Xbox One: A$599 and the PS4: A$648. It’s a neat slide of hand by Sony that got the headlines they wanted for having the ‘lowest’ price, but this is not our first rodeo and many journalists should have dug deeper before allowing their PlayStation fanboy loose on the keyboard.
While we’ve seen hardware and pricing now, there’s a lot left to learn about both consoles.
