We reported on Friday how Activision Might Stop Supporting Sony unless Sony reduce the price of the PS3. A read through of your comments to the story suggest that the only Activison games worth considering are Guitar Hero and Call of Duty and that there are high quality alternatives to those in Rock Band and Killzone 2 so Activision would not be missed by that many people. Our own Chris, cc_star, also points out in the comments that Activision would be daft to ignore an expected potential market of at least thirty million PS3 owners by next March.
Now SCEA’s spokesperson, Patrick Seybold, has issued a brief statement on the subject. “PlayStation has tremendous momentum coming out of E3, and we are seeing positive growth with more than 350 titles slated to hit across all our platforms, including many anticipated games from our publishing partners.”
He continues, “We enjoy healthy business relationships with and greatly value our publishing partners and are working closely with them to deliver the best entertainment experience.” Like I said a brief statement and one which has almost no content and does not really address the issue.
While Sony’s statement can be read as one of their frequent “we have no plans” type announcements the games industry still widely expects the PS3 to be subject to a price cut before the year ends. Another analyst, Sterne Agee’s Arvind Bhatiahas, stirred that particular pot on Friday when following a meeting with GameStop executives he stated that “Management believes that a meaningful PS3 cut is highly likely in the near-term. We continue to believe a $100 price cut on PS3 will occur around the launch of EA’s Madden NFL 2010, which is scheduled for release on 8/18.”
Such a price cut would reduce the price of the PS3 in the US to $299. That would leave the more cynical Britons amongst us to expect that to equate to a price of £299 over here which is no drop at all for the UK. Certainly with currency markets the way they are we would not and should not expect to see anything more than a £50 price cut at best if the US does indeed see a $100 reduction.
Sources: Arstechnica.com and Industry Gamers via Joystiq
