[nemomarx]

The next console is going to cost at least 1000 dollars, right? There's simply no way to sell hardware at 300 million units now. So I think their strategy is to abandon the mass market and sell to price unconscious consumers who will also pay more for games.

[wtetzner]

But what's the point of even releasing the next console? The current console generation has barely gotten started, and developers have barely taken advantage of the new hardware.

Maybe they need to look at releasing a cheaper console and making more quality games instead of constantly pushing so hard on graphics. Graphics help sales to an extent, but it's clearly not the whole story, given the popularity of the Wii or Switch. I think the people in charge no longer understand gaming, and are really struggling to produce games that will draw in large crowds again.

> So I think their strategy is to abandon the mass market and sell to price unconscious consumers who will also pay more for games.

Kinda seems like it. I'm curious to see what happens with that, because even people who so far have been willing to pay more will stop being customers if they can't produce an experience that's worth paying for. Maybe I'm in the minority, but the first-party PlayStation games all feel very samey to me.

[nemomarx]

For the ps6, they were already done with design and they'd need to let that go to waste to not put it out. I doubt it'll have many exclusives though - it's probably a ps5 pro pro thing.

But I'm also not sure they can sell a cheaper console. PS5 prices just rose and they'll rise again next year - so that level is already going to cost 800 dollars to consumers. You can't really sell hardware to anyone until ram prices come down it seems.

They could release a ps4 level console but I'm not sure it would be that cheap to source parts for... There are rumors of a handheld so that might be cheaper.

Basically console gaming is about to get impractical and they'll try and find a path to stay alive. That's my read.

[wtetzner]

I'm wondering if going back to cheaper and less capable hardware will actually result in better games. Forcing creativity, and maybe (by necessity) dropping the constant push for higher fidelity graphics. I think that push for fidelity is so costly that a large number of game developers don't even attempt to innovate in the rest of game design anymore.

> For the ps6, they were already done with design and they'd need to let that go to waste to not put it out.

I guess nobody can predict the future, but this sounds like the sunk cost fallacy. E.g., if it's not going to sell well enough to recoup manufacturing costs, then producing the console will be more costly than just wasting the design effort anyway.

Maybe they don't need mass market sales to at least break even?