The PS4 will likely see a noticeable price drop, and soon

Admit it, you were annoyed that gamers in Japan would only have to pay the equivalent of R3, 800 (around $290 at the time of the announcement) for a PS4 following this year’s Tokyo Gaming Show.

That’s significantly less than what we’re paying here in South Africa. As an example, a PS4 console will set you back, on average, R5, 999 locally. That’s a difference of an absolutely absurd R2, 199!

Even with the relatively weak Rand, that’s very nearly the difference of buying a PS Vita on top of the PS4 – what the hell.

Fortunately, we may finally see a price cut for the console, and it comes from a very odd source.

The image above is from American retailer Target who has since removed the announcement.

Still, a $50 price drop (approximately R680 at the time of writing) is significant enough to take notice, and we have reason to expect that it will likely happen and even affect those of us who live elsewhere in the world too.

According to Xbox top dog Phil Spencer, reported IGN, he fully expects that “they [PlayStation] will drop price. When I think about the playbook they’ve used in the past, we feel good about the plans we have in place going forward in the holiday. If history tells, then we’ll see a price drop from them coming.”

He was commenting on the Japan price cut, but we see no reason to suspect Target’s recent leak to be indicative of what’s to come.

In fact, Spencer suggested Sony’s press conference at Paris Games Week to be where they announce a price cut in the West, and we think we’re seeing that start to happen.

Of course, this may just be a PR stunt by Target, or it may be a part of a promotion specific to Target, so take whatever is said here with a little scepticism.

We’re just hoping that South Africa is one of the locales affected. We’ve needed one for some time now, and Sony must know that it’ll help sales a great deal.