Stately Citizen Journalism

I am actually playing Botworld Adventures which is F2P.

Not terrible, kind of like a battling Pokémon with bots

Today (8. Nov. 2021) I got a mail from Sony that I now can buy a PS5 directly from them.
Next week would be the 1 year anniversary it got released…it took them a YEAR to find a way to cut out the middleman AND the scalpers!

A YEAR!

If that isn’t corporate fumbling at its highest tier I don’t know what.
Good on the people who still want one and could not get it. I finally got mine in June and I am very VERY satisfied with it but man was that a hassle. Fuck 'em scalpers!

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PS5 has set records for sales. More than any other console ever released. And in a situation where the parts needed to manufacture it are in short supply. So I find it hard to blame Sony for the lack of availability.

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What’s your metric for setting a record? It’s sold more than other playstations? I assumed nintendo held all the records

I’m with @Strangiato on this one. I’ve been frustrated with lack of supply as I’ve been looking for one for a year, but what is the solution? Sony is supplied what they can and demand has far outpaced them. I agree that scalpers are an obnoxious issue but I don’t know how that is on Sony unless they completely overhaul their distribution methods.

This is an expensive time of year for me so even if I see one on the shelf, at this point I’m probably going to be waiting at least until spring.

My only problem is that I’ve seen several sites, including their own, use methods which seemed adequate to defeat scalpers with sneakerbots, and then seen it go months with low proportions of stock sold that way. Otherwise, yeah, global pandemic/shipping crisis/collapsed supply chain gets everybody a bit of a pass, just like my kids’ grades last year.

Of course, I waited in line for an hour at a Best Buy for a PS5, but they only had Xbox Series Xs when I got to the front, and I wasn’t going to have wasted that hour, so I bought one. That plus three months of Game Pass seems like it chilled me way the hell out on PS5s.

I feel bad. I’ve been able to get 3 ps5s. I got 2 within a day back in January, canceled one of them when nobody wanted the second one. Then I was able to get a third late last month when my brother wanted one :roll_eyes:. The big retailers are getting a little shady as well requiring you to buy premium memberships for early access. That is how I got the third one from Walmart, had to buy a month of walmart+. But it’s a pain in the ass. I had to sign up for a twitter account and get alerts from people who knew when the drops were happening. Then I had to create accounts at all the big retailers and put in all my billing/shipping info in ahead of time (walmart, best buy, amazon, gamestop, psdirect, etc.) so you don’t waste time during checkout because it sells out within a minute from the time you get the twitter alert. Then when I’m in front of my computer i’ve already opened my browser with tabs opened and logged in for all the retailers so I’m ready to go. I also have the retailer apps open on my phone if I’m away from my computer. Both times that I was trying to snag one it took me about 2 weeks.

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See, I’m not going to jump through hoops like that. Perhaps I could have gotten one by now but I’ve only tried the traditional methods of looking at the shelf…

Ok, ranting time:

I don’t blame them for that specifically. The Situation was the same when PS4 came out. And look at what happened at the launch of the Wii and the Switch.

Of course, the demand is high. And I didn’t blame them for that with the mentioned 3 earlier examples. But the amount of professional- and “hobby”-scalping out there is quite alarming. I understand them not being able to do anything fast to salvage the holiday/Christmas drought in 2020. But realistically speaking if you were someone with a: a brain and b: decision-making power at Sony how could you NOT start working on a direct sale opportunity by mid-January 2021 asap?

For all the deserved hate Valve gets for the hardware shenanigans they did it right with the Steam Deck. Have a valid steam account? Yes? Ok, get in line for your preordered Steam Deck, first come first served but you don’t have any hassle until then.

What prevented Sony from doing:

  • Have a PSN-Account? Yes? Great! Preorder here ONE in words ONE PlayStation 5 and get in line while we figure out supply logistics and everything else. We will notify you when it is time to deliver/pay)

  • Don’t have an account and want to get a surprise present for your kids?
    Well either get talking with your kids and go online together with them and order it with their credentials (they will thank you for it anyways screw the “surprise” part) and have a little bonding moment,
    or do it the regular way and be frustrated - such are these tiring times…

Sure that doesn’t help any of the traditional brick&mortar shelve-buyers out there but at least it would have had the effect that non-technological cavemen could have a less stressful shopping experience.

For Sony it would have been a tiny weeny bit of effort, but also a LOT of goodwill and a LOT less bad press, and overall a lot less scummy basterds hogging the systems. For the same “record-breaking” sales of hardware.

The costs of providing such a solution would be dwarfed by the software sales done by ACTUAL paying customers owning the systems and purchasing goods on the digital storefront (and the traditional physical media). Instead, 30-50%(?) of units are in transportation Limbo or in some dank cellars collecting mold.

It is apparent that Sony has decided to offer PS4 Legacy versions of planned formerly strictly PS5-exclusive games (God of War 2, that-racing-game-I-constantly-forget-which is apparently-kind-of-a-big-deal, Horizon - Forbidden West, etc.) as well as now developing downgraded versions of already released PS5 exclusives because the REAL hooked up PS5 customer-base is so small.

Supply limitations because of Covid and chip shortage and simply overwhelming demand is fine in my book, not combating the scalping scummery is not.

Sorry for blowing my lid here but I had a bad day and this topic riles me up quite a bit. I am usually a LATE adopter but since my PS4 produced Hurricane-levels of noise on a regular basis and the fact that the PS5 is backward compatible I was very very compelled to get a PS5 as soon as possible. I am glad I have had it now for 4 months, but it could have been another 4 months with a lot less hassle all around.

first-world-problem-money

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Not sure what sort of records PS5 broke…. Maybe revenue based on expensive units?

But it is very rare for anyone defeat Nintendo!

Www.vgchartz.com

If that chart is in units sold think about the difference in price between 1 PS5 and 1 Switch. Maybe they topped $$$ chart?

PS5 Breaks Another Huge US Sales Record - IGN

It’s both units and dollar sales in the US.

But that doesn’t include Switch because “console” and “handheld” are different categories.

Sony is also releasing their games on Xbox and PC now.

On behalf of all the Nintendo fans present, and to stem the tidal wave of ire that’s about to be released, I’ll summarise our position: No.

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I have no console loyalty.

In ownership order I have had a
Fairchild
Atari 2600
Intellivision
Colecovision
Super Nintendo
GBA
PS2
XBox 360
Nintendo Switch

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Intellivision
Sega Genesis
Game Boy
Turbo Grafix 16
SNES
Dreamcast
PS2
XBOX
PSP
XBOX 360
PS4
Switch

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This is fun:

Intellivision
Atari 2600
Vectrex
Gameboy
Atari Lynx
Nintendo 1
Sega Genesis/CD
PS1
PS4
PS5

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It is fun! Not sure I have this 100% right–not completely sure when the handhelds showed up–but:

Atari 2600
Atari 7800
NES
Game Boy
Sega Genesis
PS2
Nintendo DS Lite
PS3
Nintendo Wii
long break from console & handheld gaming
Nintendo Switch

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This is great : )

Mattel Electronic Baseball
Mattel Electronic Battlestar Galactica (these were not consoles exactly…)
Commodore 64
Atari 2600
NES
Gameboy Advance
PS1
PSP
Nintendo DS
Nintendo 3DS
Switch

I still have most of these in working order. Though all I have actually used in years is the Switch in handheld or an ipad.

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I had not really considered handhelds, so had not put my Electronic Baseball or Football on the list, I don’t know that they fit here. I did add my GBA to my list. And for my C64, maybe that goes on the list?I think of it as more of an early pc than a console.

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