How can anyone who is looking for a cheaper option and buys a PS4 instead of a Series S invest in the Xbox ecosystem? I am not talking about core gamers but for the casual audience who are looking for a cheaper system. I think that Sony wants you to buy a PS4 and eventually upgrade to a PS5 when the production is more stable, at least that’s what I think it’s their plan.
Many people, expecially in all regions where Xbox presence is abysmal.
Yeah I think you guys are way too close to the situation. Here are a few scenarios to illustrate what I think Sony wants to happen (discounting Nintendo):
Hello I am a father of 3 who knows absolutely nothing about video games. Best Buy employee, my kids are asking for a PlayStation, do you have any of those? OK great thanks ring me up.
Hey, I used to play Madden in college all the time when I was in college, are they still making those? Cool, oh hey PlayStation I remember that wow the controller looks the same that’s wild I love it.
Greetings, I am a person whose personality is that I love the MCU, is there like a Spider-Man game? Nice, I’ll take it and that Avengers game too, I love those guys.
Hi, my 12 year old wants call of duty, where is that? Ooh a pretty blue box. Oh there’s a green one too. What’s the difference between these two? The blue one has more stuff but they cost the same? I’ll take that one then.
I haven’t paid attention to technology since the nineties but I need to get something for my brother for his birthday. Oh grr Microsoft bad, I remember that antitrust trial. I don’t know what antitrust means but I know trust is good and also Bill Gates is making 5G viruses. I used to have a Sony Trinitron growing up so I’ll go with that.
If at any point there’s a “no” or a “but” in those interactions then that person who showed up with 300-500 dollars in their pocket might end up getting captured into an other ecosystem. It’s human nature to hate an anticlimax; you already committed to spend the money so it’s as good as gone in your mind, you drove all the way to the store. Are you going to buy something equivalent in your eyes or are you going to flaccidly go to another store or go home and try again tomorrow? None of these people will care about SSDs or ray-tracing (which I barely fucking understand) and no exhausted retail employee who just want this maskless conversation to be over is going to tell them about the value proposition of Game Pass or next-gen support or free cloud saves if they’re even aware of these intricacies.
Obviously the best-case scenario for Sony is to just have the PS5 available as a contrast but we’re not exactly there yet. This is just my reasoning by the way, it’s not unimpeachable or based on any business savvy. Incidentally, I think that this is part of the reason Sony are reportedly working on Spartacus. People expect subscriptions now, and Game Pass makes their offerings look like a joke, and that does have a chance of derailing those conversations.
Wait what’s this Game Pass there are signs of everywhere? Oh it’s like a pass for games? I can play over a hundred games for free? Does it work on this box I’m holding? It doesn’t? And that box that costs the same/less DOES have it? I didn’t have an allegiance in mind when I stepped into the store so I will go for the thing that gets me the most bang for my buck
(I know it’s not free, I’m in character)
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Yeah, pretty much.
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Agreed. Much smarter to sell a customer a machine that will have them in the ecosystem for the generation rather than selling them a dead machine for $50 less.
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I have a Series X buying a Series S for the office to do streaming. The strategy is working!
Series S really is a Trojan horse for capturing people in their ecosystem. I’ve personally done the conversion trick for two people who previously had no interest in Xbox and the Series S was the lynchpin. Even if they don’t buy a lot of games, they’re the type of people who’d stay subbed in perpetuity and they never would have known about it if I hadn’t explained the concept to them.
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Oh I know about that, trust me…I live in Greece. 
My point was that if someone buys a PS4 instead of a Series S (which doesn’t make sense to me as well) he will most likely invest in the PS ecosystem and this will make the upgrade to the PS5 easier I think, which is probably Sony’s plan.
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