While the fanboys in the various camps get busy falling on various swords (their own or wielded by others) over the PS3 price point, here's some interesting number crunching.
Short gist is that adjusted for inflation the PS3 is expected to cost less than an Atari 2600 did at launch. Now, the charts show a big drop in console prices after 1982 - the only post '82 consoles to crack $500 (in 2006 dollars) are the silly outliers (Neo Geo, CDi, and 3DO) and the Saturn (which was too expensive at launch as well). So Sony is still jumping up a big price point - compare the Xbox 1 -> 360 jump of less than $100 with the relative flat PS1 -> PS2, and then the PS3 is double the PS2.
It occurs to me it would be really interesting to see the same chart with inflation-adjusted prices for the Japanese market and in yen.
Another interesting little tidbit is that every succeeding Nintendo console is cheaper than the one before, when adjusted for inflation.
Lastly - check out that whopper of a price tag on the Intellivision. Woo boy!
Short gist is that adjusted for inflation the PS3 is expected to cost less than an Atari 2600 did at launch. Now, the charts show a big drop in console prices after 1982 - the only post '82 consoles to crack $500 (in 2006 dollars) are the silly outliers (Neo Geo, CDi, and 3DO) and the Saturn (which was too expensive at launch as well). So Sony is still jumping up a big price point - compare the Xbox 1 -> 360 jump of less than $100 with the relative flat PS1 -> PS2, and then the PS3 is double the PS2.
It occurs to me it would be really interesting to see the same chart with inflation-adjusted prices for the Japanese market and in yen.
Another interesting little tidbit is that every succeeding Nintendo console is cheaper than the one before, when adjusted for inflation.
Lastly - check out that whopper of a price tag on the Intellivision. Woo boy!