[Console Games] After the PS3 crisis, Sony seems to be falling into a price trap again with PSVR2 glasses

[SnO]

The way Sony chose to release any information about the PlayStation VR2 glasses was very strange. It was officially announced back in January this year, and there hasn't been a lot of news or huge reveal of VR headsets since then, and it's also strange that the important announcements (which were a few) that came out mostly, came in the form of news on the PlayStation Blog .

 

 

Cold marketing, unfavorable feedback
PSVR2 - Sony
PSVR2 - Sony
Sadly all the reveals were lackluster, no catchy trailers, no show events... everything about the eyewear ads was completely subdued. Something huge was revealed for the PSVR2 headset, in not entirely festive fashion, when Sony announced the PS VR2 release date and price with an update on the PlayStation Blog.

 

 

Unfortunately, these glasses were not taken seriously in terms of the way they were revealed. When the PSVR2 launches on February 22, 2023, those glasses will cost around $549.99. There was a backlash against the ad from a wide range of social media users, and it's not hard to see why. And frankly, it's hard to understand why Sony thinks this is a good price. Because in fact imposing a logic that I believe in .. that things are going bad from the beginning.

In fact the deeper you look at the price, the weirder it gets. $549.99 is quite a steep price for a PSVR2 but it's also worth remembering that this is an accessory, which means you can only use it if you have a PS5 which is cheaper than those VR headsets.

It's just a sub, Sony!

 

 

PSVR2 - Sony
PSVR2 - Sony
Of course the PS5 itself isn't cheap, the digital version costs $400 and the regular version costs $500 either way, that's already a pretty hefty amount of money that you had to shell out even before you bought PlayStation VR2. Once you buy it, you will notice that you have spent at least 950 dollars .. that is, more than a thousand dollars, and you have not spent any money on games yet.

Virtual Reality is such a subsection in the industry that the most successful VR headsets on the market are still a long way from selling a huge figure like 20 million copies. So it's hard to understand why Sony would consider it wise to launch more than one spin-off at such an exorbitant price tag, and in the middle of the global recession we're facing.

The price is as if the VR market is short on products so it's not as if people interested in VR will have no other choice but to buy a PS VR2 (despite how awesome the PSVR2 is). You have something like the Quest 2..a solid and respectable device with a solid library of games that you can get for $400, which isn't cheap either but you don't need an expensive home console to be able to use the glasses.

 

 

A library of games that won't tip the scales
PSVR2 - Sony
PSVR2 - Sony
With the launch of any new device, the ultimate question is always, does its game library justify its price tag no matter what? The answer so far is no. Of all the games that have been officially announced so far, there aren't a whole lot of games that looked like they were worth buying glasses, Horizon Call of the Mountain looked promising, but there isn't a crowd of gamers eager to get their hands on the game at any cost.

Given the goggles' insanely high price, and the easy availability of competing goggles, it seems almost impossible that PlayStation VR2 will be able to even come close to achieving the success Sony expects. Reports have claimed that Sony is looking to sell more than 2 million copies in the first quarter of 2023 itself, but it seems unlikely that we'll see those sales.

Given the launch circumstances at the moment, the PSVR2 seems doomed to the fate of the PS Vita...a promising piece of technology has been stymied by baffling financial decisions.

 

https://www.vga4a.com/archives/168356