PS5 becomes Sony's biggest money maker, cruising past PlayStation sales

zohaibahd

zohaibahd

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In brief: New sales data from Sony shows the PlayStation 5 is absolutely printing money – outperforming every previous generation of the console at the same point in its lifecycle. This comes a couple of weeks after the company published its earnings report, revealing that the PS5 surpassed Xbox One in lifetime sales.

According to the presentation from Sony's internal Game & Network Services business reports, the PS5 has raked in $106 billion in sales since launching in November 2020. That's quite the figure for a console that's 'only' been on the market for around three and a half years.

However, several aspects require clarification. That $106 billion doesn't just account for PS5 hardware and software sales – it covers Sony's entire gaming business during the current generation: PS4 sales, older game releases, subscriptions, the works. It's the total pie, not just the PS5 slice.

Still, the numbers are impressive when you consider the PS4 generation 'only' pulled in $107 billion across its entire seven-year run from 2013 to 2019. With the PS5 closing in on that total revenue after just four years, it's clearly on track to become Sony's biggest console cash cow ever.

The secret sauce seems to be players spending more cash on the PS5 ecosystem as a whole. While the PS4 outsold its successor by a massive 117 million to 56 million units, the higher PS5 price tag combined with increased spending on DLC, microtransactions, services, and accessories is giving Sony a bigger bang for its buck.

On average, each PS5 owner has dropped $731 on the PlayStation ecosystem so far. For PS4 folks over a similar timeframe, that figure was just $580 per person. DLC and microtransaction spending is up a staggering 176% compared to the PS4 days, bolstering Sony's bottom line. The only area seeing a decline is full game sales, which are down 12% versus the PS4 generation at this stage.

Initially, the console copped plenty of flack for the lack of killer exclusive games and stock shortages. But from Sony's perspective, all those issues are now in the rear-view mirror.

With over 59 million PS5 units shipped and the console outpacing Xbox's last-gen performance, the attention has turned to the future. Rumors of a PS5 Pro model with sweeping hardware upgrades are swirling, potentially giving Sony another avenue to double dip on its already lucrative user base.

There has been some less-welcome news, though. Sony's financial report for the fourth quarter of its financial year revealed that the PS5 missed the revised sales target for the quarter. And earlier this year, Sony's gaming division announced plans to trim its global workforce by roughly eight percent, or around 900 people, with the aim of streamlining resources.

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PS5 becomes Sony's biggest money maker, cruising past PlayStation sales

 
Too much double talk from Sony that we don't even know what to believe from them anymore.

Just in February Sony lost 10 billion dollars in stock value when they had to announce in their earnings call that the PlayStation 5 was too far behind the PS4 and their were not meeting their 2024 sales projection.

Then this time around they still recognize the PS5 sales are behind with most people still playing on PS4 but this time around they are buttering their words with "the PS5 is their best seller"

But once again, this Sony's PR speaking, the same people that ended up putting overblown words on Neil Drukemann in which they found themselves in an embarrassing situation when he himself had to stop them dry.
 
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Console sales don't mean everything anymore.. and from this it's all about the upsell, which the ps5 is excelling at. Even if you're not selling them a stack of new games (which they won't in the coming year, as there are very few first part titles coming), keep them engaged with the games they do have and they'll keep spending. I'd expect a heap of extra HellDivers 2 content for instance.

Even though PS Plus is not as broad as GamePass, there is still enough titles there to get people playing something they would have otherwise missed, and there is that chance of upselling them into further microtransactions they would not have otherwise had access to. Even if it's just $10 for an extra skin, character, or something, multiply that out by enough users and that's big dollars.

I'm assuming Sony must get a cut of every microtransaction on the platform, so from that perspective they're doing well, and there is plenty of further upside. Even if people are playing "SIE" games on PC, they still get that cut, hence the diversification.
 
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Everything on PS5 is more expensive than on the PS4, so no wonder. That alone was one of the reasons I didn't opt to buy one. The other was the massive size of the system.
 
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PS5 games are way too expensive at launch in my opinion. I wait until they are cheap and on sale or buy second-hand these days - seems like most people are happy to pay the crazy prices though so what do I know!
 
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The Talking Tech said:
Too much double talk from Sony that we don't even know what to believe from them anymore.

Just in February Sony lost 10 billion dollars in stock value when they had to announce in their earnings call that the PlayStation 5 was too far behind the PS4 and their were not meeting their 2024 sales projection.

Then this time around they still recognize the PS5 sales are behind with most people still playing on PS4 but this time around they are buttering their words with "the PS5 is their best seller"

But once again, this Sony's PR speaking, the same people that ended up putting overblown words on Neil Drukemann in which they found themselves in an embarrassing situation when he himself had to stop them dry.
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When its about making money you cant trust anything they say except that they want to make more money no matter the ways(exaggerations, half truth, twisted facts, cherry-picked facts, lies, etc).
 
Well, I own a PS5 and it has been a blast. I actually love the big form factor because of better cooling. I`m not a fan of the slimmer versions. The possibility of simply sliding an M2 and expanding the memory made a lot of difference, because I own many PS4 games that I still play. Many have a PS5 version that I have upgraded to. The graphics is on par with a much more expensive PC. But it`s hard to make comparisons like "oh, this and that graphic card outperforms it", because a game like TLoU2, Gran Turismo 7, God of War Ragnarök or others optimized for the system look much better than on your average PC. It even has some poor`s man Ray Tracing and it works fine. The system is fast, everything loads up instantly. No bloatware, spying, always online or other Microsoft shenanigans. I can barely finish a game in a month so, there`s more titles than I can buy or have time to play. Yes, the games are not cheap, but I don`t get them day one. Usually, they slash 20-30% after half a year or so and thus I could say I buy them with PS4 prices.
 
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That's why fully opening for pc will be Sony's demise. Less console sales equals less 3rd party sales.
And this mean Sony studios will have to produce usual crap like other big companies to stay afloat, and that will be a loss for me as gamer.
 
OortCloud said:
PS5 games are way too expensive at launch in my opinion. I wait until they are cheap and on sale or buy second-hand these days - seems like most people are happy to pay the crazy prices though so what do I know!
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It depends really, I dont own a ps5, I play on pc, but if playing games is your main hobby/past time then new games when compared to other hobbies are actually pretty cheap.

I enjoy flashy, graphic spectacular type games so dropping 60-100 smackers on a title I may get between 7 to maybe hundreds of hours of gameplay out of doesnt bother me but if youre a person who just has to play every new release I guess I can see how prices could be an issue.
 
OortCloud said:
PS5 games are way too expensive at launch in my opinion. I wait until they are cheap and on sale or buy second-hand these days - seems like most people are happy to pay the crazy prices though so what do I know!
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Consoles are still the cheapest option to play BY FAR. You can get regular discounts during sales, and conveniently track them on sites like xbdeals, psprices, dekudeals, ...

I never bought a game at full price ever since the original PS3 TLOU release, 11 years ago.

THEN the fact that you can actually buy used games, something that is pretty much nonexistent on the PC since everything's linked to your accounts, even after your death lol (hi Steam). You can buy AAA console titles for like half the price in just a couple of months on eBay or wherever.

Then the costs of getting a new performant gaming rig versus a new console.

And I'm saying this as a person who owns literally every platform that there is, PC, Xbox, PS5, and Switch. And I've been a PC gamer for like 30 years and a console gamer only for the past decade (yes, since the release of TLOU). You gotta be objective. The only thing somewhat holding console sales back is the lack of widespread keyboard+mouse support and crossplay. Fix those two and there's literally no point in investing in a gaming PC ever again. None.
 
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bviktor said:
Consoles are still the cheapest option to play BY FAR. You can get regular discounts during sales, and conveniently track them on sites like xbdeals, psprices, dekudeals, ...

I never bought a game at full price ever since the original PS3 TLOU release, 11 years ago.

THEN the fact that you can actually buy used games, something that is pretty much nonexistent on the PC since everything's linked to your accounts, even after your death lol (hi Steam). You can buy AAA console titles for like half the price in just a couple of months on eBay or wherever.

Then the costs of getting a new performant gaming rig versus a new console.

And I'm saying this as a person who owns literally every platform that there is, PC, Xbox, PS5, and Switch. And I've been a PC gamer for like 30 years and a console gamer only for the past decade (yes, since the release of TLOU). You gotta be objective. The only thing somewhat holding console sales back is the lack of widespread keyboard+mouse support and crossplay. Fix those two and there's literally no point in investing in a gaming PC ever again. None.
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I also have all the platforms (except Switch) and have been playing PC games since I got given a work PS2 Model60 286. I agree that second hand games (or any physical games!) on PC are pretty rare these days, but Steam sales still have some great offers at times. Hopefully Valve will continue to wrestle control of the platform away from Microsoft with more/better/slicker Proton support and make PC gaming even more attractive. You sound like you want PC gaming to die? Personally I think that would be a huge shame. These closed ecosystems prevent so much innovation - for example look at Flight Sims or Racing games on PC. The high-end steering wheels, pedals, motion simulators etc etc would never get made for console. Modding will also never be properly allowed.
 
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