Sony’s PS5 Pro announcement was meant to be an exciting time for fans. The super-powered console would see fans experience better visuals and higher frame rates on current and future games. However, while that is still entirely possible, the hard-to-digest price tag of $700 left the community outraged.
Sony announced the PS5 Pro during a special overview hosted by system architect designer Mark Cerny. The reveal started off by throwing the original PS5 console under the bus and criticizing its performance. Cerny explained how the launch PS5 can only offer gamers two options and both modes often come with drawbacks.
The PS5 Pro would change this thanks to its larger GPU, advanced ray-tracing and AI-driven upscaling. Sony showcased a number of games running on the PS5 Pro including many PS4 games.
This all sounds great on paper but the news was followed by a steep price tag of $700 and no disc drive or verticle stand. The last few seconds of the showcase were enough to set the gaming community on fire and it has.
All over the internet, Sony has gained a new reputation for gouging its fanbase and taking advantage of the lack of competition. Every social media post shared by the PlayStation accounts has been marred by angry fans calling the company out for the asking price, lack of disc drive, showcasing PS4 games on the console and leaving out the verticle stand when consumers are paying such a high premium for the hardware.
The official YouTube reveal trailer is now sitting on 152k dislikes compared to 51k likes and over 1.4 million views. Social media also lit up with rage over the reveal. Popular X users including ex-Xbox’s Major Nelson were disappointed by the price tag.
Our local PlayStation South Africa accounts were either spammed by fans demanding a local price or fans predicting the outrageous local price listing at R20,000+. Reddit also hosted its own share of angry fans. The PS5 community, who are usually ready to buy anything Sony churns out, called out the company for leaving out the disc drive on a $700 console.
Overall, the online sentiment is clear – the PS5 Pro is overpriced, the upgrades aren’t enough to warrant the price tag and it should come with a disc drive.
At the moment we don’t know what the local pricing will be for the PS5 Pro. We don’t even know if it will launch in November.
