Sony Cuts PS3 Price By $100

Last year the PS3 launch almost overwhelmed every news site on the internet, some months later the inevitable has happened and Sony is slashing prices on the highly publicized PS3 game system by 17%.

The price will drop from $500 to about $400 placing the PS3 system closer to the cost of Microsoft's Xbox 360 (which sells for only $20 less) but still nowhere near the leader in the industry, Nintendo's Wii console that sells for only $250... still $150 less than the newly slashed PS3 prices. Sony executives hope that the price cut will initiate a buying frenzy and say they expect sales to double at least.

"Our initial expectation is that sales should double at a minimum," Jack Tretton, chief executive of Sony Computer Entertainment America, said in an interview.

"We've gotten our production issues behind us on the PlayStation 3, reaching a position to pass on the savings to consumers, and our attitude is the sooner the better."

These price cuts happen almost simultaneously with the video game industry's annual E3 trade show in Santa Monica, California where it is expected that Microsoft will also drop it prices on the Xbox 360. The PS3 has been outsold by the Wii and Xbox 360 in almost every market since the huge launches of all three systems but say they're systems are made better than the Microsoft xBox 360 systems and have a much smaller failure rate.

"We're especially proud of the fact that the PlayStation 3 has the lowest failure rate of any PlayStation product. It's absolutely the gold standard," Tretton said.

Last week, Microsoft admitted that the failure rate of its Xbox 360 console had been very high, forcing it to book $1 billion in repair costs. The first round of PS3 price slashes are here, how many of you will now go buy the system? Anyone?