Analytic Dreamz: Notorious Mass Effect - "SONY'S PLAYSTATION GETS $50 U.S. PRICE HIKE"

Episode Date: August 21, 2025

Linktree: ⁠https://linktr.ee/Analytic⁠Join The Normandy For Additional Bonus Audio And Visual Content For All Things Nme+! Join Here: ⁠https://ow.ly/msoH50WCu0K⁠Join Analytic Dreamz on Notorious Mass Effect for a detailed breakdown of Sony’s PS5 price hike, effective August 21, 2025. All models rise by $50: Standard PS5 to $549.99, Digital Edition to $499.99, and PS5 Pro to $749.99, driven by $685M in U.S. tariffs. Analytic Dreamz explores Sony’s response to a “challenging economic environment,” competitor moves by Xbox and Nintendo, and the broader impact of Trump’s tariffs on gaming. Dive into stats, global context, and future pricing trends in this must-listen segment. Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Ladies and gentlemen, let me let you in on a little secret. The PS4 has been holding on to its player base for quite some time, to the point where April 30th of this, no, of last year, right? Approximately 49 million monthly active users, as far as my source from MAU, indicating a 50-50 split in an active player base. And then by March 31st, of this particular year, the total PlayStation Network, MAU had grown to $124 million with the PS5

finally surpassing the PS4 and monthly active users for the first time. So with that being said, fast forward from March 31st, 2025 when the PS5 officially and finally overtook the PS4 as far as the player base. safe to say now in August 21st of 2025 ladies and gentlemen effective immediately

Sony is raising the prices Shepard just look at the state of gaming like what is going on sometimes I think to myself what is going on to the point where I feel like the CEO of PlayStation was looking at the numbers and saying to himself

I know that ain't who I think it is I know there's not the PS4 4 player base asking for evolution and graphics and performance and they're still playing on net i know that ain't who i think so as soon as the PS5 player base overtook the PS4 guess what he rose the prices saying literally lentow may 2025 came out and said that and he warned that higher cost would pass to consumers because of and this is not a political podcast but we have to keep it objective right because of the new U.S. tariffs that were effective this month, right, that imposed up to a 25% duties on Japanese electronics.

And so that means the cost of Sony estimated to $685 million annually. So with that being said, the CEO was thinking to himself, you know, instead of us having to pay this exorbitant amount because of tariffs, let's just put it on to the consumers. Just look at the state of gaming. Like, what is going on? Sad day in history when us as regular working civilians have to put up with billion-dollar corporations having to pass on the effects of the tariffs to us. It's almost like somebody told you all before the election anyway.

You know, that's what's the point. Not a political podcast, right? So for all of those people who were hesitant to hop on the PS5 because, like I just said, it took a while for the PS5 to even overtake the PS4. and overall player base and it took them to this year and coincidentally now because of the tariffs and ultimately it's not it not having as much of a effect because now majority of the PS players are on PS5 so anyways with that being said you're probably wondering about the price well ladies and gentlemen let me let you in on the very unfortunate news the price is increasing by 50

yes ladies and gentlemen you guys see that's the problem but not only that is increasing by 50 dollars on all PS5 models in the US i'm talking the PS5 standard is going from four hundred ninety nine dollars to five hundred forty nine right then you have the PlayStation five digital edition going from four hundred forty nine to four hundred and ninety nine dollars then you have the PlayStation five pro going from six hundred ninety nine to seven forty nine dollars all y'all get the point right it's very expensive to get PS5 at this particular instance And with that being said, the main thing that people were saying before these tariffs was that you may want to stock up on certain electronics because when these tariffs hit, a lot of things are going to be more expensive. Well, now, ladies and gentlemen, the time has finally come.

It's almost like when Thanos was at the in-game battle with Captain American and Iron Man, and he was looking at them dead in their eyes and saying to them, y'all thought y'all got around me. But guess what? I am inevitable. That's essentially what the tariffs is doing in superhero language, right? The tariffs knew the type of impact it was going to have and best believe it is definitely having it. As, you know, to be fair to PlayStation, because I'm definitely not advocating for no corporation. But when it comes to the other corporations, it's not like PlayStation is the only one doing this.

Nintendo raised the original switch price on August 3rd of this year and delayed the switch two pre-orders due to tariffs before later raising the price and then of course you have Microsoft hiking and Microsoft at all people who is losing the console race horrendously when we're talking about analytics not quality because I always say on this platform Xbox Game Pass is the most valuable option for gamers who want to play multiple games I've ever seen if Best Buy and what was it red box I forget had a baby it would be Xbox game pass i mean it's just so affordable and you get new games day one but that's besides the point if people want to lose money and that act like Xbox game pass is one of the greatest thing is not one of the

greatest things since sliced bread and you know you can lead the horse to the water but you can't make them drink drinking you know i mean to compare you all the horses but y'all get the point right you guys see that's the problem so anyways when it comes to the ultimate uh debacle of gamers not realizing the Xbox game pass is the most effective to be a gamer nowadays as far as in this economy, PlayStation is still outselling the Xbox 3 to 1. It used to be 4 to 1, but as of up-to-day analytics that I usually cover every single week, which is why you should follow the podcast. You know, we cover the entire gaming and music industry.

But with that being said, getting back into it, the numbers updated. So now it's 3 to 1 in favor of PS5. So for every Xbox series X or S sold, there's at least 3 PS5 selling. so with playstation they're not really worried about the competition but anyways that didn't stop microsoft from hiking the prices when it comes to um the price hikes in april of this year you know people thought it was april fools the ceo was thinking i'm dead serious marking quote market conditions so anyways as far as current prices comparison Xbox similar to playstation had a fifty dollar price hike switch two remains four hundred forty nine dollars for now but like i said

they're holding back some of the rest of the switch twos because if you don't know the whole notion that the nintendo switch two is the most popular platform currently which you know of course was perpetuated by this podcast a little bit but um ultimately if you forget covid going back to cov that happened in 2020 and people try to act like it didn't happen but it had a huge ramification right so with covid it triggered a global chip shortage that severely impacted PS5's availability and it still came out to be the most successful console launch in U.S. history. So it's safe to say, when we're talking about the Nintendo Swiss 2, outside of the chip shortage pandemic, because during that time, obviously they caught back up and there's no more chip

shortage, right? There's just the tariffs that make it a lot more expensive to ship over to the U.S. But the shortage is not a factor anymore. Back then, it was a factor, and the PS5 still was the biggest console launch in u.s history so when we're looking at the numbers for the nintendo swiss two i would keep in mind that there was a chip shortage so that ps5 would have inevitably overtook the sales initially as far as their debut launch like the nintendo swiss two is doing currently so hopefully i ain't confused y'all with that i'm just letting you all know when people talk about how old nintendo's praying money hand over fist PlayStation is doing the exact same it's just the ship the chip shortage made it more um made it more of a longer process because you know there was a lot of

of factors into play that's not in the play now so anyways the main thing for PS4 people out there um it's over yeah it's it's a wrap we've been telling you all to upgrade um if you didn't do it now it's probably not going to happen later you know what i'm saying um indeed uh zip recruiter um a lot of different tools in society to to rack up some some monetary value right and ultimately at this point in time you may have to save an extra fit well not may have you definitely have to save up an extra $50 now to buy the PS5. But there's more. I am going to propose. I don't know if I'm able to see the future or not, but sometimes you see enough marketing strategies where you're able to put together the puzzle pieces. The $50 price tag, right? When is

Black Friday? So you already know I'm going with this. Black Friday. Let's see Black Friday. Date. So Black Friday for 2025 will be November 28th. I am proposing that the PS5, would be the exact same price that it was before the prices went up because of the tariffs on black friday so when everybody talks about oh i got the PS5 for a great deal don't even let them know just be like yes you did you know what i'm saying yes you did you did a great job on getting that at a very um original i mean um at a discounted price good job man good job to you so i think playstation not slick for black friday be on a lookout for well november 28 specifically be on the lookout and before that because you know the cyber monday y'all get the point around november

of 28th around black friday look at look out for the ps5 all the versions to be around the same price before the price hike so i don't want to spend too much time on this i mean it's literally just you know they raised about 50 which you know for some people it's a lot as you can see by the not see but as you heard as far as the analytics that i um gave off as far as how long it took for the ps5 to overtake the ps4 and overall player base active player base so with that being said sony is not having one ounce of regret with this decision they kind of let you know beforehand the ceo like i said once more lentow came out may 25 so when was this july march april may so yeah okay it was after ps5 overtook the ps 4

two months after that he's basically letting y'all know um the higher cost is due to the tariffs it's going to be passed on to y'all and he had no regret about saying that like as far as the CEO being tone deaf i mean i think it's just an olympic sport at this point like they just really try to over they just try to top each other time and time again like oh you said this tone deaf thing i'm gonna come out and say hey don't y'all think that when you play a video gaming you love it you should tip the developers like hold on now shepherd just look at the state of gaming like what is going on I know CEOs ain't out here advocating for tipping in a video game. You know, I didn't hurt it all.

And yes, that was a real quote by a CEO. So ultimately in gaming, CEOs are just really tone deaf. I think it's just because they look at numbers. You know, even me who, you know, I go by the name of analytic dreams, looking at a lot of dream like analytics, pun intended. So I'm never blinded by the fact that these analytics is because of real gamers helping out those numbers, right? people just look at numbers and they just think if we keep replicating that thing is going to keep working

which is why we have a bunch of fortnight clones that have completely flop right so ultimately CEOs being tone deaf not knowing the state of the economy raising prices saying that oh because of the tariffs we're going to pass the prices on to y'all when y'all are a billion dollar corporation and some people are out here working nine to five really hard jobs just to purchase a game for little timet right imagine they have two little timies now they're broke so with that being said um that's the main thing i want to get into i'm not going to drag this ultimately want to give you in a consolidated format and let you do of this information what you will so with that being said click my link here in my bio let me know one of my social media is what do

you think about sony raising the prices for the pf5 do you care and ultimately what do you think the long-term ramification of the tariffs will be on a gaming industry