Sony Cuts Playstation 2 US Price To $99 - No PS3 cuts

Japanese Consumer Electronics giant Sony has announced that it is dropping the price of its popular last generation gaming console, the Playstation 2 to only $99, a 25 percent drop from its suggested retail price of $130.

The cuts will take place as from tomorrow, 1st of April and will be the third one after Sony's first round of cuts back in 2002. The PS2 was released in March 2000 and is already the best selling gaming console of all times.

More than 50 million units have been sold in the US with twice as much being flogged overseas. Unfortunately, the price cuts will not be reflected in the UK according to a Sony UK spokesperson who Pocket-lint that the RRP of £94.99 still holds.

However, you can grab a pre-owned Silver Playstation 2 console from Game for only £34.25 although they do come with only 28 day warranty. Otherwise, a similar boxed PS2 silver from Computer Exchange will cost you £40 including delivery and comes with a one year warranty.

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Sony's John Koller, director of hardware marketing, said on the company's blog that "With this new price, we intend to introduce a new generation of consumers – some of whom weren't even alive when the system was first introduced in 2000 – to the immense entertainment value offered by PlayStation 2."

Nearly 2000 games are available on the Playstation 2 including some award winning titles like Rock Band or the Grand Theft Auto franchise but the platform is already feeling its age. It doesn't carry any HDMI connection and its online capabilities are quite limited.

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Our Comments
Frankly, it is quite difficult to understand why Sony is deciding to slash the price of its PS2 console now. The Playstation 3 console has been on the market for quite some time already and is already lagging behind the two other current generation gaming console. Many were expecting a massive PS3 price cut to give a welcomed boost to the PS3 sales.

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