Pre-orders of a limited-edition PS5 Pro 30th anniversary edition have sold out within seconds of going live – despite costing £960.
When the £700 price tag attached to the upcoming faster, whizzier PS5 Pro made some sectors of the internet gasp, Sony simply chuckled and announced a limited edition, 30th Anniversary version of the console and attached a £960 price tag to it.
Unperturbed, thousands of people logged into Sony’s website at 10:00 this morning (26th September) and pre-ordered one of the systems – it sold out within seconds. Andy Robinson, veteran videogame journalist and founder of VGC, was one of several people who had a PlayStation 5 Pro bundle in their shopping basket, only to discover that it was out of stock when he hit the purchase button.
As its name suggests, the PS5 Pro 30th Anniversary Bundle is timed to celebrate the launch of the original PlayStation in 1994, with its case and controller designed to resemble the pale grey case of the system that sparked Sony’s games industry dominance all those years ago. As Sony itself notes on its website, these anniversary systems were limited in supply, with only 12,300 produced.
Read more: System profile | Sony PlayStation
The firm at least attempted to stop people buying multiple systems (there’s a ‘one per customer’ notice on its shop), but there are of course simple ways of getting around that. A quick look on eBay reveals that numerous Anniversary PS5s are already being listed, with asking prices ranging from £5,000 to £9,999. Some even offer free postage. Bargain.
Price gouging aside, the birthday edition has clearly resonated with PlayStation fans, and it’s a wonder whether Sony’s kicking itself over its decision to build so few of them. The speed of its sales suggests there are plenty of people out there who are happy to drop almost £1000 on a games machine that doesn’t even have a built-in disc drive.
