Image: Push Square
We keep an eye on the PS Store a lot, especially as new sales come and go every couple of weeks or so, but it seems Sony might be toying with the idea of dynamic, per-user pricing.
It’s difficult to say definitively, of course. However, there are now a couple of cases in which somebody has discovered the same game being offered for two different prices simultaneously.
Firstly, about a year ago, someone reported different prices for Astro Bot on PS Store.
Sony Possibly Experimenting with Dynamic Game Pricing
by
u/Walking_Immortal in
GamingLeaksAndRumours
To summarise, the user saw the game being sold for both $59.99 and $44.99, with the latter price showing once they were logged into their PSN account. A friend saw the former price when logged in.
A second example has recently surfaced, this time with a discrepancy in the discount applied to Red Dead Redemption 2: Ultimate Edition.
Was excited to finally purchase until I realized the price was lower on my wife’s account
by
u/DarXIV in
playstation
In this instance, the user says, for them, the game is showing a price of $19.99. However, on their partner’s account, the game is currently listed for $14.99.
If Sony really is experimenting with targeted, dynamic pricing on a per-user basis, it throws up questions about fairness; why should one person be expected to pay more for something than another?
The only thing we’ve seen that might be related is an ‘Exclusive Discount for You’ popping up on the PS Store from time to time. We didn’t really think much of it, but we suppose it’s possible these really are being tuned to individual accounts.
At any rate, it’s interesting to see a couple of rare examples of this happening.
We’ll have to wait and see if this becomes a more widespread thing; it may simply go away, or could possibly be a mistake of some sort.
What are your thoughts on this? How would you react if you knew others were paying less or more for the exact same products? Tell us in the comments section below.