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PSN dynamic pricing in full effect during Spring Sale

In UK and EU possibly, but no chance in the US. Dynamic pricing has already been a thing in multiple industries for many years.

California and New York have recent legislation around personal pricing. They address it differently (disclosure versus data privacy) and the FTC studied it in 2024 but was halted in mid-2025 as a result of the leadership changes that year. So there is some hope.
 
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California and New York have recent legislation around personal pricing. They address it differently (disclosure versus data privacy) and the FTC studied it in 2024 but was halted in mid-2025 as a result of the leadership changes that year. So there is some hope.

I guess we'll see. I'm not expecting anything to happen since this just looks like targeted discounts and not MSRP pricing. If GTA comes out and it shows $69.99 for some people and $79.99 for others in the same region, then all hell will break loose.
 
I guess we'll see. I'm not expecting anything to happen since this just looks like targeted discounts and not MSRP pricing. If GTA comes out and it shows $69.99 for some people and $79.99 for others in the same region, then all hell will break loose.

It's already an unfavorable look as evidenced by the threads we have here, but that's how I see it too. Sony offers discounts to everyone in a stable orbit and offers more aggressive discounts to those falling out of their orbit to try to pull them back in, but never messes with list pricing. It probably would have been smarter to do this in a different manner, like offering up store discount vouchers to those stray orbiters instead of surfacing multiple prices on their storefronts which are monitored and discrepancies are bound to draw ire.
 
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Sony toying with dynamic pricing before Valve attempting it was not on my bingo card. Would have expected Valve to be the first considering there were news articles way back that mentioned them employing economists and psychologists to fine tune pricing among other things.

This is only souring me on making any future purchases at all on their store. Just a terrible idea to turn the whole shopping experience, which should be positive into something where you constantly have to second guess yourself and treat Sony as bad faith actor.
With steps like these all the marketing bullshit about nurturing a community and having built a brand over decades quickly evaporates and people will treat this relationship on a much more arms' length basis at best or view them as employing predatory practices at worst. Really have to question if the reputational damage and loss of good will is worth it at all.
Hope this blows up in their face and they course correct quickly as otherwise others might follow their lead.
 
US here and ps+ extra user:

$26.99 for Astro Bot
$29.69 for GT7 digital deluxe.
$59.99 Ghost of Yotei digital deluxe
$29.99 Sekiro. Older game but it's my cart.
$32.99 Doom the Dark Ages premium edition
$38.99 Star Wars Outlaws ultimate edition
$60.49 Assassin's Creed Shadows premium edition

Some better deals solely based on percent saves I didn't list, but these were the ones where you saved the most money. Sadly nothing for MS flight sim which is the main one I'm keeping an eye on.
 
Meta has also done this on the Quest platform for the past couple of years. I would see lower prices when logged into my daughters account. On the bright side, I bitched so much to support about it that I received two $25 credits to my account.
 
Fuck Sony, man. It's also 40 bucks for me.
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Seems like something which is probably just about legal, but which would be perilously close to straying into illegal territory very easily. Like if you are deliberately discriminating based on spending, but this happens to overlap to some extent with race, creating a system which is inadvertently racially discriminatory.

Provided this is legal in your country, I struggle finding a reason to be mad about this. I'm trying my best, but it all falls flat in the end when I realise we're talking about video games.
When negotiating rates with my clients, I'll sometimes give a €300 rate to a Polish client, and a €500 rate to a UK one, simply because I know one has more money and is used to paying more 🤷‍♂️.
I'm pretty sure this would be illegal if -instead of someone from the UK- it was someone from another EU nation, right?
 
US here and ps+ extra user:

$26.99 for Astro Bot
$29.69 for GT7 digital deluxe.
$59.99 Ghost of Yotei digital deluxe
$29.99 Sekiro. Older game but it's my cart.
$32.99 Doom the Dark Ages premium edition
$38.99 Star Wars Outlaws ultimate edition
$60.49 Assassin's Creed Shadows premium edition

Some better deals solely based on percent saves I didn't list, but these were the ones where you saved the most money. Sadly nothing for MS flight sim which is the main one I'm keeping an eye on.

Everything was the same for me that I could cross reference (GT7 was the one I couldn't). The only game that has a different price for me is Astro (I have the higher price).

Interesting. I've had premium forever now too. Could it just be that one game?
 
this is hilarious, Sony has become so brazen in how they fuck over their fan base

It looks like the discount is based largely on how many games you buy and the less game you buy the more likely you are to get a discount

So if you support buying games on PSN you basically get fucked and if you generally ignore Sony and don't buy games, that's when you get the benefit
The reverse bulk discount.

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Sony toying with dynamic pricing before Valve attempting it was not on my bingo card. Would have expected Valve to be the first considering there were news articles way back that mentioned them employing economists and psychologists to fine tune pricing among other things.

This is only souring me on making any future purchases at all on their store. Just a terrible idea to turn the whole shopping experience, which should be positive into something where you constantly have to second guess yourself and treat Sony as bad faith actor.
With steps like these all the marketing bullshit about nurturing a community and having built a brand over decades quickly evaporates and people will treat this relationship on a much more arms' length basis at best or view them as employing predatory practices at worst. Really have to question if the reputational damage and loss of good will is worth it at all.
Hope this blows up in their face and they course correct quickly as otherwise others might follow their lead.

Pretty sure that team got dedicated to CS:GO loot boxes. :p
 
Anyone want to compare?

EU Ireland:
Star wars outlaws gold edition €36 -70%
Doom Dark Ages premium €36 -67%
Mafia old country - €40 -20%
sure
EU Germany
Star Wars Outlaws Gold €35.90
Doom Dark Ages Premium €36.29
Mafia Old Country €39.99

US
Star Wars Outlaws Gold $32.90
Doom Dark Ages Premium $32.90
Mafia Old Country $39.99
 
This is going to backfire sooooo badly. Who thought this was going to be a good idea?
When I first heard of this, I simply shrugged it off thinking they'd never actually do this or it was just online chatter, but... they are doing it lol. So, so stupid. Who green-lit this?

I cannot think of one positive aspect or benefit of "dynamic" pricing and I am really trying to force myself to find even one. Can anyone else?
 
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This is such an horrible idea i'm genuinely impressed they actually went through with it.

Especially in a case where the base discount is bigger than the one offered to a specific user, that definitely classifies as false price advertising and is illegal even in the US.
 
This makes me spend even less.
Yep same here, messing with the prices would definitely encourage me to buy MUCH less.

I've checked some games from my wishlist and haven't noticed anything compared to what psprices.com is showing. But who knows, maybe they're introducing this in waves.
 
I had a look at my wishlisted games that were on sale since it was easier to see right away,

I have an extra 20% off Full Metal Schoolgirls and 15% off Atomfall.

It would be nice to properly see what my "dynamic" discounted games actually are.
 
How is this even legal. This is like walking into McDonald's and a burger is more expensive for me than the person behind me in line.

Its likely already the case since McDonald's does targeted discounts and offers in its app in many countries. Price discovery is part of a free market. It actually makes less sense to sell something to multiple people for the same price if each are willing to pay different prices.
 
The only Sony I buy these days are their stocks, but seriously how much is Elden Ring for you guys?

Elden Ring Standard: 35% off 422 SEK = 39 EUR = 46 USD

Astro Bot: 29% off 549 SEK = 50 EUR = 60 USD
 
I guess this will work like everything else. Good engaged customers who purchase regularly will get shit pricing and people who hardly play and buy shit will get all the discount to try to get them to spend.
 
This is a horrid take.

I get "targeted coupons" in the mail every week. The existence of those coupons doesn't alter the price of the product on the shelf per-customer. It's my choice whether or not to use them. In this "dynamic pricing" system you have no choice. This is the price they decided for you. Whether you like it or not.

lmao why would you ever pick the choice to pay the higher price? Like if you wanted to do that just wait for the sale to end :messenger_tears_of_joy:
 
This makes me glad I've stuck with physical. I use the store for the rare digital only game and even rarer DLC purchase, but it's always bothered me that digital game stores charge the same or more as physical releases and have always done so. The initial defence of digital stores was that prices would be cheaper and that's just never panned out.
 
"Dynamic pricing" Really? I think that's precisely what real life game stop purchases are, people can buy a game cheaper on amazon cheaper right now.
 
This is such a bad idea and I am having a really hard time believing that they are doing it, so much so that I am saying this a second time lol.

Someone might call up a friend to let them know of a game they want to play together is on sale, only for them to see a completely different price or the game not being on sale at all. Uff.
 
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Why? I mean, complain about it if you like and no one gets discounts. There are loads of industries that give discounts for loyal customers, they aren't increasing the prices for anyone merely offering discounts for some.
Is that really the case? Some reports suggest the discount seen when you're logged out can be deeper than the one you see logged in.

That is illegal. It's literally false price advertising.
 
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Why? I mean, complain about it if you like and no one gets discounts. There are loads of industries that give discounts for loyal customers, they aren't increasing the prices for anyone merely offering discounts for some.
Imagine defending that. There is really an defense force for everything.
 
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