Sony officially responds to panic over PS5 availability

If you were thinking about waiting until launch day to pick up a PlayStation 5, you might want to come up with another game plan, as the President and CEO Jim Ryan said in a recent interview that players who wanted to do just that might not be able to.

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In today’s day and age, every piece of major technology that releases is available for pre-order. Especially in the game’s industry, most people can go to their favorite tech store, drop some or all of the money, and have a product reserved before it even officially releases.

That being said, there’s always a group of people that decides that that’s not what they want to do. They think that even if they aren’t able to secure a product before launch via a pre-order, they’ll be able to pick up one no problem on release day. If you were thinking about doing that with the PS5, however, you may want to reconsider.

According to Reuters, PlayStation CEO and President Jim Ryan stated that fans who want to buy a PS5 on launch day might have a difficult time, confirming the fears of those who weren’t able to secure a pre-order.

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“It may well be that not everybody who wants to buy a PS5 on launch day will be able to find one,” Ryan said an interview with Reuters.

The PlayStation head apparently went on to say that they’ll be working hard to make sure that supply of the console meets the demand, although it’s worth noting that this this is more than likely PR speak and fans still shouldn’t hold their breath that they’ll be able to get one.

 

While this is awful news for those that were hoping to wait until day 1 to get their hands on the PS5, it shouldn’t be that surprising. Game consoles over the past couple decades are notorious for selling out quickly and considering how difficult it was to get a pre-order, this really shouldn’t be a shock.

In-store purchases for PS5 on launch day

On November 5, 2020, PlayStation flat-out confirmed that fans would not be able to go in-person and purchase a PS5 without a pre-order on launch day, meaning a trip down to your favorite retailer is going to be fruitless unless you’ve already reserved one, no matter which way you slice it. Their blog post states:

“No units will be available in-store for purchase on launch day (November 12 or November 19, depending on your region) – please don’t plan on camping out or lining up at your local retailer on launch day in hopes of finding a PS5 console for purchase. Be safe, stay home, and place your order online.”

According to the company, this new restriction is due to safety concerns about people camping out and gathering closely in one space, which makes sense considering that’s historically what happens when it comes to new console launches.

That being said, fans will have the option of purchasing a PS5 online through select retailers. Given the above statement from Jim Ryan, however, it more than likely will be very difficult to find one on launch day, even through online outlets, so if you want one, you’ll still have to be fast.

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Even if you are able to somehow get a console through online retailers on day 1, you more than likely won’t get it for a few days due to shipping reasons, meaning the narrative that people without pre-orders are going to be at a disadvantage still stands.

As of November 5, 2020, pre-orders for both the standard and digital-only versions of the console are sold out at almost every retail store. Here’s hoping that all this info is a bit hyperbolic, but all in all, this is some bad news for people who wanted to run down to their store and grab one on day 1.