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Russian gamers snapped up PS5 Pro consoles at almost double the markup
The Izvestia newspaper reported that in Russia the entire batch of PlayStation 5 Pro pre-orders was sold out in a week and a half.
The price of each gaming console in Russia was 130,000 rubles instead of $700 (about 67,000 rubles) in the US and 800 euros (about 84,000 rubles) in Europe. However, the inflated cost did not affect the overall volume of pre-orders, which amounted to 27% of PS5 Slim sales.
Sony PlayStation consoles are "traditionally popular" on the Russian market. In the first half of 2024, the base PS5 occupied 73% of the entire Russian console market.
Anton Gorelkin, deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy, Technology and Communications, believes that the main reason for PlayStation's popularity among Russian gamers is its exclusivity. He also said that the success of the Russian console was facilitated by the registration of accounts in Turkey, India, Poland and other countries.
The deputy director stressed that it is obvious that Sony is recording the mass use of accounts from other parts of Russia and is not taking any steps to stop it.
The new model features an improved graphics card, and a number of already released games will receive free updates to improve the console's performance, including Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, Gran Turismo 7, and Marvel's Spider-Man 2.