Sony has yet to set a price for the PS5, and Reddit user youessbee shared what appears to be a survey from Neilson asking for thoughts on pricing.

The survey, screenshots of which are shown below, offers two random prices and asks for respondents' opinions. This particular Reddit user received two ridiculously low prices, which is impossible for us, and we are certain that Neilson meant it when he said "random."

We would now venture to say that there is no way the PS5 will launch at £349 and the digital version at £259, $36 more than the PS4Pro and $64 less than the launch price of the 20GB PS3. But reading between the lines, it seems that something really interesting is going on.

If Nielson is generating random prices, then it is no surprise that some users are being offered outrageously high prices and commenting on them. Sony is probably accumulating all kinds of prices, sending them to users, and watching for the point at which people change from "shut up and take the money" to "wait for the sale."

It should be noted that this does not necessarily mean that Sony needs to have a majority of people who find its prices attractive. Sony would have its own sales targets in mind based on the number of units it can physically produce and the reduction in production costs over time.

The price of the PS5 has been the subject of much speculation, partly because one could come up with a reasonable argument that it would be the lowest or highest price we have ever seen.

Just recently, the PS5 price was leaked by IronManPS5 on Twitter, who claimed that the PS5 will be priced at $499 in the US and £449 in the UK when it is released at the end of the year. The leaker also revealed that the PS5 Digital Edition will be $100 or £100 cheaper than its disc-drive-equipped sibling, at $399 in the US and £349 in the UK.

Those pessimistic about the price would just point to the hardware. The closest thing to the console's GPU specs is about $350 on its own, the 825GB SSD easily clears the $100 mark, and the Blu-ray drive adds another $100, taking into account other parts needed to run the console, such as CPU, RAM, main board, and gamepad. That's already $550 before factoring in the CPU, RAM, mainboard, gamepad, and other parts needed to run the console. Doing the math, I don't feel that a $600+ price tag is impossible, even with the discounts offered by bulk pricing and Sony's readiness to take a hit to get the hardware into people's homes.

But equally inescapable is the inescapable fact that game consoles live or die by their pricing at launch. Since entering the market, Sony has only "lost" the console war with the PS3. Why did it lose? Because Microsoft was selling a 20GB Xbox 360 for $400 and a cheaper memory card-only system for $299, while Sony was having a hard time convincing people that a $500 20GB PS3 was a good investment, let alone a $600 60GB model! .

Perhaps Sony will eventually settle somewhere in the middle, absorbing some of the costs but not giving away the console.