Pity the poor PlayStation Classic. The concept of Sony doing their own take on the super popular NES and SNES classics from Nintendo was great on paper – a ton of classic games loaded onto a novelty mini box of nostalgia.
The big problem was that the games that came loaded onto the PlayStation Classic didn’t really represent the best the console had to offer in the same way that Nintendo’s consoles did.
Massive hits like Spyro, Crash Bandicoot and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 were missing – presumably as a result of licensing issues. It was like if Nintendo had tried to release the NES Classic without Super Mario Bros or The Legend of Zelda.
Instead, you could enjoy such titles as Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo. Remember that one? Of course you do. What do you mean you want Croc? Stop crying.
Anyway, if the divisive lineup of games wasn’t enough to convince you that the PlayStation Classic wasn’t gonna go down very well with customers, it’s already had a 40 per cent price drop at pretty much every store online, going from £70 to £50.
To be clear, this doesn’t look to be a Boxing Day/New Year sale of any kind, it very much seems that this is the standard new price of the Classic going forward, which implies that Sony made way more than they’ve actually managed to sell, given that it was released at the start of December.
For comparison, the NES Mini was genuinely impossible to find within a week of being on sale, while the SNES Mini was almost as much of a nightmare to track down. Of course with these consoles, there is the argument to be made that Nintendo just didn’t make enough. They certainly didn’t with the NES Mini.
Who knows, maybe this time next year you’ll find a PlayStation Classic in your stocking, or in your local Poundland.
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Ewan Moore is a journalist at UNILAD Gaming who still quite hasn’t gotten out of his mid 00’s emo phase. After graduating from the University of Portsmouth in 2015 with a BA in Journalism & Media Studies (thanks for asking), he went on to do some freelance words for various places, including Kotaku, Den of Geek, and TheSixthAxis, before landing a full time gig at UNILAD in 2016.