PlayStation’s official UK Twiter account announced the Direct Store has officially launched in Germany, with other European countries soon gaining access to the service. The PlayStation Direct Store allows players to buy consoles, controllers, and other pieces of hardware directly with the company, avoiding the high prices imposed by scalpers.
The official tweet celebrates the opening of the Direct Store service in Germany on November 8th, while underlining that the service will also be extended to “the UK, France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg launching soon.” However, access to the Direct Store does not ensure that players will be able to buy a PlayStation 5, since the product is still out of stock in the newly launched German service. Even so, with the Direct Store available in their countries, players can subscribe to a list of buyers and be directly warned by Sony when the console is available, giving them a window of opportunity to acquire it.
Since it was released in November 2020, the demand for the PlayStation 5 has been a lot higher than Sony’s ability to keep stocks. That means many players were not yet able to buy a PlayStation 5 for themselves, while others acquired the console at a higher value since stores and private users took advantage of the shortage to increase the price of the product drastically. To counter the situation, Sony started to sell the PlayStation 5 directly to consumers through the Direct Store, a service that was not yet available in Europe.
Although the demand for the PlayStation 5 is high, Sony cannot produce enough consoles due to the shortage of electronic components. Earlier this year, Sony warned a group of analysts that the situation would not stabilize before 2022 and could possibly last for even longer.
Sony is not the only company to suffer from components shortage. Nintendo also expects a drop in sales for the Nintendo Switch in 2021 for the same reason and more recently cut console production down by 20%. As for PC players, the demand for electronic components has increased the prices of GPUs since last year, making it harder for players to run new games, especially in high resolutions.
There’s no set date yet for the Direct Store to launch in other European countries. Yet, the Direct Store remains the last hope for players willing to buy a PlayStation 5 for a fair price. Check the official tweet below.
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