Should I sell the PS5 Pro 30th Anniversary bundle I bought on eBay?

A reader is conflicted over what he should do with the PS5 Pro he pre-ordered and blames Sony for tempting him into reselling it.

I was one of the lucky ones to pre-order a PS5 Pro 30th Anniversary bundle this week on the PlayStation Direct store. Initially feeling quite happy to secure one for myself – with the intent of selling my old PlayStation 5 to make the high price a bit easier to swallow, as well as getting a bunch of extra gubbins to soften the £700 price for a Pro console – I now have an unpleasant conundrum I did not originally consider. The bundle is now selling for absolutely ridiculous prices on eBay, with some reaching £5,000. £5,000! That… is… insane.

I despise scalpers, what they do to the real fans and what they stand for, but… £5,000. That’s a lot of money, and I know it’s unlikely they are all selling for that much. However, it seems quite feasible that I could sell my bundle when it arrives, buy a normal Pro as a treat and have a large chunk of cash left over, essentially being paid to buy a PS5 Pro simply for waiting for a few hours and clicking a few buttons.

This is where we are folks. Sony knew this would happen, it was obvious scalpers would jump on this and ruin it for everyone who wanted something nice to commemorate their love of the original PlayStation. And now I’m in a position where I feel like I would be a complete fool not cash in and use the money for something more sensible. I’m not sure I will, but I will probably go through a lot of back and forth, moral high ground, soul searching between now and November 21st.

I think Sony has a responsibility here and it’s about time they consider producing to pre-orders. If they were to take a similar approach to pre-orders as some of the limited print run companies, and take orders for a few months before making an amount that satisfies the demand, at least the real fans who want one will have the chance to put in an order without having to pay five times the price. You would still get profiteering to some degree, but nothing like what I’ve seen on the second-hand market today.

Honestly, I hope that I get to keep and enjoy the console, but if people in my life find out about it and how much it might go for on eBay, I don’t think there’s much chance I will be able to justify keeping it when the kind of money it would bring in would stretch a lot further.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m super happy to have one on order and feel privileged to be able to afford an entertainment item at this price in the first place, but what does this say about the state of the industry when consoles have got to these kind of prices in the first place, and what some people are prepared to pay for what is essentially a couple of grey faceplates.

It’s definitely making me reconsider my place as a collector of video games and wondering if this might be where I step off the ride. With empty useless disc copies of a dead live service game, in Concord, going for over $100 and sealed copied of retro games supposedly going for hundreds of thousands, it’s fairly safe to say things have gotten out of hand.

I’m not sure what the answer is, but some kind of shake-up wouldn’t hurt. It seems like the focus on making creative and innovative games has taken a back seat three rows behind, to marketing ploys, live service monetisation, and exploiting FOMO [fear of missing out].

It certainly worked on me. This whole PS5 Pro release seems so unnecessary, especially when most people feel that the PlayStation 5 generation has barely got going in any real capacity. Yet, here I am, queuing up to bite, hook, line and sinker. For the whales!

By reader Sean