915,000 PlayStation VR headsets have been sold to consumers as of Feb. 19, according to an executive at Sony.
Andrew House, global chief executive of Sony, told the New York Times that PSVR is selling much more than Sony originally anticipated. He said that Sony hoped to sell one million headsets in the first six months after its launch. Seeing as it has only been about four months, the sales numbers are already almost at that goal.
House was one of the executives at Sony that advocated for a smaller amount of manufactured headsets at launch. He said the following in an interview with the New York Times:
It’s the classic case in any organization — the guys who are on the front end in sales are getting very excited, very hyped up. You have to temper that with other voices inside the company, myself among them, saying let’s just be a little bit careful.Now, House seems to be eating his words. PSVRs are in short supply and high demand. House said that the supply of PSVR headsets will improve by April, and that Sony plans to start selling the PSVR in Latin American countries sometime this fall.
House went on to detail the importance of Resident Evil 7: Biohazard to PlayStation VR's more recent success. He said that since the game was released in January, the average amount of time PSVR users spend playing in the headset has doubled.
PlayStation VR sales have already outdone Sony's closest VR competitors, the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive. While the competitors have not revealed the sales of their premium headsets, the research firm SuperData Research estimates that there were about 243,000 Oculus Rifts and 420,000 HTC Vives sold by the end of last year.
The retail price for a PSVR headset by itself is $399.99, and the price of the PSVR bundle, which includes the headset, PlayStation Camera, two Move controllers, and PlayStation VR Worlds, is $499.99.
What do you make of these sales numbers? Is PSVR the immediate future for virtual reality gaming? Do you expect PlayStation VR sales to continue to grow at this rate? Let us know in the comment section below!
