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As you probably already know, the PlayStation 5 is not an easy-to-find console – and it’s about as true in Japan than here in the West. Naturally, Sony does everything he can to sell as many consoles of the current generation as possible – but because of the shortages of current chips and other persistent manufacturing problems (largely caused by the pandemic), he It will take time before Sony can not match consumer demand.
A new incentive could, however, help to appease the situation. As reported by Yahoo! A few weeks ago in Japan (sorry, we missed it!), Sony is currently working with retailers to fight the scalping of PS5 in Japan. A quick explanation in case: a “scalper” is a person who buys a limited stock to resell at a higher price – and the PS5 is a key target for scalpers since its launch in 2020.
Anyway, Sony provides the retailers of the official seals, which are applied to PS5 packaging. The idea is that when a PS5 is sold, the retailer breaks the seal so that the PS5 can be identified as sold and “open”. The seal itself is apparently difficult to remove, so a box psp that has been sold by scalpers should be easy to spot because of the seal or the damaged package that a withdrawal seal has left behind.
It is a bit difficult to know how far this incentive is going to Japan, but it looks like a fairly decent plan. Hope this has had some impact on the scalping market, and more PS5 find their way to regular customers.