Glad and Sad news for gamers as Xbox One is now £399 in UK

Microsoft has today announced a very strategic move for its Xbox One console placing it at under £400 in the UK (a price drop of £29) and being bundled with the eagerly anticipated Titanfall which launches next month. This is a fantastic deal on the surface but kicks dirt in the face of those people who purchased the console just a few months ago in November when it launched. The deal commences from February 28th and for a limited time includes a 30 day Xbox Live trial and the aforementioned Titanfall download code.

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It’s perhaps hard to stomach such a deal as an early adopter especially as something similar happened with the original Xbox, and outside of Microsoft, Nintendo also slashed the price of its 3DS handheld not long after launch. In Nintendo’s case, they then offered early adopters a bunch of free games knowing that from a consumer point of view their actions wouldn’t resonate well.

It seems Microsoft simply cannot win here what with one bad PR disaster after another, and here we are yet again in a situation that should be great news for everyone concerned, except it’s not.  It stinks, and it’s likely the thousands of gamers who faithfully rushed out to get their day one Xbox One consoles will be up in arms.

That said, in terms of posturing in the market against the still cheaper PS4 from Sony which retails at £349 but is in scarce supply, this is a well thought out tactical move that’s bound to shift a number of additional units. It’s not clear whether this new price point will be reflected in other regions of the world but according to Xbox UK Marketing Director Harvey Eagle.

“My responsibility is only for the UK so I can only talk about our territory,

This is about offering the best value to UK gamers, and as a result we’re announcing this new price point of £399. There’s no announcements in other countries planned, so it’s a UK-only adjustment and we feel this is the right thing to do in our market.”

Written by: Rob Cram

Rob Cram has hundreds of video game reviews, thousands of articles under his belt with years of experience in gaming and tech. He aims to remain fair and free from publisher/developer influence. With his extensive knowledge, feels his gaming opinions are valid and worth sharing. Agreement with his views are entirely optional. He might have a bias towards cyberpunk.