Yeah, I got my PS5 Pro back in November because I could get it for $583 and I knew that with the shortages, tariffs and inflation, that was the cheapest it would ever be. I ultimately chose it over the Xbox Series X because of Stellar Blade and Xbox giving up on physical media. Otherwise I would have gotten the Series X back when they were $350, as it's a much better-looking console. I've been gaming primarily on Sony consoles since the PS3, but I won't be buying a PS6 or any new console from Sony again because last year they sent out an update that bricked my PS4 Pro, which was my second PS4 after my original model died. Thankfully I had recently upgraded it with an internal SSD and was able to resurrect it by cloning the old hard drive. Their coding and build quality are getting sloppy. I know some people on Youtube are saying the PS6 will have a disc drive, but after Sony released the PS5 Pro without a pre-installed disc drive, I say there's no way in hell.
I'll be getting the new XBox instead because if I'm forced to go digital, it's going to be the right way with emulation and access to the GOG store. My plan is to add at least 8TB of storage to it and make it the last console I'll ever need with emulators, GOG, and Steam. I'm already digitizing my 7th-gen and earlier games in anticipation. Yeah it'll be expensive, but it's coming in 2027 according to AMD, which gives me almost 2 years to earmark $1,200-$1,500 for it. I'm not worried about exclusives because quite frankly I don't see much beyond 2028 to get excited for. Yeah we're getting some good stuff now (finally), but with modern development cycles that means we're in for another 3-5 year dry spell in a year or two. I'll probably stop buying new AAA games after 2028. The only major AAA games left in the pipeline are GTA6, Fallout 5, and The Elder Scrolls 6, which are guaranteed to be bloated beyond belief. One of the people who is working on Fallout 5 said they want the game to have over 500 hours of content, which makes it a hard pass for me. I'm already sick of games that take 70+ hours to finish. I felt like I needed a vacation after finishing RDR2 and AC: Valhalla last year.
As for Nintendo, I really don't care what they do anymore. I'm done with them, and have found 3rd-party replacements for all of their IPs I used to love (Sonic Racing for Mario Kart, Elden Ring for Zelda, Shin Megami Tensei and Monster Hunter Stories for Pokemon, etc). They've turned most of their IPs into shells of their former selves. Pretty sad that Elden Ring is the best Zelda game in the past 20 years. I would consider my purchase of the Switch back in 2018 to have been a waste of money if it hadn't been for Pokemon Legends Arceus (the greatest Pokemon game ever made), but it's clear from everything since then that Arceus was lightning in a bottle and they'll never make a Pokemon game that good again.
