Report: PlayStation 3 trade-ins on the rise
Edge finds that several U.K. retail outlets are seeing higher-than-expected trade-in figures for the PlayStation 3. Fingers point to the PlayStation Network's outage.
PlayStation 3 trade-ins have hit higher-than-expected levels at some retail outlets following Sony's PlayStation Network troubles, a new report claims.
According to gaming publication Edge, U.K. retail sources say they've seen a "massive increase" in PlayStation 3 trade-ins over the past several weeks. In one location, a source claims, PlayStation 3 trade-ins are up "over 200 percent." Half of those folks are taking cash for the trade, the publication's source says, while the other half are opting to buy Microsoft's Xbox 360.
A source from another game retailer told Edge that the strong uptick in trade-ins is being driven by the "hard-core online shooter crowd" that hasn't been able to play online with the PlayStation 3 for weeks.
Sony's troubles started last month when the company announced that its PlayStation Network had been hacked. The company subsequently took the service down to address the security problems. Sony has since revealed that the personal information was stolen from more than 100 million customers who subscribed to its PlayStation Network, Qriocity, and Sony Online services. Sony said yesterday that it hopes to bring the online services back up "in the next few days."
While the PlayStation Network remains inaccessible, Microsoft's alternative, Xbox Live, has been running without a hitch, forcing gamers who want to play titles online to migrate to that service and potentially leading to the trade-ins that retailers have apparently been witnessing.
However, it's worth noting that any trade-in problem is not universal. I contacted several of my local GameStop stores, and only one of them reported that PlayStation trade-ins were higher than expected.
Neither GameStop's national office nor Sony immediately responded to CNET's request for comment.