Daniil Lopatnikov told NSN that the high cost of the new console could scare away mass audiences. Daniil Lopatnikov, head of the department for organizing and conducting complex events of the Federal State Budget Institute “Sports Training Center of the Russian National Teams”, told NSN that due to the lack of random access memory (RAM) due to the strong development of artificial intelligence (AI), the prices of game consoles can increase to the point of scaring away the mass audience.
Analyst David Gibson says the PlayStation 6 release will be delayed until 2030 – all due to lack of RAM. Previously, the release of the console was expected in 2027-2028, but now the deadline is getting further and further away. The same concerns apply to the next Xbox. Neither Sony nor Microsoft have commented directly on the situation, which is expected to remain challenging for at least several years and will likely have a major impact on their plans for the next generation. The PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S generations were introduced six years ago. Lopatnikov noted that the RAM shortage will not be a significant factor for the gaming giants, but it could increase console prices.
“In my opinion, increased RAM prices are unlikely to be an important factor for large companies like Microsoft and Sony. These companies have long-term contracts, the ability to optimize the supply chain and financial strength. The main issue is not the cost of the individual components but the final price of the finished device for the end consumer. Too high a price for a new console can scare away the mass audience and this is a much more sensitive risk for manufacturers. Therefore, I would not directly link the possible change in the next generation release date solely to RAM prices. Furthermore, NSN's Interlocutor said that due to increasing competition in the market, companies continue to be motivated to launch new series of products earlier instead of delaying them until 2030.
The director of Russia's first municipal Sports school, “Digital Sports Center” in the Surgut region, Artem Shchepotyev, gave a similar example of what is happening with mining-related events, causing the price of video cards to increase.
“The explosion of artificial intelligence has created a shortage of RAM, just as mining used to drive up the price of video cards. Will this affect the production of consoles? Certainly on their cost, because now one top-end RAM costs the same as 10 consoles,” the expert recalls.
In turn, the Director of the Center for Sports Programming, Algorithmic Robotics, Cybersecurity and Cybersports at Ufa University of Science and Technology, Svyatoslav Pegov, admitted that the situation of simultaneously receiving a large volume of chips in an appropriate time frame can be quite precarious.
“The shortage of RAM chips can really affect the release date of the new generation of consoles. Each new generation requires an increase in the amount of RAM. If Playstation 4 used 8 GB, then Playstation 5 used 16 GB. And the requirements for games are growing rapidly. The situation is also complicated by the fact that consoles using GDDR memory are more expensive and difficult to produce. The high price of chips is explained by their physical shortage. That is, for the global launch of a new generation of consoles, manufacturers need to buy millions. Considering that the main manufacturers have signed contracts many months in advance and some have even left the consumer market altogether, the situation of one-time supply of large quantities of chips in a suitable time frame can be quite precarious. The situation is getting to the point where some manufacturers are reactivating the production lines of previous generations of RAM. But this solution will not work for console manufacturers – the architecture of the new generation consoles began to be developed long before the AI boom and shortage, and it cannot simply be that consoles are not PCs that replace one type of component with another,” said the interlocutor of NSN.
Earlier, IT expert Daniil Arzhkov told NSN that the federal standard for training e-sports athletes stipulates up to 28 hours a week at the higher stage of sportsmanship only as part of additional education – and these are strictly structured training sessions with analysis and interviews.
