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Consumers win the price wars

PSA: Xbox One, PS4 bundles back down to $299 for holidays

Extended Black Friday prices could presage permanent price drops.

Kyle Orland | 47
Credit: Ars Technica/Aurich Lawson
Credit: Ars Technica/Aurich Lawson

Were you too busy enjoying the pleasures of friends and family to get the lowest-ever official prices on Xbox One and PS4 bundles over Black Friday weekend? Good news, procrastinators: Microsoft and Sony are giving you a second chance at those low prices.

All Xbox One bundles (listed below) are available at $50 off the usual price starting today through December 26, putting them as low as $299. Meanwhile, two PS4 bundles (including either Star Wars: Battlefront or Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection) are back at their $300 sale price through December 19. If you happened to buy either system at regular price in the last week or so... well, we hope you kept the receipt.

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Don't be shocked if either Microsoft or Sony pivot from these "limited time offers" for the holidays to a permanent price drop for the consoles going in to next year. In 2014, the Xbox One dropped to $349 as a holiday promotion from November 2 through January 3. Two weeks after that offer expired, the company decided to stick with the $349 price for the longer term (Sony didn't drop the PS4 to $350 until October.)

The same kind of thing could definitely happen on either or both sides this year. Microsoft says its Black Friday promotion led to record-breaking sales over the Thanksgiving weekend, up 22 percent from the year before. That's important for a system still struggling to keep up with the PlayStation 4 in the worldwide sales race. In a competitive battle for console war supremacy, it looks like consumers are coming out ahead.

Here are Microsoft's official Xbox One packages as listed just before Black Friday, and their current prices:

Sale price: $299 (Standard price: $349)

  • Xbox One "Gears of War: Ultimate Edition" Bundle
  • Xbox One "The Lego Movie Videogame" Bundle

Sale price: $349 (Standard price: $399)

  • Xbox One 1TB Holiday Bundle
  • Xbox One “Rise of the Tomb Raider” Bundle
  • Xbox One with Kinect Bundle
  • Xbox One “Fallout 4” Bundle
  • Xbox One Limited Edition “Forza Motorsport 6” Console (Nearly sold out)
  • Xbox One “Madden NFL 16” Bundle (Nearly sold out)
  • Xbox One “FIFA 16” 1TB Bundle (Nearly sold out)

Sale price: $449 (Standard price: $499)

  • Xbox One Limited Edition “Halo 5: Guardians” Bundle
  • Xbox One Elite Bundle
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Kyle Orland Senior Gaming Editor
Kyle Orland has been the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica since 2012, writing primarily about the business, tech, and culture behind video games. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He once wrote a whole book about Minesweeper.
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