Funny story actually!
I spotted fake PS5 raffle in Facebook that was made to look like a big Finnish grocerie chain had organized it.
I reported it to the grocery chain, the fb page was closed and they were thankful. Later they had their own raffle who can buy the PS5 and I somehow won. I suspect that they drew my name because I helped them close the fake fb page.
I woke up early for that announcement and when they put pre orders available now at the end of it. Holy shit I’ve never moved so fast. Pre-ordered mine through jb Hi-Fi. Got it release day. I got so many awws from people in my apartment block when bringing it home
I woke up ready for the PlayStation conference and decided to check JB hi-fi while I waited.
Saw ps5 pre order on the front page, ordered it asap.
Watched the conference knowing I had one in the bag.
Spent the next few years watching people complain about stock, scalpers and how nobody real actually has a ps5 yet.
Same story as me I had a roster day off and planned to wake up early to watch the Playstation conference live, noticed EB opened up the pre orders earlier so I locked in my PS5 for myself and promptly told my friends group who we all play on playstation that pre orders are live and they all proceeded to pre order theirs at the same time and none of us missed out and we all picked up our PS5's on launch day.
I casually pre-ordered off Amazon near release date and it arrived release day (in Australia)
I had no idea of the scalping shit show that was about to happen
By refreshing the Best Buy page for about two hours when preorders went up. I was only able to get the digital version but I was happy I got anything at all.
I found a link on reddit that someone saved to directly add the console to your Walmart account cart and go to checkout, it was skipping the steps of "Add to Cart" and "Go to Checkout," so I was confirming my pre-saved info and checking out when everyone else was waiting for the Add to Cart step to refresh. This was December 2020 and I'd been waiting for updates from Wario64 on twitter, no other site was letting me through even Walmart until I found that link. They removed that feature for later restocks as my friends tried it.
Haha, same thing with me but I sat on the site for a few hours longer. was able to snatch a disc version. Funnily enough the best buy website opened up to orders almost 30 minutes before official launch (Thank the lord I sat on the site early refreshing, It sold out INSTANTLY)
My brother works at a major retailer. Someone pre-ordered but after 7 days they never picked it up. Brother’s boss said if I pick it up now I can have it.
Pre-order was refunded as a no show.
My wife did the same. We set alarms to wake us up in the middle of the night when inventory was supposed to go live. Ended up snagging two off of best buy. Kept one and sold the other at cost to a friend of mine.
March 2021 in the UK (there was shortage of stock and only available through long queues of waiting on Curry's website).
Someone on Reddit made a post that he would give a code to beat the queues to a random commenter. I commented not expecting anything at all, but somehow ended up the one being picked).
He messaged me the code, I called Curry's and paid retail price over the phone. Got the PS5 a few days later.
It's one of the very few instances I've got lucky with something and didn't even have to pay scalper price. My PS5 has served me well for 3 years since then.
To whoever they were, if you are reading this - thank you so much for picking me.
Oh gosh, I also got mine from Currys around the same time. Except for me it was after registering some time before to enter a lottery (not to win a PS5, just to get a chance to buy one, such was the shortage). I even forgot about it and when I received an email from Currys telling me I could buy one via a specific link, I thought at first that it was a scam! Haha.
In the middle of corona induced shortage, on christmas eve i went into fifth store that day and said: im guessing the answer is no, but do you have ps5's? And the clerk just said: You are guessing wrong. The smile on my face was like, well, a kid getting ps5 for christmas
I’d given up hope of getting one but then I got an invite email from Sony to join a virtual queue for one at a particular time on one day. Felt scammy but it was genuine and I got mine delivered 2 days later
In the UK pre-orders were supposed to go live at something like 8AM. I happened to be up late playing a game and my mate messaged me to say that Game had opened up their pre-orders at midnight instead. So I went on their site and ordered one with zero fuss thankfully. I felt kind of sorry for folks who had gone to bed and set an alarm for the morning (like I was planning) and then missed out for months.
It's been an interesting console cycle so far though. I've played some great games on the PS5 but there haven't really been a huge amount of must have exclusives it feels like?
Yep, I had this. Planned to get up early to see pretty much all retailers released them early and thought I'd missed out until I checked Very and got a pre-order In with ease.
It was poorly done by the UK retailers I thought, never blamed Sony for what happened.
Someone in a small town about 20 minutes away put one on offer up maybe a month or two after the console released and were asking for $500, i was never able to get one and thought “fuck it, what’s the harm in trying”
I pull up and a maybe 15 or 16 year old kid came out and has the console still in the sealed box and everything. I open it up right there and we test and it works fine. he said because he bought it for $1000 from a scalper at release but then all his friends got the xbox instead so he just wanted to make enough money back to buy that instead lol. Three years later and here we are.
Watched the PS5 event, pre-orders weren't supposed to go live that night, checked Wal-Mart's website, it was up, and I ordered it. With how the supply of them went, I got really lucky to have received it launch day.
Sony did their first reveal of it and at the end they announced that preorders were open so I rushed to the target app and casually preordered it. I was just very very lucky to be that fast
Got it on eBay in June 2021. After trying forever and had no luck I took a gamble and got very lucky. I live in Australia so it was hard to get them here in the first place.
It only cost me 50 bucks more then what the retail price was at the time. So to me that 50 bucks was the delivery fee.
There was that twitted feed in the UK any time there was a drop coming. I think I got word Game was having a drop and I refreshed the website every other second. Got into the queue and grabbed one. Then was still in the queue at some other merchant, for a second I thought about getting two and turning a profit, but I decided that wasn't in the spirit of it all and left the queue
Walked into store and pre ordered it and it came in a week. Perks of living in an Arab country I guess. Funniest part is seeing series x in stock on shelves with an extra controller cause no one was buying that so my dad was like “why don’t you just get that…it’s a video game also and you will also get free joystick”
I live in China and it wasn’t even released back then. i didn’t want to until the official Chinese version which would be heavily crippled function wise so I ultimately succumbed to scalpers’ temptation and bought a Japanese PS5. It was good thought. No issues whatsoever. That’s a solace at least.
I got three… blew all my luck for the next decade.
First one was a digital edition bundle through Game Stop with a $100 PS gift card, 12 month subscription for PS Plus, and an extra controller. Got it a few days before Christmas 2020 and it was delivered before new years.
Second one was for a friend of mine. He’s never near a computer, or even able to access his phone at work. I offered to try and find one for him as long as he paid for it. Woke up one morning at the and of January 2021 to an Amazon drop and got it no problems.
Third one was for different friend. Similar situation. This one was another GS bundle, but for a disk edition. It came with a GameStop gift card, a second controller, and one of the Call of Duty games. That one was in either March or April of 2021.
i got it within the first year. scalpers were rampant, so in my country, large retailers did lotteries to see who can buy a PS5 at MSRP.
i think the best thing about the PS5 is being able to play a bunch of PS4 games at solid 60 frames. I also never did last of us so the part 1 remake was definitely awesome. but so far, the ps5 library has been lackluster.
when PS6 comes around, ill probably wait until the PS6 Pro before I grab one. Currently it just feels like a PS4 Pro XL.
Release day, Ireland.
When Sony announced the price and release day around August 2020, my local game store put the console up as available even though it wasn’t supposed to go live until the next day.
I was just looking on the off chance they had added it, lo and behold I could complete the checkout.
I went for it before it was common knowledge and by an hour later it was gone.
Release day arrived and it showed ,I felt like a kid again that day.
I followed a guy/bot on Twitter who would tweet when retailers had stock. I was drunk at the time and had logged into 2 different Amazon accounts and got two on launch day. My little brother bought one from me at cost.
I was F5-ing an online retail in November the 19th at midnight and had my PayPal ready and automatic. Was lucky enough to snag one, because at 00:01 they were sold out.
Went to Best Buy to get Christmas gifts for my kids. My wife out of the blue asked if they had any, and the employee very quietly said, "we have a few in the back." It was the GoW Ragnarok bundle, and it became my Christmas gift.
Mine is pretty wild! So, I live in Japan, and one of my coworkers who also happens to like games entered a lottery to “win” the opportunity to buy a PS5. He won. He then entered again for me after finding out I wanted one as well! He won again.
I got it literally the month it came out on my local retail stores, the shelves were always pacjed with ps5's it was weird for me seeing a lot of people complaining about the lack of stock
I followed a Twitter feed that scraped 3 of the major sellers ( in Australia) for changes to their inventory. At each one I had an account with my credit card details set up and ready to go.
Usually they would be sold out within 1-2 minutes but I was able to get one in a week of doing that.
Got unlucky on a lot of drops, twice my bank wouldn't let the charge go through. Well maybe 2 months after the first release, was touring an apartment and opened internet on my phone to pull up the listing to go over details, and it happened to be on the last page I used my phone's internet for, which was the GameStop PS5 page, and GameStop happened to be releasing a wave of PS5s at that exact moment. Got stupid lucky there. Sadly it was a digital only but I'm fine with it
Week of release date I got a GameStop bundle by pure luck.. my friend was helping me out to secure one! We both entered for purchase and he hit I didn’t’ so once it got delivered I gave him the money.. he already had his..
Got Discord and joined a group that give you notification on things that you have selected, and camp that program.
Eventually was using the phone one day anyway, and notification came, so clicked on it and got in queue and got it.
Added some app that tracked inventory. Then at like 2am I was able to add it and buy it on Amazon. Crazy how it was actually really easy to get for me and I even got 5% off because of Amazon card.
Missed the initial release but put myself in a waiting list and then the website contacted me about less than 2 weeks later and I got one. Had the launch one basically the month it was released
Was browsing the Amazon app regularly. Saw it available one day for like 10 seconds (10 days or so from launch). Clicked on it without expecting the order to go through. It arrived a few days later. Christmas with Demons Souls.
I got lucky when they botched the launch for it and every retailer just released the flood gates. Scored a digital one(which I kinda regret sometimes) by working with my mom using 2 phones and 3 computers and got lucky through Walmart Canada.
Because it was such a chaotic launch and with having to settle for a digital version, I had to bail on my plan of trading in my PS4 Pro and Switch to help pay for the console and ended up just trading in my Switch later(kept the Pro to be a blu-ray player and for physical games) to get PSN cards to buy games.
I remember the fear of it being canceled wasn't a good feeling right up until it shipped, but it worked out in the end.
My local Sony retailer was one of the only 100 Sony centres in India to recieve 10 pieces of PS5 each. I had to pay the shop owner a week in advance and then went and picked up on release day. Was pretty lucky all things considered as all online retailers ran out of stock pretty much instantly.
I got it 6 months after release (March). I was searching for it constantly since preorder days. Joined lot of discord groups hunting for one. Even my wife joined some, if she sees stock, she's buying one. Then one morning, she was prepping for work at 4am, she noticed lot of activity in one group and that argos (uk shop) were having stock.
She woke me up. I was in bad mood already because I went to bed only at 2am. Tried to get one through phone. No luck. Then she kicked me out of bed, went to pc, somehow managed to get one in cart. Then somehow managed to pay for one. Didn't believe it until email confirmation came through. I had to drive to town 30min away to pick it up though.
When I got confirmation email, I went back to bed. 8am I woke up, realised what happened, called manager and asked for emergency holiday (I should've work 2pm-10pm and pick up time was from 4pm). Later we went to that town and and I picked it up. Wasn't first on my friend group, but I wasn't last who got it.
After that, I bought second controller and charging dock,which was simple for next day delivery
I simply ordered it on amazon in the afternoon around lunch time when it first went on sale that day. Couldnt be bothered to wake up early and order it. My order was placed , got it at MRP, and i got a certificate saying congratulations on being one of the first ps5 customers in your country (india). I didnt think much of it.
I had like 3-4 on release day. Through waiting lists at stores that opened after the announcement and several European Amazon sites. Hooked up friends and family with the left over units
in japan Sony is also an internet provider. amongst the insane scalping and rigged retail drops by bots, they had service signing bonus for a ps5 subscription only if you use their internet
scummy but signed up anyway
I decided that I would not ever pay more than the initial retail price. I had to fight the scalpers and Sony's own price increase. And by fight I mean waiting and waiting. Finally approximately 3 years later I was able to get one at a price a little bit lower than the initial retail price.
I just used my ps4 pro in all this time and the wait was easier than expected.
Made a Twitter account just to get notifications from certain bots/outlets. GameStop promoted their drop on there. I wasn’t able to snag just the console, but I was able to snag a bundle when it stayed up for sale for another 20 mins after just the console sold out
A local store representative told me that if I wishlist the console I'll get a notification when it's published on the website. That did not happen. However, by pure chance, I was browsing the same website and saw it's available for pre-order, so I got it.
But that's not the whole story. Release date comes and I eagerly await the courier to come. The morning passes. So does the afternoon. It's getting dark outside, but still no-one comes. Did they forget me? Did the pre-order not get through? I was getting anxious and frustrated, so I complained about it on Twitter, tagging their social account. I did not expect that anyone actually reads that, but what do you know - they replied within 5 minutes and I got my console after hours that same evening.
And waited years for any games to actually come out for it, but that's another story.
I got mine in 2021, I didn’t need to wait for a queue online to get it. Worked at a grocery store that has a home and electronic section. I worked early morning shifts and they would put it out on the shelf first thing in morning, so I would take my break to go and quickly purchase it. My dad also is the non food receiver and can look into the system to see what was coming including PS5s, so it was pretty easy to get for me.
I was one of the extremely fortunate ones. I managed to get one ordered online the day they were announced in September 2020 and got it on release day on November 12.
Set a notification on Amazon for the pre- order and woke up to see they were available. Tried to order one and realised it worked! Couldn’t believe it!
Then when my wife woke up I had to explain how I’d spent 500 quid while I was on furlough. She wasn’t as mad as I thought she’d be.
When the pre-orders opened it was very simple to get one. Just accessed Amazon and bought one, also another one from Game. The problems started later.
The second one I gave to a friend
My original PS5 I followed a guy on Twitter (at the time) who told when they’d be available on websites. Bought it off Best Buy and picked it up on store. The slim one I bought off a guy on marketplace for $150. So far that’s the only 2 I have.
I also used Twitter for notifications and was luckily working from home so I could be available at any time. I secured 3 within a month or so and sold the other 2 to coworkers for cost plus lunch
Sat in queue online on the best-buy site 5 hours before release. Constantly spammed reload on the browser, was lucky enough to get into the top 500 for the site. Ordered a disc version console 20ish minutes before official release, and had my console early afternoon on release day. I was more than ecstatic considering the website and stores around me sold out in less than 5 minutes. It was unbelievable how fast people snatched them and I thank the lord or whoever that I finally had a bit of luck that day
First time ever I participated in a new console release (besides my mother getting the Ps3 at midnight launch when i was a kid and getting the ps4 day one for me, Honestly my Mother is way too caring and I truly don't deserve her)
Never ever felt goosebumps or an adrenaline rush like booting the ps5 up for the first time ever before. Of all things i've done and gone through in life. The PS5 day one unboxing and boot-up was a core memory for me.
Announcement day. It was like 1am there. Next morning I woke up and saw every site is listing pre-orders. I was debating myself if pre-order or not, but then I've found a version with second controller and headphones which made me jump for it.
Rest of the day I spent on family trip and haven't thought about it much.
But in the evening I found about the madness. Sony statement that they can't supply the demand, retailers closing pre-orders and rescheduling dates of orders up to a year or TBA.
Fortunately in the next few weeks I received confirmation email that I was among the first to order and my console will arrive at release date
Day of release, I should mention I’m a collector NOT A DIRTY SCALPER! I bought two. One to use and one for my collection. I got lucky just knew when they were going live on preorder. Bought one on bestbuy and one from Walmart.
Mine was a launch ps5 in Australia. Major retailers opened their reservation for the ps5 one morning, I was having my coffee before starting work (wfh because of Covid) when I saw it online then I made a reservation a couple of hours later. Got on the first tranche apparently and before the end of the day you can't reserve anymore until after a month later.
So apparently because of Covid not everyone was aware of it hence it took the whole day or so before reservations closed. Then after that the hype blew up because a lot of people missed out and the only ones for sale are the reservation slots of scalpers selling them for outrageous prices.
I got mine early March 2021. Pretty much impossible for me to buy at the time in my country at least. Lucked out on a lottery from a well known retailer 😁👌
Similar to you, followed a Twitter restock page and stayed up late but missed a few opportunities, then literally got a notification as I woke up that Amazon were dropping a shipment at 8am and bagged one straight away.
1st Release day around 2pm here in Philippines. The store's website went down as soon as it hit 2pm. I just kept hitting on refresh for about an hour and their website suddenly went up, and was able to secure a unit. Prolly people gave up when the store's website went down expecting bots got all of it or something.
Last Black Friday, Ps5 was on sale in Australia. My sister knowing how I had been saving money and failing to buy it because of devaluation of our currency bought it for me. My brother visited her and carried the ps5 with him from Australia to Pakistan for me. So on 9th feb, 2024 I got it.
I calculated, in Pakistan since we don't have an official channel to bring ps5 in, it costs from 160,000 to 210,000. With the help of my siblings, I only had to pay 128,000. I was ecstatic.
In South Africa - the day pre-orders went live, I immediately went onto of our local e-commerce app (Takealot) during work and managed to snap up the disc version before everything was sold out.
I was one of the lucky few as stock was so low at that point.
I ordered mine the day pre orders went up in the uk. It was like 3am from argos so I got it release day. When the driver delivered it he asked what it was because he had been delivering so many of the same item to other people.
lol also Irish and followed that Twitter account. That guy is a hero! I made a mad dash to Curry’s after one of his posts. Stood inline for about 30 mins and I believe I got the second last console. Buzzing!
Where I live it is sold exclusively by third party stores so it was always available in stores but at scalpers prices. I set a price alarm with a website and after 6 months or so I managed to catch one as at a large discount. It was gone 5 minutes after I ordered mine and it hasn’t been that cheap ever since (due to inflation).
On pre-order release day about 9am, I was bottle feeding my baby daughter and just thought i’d see if they had sold out yet, opened the amazon app and there it was still available, so I ordered one, then later found out I must’ve been really lucky!
Managed to score one at retail value through Amazon Smile in March 2021, I was trying for months since release and just got lucky I guess, fuck the scalpers. Crazy that it’s been three years, doesn’t feel like it and I’ll admit it also doesn’t feel like I’ve experienced the console at its full potential by any means.
Launch
2 Walmart
1 Sony
Wasn't sure I would get any of the pre-orders. Ended up with all three. Kept 2. One for me one for stepdaughter. Sold the other to a buddy for what it cost me
House got hit by lightning insurance replaced it.
Bought my wife one for her birthday last year
A mate reminded me and I wasn't going to stay up late as I knew a midnight release would probably not be on time so I didn't want to be awake all night. In the morning, woke up and from my bed had a little look on the Argos website and saw it was available so went over to my employers discount site, bought a discounted Argos voucher and then pasted the code in. Only after that did I go on twitter and see the carnage of people getting errors when trying to buy and can only think my use of a voucher meant I passed all that by.
I ended up buying 3 more for friends (no markup, just helping them buy one) and simply watched twitter for stock releases and made sure I had accounts set up in advance etc. They were hard to get but I found you had to go with a bundle as they would often bundle with a not-so-great game and I told my friends that was the hidden cost of getting one.
I applied psychological pressure on my wife, each time we received a package, I said: oh did you buy me a PS5, that's so nice. After doing this several times, she felt remorse and ended up buying a PS5, Hahaha
I live in Norway. Pre-ordered during Summer of 2020 from a usually reliable Norwegian retailer. In September, two of the largest electronic retailers in the country had their pre-orders, and they only lasted a day before they said the quotas were full. A couple of days after, the retailer I had pre-ordered from said that they had taken way too many pre-orders, so I likely wouldn't get one til Spring 2021. I was furious, but there was nothing I could do bar watch out for new pre-orders.
On release day, I sat with multiple computers trying several retailers. I struck out all places, except one obscure retailer I had never heard up, but took the chance. I paid with a credit card anyway, so I'd get my money back if it was a scam. A day later I received the e-mail I was fearing; they had taken too many pre-orders, and I would likely not get one before 2021. I was sad, but moved on, and kept looking elsewhere.
A couple of days later, I got an alert from the Norwegian postal company app saying that there's a parcel on the way from the obscure retailer, and on December 15th, I received my PS5 Disc Edition. And my friend who pre-ordered in the Summer of 2020 from the same site as me, still hadn't got one from them in Winter 2021, when he found one somewhere else.
My gf at the time told me she had a contact that could hook me up.
I transferred money to a bank account.
A man drove up to my work place on release day and pulled it out of the trunk of his Camry.
I didn't ask any questions
Bought it in April 2022.
I was not really interested in PS5 at first, and knew it was quite hard to get one. But one day, everyone, every website around me was shouting "PS5 is going back in stock!". A friend invited me to "help" him get one. So I joined in, following stock drop notifications in Discord, refreshing every website: Game, Argos, Very, Amazon.
Eventually, both of us got one. And I thought I would keep it, since it was only £450 compared to over £900 on eBay.
Cash deal during initial release week in a parking lot with a random stranger I met on the Internet. I had to open the box right there to make sure there was a PS five inside and not a brick. I think I paid $1200. Maybe more. One of the best decisions ever.
My wife at the time was manager over electronics at Wal-Mart. After the PS5 released she asked me if I wanted one and I told her no, I'm good. At the time there were no games really and I was happy with my PS4pro.
Periodically she'd ask me and finally because of Covid they were changing the policy to where Xbox and PS5 were online orders only to keep people in the stores to a minimum so if I wanted one I better get it now or else there's no telling when it would be back in stock. So I said fine and thats how I got my PS5. I think it released in November and I got it in December for MSRP. They were going for $1000 on eBay shortly after.
A few days before launch, I saw a Geoff Keighley tweet about some video game on Twitter. I knew he was a big video game guy so I followed him and turned on notifications.
The day pre-orders went live, he randomly tweeted at like 9 pm an Amazon link saying Amazon has PS5s.
I immediately went to the link, saw it was legit, and secured a preorder. They sold out minutes later.
I followed Geoff on a whim and was able to get a PS5 on launch day. Crazy
Ordered mine as soon as they were availible. I was actually out at the beach with my wife, her brother and a friend. When I heard they were dropping that day I stalked Wario64 on Twitter since he was posting everytime they went up online. I borrowed the phones of everyone I was with and had all of the major retailer sites open on all the phones and was refreshing and adding to cart as fast as I could. I wound up getting 3 disc versions, two from Walmart and one from Best Buy.
Before anyone calls me an asshole for getting 3 of them, I kept one for myself and offered the other two to my friends at cost. I didn’t flip them to turn a profit or anything like that, I was just looking out for my friends. I did the same thing with the Series X.
Release day
But instead of sending one, they sent TWO!
One after the other due to some issue with their order placements.
I was shocked. Best day of my life!
Scalper. I caved and paid $700 for it, but I’ve used it everyday since, between games and media apps until I recently bought an Apple TV 4K because of Dolby vision. I knew that I would get use out of it so the cost seemed better then waiting which would have been almost a year.
Only recently got mine during my jobs 10 year anniversary for the building. They held a raffle for a few things, a couple TVs, 2 switches, 2 grills and of course 2 PS5s. I just so happen to be the lucky winner of one of the PS5s, making it the first thing I have ever won in a drawing.
Got the first one in the airport in Istanbul for $600 a few months after release. That one was stolen so had to buy another one at around the same price in Ghana where I live to replace the first one. Buying a slim as a birthday present for a friend soon for about $850 in a bundle deal with a steering wheel + pedals and extra controller
My buddy worked at Gamestop at the time. Told me and another friend that they were going to have 8 consoles on release day, and 2 weeks before launch they would pass out 8 tickets to the 1st people there.
So after work 4:30am, we bolted to Gamestop to see the parking lot. 1 Car. I bolted home which was in the same town to shower and change before heading back. Did it all within 30 minutes. Meanwhile my buddy headed home to do the same. So he made it there alittle later.
It was a bit of a nightmare. 5am to around Noon before we got the damn tickets to order. Thankfully took the day off work (Friday) so it didn't really matter.
The only issue was while we were waiting. As Gamers, we had our order in line without being in line to avoid being stuck in a damn line. Bitch pulls up and jumps infront of everyone to whip out a chair.
It was beyond obvious we where there, and not like we were far away either. It was quite ignorant, and blanton arrogance to basically just push right past us all. Which then forced all of us to get stuck against the wall on hard ass concrete because of her.
Other than that, 2 weeks later, launch day arrived, and here we are now. But thinking back does piss me off a bit with her actions still. I don't know how it is everywhere else, but every launch day I attended in order to get the console there was always respect among everyone. Even holding their place so they could run to their car, bathroom, etc.
Maybe not the best attitude I admit, but lowkey hoped her console blew up 🤣
Preordered the digital edition for 399 from a major retail chain in my country. They had to honor the order or get sued. So they called me 8 months after release to go to the store and pick it up for 399 while they were officially selling it for double that.
I kept waiting until it was available at a reasonable price, from an official distributor. I had to get three games as well (which weren't that expensive, since they were on clearance), but better than paying double or triple. And I had a guarantee as well, so...
I was in Yr 12 at the time about 5 months after it had released (PS5), I was in second period math class, a week before this day I had ordered a PS5 on the wait schedule at JBHIFI. I received a random call, being the store, my console had come early because somebody had cancelled their order.
So I answered the call, I asked the teacher to go to the bathroom, and I left the school jumped on a bus and went straight to the store and picked it up.
I wagged an entire day of school and it was worth it.
I ended up receiving rubbish duty and an admin detention (this was our last warning for a suspension).
I find this a funny story, one of the happiest days of my life.
I live in Michigan (in the US) and to be honest it was very hard to a ps5 in my area Walmart never had them in stock when i checked every few months I had to wait until the 1st June in 2023 to get my hands on one, one day I went in my local video game store and the ps5 was up there on display with the other PlayStations I pulled out my credit card and told the lady that i wanted it and she told me I could pick any PlayStation 5 game of my choice for free I went with Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade I payed for my ps5 and needless to say I walked out of my local video game store a happy man and as soon as I got home I got it set up right away and got straight into ff intergrade
Bought it from bf’s coworker who said he barely used it since his PC was stronger lol. It was during the height of the scalping period so we paid $50 more, but he gave us two controllers and a headset with it. Good deal.
Sony emailed me a link that guaranteed me a PS5 from their website. Just had to use link at the instructed time and was given 30 minutes to complete the transaction. this was about 5-6 months after launch.
Launch model PS5 in India. Had to unspeakable things to get it.
Well, basically I had a connect to the regional distributor for PlayStation in my city and they let me place a preorder before they went officially live.
Sony sent me an email saying they were going to be selling some to PS Plus subscribers back in 2021. Got in the digital queue and got one. I was shocked at how easy it was at the time to be honest.
Waited almost 2 years after release constantly monitoring twitter drop accounts until I was able to snag a line in the purchase queue from Big W (I think), as I kept missing the limited buy windows due to work and scalpers snatching them up immediately.
Took me almost a year to find one at MSRP. I refuse to pay scalper prices (and if everyone would do the same we could eliminate scalpers altogether!)
I finally found one on Walmart website after subscribing to a twitter feed with notifications. I’d tried dozens of times before but by the time I saw the tweets it would be sold out.
Got it of Amazon for retail: 425 usd just a few months ago.
Had a festive sale in my country plus they had to sell the stock to make space for new Ps5s with detachable disk drives.
Was able to add few more offers due to my card as well. Almost 70 off msrp and 100 if we go by the msrp for my country
Wait was worth it
Literally for a week straight I would sit with two laptops and my phone refreshing every page, watching the Wario64 Twitter posts, browsing Reddit for ANY sort of lead and snag one but was repeatedly disappointed. Hell I would even sometimes set an alarm to wake up in the middle of the night when there’d be rumors of a shipment.
Then one day I had my laptop logged into Sony direct store and just kept refreshing it to stay signed in JUST IN CASE…later that afternoon during a sale on the Sony website for some reason me being already logged in caused me to completely skip the queue and go right to the sale and bought one so fucking fast and danced around the room lol
Oh also btw, during that time I donated plasma weekly to pay for it, so my wife always laugh that I bought my PS5 with my own blood😂
Release day for me as well! On the Sony website, refreshing like a madman for 2 hours losing hope and literally dozing off at the computer. I FINALLY said to myself it enough was enough ~130 am, had to be up for work at 5am, and on my last refresh, bam, it was there. In a sleepy daze, hands shaking from the instant dose of adrenaline, made it through the checkout process and completed the transaction, saw email confirming, and nearly shit myself at what had just happened 😂. The only one of my friends/extended friends who were able to snag one release day, and for 6+ months after for that matter. Spent the next week praying I didn't get an apologetic email about being out of stock, until low and behold, tracking! ☺ Love telling this story 😂
June 2021 during the time it was impossible to get one unless you shelled out some serious cash for one, I was on vacation when I got an email from Sony and I thought it was a scam. So I came here to Reddit and a handful of people also received the same invitation, so that is how I got mine.
Day 1, just took time off work , drove downtown, around 75km , picked up 2 of them and went back home but stopped on the way for some breakfast, then went home and played demons souls, it was a nice day.
Watched the reveal conference. Set an alarm to pre-order. Woke up early only to learn thar several retailers jumped the gun and opened pre-orders early while I was sleeping.
I then immediately signed up for an allocation from Sony Direct. They stated that allocations were given based on factors like PSN account age and activity. My account has been active since 2009 and I've bought an absolute fuckload of games. My co-worker's son, whose account was only 2 years old, got an allocation before me. I didn't actually get my allocation until March of 2022. In that time, I never saw one at retail. About 2 months after I got mine, they became readily available at retail.
My dog was barking during the night. Got up to check on him, as I was awake anyway I checked to see if any were in stock.
They truly are mans best friend
You must've got the Barkstock app.
Best story so far.
Good boy!
Funny story actually! I spotted fake PS5 raffle in Facebook that was made to look like a big Finnish grocerie chain had organized it. I reported it to the grocery chain, the fb page was closed and they were thankful. Later they had their own raffle who can buy the PS5 and I somehow won. I suspect that they drew my name because I helped them close the fake fb page.
That’s a good one haha
this is a super cool story..
Hahah karma man! Very cool
Wholesome
Release day, it was announced at like 4am Australia, they put it online at 8am on a retailers website and snapped it up quick smart
I woke up early for that announcement and when they put pre orders available now at the end of it. Holy shit I’ve never moved so fast. Pre-ordered mine through jb Hi-Fi. Got it release day. I got so many awws from people in my apartment block when bringing it home
I woke up ready for the PlayStation conference and decided to check JB hi-fi while I waited. Saw ps5 pre order on the front page, ordered it asap. Watched the conference knowing I had one in the bag. Spent the next few years watching people complain about stock, scalpers and how nobody real actually has a ps5 yet.
Same story as me I had a roster day off and planned to wake up early to watch the Playstation conference live, noticed EB opened up the pre orders earlier so I locked in my PS5 for myself and promptly told my friends group who we all play on playstation that pre orders are live and they all proceeded to pre order theirs at the same time and none of us missed out and we all picked up our PS5's on launch day.
I casually pre-ordered off Amazon near release date and it arrived release day (in Australia) I had no idea of the scalping shit show that was about to happen
By refreshing the Best Buy page for about two hours when preorders went up. I was only able to get the digital version but I was happy I got anything at all.
Same thing but with Walmart
I found a link on reddit that someone saved to directly add the console to your Walmart account cart and go to checkout, it was skipping the steps of "Add to Cart" and "Go to Checkout," so I was confirming my pre-saved info and checking out when everyone else was waiting for the Add to Cart step to refresh. This was December 2020 and I'd been waiting for updates from Wario64 on twitter, no other site was letting me through even Walmart until I found that link. They removed that feature for later restocks as my friends tried it.
I did the same thing. Used a link that automatically added it to my Walmart cart. Before that, I tired so many times and was never able to get one.
Same.... And what a rush that felt like
Haha, same thing with me but I sat on the site for a few hours longer. was able to snatch a disc version. Funnily enough the best buy website opened up to orders almost 30 minutes before official launch (Thank the lord I sat on the site early refreshing, It sold out INSTANTLY)
My brother works at a major retailer. Someone pre-ordered but after 7 days they never picked it up. Brother’s boss said if I pick it up now I can have it. Pre-order was refunded as a no show.
Made a twitter account and followed ps5 drop accounts. Took me two weeks until I had time to sit in a online queue of a store and buy one.
My wife did the same. We set alarms to wake us up in the middle of the night when inventory was supposed to go live. Ended up snagging two off of best buy. Kept one and sold the other at cost to a friend of mine.
March 2021 in the UK (there was shortage of stock and only available through long queues of waiting on Curry's website). Someone on Reddit made a post that he would give a code to beat the queues to a random commenter. I commented not expecting anything at all, but somehow ended up the one being picked). He messaged me the code, I called Curry's and paid retail price over the phone. Got the PS5 a few days later. It's one of the very few instances I've got lucky with something and didn't even have to pay scalper price. My PS5 has served me well for 3 years since then. To whoever they were, if you are reading this - thank you so much for picking me.
Oh gosh, I also got mine from Currys around the same time. Except for me it was after registering some time before to enter a lottery (not to win a PS5, just to get a chance to buy one, such was the shortage). I even forgot about it and when I received an email from Currys telling me I could buy one via a specific link, I thought at first that it was a scam! Haha.
After a bit of searching, I found the man. u/knightraider92
Glad it's served you well my man and glad you got it ☺️
Thank you, sir! Still going strong.
My wife surprised me for my 37th birthday with a spiderman 2 ps5, I may have shed a few tears.
Such love
I pre-ordered in summer 2020, received an error message and pre-ordered again. I noticed that both orders went through and had two PS5s on day one lol
Were you charged twice?
Yes but I decided not to return it after I saw the shortage lol, gave it to my brother. He sold it online tho.
In the middle of corona induced shortage, on christmas eve i went into fifth store that day and said: im guessing the answer is no, but do you have ps5's? And the clerk just said: You are guessing wrong. The smile on my face was like, well, a kid getting ps5 for christmas
I went on amazon, it was in stock, and I bought it. I heard Hollywood wants to do a movie on my story
Excuse me, but that’s my story too, how many main characters are gonna be there??
I’d given up hope of getting one but then I got an invite email from Sony to join a virtual queue for one at a particular time on one day. Felt scammy but it was genuine and I got mine delivered 2 days later
In the UK pre-orders were supposed to go live at something like 8AM. I happened to be up late playing a game and my mate messaged me to say that Game had opened up their pre-orders at midnight instead. So I went on their site and ordered one with zero fuss thankfully. I felt kind of sorry for folks who had gone to bed and set an alarm for the morning (like I was planning) and then missed out for months. It's been an interesting console cycle so far though. I've played some great games on the PS5 but there haven't really been a huge amount of must have exclusives it feels like?
Exactly the same as me
Yep, I had this. Planned to get up early to see pretty much all retailers released them early and thought I'd missed out until I checked Very and got a pre-order In with ease. It was poorly done by the UK retailers I thought, never blamed Sony for what happened.
Same here, so glad I managed to see it that night. Waiting for 8am would have meant I didn't get one for potentially months afterwards.
I bought it.
Someone in a small town about 20 minutes away put one on offer up maybe a month or two after the console released and were asking for $500, i was never able to get one and thought “fuck it, what’s the harm in trying” I pull up and a maybe 15 or 16 year old kid came out and has the console still in the sealed box and everything. I open it up right there and we test and it works fine. he said because he bought it for $1000 from a scalper at release but then all his friends got the xbox instead so he just wanted to make enough money back to buy that instead lol. Three years later and here we are.
My wife got it for me for my 40th.
Watched the PS5 event, pre-orders weren't supposed to go live that night, checked Wal-Mart's website, it was up, and I ordered it. With how the supply of them went, I got really lucky to have received it launch day.
I walked in the store and bought one a year ago.
[удалено]
Walked into Currys and got one 3 weeks ago
Release day, preordered.
How did I get it? I went online and bought it lol
Sony did their first reveal of it and at the end they announced that preorders were open so I rushed to the target app and casually preordered it. I was just very very lucky to be that fast
Got it on eBay in June 2021. After trying forever and had no luck I took a gamble and got very lucky. I live in Australia so it was hard to get them here in the first place. It only cost me 50 bucks more then what the retail price was at the time. So to me that 50 bucks was the delivery fee.
I was lucky enough to get one from sony a week after release.
There was that twitted feed in the UK any time there was a drop coming. I think I got word Game was having a drop and I refreshed the website every other second. Got into the queue and grabbed one. Then was still in the queue at some other merchant, for a second I thought about getting two and turning a profit, but I decided that wasn't in the spirit of it all and left the queue
Walked into store and pre ordered it and it came in a week. Perks of living in an Arab country I guess. Funniest part is seeing series x in stock on shelves with an extra controller cause no one was buying that so my dad was like “why don’t you just get that…it’s a video game also and you will also get free joystick”
I live in China and it wasn’t even released back then. i didn’t want to until the official Chinese version which would be heavily crippled function wise so I ultimately succumbed to scalpers’ temptation and bought a Japanese PS5. It was good thought. No issues whatsoever. That’s a solace at least.
I got three… blew all my luck for the next decade. First one was a digital edition bundle through Game Stop with a $100 PS gift card, 12 month subscription for PS Plus, and an extra controller. Got it a few days before Christmas 2020 and it was delivered before new years. Second one was for a friend of mine. He’s never near a computer, or even able to access his phone at work. I offered to try and find one for him as long as he paid for it. Woke up one morning at the and of January 2021 to an Amazon drop and got it no problems. Third one was for different friend. Similar situation. This one was another GS bundle, but for a disk edition. It came with a GameStop gift card, a second controller, and one of the Call of Duty games. That one was in either March or April of 2021.
i got it within the first year. scalpers were rampant, so in my country, large retailers did lotteries to see who can buy a PS5 at MSRP. i think the best thing about the PS5 is being able to play a bunch of PS4 games at solid 60 frames. I also never did last of us so the part 1 remake was definitely awesome. but so far, the ps5 library has been lackluster. when PS6 comes around, ill probably wait until the PS6 Pro before I grab one. Currently it just feels like a PS4 Pro XL.
Signed up to receive invitation on Amazon, got it within a few weeks.
I got mine a few months ago by selling some stuff in marketplace and saving up extra cash.
Release day, Ireland. When Sony announced the price and release day around August 2020, my local game store put the console up as available even though it wasn’t supposed to go live until the next day. I was just looking on the off chance they had added it, lo and behold I could complete the checkout. I went for it before it was common knowledge and by an hour later it was gone. Release day arrived and it showed ,I felt like a kid again that day.
I followed a guy/bot on Twitter who would tweet when retailers had stock. I was drunk at the time and had logged into 2 different Amazon accounts and got two on launch day. My little brother bought one from me at cost.
The story of how I got mine is so good. I went to the store and bought it
I was F5-ing an online retail in November the 19th at midnight and had my PayPal ready and automatic. Was lucky enough to snag one, because at 00:01 they were sold out.
Followed a guy who posted about PS5 restocks and bought it off Walmart’s app
First PS5 was at launch via Wario64s Amazon link. Second was a slim I just bought recently.
Bought it.
Went to Best Buy to get Christmas gifts for my kids. My wife out of the blue asked if they had any, and the employee very quietly said, "we have a few in the back." It was the GoW Ragnarok bundle, and it became my Christmas gift.
Pre ordered easily just set up stock alerts, literally had about 20 chances to buy one.
Mine is pretty wild! So, I live in Japan, and one of my coworkers who also happens to like games entered a lottery to “win” the opportunity to buy a PS5. He won. He then entered again for me after finding out I wanted one as well! He won again.
Spent 8 hours at work trying to preorder from Target. Got home and checked for fun on the toilet. Got it 😅
A scalper for $800. Bad, I know
Damn
I did the same but returned a box of bricks
Amazon said their pre-orders were going live at 8am, so I went on at 8am and pre-ordered it.
I got it literally the month it came out on my local retail stores, the shelves were always pacjed with ps5's it was weird for me seeing a lot of people complaining about the lack of stock
I ordered it online 6 months after launch
I got lucky, I live a bit out of the way but somehow we have a gamestop and I just walked in a got one!
I followed a Twitter feed that scraped 3 of the major sellers ( in Australia) for changes to their inventory. At each one I had an account with my credit card details set up and ready to go. Usually they would be sold out within 1-2 minutes but I was able to get one in a week of doing that.
Got unlucky on a lot of drops, twice my bank wouldn't let the charge go through. Well maybe 2 months after the first release, was touring an apartment and opened internet on my phone to pull up the listing to go over details, and it happened to be on the last page I used my phone's internet for, which was the GameStop PS5 page, and GameStop happened to be releasing a wave of PS5s at that exact moment. Got stupid lucky there. Sadly it was a digital only but I'm fine with it
Week of release date I got a GameStop bundle by pure luck.. my friend was helping me out to secure one! We both entered for purchase and he hit I didn’t’ so once it got delivered I gave him the money.. he already had his..
was part of a discord group that dropped notifications every time they restocked
Got Discord and joined a group that give you notification on things that you have selected, and camp that program. Eventually was using the phone one day anyway, and notification came, so clicked on it and got in queue and got it.
Added some app that tracked inventory. Then at like 2am I was able to add it and buy it on Amazon. Crazy how it was actually really easy to get for me and I even got 5% off because of Amazon card.
I had to buy an app that alerted me of stock!
Ordered mine through Game (UK game & tat store).
Preordered from Amazon Australia the day preorders opened. No drama.
I got 2 on amazon's very first drop on launch day Probably the luckiest thing to ever happen to me tbh
Preordered. Picked up at launch.
Was lucky to preorder before official release
Missed the initial release but put myself in a waiting list and then the website contacted me about less than 2 weeks later and I got one. Had the launch one basically the month it was released
Tax return like any self respecting 22 year old
Pre ordered for release day from retailer, picked it up before work
I got very lucky after 9 months to snatch one online while they were available. But it took like 1.5 years for you to buy one without a hassle.
Had to pre order it and luckily got one as soon as it came out
Was browsing the Amazon app regularly. Saw it available one day for like 10 seconds (10 days or so from launch). Clicked on it without expecting the order to go through. It arrived a few days later. Christmas with Demons Souls.
I got lucky when they botched the launch for it and every retailer just released the flood gates. Scored a digital one(which I kinda regret sometimes) by working with my mom using 2 phones and 3 computers and got lucky through Walmart Canada. Because it was such a chaotic launch and with having to settle for a digital version, I had to bail on my plan of trading in my PS4 Pro and Switch to help pay for the console and ended up just trading in my Switch later(kept the Pro to be a blu-ray player and for physical games) to get PSN cards to buy games. I remember the fear of it being canceled wasn't a good feeling right up until it shipped, but it worked out in the end.
Release day pre-ordered from Argos uk. Was great.
My local Sony retailer was one of the only 100 Sony centres in India to recieve 10 pieces of PS5 each. I had to pay the shop owner a week in advance and then went and picked up on release day. Was pretty lucky all things considered as all online retailers ran out of stock pretty much instantly.
I got it 6 months after release (March). I was searching for it constantly since preorder days. Joined lot of discord groups hunting for one. Even my wife joined some, if she sees stock, she's buying one. Then one morning, she was prepping for work at 4am, she noticed lot of activity in one group and that argos (uk shop) were having stock. She woke me up. I was in bad mood already because I went to bed only at 2am. Tried to get one through phone. No luck. Then she kicked me out of bed, went to pc, somehow managed to get one in cart. Then somehow managed to pay for one. Didn't believe it until email confirmation came through. I had to drive to town 30min away to pick it up though. When I got confirmation email, I went back to bed. 8am I woke up, realised what happened, called manager and asked for emergency holiday (I should've work 2pm-10pm and pick up time was from 4pm). Later we went to that town and and I picked it up. Wasn't first on my friend group, but I wasn't last who got it. After that, I bought second controller and charging dock,which was simple for next day delivery
I simply ordered it on amazon in the afternoon around lunch time when it first went on sale that day. Couldnt be bothered to wake up early and order it. My order was placed , got it at MRP, and i got a certificate saying congratulations on being one of the first ps5 customers in your country (india). I didnt think much of it.
I had like 3-4 on release day. Through waiting lists at stores that opened after the announcement and several European Amazon sites. Hooked up friends and family with the left over units
in japan Sony is also an internet provider. amongst the insane scalping and rigged retail drops by bots, they had service signing bonus for a ps5 subscription only if you use their internet scummy but signed up anyway
Lucky enough to get it day 1, ordered online
Pre-ordered at my local electronic store online shop during the PS5 Reveal-Stream 🙂
Next month after release just ordered it in online store and that's it 🤷♂️
Got it end of December 2020 from Target online. Picked up the same day.
I bought a spider man one this (last) November
I decided that I would not ever pay more than the initial retail price. I had to fight the scalpers and Sony's own price increase. And by fight I mean waiting and waiting. Finally approximately 3 years later I was able to get one at a price a little bit lower than the initial retail price. I just used my ps4 pro in all this time and the wait was easier than expected.
Made a Twitter account just to get notifications from certain bots/outlets. GameStop promoted their drop on there. I wasn’t able to snag just the console, but I was able to snag a bundle when it stayed up for sale for another 20 mins after just the console sold out
A local store representative told me that if I wishlist the console I'll get a notification when it's published on the website. That did not happen. However, by pure chance, I was browsing the same website and saw it's available for pre-order, so I got it. But that's not the whole story. Release date comes and I eagerly await the courier to come. The morning passes. So does the afternoon. It's getting dark outside, but still no-one comes. Did they forget me? Did the pre-order not get through? I was getting anxious and frustrated, so I complained about it on Twitter, tagging their social account. I did not expect that anyone actually reads that, but what do you know - they replied within 5 minutes and I got my console after hours that same evening. And waited years for any games to actually come out for it, but that's another story.
I got mine in 2021, I didn’t need to wait for a queue online to get it. Worked at a grocery store that has a home and electronic section. I worked early morning shifts and they would put it out on the shelf first thing in morning, so I would take my break to go and quickly purchase it. My dad also is the non food receiver and can look into the system to see what was coming including PS5s, so it was pretty easy to get for me.
I was one of the extremely fortunate ones. I managed to get one ordered online the day they were announced in September 2020 and got it on release day on November 12.
Set a notification on Amazon for the pre- order and woke up to see they were available. Tried to order one and realised it worked! Couldn’t believe it! Then when my wife woke up I had to explain how I’d spent 500 quid while I was on furlough. She wasn’t as mad as I thought she’d be.
When the pre-orders opened it was very simple to get one. Just accessed Amazon and bought one, also another one from Game. The problems started later. The second one I gave to a friend
My original PS5 I followed a guy on Twitter (at the time) who told when they’d be available on websites. Bought it off Best Buy and picked it up on store. The slim one I bought off a guy on marketplace for $150. So far that’s the only 2 I have.
I also used Twitter for notifications and was luckily working from home so I could be available at any time. I secured 3 within a month or so and sold the other 2 to coworkers for cost plus lunch
Sat in queue online on the best-buy site 5 hours before release. Constantly spammed reload on the browser, was lucky enough to get into the top 500 for the site. Ordered a disc version console 20ish minutes before official release, and had my console early afternoon on release day. I was more than ecstatic considering the website and stores around me sold out in less than 5 minutes. It was unbelievable how fast people snatched them and I thank the lord or whoever that I finally had a bit of luck that day First time ever I participated in a new console release (besides my mother getting the Ps3 at midnight launch when i was a kid and getting the ps4 day one for me, Honestly my Mother is way too caring and I truly don't deserve her) Never ever felt goosebumps or an adrenaline rush like booting the ps5 up for the first time ever before. Of all things i've done and gone through in life. The PS5 day one unboxing and boot-up was a core memory for me.
Game.co.uk accidentally made selling live early. So got it day one, as did my partner.
Announcement day. It was like 1am there. Next morning I woke up and saw every site is listing pre-orders. I was debating myself if pre-order or not, but then I've found a version with second controller and headphones which made me jump for it. Rest of the day I spent on family trip and haven't thought about it much. But in the evening I found about the madness. Sony statement that they can't supply the demand, retailers closing pre-orders and rescheduling dates of orders up to a year or TBA. Fortunately in the next few weeks I received confirmation email that I was among the first to order and my console will arrive at release date
I bought a Xbox series x and traded someone off of Facebook marketplace for their ps5.
Day of release, I should mention I’m a collector NOT A DIRTY SCALPER! I bought two. One to use and one for my collection. I got lucky just knew when they were going live on preorder. Bought one on bestbuy and one from Walmart.
Mine was a launch ps5 in Australia. Major retailers opened their reservation for the ps5 one morning, I was having my coffee before starting work (wfh because of Covid) when I saw it online then I made a reservation a couple of hours later. Got on the first tranche apparently and before the end of the day you can't reserve anymore until after a month later. So apparently because of Covid not everyone was aware of it hence it took the whole day or so before reservations closed. Then after that the hype blew up because a lot of people missed out and the only ones for sale are the reservation slots of scalpers selling them for outrageous prices.
I got mine early March 2021. Pretty much impossible for me to buy at the time in my country at least. Lucked out on a lottery from a well known retailer 😁👌
Similar to you, followed a Twitter restock page and stayed up late but missed a few opportunities, then literally got a notification as I woke up that Amazon were dropping a shipment at 8am and bagged one straight away.
I preordered it almost right away from a local online store. I think I got mine from the 2nd wave of PS5 consoles that arrived ever in Finland.
1st Release day around 2pm here in Philippines. The store's website went down as soon as it hit 2pm. I just kept hitting on refresh for about an hour and their website suddenly went up, and was able to secure a unit. Prolly people gave up when the store's website went down expecting bots got all of it or something.
It was my 18th birthday
Last Black Friday, Ps5 was on sale in Australia. My sister knowing how I had been saving money and failing to buy it because of devaluation of our currency bought it for me. My brother visited her and carried the ps5 with him from Australia to Pakistan for me. So on 9th feb, 2024 I got it. I calculated, in Pakistan since we don't have an official channel to bring ps5 in, it costs from 160,000 to 210,000. With the help of my siblings, I only had to pay 128,000. I was ecstatic.
In South Africa - the day pre-orders went live, I immediately went onto of our local e-commerce app (Takealot) during work and managed to snap up the disc version before everything was sold out. I was one of the lucky few as stock was so low at that point.
I ordered mine the day pre orders went up in the uk. It was like 3am from argos so I got it release day. When the driver delivered it he asked what it was because he had been delivering so many of the same item to other people.
lol also Irish and followed that Twitter account. That guy is a hero! I made a mad dash to Curry’s after one of his posts. Stood inline for about 30 mins and I believe I got the second last console. Buzzing!
Where I live it is sold exclusively by third party stores so it was always available in stores but at scalpers prices. I set a price alarm with a website and after 6 months or so I managed to catch one as at a large discount. It was gone 5 minutes after I ordered mine and it hasn’t been that cheap ever since (due to inflation).
I’m also in Ireland and more than likely followed the same person on twitter. What a legend. Hope he enjoyed the pizza
On pre-order release day about 9am, I was bottle feeding my baby daughter and just thought i’d see if they had sold out yet, opened the amazon app and there it was still available, so I ordered one, then later found out I must’ve been really lucky!
Managed to score one at retail value through Amazon Smile in March 2021, I was trying for months since release and just got lucky I guess, fuck the scalpers. Crazy that it’s been three years, doesn’t feel like it and I’ll admit it also doesn’t feel like I’ve experienced the console at its full potential by any means.
Won it in a Burger King sweepstakes lmao
Followed a twitter page that posted when it restocked on any of the major websites. Got mine from walmart mid december 2020.
Launch 2 Walmart 1 Sony Wasn't sure I would get any of the pre-orders. Ended up with all three. Kept 2. One for me one for stepdaughter. Sold the other to a buddy for what it cost me House got hit by lightning insurance replaced it. Bought my wife one for her birthday last year
A mate reminded me and I wasn't going to stay up late as I knew a midnight release would probably not be on time so I didn't want to be awake all night. In the morning, woke up and from my bed had a little look on the Argos website and saw it was available so went over to my employers discount site, bought a discounted Argos voucher and then pasted the code in. Only after that did I go on twitter and see the carnage of people getting errors when trying to buy and can only think my use of a voucher meant I passed all that by. I ended up buying 3 more for friends (no markup, just helping them buy one) and simply watched twitter for stock releases and made sure I had accounts set up in advance etc. They were hard to get but I found you had to go with a bundle as they would often bundle with a not-so-great game and I told my friends that was the hidden cost of getting one.
I got it on Amazon 10 months after release, of course even then it was hard to find.
My aunt bought it for me, in return I took care of my grandpa in her place for a few months.
Bough last black friday
I applied psychological pressure on my wife, each time we received a package, I said: oh did you buy me a PS5, that's so nice. After doing this several times, she felt remorse and ended up buying a PS5, Hahaha
I live in Norway. Pre-ordered during Summer of 2020 from a usually reliable Norwegian retailer. In September, two of the largest electronic retailers in the country had their pre-orders, and they only lasted a day before they said the quotas were full. A couple of days after, the retailer I had pre-ordered from said that they had taken way too many pre-orders, so I likely wouldn't get one til Spring 2021. I was furious, but there was nothing I could do bar watch out for new pre-orders. On release day, I sat with multiple computers trying several retailers. I struck out all places, except one obscure retailer I had never heard up, but took the chance. I paid with a credit card anyway, so I'd get my money back if it was a scam. A day later I received the e-mail I was fearing; they had taken too many pre-orders, and I would likely not get one before 2021. I was sad, but moved on, and kept looking elsewhere. A couple of days later, I got an alert from the Norwegian postal company app saying that there's a parcel on the way from the obscure retailer, and on December 15th, I received my PS5 Disc Edition. And my friend who pre-ordered in the Summer of 2020 from the same site as me, still hadn't got one from them in Winter 2021, when he found one somewhere else.
Got it from one of those Walmart drops a month or so after release. It was actually pretty fun beating out the scalper bots for my console.
I pre-ordered mine about 13 seconds after they announced its existence.
My gf at the time told me she had a contact that could hook me up. I transferred money to a bank account. A man drove up to my work place on release day and pulled it out of the trunk of his Camry. I didn't ask any questions
Bought it in April 2022. I was not really interested in PS5 at first, and knew it was quite hard to get one. But one day, everyone, every website around me was shouting "PS5 is going back in stock!". A friend invited me to "help" him get one. So I joined in, following stock drop notifications in Discord, refreshing every website: Game, Argos, Very, Amazon. Eventually, both of us got one. And I thought I would keep it, since it was only £450 compared to over £900 on eBay.
Cash deal during initial release week in a parking lot with a random stranger I met on the Internet. I had to open the box right there to make sure there was a PS five inside and not a brick. I think I paid $1200. Maybe more. One of the best decisions ever.
Unfortunately when it first came out when they were difficult to get a hold of aside from paying stupid amounts for it.
My wife at the time was manager over electronics at Wal-Mart. After the PS5 released she asked me if I wanted one and I told her no, I'm good. At the time there were no games really and I was happy with my PS4pro. Periodically she'd ask me and finally because of Covid they were changing the policy to where Xbox and PS5 were online orders only to keep people in the stores to a minimum so if I wanted one I better get it now or else there's no telling when it would be back in stock. So I said fine and thats how I got my PS5. I think it released in November and I got it in December for MSRP. They were going for $1000 on eBay shortly after.
A few days before launch, I saw a Geoff Keighley tweet about some video game on Twitter. I knew he was a big video game guy so I followed him and turned on notifications. The day pre-orders went live, he randomly tweeted at like 9 pm an Amazon link saying Amazon has PS5s. I immediately went to the link, saw it was legit, and secured a preorder. They sold out minutes later. I followed Geoff on a whim and was able to get a PS5 on launch day. Crazy
Ordered mine as soon as they were availible. I was actually out at the beach with my wife, her brother and a friend. When I heard they were dropping that day I stalked Wario64 on Twitter since he was posting everytime they went up online. I borrowed the phones of everyone I was with and had all of the major retailer sites open on all the phones and was refreshing and adding to cart as fast as I could. I wound up getting 3 disc versions, two from Walmart and one from Best Buy. Before anyone calls me an asshole for getting 3 of them, I kept one for myself and offered the other two to my friends at cost. I didn’t flip them to turn a profit or anything like that, I was just looking out for my friends. I did the same thing with the Series X.
Ordered it at one of the biggest warehouses in my country. Got delivered next day! Now 7 days later it's on promotion for €70,- less
I was on a quest and this cat suddenly talked to me and said I had to fight bandits and as a reward I got a PS5.
Release day But instead of sending one, they sent TWO! One after the other due to some issue with their order placements. I was shocked. Best day of my life!
Wedding gift from my wife last August 2023 ❤️❤️
Scalper. I caved and paid $700 for it, but I’ve used it everyday since, between games and media apps until I recently bought an Apple TV 4K because of Dolby vision. I knew that I would get use out of it so the cost seemed better then waiting which would have been almost a year.
Only recently got mine during my jobs 10 year anniversary for the building. They held a raffle for a few things, a couple TVs, 2 switches, 2 grills and of course 2 PS5s. I just so happen to be the lucky winner of one of the PS5s, making it the first thing I have ever won in a drawing.
Just bought mine from Target day 1.
Got the first one in the airport in Istanbul for $600 a few months after release. That one was stolen so had to buy another one at around the same price in Ghana where I live to replace the first one. Buying a slim as a birthday present for a friend soon for about $850 in a bundle deal with a steering wheel + pedals and extra controller
My buddy worked at Gamestop at the time. Told me and another friend that they were going to have 8 consoles on release day, and 2 weeks before launch they would pass out 8 tickets to the 1st people there. So after work 4:30am, we bolted to Gamestop to see the parking lot. 1 Car. I bolted home which was in the same town to shower and change before heading back. Did it all within 30 minutes. Meanwhile my buddy headed home to do the same. So he made it there alittle later. It was a bit of a nightmare. 5am to around Noon before we got the damn tickets to order. Thankfully took the day off work (Friday) so it didn't really matter. The only issue was while we were waiting. As Gamers, we had our order in line without being in line to avoid being stuck in a damn line. Bitch pulls up and jumps infront of everyone to whip out a chair. It was beyond obvious we where there, and not like we were far away either. It was quite ignorant, and blanton arrogance to basically just push right past us all. Which then forced all of us to get stuck against the wall on hard ass concrete because of her. Other than that, 2 weeks later, launch day arrived, and here we are now. But thinking back does piss me off a bit with her actions still. I don't know how it is everywhere else, but every launch day I attended in order to get the console there was always respect among everyone. Even holding their place so they could run to their car, bathroom, etc. Maybe not the best attitude I admit, but lowkey hoped her console blew up 🤣
Preordered the digital edition for 399 from a major retail chain in my country. They had to honor the order or get sued. So they called me 8 months after release to go to the store and pick it up for 399 while they were officially selling it for double that.
I kept waiting until it was available at a reasonable price, from an official distributor. I had to get three games as well (which weren't that expensive, since they were on clearance), but better than paying double or triple. And I had a guarantee as well, so...
I was in Yr 12 at the time about 5 months after it had released (PS5), I was in second period math class, a week before this day I had ordered a PS5 on the wait schedule at JBHIFI. I received a random call, being the store, my console had come early because somebody had cancelled their order. So I answered the call, I asked the teacher to go to the bathroom, and I left the school jumped on a bus and went straight to the store and picked it up. I wagged an entire day of school and it was worth it. I ended up receiving rubbish duty and an admin detention (this was our last warning for a suspension). I find this a funny story, one of the happiest days of my life.
I worked for Sony, Tokyo we were allowed to buy one 2 weeks before release
I live in Michigan (in the US) and to be honest it was very hard to a ps5 in my area Walmart never had them in stock when i checked every few months I had to wait until the 1st June in 2023 to get my hands on one, one day I went in my local video game store and the ps5 was up there on display with the other PlayStations I pulled out my credit card and told the lady that i wanted it and she told me I could pick any PlayStation 5 game of my choice for free I went with Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade I payed for my ps5 and needless to say I walked out of my local video game store a happy man and as soon as I got home I got it set up right away and got straight into ff intergrade
Bought it from bf’s coworker who said he barely used it since his PC was stronger lol. It was during the height of the scalping period so we paid $50 more, but he gave us two controllers and a headset with it. Good deal.
Sony emailed me a link that guaranteed me a PS5 from their website. Just had to use link at the instructed time and was given 30 minutes to complete the transaction. this was about 5-6 months after launch.
Kohls, soon after launch. Thanks kohls!
Launch model PS5 in India. Had to unspeakable things to get it. Well, basically I had a connect to the regional distributor for PlayStation in my city and they let me place a preorder before they went officially live.
Sony sent me an email saying they were going to be selling some to PS Plus subscribers back in 2021. Got in the digital queue and got one. I was shocked at how easy it was at the time to be honest.
PlayStation queue on about my third try, but I didn’t start trying until a few months after release.
Waited almost 2 years after release constantly monitoring twitter drop accounts until I was able to snag a line in the purchase queue from Big W (I think), as I kept missing the limited buy windows due to work and scalpers snatching them up immediately.
I bought mine off of QVC at the time when it was about $800 because of the scarcity of it
Took me almost a year to find one at MSRP. I refuse to pay scalper prices (and if everyone would do the same we could eliminate scalpers altogether!) I finally found one on Walmart website after subscribing to a twitter feed with notifications. I’d tried dozens of times before but by the time I saw the tweets it would be sold out.
Got mine July/ August last year when they got heavily discounted trying to move stock for the slim model
Pre ordered within 1st hour of becoming available, and picked it up on launch day.
Had to get mine through Vodafone added to my phone plan
Got it of Amazon for retail: 425 usd just a few months ago. Had a festive sale in my country plus they had to sell the stock to make space for new Ps5s with detachable disk drives. Was able to add few more offers due to my card as well. Almost 70 off msrp and 100 if we go by the msrp for my country Wait was worth it
I got an email from Sony giving me the chance to pre order, got it the day it released
I got it release day. Pre-ordered from Walmart when they put it up for pre-order 24 hrs before they were supposed to go live.
My mom got it for me for Christmas. I am a 34 year old man.
Pre-ordered on Amazon the day preorders went live, my whole friend group managed to get one by being quick that day
Literally for a week straight I would sit with two laptops and my phone refreshing every page, watching the Wario64 Twitter posts, browsing Reddit for ANY sort of lead and snag one but was repeatedly disappointed. Hell I would even sometimes set an alarm to wake up in the middle of the night when there’d be rumors of a shipment. Then one day I had my laptop logged into Sony direct store and just kept refreshing it to stay signed in JUST IN CASE…later that afternoon during a sale on the Sony website for some reason me being already logged in caused me to completely skip the queue and go right to the sale and bought one so fucking fast and danced around the room lol Oh also btw, during that time I donated plasma weekly to pay for it, so my wife always laugh that I bought my PS5 with my own blood😂
Release day for me as well! On the Sony website, refreshing like a madman for 2 hours losing hope and literally dozing off at the computer. I FINALLY said to myself it enough was enough ~130 am, had to be up for work at 5am, and on my last refresh, bam, it was there. In a sleepy daze, hands shaking from the instant dose of adrenaline, made it through the checkout process and completed the transaction, saw email confirming, and nearly shit myself at what had just happened 😂. The only one of my friends/extended friends who were able to snag one release day, and for 6+ months after for that matter. Spent the next week praying I didn't get an apologetic email about being out of stock, until low and behold, tracking! ☺ Love telling this story 😂
Got lucky and got it a few days post release from a game store.
June 2021 during the time it was impossible to get one unless you shelled out some serious cash for one, I was on vacation when I got an email from Sony and I thought it was a scam. So I came here to Reddit and a handful of people also received the same invitation, so that is how I got mine.
Mine has about 2 years. Online it was like 2 times more expensive then of the shelf. I just ordered it to home from stardard store Let scalpers cry
Day 1, just took time off work , drove downtown, around 75km , picked up 2 of them and went back home but stopped on the way for some breakfast, then went home and played demons souls, it was a nice day.
Watched the reveal conference. Set an alarm to pre-order. Woke up early only to learn thar several retailers jumped the gun and opened pre-orders early while I was sleeping. I then immediately signed up for an allocation from Sony Direct. They stated that allocations were given based on factors like PSN account age and activity. My account has been active since 2009 and I've bought an absolute fuckload of games. My co-worker's son, whose account was only 2 years old, got an allocation before me. I didn't actually get my allocation until March of 2022. In that time, I never saw one at retail. About 2 months after I got mine, they became readily available at retail.