My recent trip to one of India’s most notorious grey markets proved quite an interesting affair; I amassed a significant amount of detail about the gaming scenario of our country. The findings did not come as a surprise to me because 95% of gamers still thrive on grey markets to fulfill their gaming desires.
The official sales figures for any gaming console may not even be a drop as compared to the rest of the globe but right here in the heart of C.P. it is a different story all together. My survey included four of the main suppliers in the market, all the stuff here comes from another grey market called “Gaffer market” and I went through basically 4 major gaming systems:- PS2, Xbox, Xbox 360 and PS3 (yes the PS3 does retail here!).
The PS2 is still doing brimming business over here with at least 5 – 6 sets being sold by each shop during the day, which averages around 35 sets in a week. A PS2 costs Rs. 6500 ($140) with the guy making a profit of three to four hundred bucks on each machine sold, each game retails for Rs 50-75 ($1) depending heavily on your bargaining skills, numerous titles are popular with the PS2 loving crowd, excluding RPGs, best sellers include the FIFA, NBA series and the Racing Sims, only a niche actually pick up games like Metal Gear Solid or Splinter Cell because they are a tad slow when it comes to gameplay, most consumers have come to know about the console through friends or Internet or a gaming Café situated at the corner of their houses. You can find all the peripherals for the console including the hard drive, carry all case, DVD playback remote, special controllers(I saw a Star war: Episode III controller for Rs 500) in a nut shell, “the works”
Next up is the original Xbox which retails for about Rs 9500 (roughly $200) but there aren’t too many takers because of insufficient games available on the platform here (a game like Double agent available for the PS2 may not be available neither will be the latest iteration of FIFA) each game costs Rs 100 ($2) and is again subject to your haggling skills, but most of them somehow refuse to bring the prices down due to the lack of titles.
The Xbox 360 seems to be the next big thing next to the PS2 with 3-5 sets being sold on a daily basis, the console has been modified and retails for Rs 21,000 Premium ($456), the end result of the modification is that there is a region lock for games / movie (the missing word here is Original) it also dampens the prospect of you playing on Live if Microsoft ever decides to bring its glorious service on our land, most of the sets sold here are the from India or from Hong Kong and are modified by the technician sitting at these shops. The game used to show off the might of the 360 is Burnout: Revenge, which seems a bit absurd with Gears of War not exactly flying off shelves over here, customers love to pick up E.A Fight Night series and the enhanced versions of all the Footy games available on the platform The price range for games is between Rs. 250 – Rs.300 ($5 – $6). Most of them have experienced the console before actually going for the kill, they have seen it in the malls and music stores that retail the 360 and some of them have even seen the ridiculous advertisement and were a part of its launch. So, Microsoft’s campaign has not gone in vain in educating the consumer about video gaming, they should probably set shop here to change the official figures in the country which seem horrendously low.
The Playstation 3 is here and so are its games. Virtua Fighter 5 is already sitting on shelves on par with their western counterparts. The only model that most shopkeepers stock here are the 20 GB ones retailing for Rs 24,000 ($520), mind all of you that the console has not been modified as yet hence only original games run on the platform which retail between the price range of Rs 3000 – Rs 3500 ($65-$75), the sales of the console is yet to be ascertained because most people opt out for the 360 even if they come looking for the PS3.
Such glorious pieces of hardware/software sitting/flying off shops in a grey market, the time when video gaming being a legitimized industry in our country is still a dream far far away.
–Neelesh Mukherjee