PlayStation 5 officially just became cheaper than ever before

You can be the proud owner (for a limited time) of a PlayStation 5 for less than the cost of a large McDonalds meal… provided you live in Japan (man they really do get all the best stuff over there).

GEO Corporation, one of the largest retailers of physical media and video game consoles in Japan, launched a very interesting and unique service across parts of the country last month.

On February 28, GEO launched a PlayStation 5 rental service that does exactly what it says on the tin.

For 980 Japanese Yen, equivalent to roughly 5 British Pounds, you can rent a standard PlayStation 5 from GEO for seven days and eight nights. For 1,780 Japanese Yen, just over 9 British Pounds, you can keep it for 14 days and 15 nights instead.

And, according to a report from Automaton Media's Amber V, the service has become so popular that (as of yesterday) GEO are actually fully booked.

There are no exact numbers on the amount of PlayStation 5 units that GEO has out on rental, but the service is being offered in over 400 of their 1,086 stores across Japan - so it’s probably pretty fair to say the number is pretty high.

As Amber notes in their article, the popularity of the service has probably been slightly inflated due to the launch of Monster Hunter Wilds, as it also released on February 28.

In fact, Monster Hunter Wilds has (as of March 4) sold over 8 million copies, making it the fastest-selling game in Capcom’s history. Perhaps “slightly inflated” might have been underselling it a tad.

Unfortunately, if you were hoping to take advantage of this service once the PS5s are back in rotation, then you’ll have to move to Japan - as GEO doesn’t have any stores in any other countries.

Also, I’m not sure if folks in England could be trusted with a service like this. I know that a very small percentage of people would be straight down to CeX to trade their one in.