Sony's PS5 Pro Lottery Demands 60 Hours of Play - Is This Fair?

Sony Japan's anti-scalper lottery for PS5 Pro requires 60 hours of gameplay, sparking debate about brand loyalty tests for buying hardware at full price.

Ever been asked to prove you're a real fan just to buy a console? Sony Japan is now doing exactly that for the PS5 Pro. To even enter the lottery for a chance to buy the pricey console, you need a Japanese Sony account with at least 60 hours of gaming on a PS4 or PS5. That's right—you have to show you've put in the hours before you're allowed to spend your money.

In theory, this should deter scalpers and their bots, who probably don't have time to rack up 60 hours of gameplay. But in practice, it feels like a weird brand loyalty test. I'm not a fan of locking hardware purchases behind a dystopian proof of dedication. It's not just Sony, either. Valve recently rolled out a reservation system for the Steam Frame, requiring a Steam account 'in good standing' and a purchase made before April 27th, 2026. What does 'in good standing' even mean? Valve hasn't defined it clearly, leaving us guessing.

Look, scalpers are a problem. We all hate them. The Steam Machine was reportedly scalped for over $3,000, and GPU launches are always a mess. But the solutions we're seeing—lotteries, reservation systems, and loyalty tests—feel like they're punishing regular gamers. I've written before about how it was cheaper for me to fly internationally to QuakeCon or PAX West and pick up an RTX 5090 at MSRP. That was through Nvidia's 'Verified Priority Access IRL' draw, similar to Newegg's Shuffle lottery. Zotac even sold RTX 50-series cards via Discord to actual gamers. These methods might work, but they're exclusive and often confusing.

I firmly believe gaming should be for everyone, though it rarely lives up to that ideal. Brand loyalty tests, combined with the ongoing memory supply crisis driving prices up, mean that if you don't have deep pockets and lots of free time, you're stuck on the outside. Scalpers might be mostly locked out by these systems, but I'm not convinced this is the best deal for hardware consumers. It feels like we're jumping through hoops just for the privilege of paying full price.

What do you think? Are these anti-scalper measures fair, or are they just another barrier for everyday gamers? Will you be jumping through hoops to get your next console or GPU, or does this trend turn you off completely? Let us know in the comments.