It is no secret that everyone was expecting, or even deserved to see, a drop in the price of the PS3. With a console that started at $599 USD three years ago, everyone was waiting to see when Sony would begin to appeal to the majority of consumers who aren’t willing to drop that much on a video game console. But, the question is now that it has come, is it enough to bring Sony back into the console war?

The PS3 Slim is a console that is going to retail for $299 starting in early September. It will come with a 120GB harddrive and is 34% lighter and smaller than the original PS3; this PS3, however, has a matte finish and no longer features the option for installing a secondary operating system.

The Nintendo Wii has heavily dominated the market and brought countless people who have never played video games into the market, but the Xbox 360 has been the console of choice for most people who can only purchase a single console and want a more adult experience than the Wii. The PS3 has always had the advantage of a built-in BluRay player, but the reasonable price difference that Microsoft has kept between it’s console and the PS3 and exclusive games made the BluRay feature more of an added bonus for buying a PS3 than a true decision changer in choosing a console.

The game changes a bit now that the Xbox 360 Elite, the version of the Xbox that is most comparable to the PS3, is $100 dollars more expensive and lacks a Bluray player. There is still a version of the Xbox 360 at the $299 price-point, but it features a 60GB harddrive unlike the 120GB that is being shipped with the PS3 slim. Rumors are now circulating that this version will be completely phased out and the Xbox 360 Elite will drop in price to $299.

Now to the point of the console war, I think that the PS3 can still come out on top of this…with a few caveats of course. The PS3 has to begin focusing on getting more exclusive games and helping developers use the core processor to make games better on the PS3 than on the 360. Although many people who will only ever buy one console every generation are probably already lost to the 360, their are still some who recognize the horrible failure rates of the Xbox 360 (for every 1 PS3 that fails, 5 Xbox 360’s do). The PS3 can definitely harness this market with better games, better online features, and streaming features. Microsoft seems to be trying to make the Xbox 360 the center of the living room, even though the PS3 is a device better poised to take that role. The Xbox 360 has Netflix streaming and a slew of other things, like a booming Arcade; the PS3 has an arcade that is dismal compared to the Xbox 360 and has no TV/ Movie store. The PS3 has the BluRay drive that many people have yet to upgrade to but would nonetheless enjoy, and they have the amazing leverage by being in the Sony brand of products. Sony can begin to intergrate the PS3 in with many of their products creating a truly integrated home centered around the PS3 and its multicore processing power.

I think the price drop could play a major role in the console wars, but Sony has to begin to become a lot more aggressive to reach their long term goals for the console.