No PlayStation 2 price cut before Christmas in Europe

Sony Computer Entertainment UK boss Ray Maguire has dashed hopes of a PlayStation 2 price cut before Christmas, saying that any further decrease to the system's SRP will not come before the end of the year.

His comments, made in an interview with the BBC News website, come only a week after rumours swept the Game Convention in Leipzig that Sony was set to announce a drop to the PS2 price point at its conference there - but no such announcement was forthcoming.

Sony has traditionally used late August or early September as an opportunity to cut the price of its hardware and set it at the level which will be used throughout the Christmas market, but this year, Maguire says that it's hoping to drive sales with new types of software instead.

Games such as EyeToy compatible exercise title Kinetic and music quiz game Buzz are being touted as big sellers for the Christmas season on the PS2, while much of Sony's efforts will undoubtedly go into marketing the PSP throughout the fourth quarter.

"We want to re-engineer the console and drive costs down," Maguire told the BBC, but he said that the cut would not come until after Christmas - while insisting that there is plenty of room for the console to grow in this market, despite having already sold 7.5 million units in the UK.

"70 per cent of the UK does not have a PlayStation 2," he commented.