BODY: Want to buy a PS5 Pro in Japan? You'll need to prove you've actually been playing games.
Sony Interactive Entertainment announced on September 28 that it has begun accepting purchase applications for the PlayStation 5 Pro through Sony Store, the company's direct-sales channel. The console has been in short supply since launch, and the application system is Sony's answer: rather than a first-come sprint that bots and resellers reliably win, buyers register interest and wait.
The eligibility conditions are where it gets interesting. Applicants need a Sony Account registered in Japan with an active PlayStation Network status, that account must be linked to a My Sony ID — automatic for accounts created after January 19, 2022 — and, most notably, they must have logged 60 hours or more of combined PS5 and PS4 playtime between September 27, 2024 and September 27, 2026. In other words, Sony is reading your play history to decide whether you're a real player or a flipper.
The application window runs from September 28 through October 7 at 11:59 p.m. JST. Results go out starting October 26, and successful applicants have until 11:59 a.m. on November 2 to complete their purchase. If applications exceed available stock — which is the safe bet — Sony will hold a lottery to pick buyers. Sony did not disclose how many units are on offer.
Worth remembering that the PS5 Pro ships without a disc drive. Anyone with a physical game library needs to buy the detachable drive separately, an extra cost that has dogged the model's value pitch since it launched.
The insider take
Japanese consumers have seen this playbook before: Sony ran playtime-and-account-age gates on PS5 purchases back in 2020, and 抽選販売 (lottery sales) is a standard retail ritual here, used for everything from sneakers to Pokémon cards. What makes the 60-hour bar notable is how casually it treats telemetry as a purchase credential — a threshold that quietly excludes lapsed players, newcomers, and anyone buying a first console as a gift. On Japanese social media, the reaction splits predictably between relief that resellers are being squeezed and irritation that two years into the Pro's life, Sony still can't simply put the thing on a shelf. For a console pitched at enthusiasts, gating it behind proof-of-enthusiasm is either elegant or absurd, depending on your hour count.
Originally reported by AUTOMATON (Japanese).