Sony celebrate 500 million PlayStations sold, announce limited edition PS4 Pro

Update: Pre-orders are available here - be quick, they'll be extremely limited!

Original:

Since first appearing back in 1994, the PlayStation has made Sony one of the most successful gaming manufacturers ever. The PlayStation 2 and original PlayStation are the two best-selling home consoles of all time; the former might even be the biggest selling console of any type.

Today, Sony announced a very special milestone: they have now sold 500 million PlayStations. By comparison, only Nintendo have sold more, with more than 700 million in console sales, and they have been in the game more than a decade longer than Sony.

Such a momentous number deserves celebrating, and that's exactly what Sony are doing, by announcing a new PS4 Pro. This limited edition model won't do much to boost their sales figures - only 50,000 are being put into production - but it has some nice touches that are certain to make it a popular piece of hardware.

In fact, we'd go so far as to say this is one of the nicest special edition PS4s we've seen this generation. We've noted before that Sony have been criticised for some less-than-inspired special editions. However, this Pro is extremely nice.

With a dark blue shell, what immediately stands out about the 500 Million Limited Edition model is the fact it's transparent. This harks back to an era when this was all the rage, and is a nice nod to the past.

Another nice touch is a small gold plaque, which will record each unit's unique serial number. The bundle comes with a controller and, curiously, the PlayStation Camera, both in the same transparent blue.

This Pro is also unique in that it has a 2TB hard-drive. So far, we've only ever seen Pro consoles with a 1TB capacity.

The bundle will be available from August 24th, with an RRP €499. We expect this will probably translate to £450.