Digital Battle is reporting that MediaMarkt, a German retailer, is taking pre-orders on the 60GB PS3 for 600, or around $765. They seem a bit astonished by the price, but note that you'll get a free game: Formula 1, Motorstorm, SingStar or Genji.

Mark my words: 600 is exactly what the PS3 is going to sell for in Europe. People who don't know exactly how hard Europeans get boned on games and console always just try to translate the US price into the stronger currency at whatever the current exchange rate is, then maybe rounding it up a bit. This is not how it works: companies instead translate by assuming that one dollar is equal to one euro when pricing for European release. Considering a dollar is worth 0.79 or thereabouts, it's a big price jack.

Why do they assume a 1:1 currency rate? Well, partly, it's because of Value Added Tax built into the price of products, which is about 20%. Since the disparity between the dollar and the euro is currently around 20% in favor of the Euro, selling a $599 product for 599 probably seems fair, except that companies are supposed to be swallowing the V.A.T. tax themselves, not bumping the price up for consumers. But that almost never happens.

And sometimes, as in the case of the European DS Lite release, the cost of the system (even at a hypothetical 1:1 exchange rate) is even more than it is in the States. Yup. We get boned. Florian Eckhardt

PS3 Pre-order In Germany. $765. Seriously. [Digital Battle]