No, as likely and expected as it seems, that post about an Amazon France listing of a Skyrim Special Edition for PlayStation 5 isn’t real. Skyrim PS5 just feels like an inevitability at this point, but it’s posting less than 24 hours after the reveal of the PS5 game case design is far too convenient, especially where no other PS5 game listings have appeared, officially or otherwise.
Skyrim Special Edition for #PS5 appears on Amazon France pic.twitter.com/DUwJbad9YP
— Hunter (@NextGenPlayer) July 9, 2020
The hoax in question began on Twitter with @Chinnerdomain posting a dubious, but real enough-looking screenshot of an Amazon France listing. After all, this isn’t the first time that a leak involving the site has happened, both real and fake. The real damage, however, wasn’t done until @NextGenPlayer took the tweet for their own and posted it, quickly gaining almost 4,000 retweets. This is the point at which the rumor kicked up and it hit that point of information dissemination that folks started thinking it might be real.
Well, it’s definitely a hoax. No such listing, or any PS5 game listings, are to be found on Amazon France just yet. This is just a Photoshop. I mean, it uses the same cover as the current gen case. Crisis averted. I don’t know about you, dear reader, but I am glad to hear that yet another version of Skyrim isn’t officially on its way just yet. Then again, the reason this rumor is so hard to keep from spreading is of two parts; The meme exists just because of how often Skyrim has found itself coming to new hardware–even the Amazon Echo. And, because of that, it’s a totally plausible rumor that spreads far and wide until someone does some rumor-killing.
Social media hoaxes just have a way of coming to life on their own, and before you know it even the most studious well-versed fan falls for a fake rumor or two. I can’t tell how many times I’ve ran to my friend’s group chat to shriek about how Persona 4 Golden was actually coming to a non-Vita console, only to realize I had been duped. Of course, this was made even worse by the fact that when it finally came true not a single one of them believed me, even after the Steam page went live.
As for that fake Skyrim PS5 Amazon page? Consider the rumor killed. Go back to your daily lives, Todd Howard can no longer hurt you because he has no power in this realm… yet.
