How You Could Get Your PS5 From Burger King

It is difficult to be frugal when you are a gamer. You have to purchase consoles, accessories, and video games. Sure, you can buy old titles and platforms on sale, but if you desire the newest items, your wallet will cry. If you want the PlayStation 5, for example, prepare to shell out $499.99 ($399.99 for the discless Digital Edition) for the console and up to $69.99 for each game. If only there were a way to save a few bucks. Thanks to Burger King — and a lot of luck — there is.

On October 12, Burger King's Twitter account teased the PS5's startup sound, which confused many gamers. However, on October 15, the reason behind the cryptic tweet became clear: Burger King and Sony joined forces to give away thousands of PS5-themed prizes. Participants can win a three-month PlayStation Now subscription, a digital copy of either Sackboy: A Big Adventure or Demon's Souls (sorry, physical copy fans), and, obviously, a PS5. Oh, and food coupons, but those aren't PS5-themed.

Normally, such giveaway prizes would be limited in scope or, to be more specific, quantity. You might expect one grand prize winner to walk away with a PS5 and only 100 secondary winners to earn the games, but that's not the case this time. Burger King is giving away 1,000 PS Now codes, 2,000 copies each of Demon's Souls and Sackboy: A Big Adventure, and 1,000 PS5 consoles for a grand total of 6,000 prizes, not including food coupons. Burger King didn't specify if the consoles are the regular or discless variety, but a free PS5 is still a free PS5. Well, almost free.

You can enter the sweepstakes one of two ways. The first method involves making a minimum $5 qualifying purchase (before tax) on the BK App, at BK.com, or in-store. If you make the purchase through the app or website, you will be given a token redeemable for a chance to win a prize. If you buy your more than $5 worth of food at a Burger King, you won't receive your token unless you punch the receipt info into the BK App or on BK.com, so don't throw your receipt away.

However, you don't need to purchase anything to participate. For those of you trying to stick to a diet, you can simply place your full name, mailing address, email address, and birth month and year on a 3x5 sheet of paper and mail it to Realtime Media for a chance to win. Just make sure to provide proper postage and label the envelope properly — Realtime Media, Attn: Sony Scratch to Win, 200 Four Falls Corporate Center, Suite 10, Conshohocken, PA 19428.

As with all sweepstakes, you have to abide by certain rules. The PS5 giveaway is subject to standard rules, such as only being open to legal residents of the contiguous United States (i.e. Hawaii and Alaskan citizens are ineligible) and to contestants who are at least 18 years old. But, the most important rule is "one entry per day." You can't order Burger King for breakfast, lunch, and dinner via the app and expect three tokens. Moreover, if you participate in the mail-in portion of the sweepstakes, you can only send one letter per day.

In addition, don't expect to win all the prizes. Winners are limited to one PS5 and one digital code per person. If you win the three-month PS Now subscription but want a copy of Demon's Souls or Sackboy (or vice versa) instead, you're out of luck. Maybe you can find a friend willing to trade codes, but don't expect Burger King to give you more than one code.

Of course, you can't expect this giveaway to run indefinitely, especially since the PS5 will hit store shelves on November 12. Purchases toward the giveaway are only eligible until November 22, and you can only redeem tokens until November 23. If you opt for the mail-in sweepstakes, you have some more leeway, but only a bit. Letters that don't arrive by November 30 will be disqualified.

As for prize distribution, that will take some time. Winners will be notified by email, but prizes won't start delivery until mid-November. Mail-in participants, meanwhile, have to wait until around December 1 to receive prize notifications. If you don't win, though, you aren't completely out of luck, since Burger King might hold a "Second Chance" drawing on December 15 to give away the unclaimed prizes.

Best of luck to those who enter.