He says: That’s an interesting question. I think it was going to happen sooner or later, maybe not from Nintendo, but it was going to happen eventually. We live in contrasting times, where inflation is real and significant, but people expect games that are ever more ambitious and therefore expensive to develop to cost the same. It’s an impossible equation.
by S4v1r1enCh0r4k
26 Comments
From the [Insomniac leaks](https://thesportsrush.com/gaming-news-fans-shocked-leaks-reveal-playstation-believes-games-cost-around-80-100-2027/), we know that Sony has been planning on a price hike for years now.
I have no problem paying $80-100 for games that don’t use predatory monetization methods. The problem is that they’re still going to put mtx in the games. They’re still going to nickel and dime consumers. The dark patterns aren’t going to just disappear because the price increases.
Gaming is the largest and most profitable entertainment industry. They aren’t hurting for cash.
Well yeah prices are going to go up, just a really really bad time in the beginning of a recession.
Game prices had already increased years ago. It was through mtx, expansion passes and DLC.
Now we’ll have to pay $20 extra AND for the same mtx, passes and DLC.
Yeah, but their prices were already raised from 2020 to 80/90 euro games. Right?
*Clair Obscur has entered the chat*
If prices go up then I hope the quality goes up as well. If not than well that sucks.
We need to pay more so the poor poor ceos can eat
Awesome! Then rising compensation should follow right? Wait… what? It’s stagnated for decades? That can’t be right…
It’s not just that inflation has increased in the last years, it’s also that it is rising still. There is a larger inflation rate globally, in due to general economic uncertainties for the coming decade which includes trade wars, tariffs, shifting prooduction locations, and potential stagflation.
Companies launching luxury products like those in the videogames industry oligopoly, with products which last an entire generation in the market, have to think not just for prices today but for prices in 6 to 8 years in the future.
They also know that people will lose purchasing power during this cycle, so they focus on the more demanding consumers, leaving the more casual gamers aside, and charging more per unit sold to cover the decrease in the consumer base.
It all makes business sense, even if bad to the consumer. It’s just Economics. The average population in developed nations is poorer than it used to be, as such luxury products naturally become less affordable.
~~So they’ll come back down in the event of inflation reduction, right?~~ okay two people already explained why that’s wrong. I just hope wages rise because jesus christ.
Personally I wish “Triple A studios” would actually make more smaller scale games. I think there would definitely still be a market for games the size and scope of SNES and N64 games.
No one’s arguing that. We still don’t like it and on average we’re all making “less” money relative to these rising costs so the indignation is still justified and no amount of “b-b-b-but inflation/market forces/tariffs” are going to make me stop and think “Oh, yeah. You’re right. My b”
It sucks that my favorite hobby as a kid probably would’ve been unaffordable to me at these prices. I get it, inflation, whatever, but most people don’t make that much more for the same jobs and salaries definitely haven’t kept up with the cost of living.
This is a whole lot of corporate selfish excuse considering games like Expedition 33 and Hi Fi Rush to name a few examples are high quality amazing games that costed so much less because you can still bring in quality games without putting hundreds of millions into them which isn’t needed
I understand what he’s saying and to a degree I agree, but he (probably intentionally) misses the fact that games also sell more copies than ever.
I knew game prices would rise, it really was inevitable. It just sucks that for alot of places, pay hasn’t risen to offset the cost. Speaking as an American, it seems everything has gone up in price over the last decade yet pay has been pretty stagnant in most places.
Minimum wage in the US hasn’t changed in 16 years, which is shameful. Rent, groceries, bills, insurance, cars, and now video games/consoles have all risen in price. But instead of higher wages in most jobs, people have to do side hustles or double shifts.
I think if people were being paid fairly, or at least at a rate that kept up with inflation, then $80-$100 games would be easier to swallow.
Around 3.2 billion profit last year, this isn’t inevitability it’s greed.
The other solution would be to cut back on team size and stop making as many expensive AAA games.
Who else said “Inevitable” like Kim Jong Il in Team America?
They were. What does everyone think all the MTX bullshit was? What does everyone think these pricey “delux” editions now are? The cost to make games goes up and up, and yet most of the increase in the gaming market is mobile.
It’s an impossible equation because you seem to have left one variable out-sales.
4 million $60 games-$240 mill
5 million $50 games-$250 mil
The player base keeps expanding.
And I don’t really feel like I am necessarily getting more from games that are full priced. Many recent iterations of games (nintendo sports titles for example) that lack a lot of the features included in previous versions.
We’re putting ray tracing, upscaling, supersampling, post processing on all of your games even though you dont want them and we’re going to charge you higher prices for it because fak you 🙂
Its not inevitability, its pure greed, plain and simple
What ruined gaming was the microtransactions
He says as he rubs his hands together 🥺
Not if the gamers revolt.
“Nintendo Surpasses $100-Billion Market Cap for the First Time, Closing in On Fast Retailing” is the post below this one. They clearly needed to increase prices to feed their devs.