Not defending Dementia Donny and either way I’m not shelling out $80 for a game ever, just wondering if this is really a result of the tariffs. I understand the console price being high due to them but I don’t see how it would affect the price of games that are essentially going to be 100% digital
Honest question because I’m OOTL, but haven’t games been this price for a long time now and weren’t Switch games even more expensive than this?
I’m a bit confused.
AAA games have been 70 bucks for a while, but I’m not sure of any base switch games that were 80 bucks. Could be wrong tho…
Considering Nintendo has an eShop, I doubt it is tariffs. Hopefully they don’t try to tax digital goods next as it appears they have everything else.
Not to be THAT GUY, but games haven’t kept up with inflation or increasing development costs. Someone in these convos usually point out that, adjusted for inflation, that 80’s Donkey Kong game actually costs more in today’s money than $60-80. So I guess that’s me today lol
Do I agree that their worth that much? Ehhhh
But have we gotten massive improvements, longer games, more physics, graphics, etc? Yeah.
Games like GTA take half a decade or more to be made. If you want that kind of game development to continue, consessions need to be made somewhere. Now, maybe there’s a better pace to do it, but asking more for these games isn’t completely unreasonable.
You know what else hasn’t kept up with inflation? Wages.
So before you go espousing raising prices, let’s first make it so people can afford the higher costs.
Lmao that’s a completely seperate issue between you and your employer. Has nothing to do with the value of the dollar.
Has inflation kept up with wages? No. Have prices gone up anyways? Hell yes. Only thing you can find under $1 anymore is Arizona Tea, and even that isn’t a guarantee.
But yes, complain that a luxury item has gone up in cost. You know, something not necessary. So no one needs to make sure “everyone can afford it”. The ones who can buy, will buy, and the numbers show overwhelmingly that they do.
All you’re literally arguing is that wages should increase. Agreed. It should increase to match the new prices that are inflating as well. Wouldn’t change the fact that games cost the same “spending value” as before with the new pricetag.
I mean tbf complaining that less people can afford it now because prices have increased but wages haven’t is fair. Everything needs to be looked at relative to all the other values. If you wanna go even more in depth I guess you would need to add popularity of games, reputation of a brand or game series, value of the currency, and other factors.
I generally agree with you that prices for video games haven’t kept up that well, although I would also point out that due to multiple factors anchoring the video game price at 1980 might not be the best if you want a fitting picture. Games were much more rare baack then, the market was smaller, small production volume meant physical costs per unit increase, there’s things like way higher shipping costs to think about because globalization is a more modern phenomenon and a lot more stuff. Imo using the 2000s as an anchor to extrapolate from would be more fitting, as the market was well established at that point and thus prices would appear more stable.
I’m not doing that because I am literally a little gremlin who can’t be arsed to put the time in rn but these are my two cents of criticism against your methodology.
Yes, but you can make the wages claim about EVEYTHING. House, cars, food haven’t gone down. Everything else went up. So why is this one luxury exempt?
And yes, because of globalization, a Steam Deck is cheaper than a NES was. That’s great! So why are you complaining when prices are objectively better than 1980? Like yeah, we made things better! And even with inflation, they’re cheaper!
So why are you complaining about a $20-30 increase when the math says you should have a $60 increase? That’s what I’m calling entitlement. We have it objectively better by every metric in video games, including cost, and people are throwing a fit over an increase that’s still below inflation.
Yes but back then most people only bought maybe 2-3 games the entire generation and traded with their friends. There was also a lot of local coop games.
Now people would like to play dozens of games and it’s difficult to share, often you even need to buy two copies of a game to even play with your family in the same house.
Exactly, games back then were EXPENSIVE. Currently we live in luxury where you have hundreds of options. How does that not justify it costing more?
If indie devs can make a game and sell it for less than Nintendo games sold for in the 90s then maybe it isn’t actually more expensive to develop and distribute games that are somewhat comparable to games from the 80s. A lot of games sell for $40 or less and are making profits.
Nintendo games are more expensive partially because they are limited to Nintendo hardware. Like Apple, this requires more costs for software because their target audience is smaller than something through a digital platform like steam, and distribution is a pretty significant cost and physical distribution has a lot of risk and waste compared to digital if something doesn’t sell as many as expected.
Ummm Nintendo has a digital platform, so not sure what you’re on about that one.
And in regards to indie studios: then buy their games and stop complaining, duh. Like, if you know there’s all these amazing and cheap alternatives, why are you bitching about what Nintendo charges? No one’s forcing you. Go play something else. It’s really that easy.
Nintendo, love em or hate them, is like Disney. They want to curate a very specific image. Look up the invention of the Nintendo Seal of Approval and why that was such a big thing. Nintendo wants to be very specific thing and frankly doesn’t give a shit if you like it. If you dont, then you’re not their target audience. It’s really that simple. Their not catering to everyone, they’re catering to a specific group. If they want to charge a certain amount but you know it’ll be quality cus it’s Nintendo, then what’s the harm?
A digital platform limited to their hardware.
And in regards to indie studios: then buy their games and stop complaining, duh. Like, if you know there’s all these amazing and cheap alternatives, why are you bitching about what Nintendo charges? No one’s forcing you. Go play something else. It’s really that easy.
It is easy enough that I am doing that and not complaining about Nintendo’s pricing, just discussing why it is so high. Is discussion automatically complaining?
Again, what’s it matter? A PS store game is limited to their platform. An Xbox store game is limited to their platform. A Steam game is…
Seeing a pattern? It’s irrelevant. Console exclusivity has always been a thing until modern times. But now we have cross play, something that never existed. So again, objectively better. Are some games still stuck to certain consoles? Yeah. And that’s their prerogative and frankly is the norm. So what? What reason do you have that you deserve it? You don’t. You just want it.
Xbox game store is also on PC, and they share titles on steam. A lot of Playstation games are also released on steam. In fact, being exclusives to those consoles is becoming far less common than cross platform with PC. Nintendo is the only one that doesn’t do any cross platform releases and doesn’t do sales.
What reason do you have that you deserve it?
You clearly just want to be right and are projecting because not everyone agrees with you.
So you have no reason to deserve it but entitlement. Gotcha. Thanks for articulating. Companies don’t owe you shit. As soon as you get that through your head a lot more will make sense. If companies owed you anything, we wouldn’t have micro transactions and season passes and all of that money grubbing bullshit. But did your outrage stop that? Nope. So go ahead and yell and scream and see what it does now.
Be that guy. Games are too cheap.
I think Nintendo made a mistake pricing Mario Kart that way, since they’re selling it for half that price in a bundle anyway. Had it been 70 like DK with a bump of 10 for physical it’d be a different conversation.
I’d love to blame him but that seems like Nintendo’s choice. Yeah, I’m not fucking spending $80 on a game, especially when I have a gaming PC
PC gaming seems so cheap in comparison at this point doesn’t it. I guess we have better options which means there is more competition in price. Why would I spend £90 for something EA shat out when I can just not do that.
It really is. It’s a big cost upfront but the amount of games you can buy or emulate for such a low price makes up for it plus your PC can just be upgraded with parts and last years and years versus the death of consoles every five years give or take. Triple A games are still expensive to buy but the sales on steam make it so much easier cos those really expensive games will be like 50% off sometimes
Vote with your wallet, and don’t let the FOMO pull you in.
Nintendo is just a small slice of the gaming industry. If you don’t like what you see there are other platforms and game developers.
For 80 usd you can buy a handful of bigger titles during a Steam sale. Just saying.
80? More like 90 if it’s the physical version.
No this isn’t because of tariffs. If anything tariffs will make it even worse (which will be painful.for americana to watch). This is just good ol’ Nintendo greed.
There’s zero justification for a Mario Kart game costing 80/90 dollars/euros. It’s simply not a game with the kind of investment behind it to justify such a price home. IMO only GTA6 has a somewhat reasonable argument to get away with that. Yes they will make a ton of money but they also spent quite a lot making it.
Aren’t the physical versions just a key you plug in that let’s you download the game?
Someone corrected me the other day on here that it’s not all games that are doing that but only some will be a game key and others will be the full game. I’m assuming that all first party titles will be the game key since this is largely about piracy and not allowing people to easily dump the game from the cartridge like people did for the Switch.
From what I read, some are like that, but not all. That would be a fucking travesti.
No, not all. It’s a an option. Basically yubikey DRM
Like even the game carts have a few choices for storage. For example, Pokemon pearl and diamond remake were notorious to go with the smaller storage carts where half the game is only downloadable
And subsequently kill off the second hand market, perfect for a company that famously never discounts their games.
My understanding is that only some games are a “key in a cartridge” and they are able to be resold second hand.
Just gouging us. Even on the 3DS before they shut the shop down, digital download games were the same price as buying them on a cart.
The new Switch 2 cartridges supposedly won’t have the games on them… just the license to download and play them.
The sheet was describing the new box art spec for games like this one, not saying that that their new games would do that. It will probably be the same situation as with the Switch 1 where only a tiny fraction of games are like that.
Not all games will be like that. Some will have the game on them. Street Fighter, Elden Ring, and Bravely Default are examples of a few that will be key cards. Oddly, I heard that Cyperpunk will be entirely on the cartridge.
Yes CDPR is going to put an understandably storage optimized version of Cyberpunk and Phantom Liberty on a 64GB cart
Interesting. I know that one is 70GB minimum on Steam.
If that’s the case why would they bother giving game cards a higher speed interface?
I guess it’s not all games, but only some will be license only.
Pretty much the same as Switch 1 then
Wow, if the games are not on the cart then I’m not buying Nintendo.
Same here. Unless it’s a game that I absolutely can’t get anywhere else, I’m probably just gonna use the Deck for those “key cart” “games”.
Games have been around the $50-$70 mark my entire life.
It’s a sad reality, but I expect prices of major mainstream games to go up, regardless of tariffs.
Frankly, I don’t even really mind if they’re not riddled with micro transactions, and there’s a solid selection of indie and older games that cost less to choose from. Part of the problem is Nintendo never lowers their prices on old games.
Distribution cost of games has gone down to almost zero since then.
The price was announced first… So it’s not related.
Adjusted for inflation though, and $80 is the normal price it’s been for 40 years.
I just don’t know why people are shocked Nintendo is doing this, they’ve always been one of the first companies to increase prices.
40 years ago they didn’t sell them by millions with each copy cost being a few cents. It’s price gouging simple as.
I mean, this just isn’t true, though. You’re not wrong in pointing out that the scope of sales has changed, but so has the scope of development, as well as consumer expectation. I suspect if you compare the number of man hours spent on a title today vs an NES game, it’s not even a comparable discussion. And then there’s the matter of post-release support.
To be clear, I don’t think a $30 price hike for physical copies is at all sensible, but the arguments being presented both for and against it are incredibly poorly thought out. Everyone presents a single facet of videogame development today compared to years ago and then acts like it’s a “gotcha” that proves their point. The entire ecosystem of game development and consumption has changed so drastically, that any discussion comparing the adjusted for inflation price of games then vs now is just pointless. Art and entertainment are art and entertainment, and it’s impossible to create a de-facto value statement for them, because consumer subjectivity, bias, and valuation is too wide to make objective statements about.
Imo, the real criticism of the matter is that +50% cost during a time of economic upheaval, when the buying power of the middle class is approaching the weakest it’s been in a long time, is going to be received poorly, and probably result in a loss of Western sales. It’s a massive leap, in a single generation, at the worst possible time, regardless of what inflation adjustments tell us.
Considering they are delaying pre orders due to the tariffs I do not think tariffs are the reason the price is so high. I think Nintendo is trying to set a new standard for game prices. If these games still sell at $80 then I wouldn’t be surprised to see GTA 6 release for $100. The whole gaming market will likely follow.
The whole AAAAAAAA gaming market… I still see the Indy devs not caving to this bullshit. I only support indy devs now. The AAAAAAAAA pricks are useless, overpriced failures imo
luckily, this is the one industry you can boycott them AND still get the product anyway 🏴☠️
Or be a patient gamer and get it on a sale.
Kinda sorta. Remember the pandemic? Prices went up but never came back down. I suspect the tariffs will do this as well
It’s all excuses, every greedy company does it. Take Games Workshop for example, when they switched from metal to plastic minis they said they were “forced” to increase prices “temporarily” to recover the cost of the new molds, but then Never decreased the price again, and instead just kept increasing it over time for fewer models.
Nothing to do with tariffs, just a reflection of higher development cost and, and that’s perfectly fine to an extent, the very core principle of capitalism.
Let’s please not discuss if capitalism is good. It’s just the way it is.
Let’s please not discuss if capitalism is good.
Brings up the “merits” of capitalism, but refuses to discuss the “merits” of capitalism.
It’s just the way it is.
Yeah, it’s because have this mentality that it’s this way.
Btw: capitalism is a plague on society and has done nothing but ruin the things we (consumers) hold dear, because capitalism stifles innovation and wrings whatever blood from a turnip it can.
We are here to discuss Nintendo’s prices, not the economical system itself. This would derail the conversation too much.
If you want to go down the rabbit hole, I suggest you open a new thread. However, keep in mind that the majority of Lemmy users will likely agree, given that this is a bit of a leftist echo chamber. And to make sure we’re on the same page: we ARE on the same page. Capitalism isn’t what we want, yet, it is what we currently have (and will have when Mario Cart will release for Switch 2).
That would only be true if you ignore every other part of the price calculation. For example because the numbers of sold consoles are much higher than in the past, more people are buying the games, leading to more income for the game development cost, leading to the same prize.
See? By ignoring every other influencing factor I can also argue the complete opposite of you.
We all know that defining a price for a product across markets, regions, continents is more complex than “development cost”, “inflation”, “greed”, or “NiNtEnDo”.
Factually, it has nothing to do with tariffs, and definitely has to do with cost and capitalism. Feel free to add what’s missing, but please be complete, as someone will likely argue differently because of something you forgot.
Yeah, that’s a basic supply and demand curve… Guess what happens when demand is high? There’s no reason to lower prices if you have high enough supply(digital copies are infinite). Your argument is completely invalid. If anything, it’s proof to them that they CAN charge more and SHOULD.
Thank you for explaining my point in more detail. They charge more because they can, correct.
Exactly. So then the number of sold units is only $$$ in their eyes, not a reason to be more efficient.
$80 was before the tariffs…
Okay, here’s a slightly hot take.
I’d rather the price go up and the games remain ad free and high quality (not you, pokemon, you can get fucked) than become enshittified with micro transactions, ads, etc
I don’t like it. But it’s much more acceptable to me
Sorry bro, you get all of the above. Price go up, micro-transactions increase, more ads, and games get worse. We’re already seeing it happen, most games are overpriced and not even finished when they come out these days, and yeah, we are seeing ads in games now, especially sports games, and it seems Every game has to have a battlepass or some shit these days.
You want good games without ads or micro BS? Buy indie, play old games, and wait for the AAA industry to collapse in on itself.
Okay, here’s a slightly hot take.
I’d rather the price go up and the games remain ad free and high quality (not you, pokemon, you can get fucked) than become enshittified with micro transactions, ads, etc
I don’t like it. But it’s much more acceptable to me
That’s absolutely a false dichotomy. In a world where games exist that are ad-free, high-quality and affordable, there’s absolutely no reason to believe any notion of high prices or in-game ads being a requirement for development. It’s just not true. Don’t fall for it.
Okay, fair enough. Just appreciating the lack of shit and (for something like an Animal Crossing or a BoTW quality Zelda game) I’m super happy to pay that much for a game I’ll sink hundreds of hours into, and I’d rather reward that price hike than any other form of monetization by them.
I’m real enraged by like 99% of things on the internet and in the world these days, but this pales in comparison to the rapid pace of enshittification I feel like I’ve had in virtually every other place in my life.
Still don’t love it.
But you don’t need either. Plenty of great games are cheaper and have none of that bullshit. Rimworld, Factorio?
The increased price is not the result of tariffs, neither for the games nor console. That’s pretty much confirmed by them costing the same amount (converted + sales tax) in Europe. The console is (was, before tariffs) fairly priced imo, it is comparable to the steam deck + dock.
Is 80$ Mario Kart price gouging? Eh. The edit maniac in the comments here is right that video games have become cheap, maybe even too cheap, and that a price increase at some point was inevitable. 60$ was set as the AAA price before the smartphone existed, and was not always profitable as we’ve seen with the recent lay-offs.
My own 2 cents: I’m glad some company broke that unspoken rule (we ignore skull and bones for obvious reasons), so big releases have more options in pricing, too long have we accepted 60$ games with 20$ DLC, I’m glad if this means devs can just charge 80$ for a full game. Oh, and it’s good for indie games too. People may actually buy the shorter games with worse graphics they wanted so badly a few months ago.
