2022 Game prices going up

[Zivouhr]

When I was younger, I would buy new games all the time at full price. Now that I'm older and can afford a lot more, I rather save more money for other things and the future as too many games these days are unpolished, unfinished or broken and not worth investing full price into. Especially at nearly $100 each game almost in 2023. Forget that, if the game isn't an absolute must have game, I don't mind waiting.

It's important to remember that gamers don't have to save any Developer or Publisher from going out of business, as some kind of obligation as a gamer. That's the game team's problem and challenge to make polished, excellent games worth spending the $60 to $75+ on. Ubisoft taught a lot of people with Assassin Creed Unity, how releasing an unpolished, broken game can hurt trust in big publishers. I still haven't bought that game even when it was $4.99.

The PSN playstation store has given me a new perspective though. The sales of 2020, 2021, and 2022 have been insane for games I decided to wait on and ended up buying new digitally for $4.99 and under. I keep thinking how underwhelming many of them are, and thinking these games really aren't worth full price for anyway.

It's fun now to wait for price drops on games that are of interest, but not absolute must-play right now games. I have so many video games to play, and not enough spare time to play them anyway, so that also helps.

[R3P0]

Originally Posted by Mavrick

Premium is at a disadvantage to gamepass since it doesn’t release new games Day and date with retail.

I have to admit though I’ve stopped buying games on release unless I’ve had store credit in my wallet that brings the price below rrp.

I’ve been dying to play Jedi Survivor but I just can’t justify £70. Hopefully it’ll be on sale in a month or two and will have had a patch or two.

Jedi Survivor already on sale for 60

[Mavrick]

Is that on the store? I’ll have to see what wallet offers are available. Can usually get £60 credit for around £54 cash so might be worth looking at thanks

[Blu Lemmy]

Jedi Survivor is the first release date game I've picked up in around 12 months.

[dyne]

Amazon has had a $10 "coupon" for the last couple of days.

[emailking]

Fewer sales doesn't mean less revenue. The price increase can lead to more revenue. That's why you increase prices knowing it will lead to fewer sales.

[supersix4]

Originally Posted by emailking

Fewer sales doesn't mean less revenue. The price increase can lead to more revenue. That's why you increase prices knowing it will lead to fewer sales.

in the end a good game is a good game and a bad game is a bad game.


Make a good product 39.99, 59.99 or 100.99 and people will buy it if its that good.

Make a crap game or a game that quickly gets embarrassed coughs Battlefield 2042 and people won't play it for free on EA Play

[Lum]

On one hand, modern consoles really are that powerful. It costs a whole lot to take advantage of the visuals and physics possible today.

But with massive budgets, you can't afford risks. Everything has to be made by committee to sell to the masses.

[supersix4]

Originally Posted by Lum

But with massive budgets, you can't afford risks. Everything has to be made by committee to sell to the masses.

Idk about that.

Take Callisto protocol with their new combat dodge system that's a 200+m dollar AAA title and it was an epic fail. I think devs try new things all the time for the sake of being different or claiming somethings new.

Playing its safe and giving people known structures and setups would honestly be best when paired with increased visuals / presentation.

Take COD/BF any AAA shooter they have the data and designs to just reskin what already proved perfect and they don't they fumble around with things and try to make it different and end up worse overall.

[VictoryAtNight]

In comments this past weekend, Capcom president Haruhiro Tsujimoto asserted that video game prices are too low, pointing to the massive increase in development costs and how game prices haven’t risen at the same rate. He suggested that increasing the price of games would be a “healthy option” for the industry.

It was only a year ago that the era of $70 video games really began, as numerous “AAA” releases—like Gotham Knights and God of War Ragnarök—began selling for $10 more than what players had come to expect. Now in 2023, around half of AAA games from large publishers have adopted the new $70 price point. Yet Capcom is one of the few publishers that’s abstained from raising prices thus far. It has continued to sell new games, like Street Fighter 6, at $60 instead of $70. But that might be changing.

https://kotaku.com/capcom-president-...l-4-1850874279


My reaction after reading Tsujimoto's comments.

[NARMAK]

Originally Posted by VictoryAtNight

https://kotaku.com/capcom-president-...l-4-1850874279


My reaction after reading Tsujimoto's comments.

On one hand, if Capcom is keeping prices at $60 when others raised them to the new so called MSRP, then they can raise them up with little backlash in line with everybody else. If however they think $70 is too low, well, is there a Hunger Games or SAW style show we can shove all these execs on.

If they all had their way and be in no doubt about it, its coming very soon to consoles. They will have artificially high pricing on all digital games locked near to the MSRPs forever, until they decide to be "benevolent" for the peasants that want to play.

I loved gaming. I still want to. It's just become too hard to love something that's now fully seeping in more and more poison as a consumer.

[dyne]

They’re pricing RE4 on iOS at $60.

The industry raising prices isn’t going to accomplish what they want it to. It’ll just push folks towards the subscription services. What they need to do is move more towards A-AAA to offset costs. Expectations from consumers need to change.

[Hatter]

I have a hard time taking gamer complaints seriously when these same gamers happily pay more for "deluxe" editions and extra just to play a few days "early" (I put early in quotes because companies literally do this to eek more money out of consumers They know damn well there's no actual reason for early access other than they can get away with it).

Consumers did this to themselves by having no will power.

[dyne]

Originally Posted by Hatter

I have a hard time taking gamer complaints seriously when these same gamers happily pay more for "deluxe" editions and extra just to play a few days "early" (I put early in quotes because companies literally do this to eek more money out of consumers They know damn well there's no actual reason for early access other than they can get away with it).

SOME Consumers did this to everybody by having no will power.

Don't speak for everybody.

[NARMAK]

Originally Posted by Hatter

I have a hard time taking gamer complaints seriously when these same gamers happily pay more for "deluxe" editions and extra just to play a few days "early" (I put early in quotes because companies literally do this to eek more money out of consumers They know damn well there's no actual reason for early access other than they can get away with it).

Consumers did this to themselves by having no will power.

I agree with the sentiment but also have to side with Dyne correcting you a little. Most consumers unfortunately seem to fall into that category though it seems offering these corporations financial incentive.

Honestly, i think the human race hits new lows in many 5hings everyday but then again, maybe we've always been this dumb as a species and the access to social media, internet etc. has just made it easier to see.

I wouldn't class myself as a genius, but even i can see when we're being had all over but it seems the majority are happy to gripe for a bit then pony up the money. It's why corporations don't take any protests being made verbally serious at all. There's never any action being used to back it up by consumers.

Companies literally rely on the income from consumers to stay actively afloat in 95% of the case, but because consumers don't take meaningful stands, then this crap will continue to happen.

I said it before, but i genuinely hope that UE5 and other game engines making it easier and easier to make games, almost to the point where like Square or similar let you design your own website without worrying about coding etc. because it's done by the programme, allow aspiring devs and creative to craft AAA style worlds and embarrass these super expensive productions. There's signs out there already of such ambition.

[heyadol]

Originally Posted by dyne

They’re pricing RE4 on iOS at $60.

The industry raising prices isn’t going to accomplish what they want it to. It’ll just push folks towards the subscription services. What they need to do is move more towards A-AAA to offset costs. Expectations from consumers need to change.

I also noticed RE Village is $30 for iOS/iPadOS, and $30 for MacOS; RE4 is a universal purchase (iPhone 15 Pro, M1 iPads, M series Macs) for $60, so it works out the same as buying the mobile and desktop versions.

[Zivouhr]

When I see a game I'm a huge fan of the concept for, I'll pay full price to support the game and ideas of the developer/publisher.

Sadly, that's not as often as in the past, and we've kind of hit a point on PS5 where we're getting a lot of "more of the same" kind of games with tons of sequels and similar themes/gameplay over and over but with a different theme.

After getting burnt with Cyberpunk 2077 in 2020, I've cut back a lot on buying games at full price if they're not must-have games. I did get a full refund from CDPR for that game, and they let me keep it too. That was something I didn't expect. I hardly ever play it though. That launch really soured my enthusiasm for the game, knowing that is what they were hyping up all those years before release.

GTA6 in 2025 probably, I might wait on that one if it looks just okay. We'll see what they offer. If it looks good, and is offline playable, I'll consider it.

Honestly, not much I'm looking forward to anymore with PS5. Spider-Man 2, I'll actually go ahead and pay full price 69.99 on that one. It looks fun and has enough new ideas to have my interest at launch.

I support more indie developers more often, with simulation PS5 games (usually driving themed) at full price, which is usually 29.99 to 49.99.

Games I don't need to play day one, I'll usually wait till they hit 19.99. I'm so glad I waited on Saints Row PS5. The map is nice, but I can't get into that game's style. I've always waited for major price drops on that series and glad every time that I did.

Ubisoft has Star Wars Outlaws I'll probably buy full price day one in 2024.
But Avatar Frontiers being FPS view, not a good move IMO and I'll wait till that 69.99 game is 19.99. It looks decent otherwise, but not a FPS fan.

Dying Light Deluxe version, I got that for 8.99 digitally on sale, and so glad I waited all that time. Not my kind of game. The city feels like a town, with those very narrow streets and small range. The DLC rural map, the zombies run, so that is even worse.

From 2021 to 2023, I've bought about 40 games at 1.00 to $9.99 digitally on PSN with those insanely good store sales for games I was interested in, but didn't need to buy day 1.

NFS Unbound, I paid $19.99 for. Good deal only months after the 69.99 retail price dropped.

I used to feel responsible to keep these developers in business, but the heck with that these days. I'll let those who love these games more buy them on day 1 and pay full price. I'll wait for price drops most times, as I have more hobbies to invest in besides gaming too, nevermind cost of living bills.

[JurassicBD]

During the PS3 gen (my return to gaming after having to quit in the mid 90's to focus on college), I bought 2-3 games per month, some being repurchases of GOT editions and the like. By the end of the PS4 gen, that was down to 1 game per month at best, as I just couldn't justify paying the rising premium for games that released untested, if not unfinished or incomplete as a matter of SOP. To date I've only invested in 2 PS5 games, 1 because it was also an upgraded edition and on sale at BF, the other an upgrade of my very favorite game franchise.

It's not just that the prices are way too high, it's that I've lost ALL respect for the gaming industry: I can't muster any sympathy for an industry that can afford to routinely spend millions on games that are just junked and never released. Such illustrates just how wasteful and mismanaged the industry has become, compounded by how it exploits consumers as free beta-testers. Then the way they deliberately withhold parts of the game, to squeeze even more money out of our wallets, as if paying these absurd day one prices still isn't enough for them to give a buyer everything.


Of course, underproducing physical copies and essentially eliminating market competition of their product forces people who value a dollar to pay the full premium for something they can genuinely own, or impatiently pay for something they can't, which digital is never out of stock and can even be sold at a hefty discount direct to the consumer for more profit than through traditional retail models even at full price, especially when they know that digital version will never change hands, it'll never transfer to another player whom they didn't get any money from whatsoever. Though, from what I've seen, it's mostly lower-profile and older games with greatly reduced demand that seem to get the kind of discounting that would make faux ownership appealing to someone like me. I'd buy something digitally for 10-15 bucks, because I'd lose that much reselling it, if I didn't like the game as much as the advertising suggests. But if I think I'll like the game enough to play through multiple times, I'd still rather pay $30-$35 for a physical copy over 10-15 for vaporware. $50-$60 is completely out of the question for my wallet though. IF they need to charge more to pay for their excesses, mismanagement, and unnecessary advertising, it's because fewer consumers are buying their product due to already high prices and thus should prove the need to return to more affordable pricing and fair market competition (sell more for less, rather than less for more, then the consumer can even better justify paying more for DLC or passes). Though, in this case, it sounds like pure spin from Capcom just trying to justify more greed.