I get it, prices of games going up sucks but games rose to about $60 (cad) during the wii era. Put that into an inflation calculator and you end up with about $90 nowadays, it’s not really a price hike out of line with general inflation. The switch 2 pricing isn’t out of line with AAA PS5 games either ($80 for a digital copy has already been the case for a while there).

Games are not free to make and modern games have longer dev cycles and therefore cost more to make as well.

Consoles are also typically sold at a loss with the idea that software sales will make up for the loss. Were games to remain the same price the console would likely be significantly more expensive.

I get that consumer purchasing power is down due to wages not keeping up with inflation but sadly the reality is that if making a console and games for it are unprofitable then they’ll stop making them.

  • CrazyLikeGollum@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Definitely an unpopular opinion, though I don’t disagree with it.

    For an additional point of comparison, a brand new N64 cartridge back in 1996 would have been anywhere from $60 to $80. Which based on an inflation calculator would be slightly over $120 to $160 today.

    And games are more expensive than ever for studios to make and push to the market. Given that, I’m not surprised we have loot crates, micro transactions, and predatory dlc. A AAA game should have a baseline price closer to $200.

    • Dark Arc@social.packetloss.gg
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      1 day ago

      And games are more expensive than ever for studios to make and push to the market. Given that, I’m not surprised we have loot crates, micro transactions, and predatory dlc. A AAA game should have a baseline price closer to $200.

      Yeah … then there are people the won’t buy games for more than $20 (not necessarily because they can’t afford it but because “it’s just a game”) … which is just kinda crazy to me (and disrespectful to the amount of work that went into the game).