fujishig

We need GatorDeb in here to break out her excel sheet and do cost per minute of gameplay just to make sure...

Mike86

I mean.. going by your logic the only differences are that Super Mario 3D World is two years newer (released in 2013 versus 2011) and the Switch edition adds the Bowser’s Fury content.

Zelda games are pretty expansive too, and I’m sure Skyward Sword is no different. You really seem to have an axe to grind with Nintendo over this game. Just don’t buy it.

I've read that Skyward Sword was a lesser received Zelda game (never played it personally). Supposedly a lot of it was down to the motion controls. Maybe the Switch version will improve that.

Decker

That's fair and consistent with what you always post. Personally I wouldn't have spent $60 on just Mario Galaxy but was happy to spend $60 on the collection and thought that was a fair price point. I rolled my eyes at those who complained that Galaxy 2 wasn't also included.

Out of curiosity, strictly hypothetically, if they released a AAA new game, let's say a sequel to Mario Odyssey or Breath of the Wild and announced that they were going to charge a special $80 price for the base game, just because they could and knew the demand was there, would you still stand by their pricing model?

We see that video game companies adhere to unwritten rules in pricing, just like movie theaters don't charge more for highly anticipated blockbusters even though they theoretically could. No one says that they have to of course. The only hits they would take are in the court of public opinion and maybe in total sales. I think it's more the fear of a negative backlash that keeps them from pushing the envelope too far rather than a dollar and cents analysis of projected sales numbers at every potential price point. That's why I am happy to see negative press with this Skyward Sword price point and why I am dismayed when I see it still selling well at what I and others feel is an inflated price.

The Questyen

I just paid $80 for Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart and Resident Evil Village (edit: forgot this was $70) so yes I'd pay $80 for any new game I'm really interested in.

I think game prices are too low and the devaluing of videogames is bad for the industry and the reason why you see alot of these remasters that are not a huge risk for publishers. Steam sales are really what started the trend and now everyone just waits for games to go on sale instead of buying the games they're interested in when they first come out. The publisher really only cares about the sales number during the first month so if you wait for every game you're interested in to go on sale before buying then don't be angry when they stop making the games you're interested in or start filling them with microtransactions.

fujishig

I don't know. I'm not a fan of the increase in price for next generation games because even though there's increased cost, the big guys (who are doing the raising of prices) are still raking in money because of volume, and the ones that really suffer are the marginal games who in comparison aren't valued that way. Also, I kind of see it as their own fault for dropping prices so quickly... maybe price games a little lower but keep them at that price and retrain your fanbase not to wait a month for a clearance sale that we are all certain will happen. Otherwise it feels to me like you're just milking your loyal fanbase and screwing them over.

The Questyen

I don't agree with this. Indie/smaller games have never been more valued or appreciated. Some of the most popular mainstream games out there are these smaller games like Among Us, Hades, Untitled Goose Game, etc. Lower price points are perfect for these games because they are not costing $100 million dollars to make like your AAA games are. The cost of making AAA games has increased tenfold compared to the price increases so studios are far less likely to throw away $100 million dollars on a new property or new idea and will instead take the safe bet of another sequel or spend less money on a remaster.

fujishig

Sure, I should have clarified. I think the much cheaper indy titles, especially those that don't need a retail release, are fine (although there are SO many coming out that I have no idea how you stand out in the eshop, psn, or xbox stores). I'm saying if you raise the price of all games to say 70 bucks, that's 10 bucks less per game someone has to spend, and if they budget that, that means they pick up less games. The Maddens and NBA 2ks and CODs are going to still be bought, so the games that come out in retail that aren't tiny indy games but also aren't the AAA titles are going to suffer or people are going to wait, or whatever. Those are usually the "new ideas" games that fail.

This is only anecdotal, but I bought a LOT more games at launch back when I had Best Buy GCU than I did after that expired. I tried a lot of stuff that I would now just wait for a sale on.

Decker

^ All next gen games are going to be $70, so that should be the standard going forward. That said RE8 is $59.99 for the standard edition for either the PS4 or the PS5 version. If you paid $70 it should have been for the Deluxe Edition instead. I know this as I just put one of my last GCU pre-orders down on this game + Steelbook for $48.

spainlinx0

This nonsense about devaluing games is driving me nuts. Games don’t need to go up in price. Game companies are making more money than ever. Yes, development costs have risen, but they are more than offset by the much larger user base, and the much lower distribution costs, especially with digital.

This doesn’t even include the massive amounts of money they are making for cosmetics, battle passes, DLC, etc. You may be fine paying $80, but don’t come in here and say they need to raise prices to cover costs. They don’t.

PerryD

Yeah, back in the olden days of cartridges, most of the cost of the game was in the physical cartridge themselves. In Nintendo's case with the NES/SNES/N64, they also were the only ones allowed to approve and manufacture games, and would require up front payments of somewhere around $30 per game in large cartridge contracts, not even accounting for what they charged for their development kits.

The Questyen

Games cost like 100 times more to make then they did in the NES days.

Mike86

I don’t see where people get off on complaining about game prices honestly. The price of games has stayed the same for a long time and in some cases gone down (cartridges for SNES and N64 were more).

For about as long as I remember being younger games were around $50. They’ve been $60 since like what 360/PS3 era, and are only now going up with the new generation.

I get it that no one wants to pay more, but really game pricing hasn’t changed that much at all for a long time and could be way more than it is.

fujishig

We had this discussion before, but it's not about inflation.

I would be fine if increasing the price of games
a) Meant they were going to stop double dipping with DLC/subscriptions/etc.
b) Meant that they would allocate the funds to stuff like getting rid of crunch or paying the developers/people working on the game

But with $60 prices, the AAA games were raking in the money, way more than the NES days. The extra 10 bucks is presumably just going into their pockets and they aren't going to give up DLC and the like because of it. You can argue that some AAA games failed miserably, and all an extra 10 bucks would've done is make people regret the purchase any more.

$60 is not devaluing games, what's devaluing games is them reducing prices a few weeks after release (I'm looking at you, Ubisoft). It's ironic we're talking about this in a Nintendo thread where they intentionally don't devalue games and people are complaining about the pricing of their rereleases because they're too high.

spainlinx0

You people forget the explosion of the market. They have a MUCH larger customer base now than in the SNES days. This is NOT to cover costs, or else the gaming companies wouldn't be making record profits right now. Games do NOT need to go up in price just because it costs more to make them. They are also selling their games to a much wider audience, and they have many more sources of revenue.

Prices don't have to go up, "just because."

If in the old days I sold 500k copies of something at $80, but now I can sell 20 million copies at $60, and I also don't have to pay for the manufacturing of cartridges, it really doesn't matter that development costs have gone up significantly, because revenue and profits have also skyrocketed due to the much larger number of buyers.

milo bloom

We have had one of these game prices discussions before and I'm still on the side of understanding that AAA games should technically be higher, but that should definitely include all the DLC and such, but the flip side means that remasters/compilations/indie games should be much lower.

And I would especially want that extra money for AAA titles going to the actual workers so they don't have to do so much crunch time, or at least get paid better for it.

slop101

100%!
BUT, they're corporations, and it doesn't matter if they made a TON of money last quarter, they have to make even more the next quarter - gotta keep stock-holders happy!

Still, I wonder how many more units they'd move if they didn't price old games so exorbitantly.

fujishig

The funny thing is, especially considering the site we're on: Everyone would balk if the cost of DVDs, Blu Rays, and digital titles increased to like 40 bucks a piece (for everyday prices) because movie budgets have gone way up. Heck, we balk at the price of movie tickets and delight in stuff like moviepass and AMC + (or whatever it's called, it's been so long I can't even remember!)

The only reason prices went up for next gen is because they had a built in excuse to get away with it (hey, next gen!) and people still bought it (they tried it last gen and people balked). The only reason Nintendo prices things the way they do is because... people still buy them. So it comes back around to vote with your wallet.

milo bloom

Do you remember how VHS prices were initially $90-100 a piece? Because they were only being sold to rental stores. They came down for direct customer sell through and the studios didn’t want to give that up.

Games could definitely benefit from different pricing tiers, there’s a wide range of effort and work needed.

tanman

And why exactly is it that people can't complain about Nintendo selling a Wii game in 2021 for $60? At least one good thing about social media and the internet is that it does give people more of a voice. Companies have listened to the internet mob before. We're all used to paying a "Nintendo tax" and we all know that Nintendo games hold they're value and don't drop in price as much. And we're all used to them reaching, especially with this generation and them re-releasing WiiU games. But this is just too much. Releasing a game that's two generations old with virtually zero improvements for full retail price is just absurd. That's just entirely lazy and stingy on their part and I'm glad they're getting push back for it.

fujishig

People can complain, but the key is, just don't buy it. If you complain and then buy it (at full price) anyway, nothing's going to change.

spainlinx0

I agree with both, but one person not buying it doesn't change much. If people complaining opens other people's eyes, and that causes them not to buy it, that's when companies may start to notice. That's why I have no problem with people giving Nintendo shit about it.

Mike86

I think if people weren’t paying the price these types of releases would either slow or they maybe would release cheaper. That’s not the case though so they must do well enough.

tanman

Like I said previously this is the laziest biggest reach money grab that Nintendo has pulled. Usually people are okay with paying more for Nintendo games and nostalgia because there is value there. Not with a straight up port of a Wii game selling for MORE then it did originally. They've never tried to do this before. Have zero added benefit on a game two generations old.

And I'm saying this as a huge Nintendo fan. I bought all the classic systems and the Game and Watch Mario anniversary system. That was definitely overpriced as well but again there's quite a bit of value (yes mostly nostalgic) there even for what the price is. The SS port is just lazy and cheap and not what Nintendo usually does.

Adam Tyner

E Unit

OLED! Yes! 720p....what??