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I will admit: I’m in this picture.
Game developers have to eat, too, so a (!) price hike at some point was expected, the price for AAA games was set to 60$ before smart phones existed. They only stayed at 60 so long because gaming got much more popular in that time, driving sales. IF (!) this increase would allow developers to pay their employees more and eliminated the crunch culture, I’d have no problem with it.
But we know this is just corporate greed. Pay extra to own your game physically, pay extra to play your old games, join our subscription program. Oh, you’re in Europe and your wages kept up with inflation? Forget the 33%, you can afford a 50% price increase instead.
With the Japanese-only model being the singular exception, you’d think the direct was lead by 3 new faces just so Nintendo could put the blame on them when the thing doesn’t sell well due to the price.
Oh, and Skull and Bones was dog shit, of course everyone hated it’s ludicrous price point.
With the more robust tools developers have available now and the reduced need for optimization due to more powerful hardware games should be cheaper to produce, not more expensive. Especially if you use a cartoon art style like most Nintendo games.
As you alluded to, the developers will get exactly 0% of the profits from that price hike. Games today are very profitable at $60. The problem is that execs are eating into those profits before pissing the rest down to the developers. There is also a really shitty tech bro culture that many game studios have, decorating their studios with overpriced and expensive tat which should have been spent on employees.
I think a big part of it is that a lot of gaming companies keep wanting to make AAA gaming, but no one wants to pay for AAA gaming.
Mario Kart 8 was already a recycled game from the Wii U and it sold well. After it stopped selling copies, Nintendo sold more DLC with the Booster Course Pass.
You know the tariffs mean the Switch 2 may actually now cost $600, not $450, right?
You gotta pay the club membership fee before you can pay for event attendance.
Oh I know. Would suck to be American right now 😎.
I instead get to pay a converted 98$, 50% more than Xenoblade X or Brothership cost here…
Ah, my American is showing, assumed you were ‘one of us’ lol.
Apologies.
But uh yeah… we are completely fucked lol.
EDIT: I still can’t wrap my head around how basically every American Asmongold viewer right now must be tying themselves in even more mental pretzels to avoid comprehending how they voted for the guy that just made not only video games and hardware instantly 30% more expensive, but also basically everything else they need to buy/pay regularly to keep their ‘Being a Living Human Being’ battlepass going.
I just cannot grasp how stupid these idiots are, but there are somethingn like 100 million of them.
By odd coincidence you just named the most recent two games that I purchased.
Oh just wait until Nintendo shits out another half baked pokemon game that looks like a student project from 2005 and watch all the man children that think being obsessed with pokemon is a personality triat pay $90 for that shit.
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“Oooh, retro!”
What are “saleries?” Something to do with sales?
Celeries. One needs to eat.
Places where saled goods are saled. Like bakeries.
Me misspelling salaries.
When did VP Couch Fucker do game streaming?
Keep consuming and keep the enshitification machine working, you control everything around you with your wallet and your attention.
These companions took ahold of both and now you’re a slave.
A bit of an exaggeration. Your wallet speaks, sure. But I haven’t been to a lot of places in years, some even for decades and they’re still doing just fine. I didn’t buy any Nintendo console from the NES until I got a Wii paying half with a friend.
The last Ubisoft game I purchased was Cliffs over Dover.
Yes but consider:
A: Nintendo games are actually good, not a pile of crap
B: It is actually true that games have not been keeping up with inflation. Is the same reason why GTA 6 is waiting for launch. They really want to sell that shit at 100 USD or more
I haven’t pirated a game in over a decade, but…
sure, but that doesnt even mention the difference in quality and value that the pile of dogshit “pirate game” has compared to the latest innovative mario kart.
latest innovative mario kart.
This is literally the Cars videogame but with Nintetendo IP and Nintendo Proprietary TCP pos p2p online multiplayer.
I used to play that game for free with my friends at the local library 2 decades ago.
Genuine question: How is MarioKart 10 different from MarioKart 9? Or 7? Or 4?
I still haven’t gotten an answer to how BotW innovated open world except for a list of features that were already in other games.
Not played it but didn’t it just put them together well? Rather than specifically innovating too much on its own
I can agree on that, but I just don’t think touting that as being a major innovation that changed the face of gaming like many people do is appropriate.
I remeber seeing my lifelong, die hard Nintendo fan brother, play BotW.
After watching for about 30 minutes, I said something like ‘oh neat, its like an open world, version of a Zelda game, with more voice acting, open world item durability mechanics, and Garry’s Mod style physics/build nonsense!’
I meant it in earnest. I did think this was neat, though maybe the item durabilty values or mechanics could have been tweaked a bit, seems like you often spend a bunch of time just re-grinding for good weapons that break too fast, with no straightforward repair mechanic.
But he thought this was entirely an insult.
He rarely played non Nintendo games, hated online multiplayer and never played an open world survival craft game, had never played GMod, and seemed to actually think these were all revolutionary game design concepts.
Meanwhile I’d been a mostly PC gamer since like 2003, played too much GMod, DayZ (back when it was an Arma 2 mod), and had even written some fairly comprehensive game modes (mods, basically?) for GMod, and had… just in general played a much wider variety of games.
When he decided to finally get a gaming laptop, he found Black Mesa when it formally, fully released for $$$, and he entirely did not believe me when I said that I had actually chatted with some of their dev team before, waaaay back when Black Mesa was just an insane dream of a bunch of HL2 adjacent dorks, many of whom talked and argued on ModDB and the old Facepunch forums before Garry nuked them.
… He also did not believe me when I told him I actually met, and took a picture with Ashley Burch at PAX, back when she was just Ash from ‘Hey Ash Watcha Playin?’, waaay before she became the voice of Aloy, and she and her brother did panels at PAX.
Same with Jonathan Coulton, the guy who wrote the ending songs for Portal and Portal 2, which my brother now finally discovered in like … 2022? When he finally got a gaming laptop.
I had the pictures, from a decade ago at that point, but he was so convinced I was lying he wouldn’t even look at them.
Pretty much haha.
I have distinct memories of… actually having to look away when Alyx first gets sent through Kleiner’s teleport in the beginning of HL2…
Because my piece of crap eMachine could not handle the scene, when your view is centered on Alyx.
It would ctd every single time time, the 100% reliable work around was to look at the ground before the screen flashing/color inversion thing happens… I’m pretty sure my rig just could not handle that ‘negative’ effect on top of the … bloomy, glowing sparks/lightning from the teleporter, at the same time.
Other than only that scene in particular, the game ran well, lol.
unpopular opinion: the quality of Nintendo games are worth the cost of admission, and they know it. there are very few bad nintendo games.
super hype to play the new Mario kart for years like I did with 8
I have played a couple when someone has brought a switch over. They are ok but you can fuck off if you think I would pay £90 on it. Even £30 and I would look at something else.
More likely to get a steam deck instead. There are plenty of incredibly high quality games there that cost so much less. Just don’t buy games on their launch week to avoid the crap. Wait until it’s well reviewed and been out for a while.
that’s fair! i feel safe justifying my purchase when it comes to mario kart (I’ve purchased every one since the snes) and the already highly reviewed tears of the kingdom, so they’ll be getting my cash launch day lol
This isnt really on topic but what we wanted was a more realistic Sea of Thieves and Skull and Bones was like ship arena battles, it was bad.
It’s funny, because I actually enjoy the less realistic versions, like ship of fools. Void crew was fun and all, but didn’t tickle my biscuit enough. Sea of thieves was just sort of… boring. It took too long to get into the fun, and then the fun was over too quickly.
Look, if I have to pay $80 for Kirby Air Ride 2, I will pay $80 for Kirby Air Ride 2.
Or just go back and play all the games from the 90’s tag you missed when they first came out.
There is do much retro content, by the time I get to Switch 2 content, it’ll be retro too
Every time I tell myself I am not buying a Switch 2 because the games are too damn expensive and I already own a Legion Go for hand-held gaming, I remember that Kirby Air Riders will exist and I become the angry, arms crossed “WELL, FINE!” guy.
That said, City Trial mode or I riot.
City trial alone is the only thing that might convince me to buy a switch 2 if they have a decent sale on.
Otherwise I’m happy waiting a few years to buy a cheap one second hand.
what about piracy?
First time ever I might actually consider paying for a pirate solution back like the R4 days because someone is actually gonna need the funding to make proper homebrew that will keep up with Nintendo’s DRM, or sell mod chip services to keep up with Nintendo’s DRM. Switch revisions and OLED aren’t even software hackable, or at least no one has discovered any big unpatchable vulnerability like the launch Switch.
And no offense to the talented people who work on Switch hacking, but the CFW and homebrew is honestly pretty basic and lame because everyone has to keep constantly updating for firmware releases and dancing around Nintendo’s own zombified BSD system to coax things just to work.
Suddenly all that crap about team xecutor goes out the window when they offer an OS better than Nintendo, even if their intention was just to make a dedicated hack launcher.
Even tho mario kart is and probably will be an extremely fun game, its still such a fucking scam. Im gonna buy a switch 2 but to be fair i skipped the switch because i suspected at the release that there will be backwards compatibility and seems like i was right. Even tho i only have a gba and 3ds and then the switch 2 ill buy, i can basically play the entire handheld line of games that nintendo released. This was my tactic but im still dissapointed at the prices even tho i skipped a gen.
i suspected at the release that there will be backwards compatibility
I suspect that they will make you pay for the backwards (enhanced) compatibility.
To be fair, asking that much for Skull & Bones really is taking the piss…
At least Skull And Bones is a AAAA game smh my head
With the switch 2 coverage, this is something that bugs me quite a bit… Not the meme, Nintendo games, by comparison, are worth more than the slop that Ubisoft craps out. No matter how good a Ubisoft game could be, Nintendo has them beat in terms of quality.
Back to my point. The cost of games is insane. The price point for most video game systems is around $500 USD. Whether PS5, Xbox, switch, whatever, they’re all either at or near, $500.
You buy 6 games, and you’ve spent more in games than you did on your console. The fuck is this? We might as well go back to the days when you would buy a whole ass console that could only play a single (or small selection) of games like the Coleco Telstar.
I think they figured out that you make money from selling the add-ons, so they dipped the price of the console and jacked up the cost of all of the games so they could increase profits and shareholder value.
Oh wait.
Game consoles are sold at a loss. You are supposed to buy more games than the console costs.
Here is a nice little inflation chart I’ve assembled:
You people are upset about (analogy) gas being 5.31 a gallon when you should be upset that you don’t make enough to afford gas at 5.31 a gallon. You should make enough to afford a $450 switch 2, and the fact that you don’t is because your masters have been stealing from you for 30+ years. Or since forever, if you’re as woke as me.
NES
1985 $179 -> 2025 $528
Games $49.99 -> $147SNES
1991 $199 -> 2025 $464
Games $49.99 -> $116
Super Mario All-Stars $59.99 -> $140N64
1996 $199 -> 2025 $403
Games $59.99 -> $121GameCube
2001 $199 -> 2025 $355
Games $49.99 -> $89Gameboy
1989 $89.99 -> 2025 $230
Games $29.99 -> $76Gameboy Advance
2001 $99.99 -> 2025 $178
Games $34.99 -> $62Nintendo DS
2004 $149.99 -> 2025 $251
Games $29.99 -> $50Playstation 1
1995 $299 -> 2025 $622
Games $49.99 -> $104Playstation 2
2000 $299 -> 2025 $552
Games $49.99 -> $92X-Box
2001 $299 -> 2025 $535
Games $49.99 -> $89Sega Genesis
1989 $189 -> 2025 $483
Games $59.99 -> $153Sega Dreamcast
1999 $199 -> 2025 $380
Games $49.99 -> $95
Which is also why anyone who says consoles are better is straight clowning tbh
Has there been a better ass Creed game than Black flag?
the slop that Ubisoft craps out
I’d, uh, argue there are some exceptions, like the better asscreed games or the anno series.
Nintendo games, by comparison, are worth more than the slop that Ubisoft craps out
Agree, I grew up with Playstation up until the ps3. I have never owned a Nintendo console my whole life and the only Mario games I’ve tried is the O.G back then, but it’s clear to me that Nintendo put better effort into every bit of design of their IP release.
I know the Jazz scene would go nuts over a “Mario Kart Lick”, and I never played Mario Kart even once.
The only thing stopping me from owning their console is the lack of regional pricing.
Eh, there‘s some truth to either one. Game development is expensive and pricing hasn’t kept up with inflation ($60 in 2010 are almost $90 today). But also, games are ridiculously expensive at full price, especially in todays economy and especially if they’re as badly received as Skull and Bones, while Nintendo games are at the very least usually pretty decent.
I’d recommend voting with your wallet and only buying games on sale or used. Just wait a little. (Or pirate them, if you can live with not supporting the developers at all).
“games are ridiculously expensive at full price”
A board game with paper and plastic pieces can range from 12-45 dollars
People will go spend $20 at the movies for 1 night
Hell I’ll pay 100 if it’s a good game
I have 1200 hours in Overwatch. $60 (free now). I have paid 5 cents per hour to play it. I am completely happy with my purchase even though it’s free now.
If the game isn’t worth it, don’t get it. But to complain about it is ridiculous.
Some N64 games were $50-$60 dollars back in the 90’s
I feel like we are fortunate
Yea, I don’t generally disagree. Especially if you‘re someone who plays games for hundreds of hours, instead of dozens.
But $100 is still a lot of money for a lot of people. I‘d have to save up for months for that (I’m a trainee and have less than 1000€ per month for rent, food, internet, gas, etc.), so I rather wait until I can get games cheaper.
I agree with this. I have quite a few games I paid 60 dollars for that per hour entertainment makes it insanely cheap. Smaller cheaper indie games are even cheaper per hour.
It does suck though paying full price for something that will not fulfill that. I bought star wars outlaws or whatever for half price. I knew it wasn’t good but man it was worse than I expected. Not with the price to me even though I probably played 10 hours or so. I read some reviews but I should’ve read more.
I think a lot of the problem is that they cheap out to maximize profit.
They could spend 1 million dollars and make a decent game for $70.
Or
They could spend 2 million and make an amazing game for $140.
But the price of the video game has been locked around 60-70 for years.
Even if you made star wars outlaws just a little better it’s not going to sell that much more.
Looks like it’s already at least 50% off
You can’t spend 2 million, sell for $70, then expect your game to go on sale anytime soon.
Spending 1 million, and selling a ton at $70 or even $35. Turns a profit.
TL;DR: We’d get better games if we were willing to spend more
Yes, but the difference is that wages have not significantly gone up since then apart from minimum wage in a few states. That is the difference. People are literally poorer because of the massively increased wealth inequality coming from employers shoving down wages while making yearly record profits…
If peoples’ purchasing power is more or less the same, factoring in inflation to game prices would result in a ton of people simply not being able to buy “luxury goods” like video games.
Game dev salaries have increased roughly in line with inflation though, so development time still costs the studio the same as 15 years ago, while AAA game prices are only now starting to surpass the $70 mark with games not generally surpassing the $60 mark until 2020.
It’s a wonder, they haven’t increased to prices any sooner, as much as I‘d like them staying where they were.
And again: if you don’t like the prices, vote with your wallet, buy used or on sale or don’t pay at all.
I would like to see the stats on that. A lot of times people who are in the industry or know someone in it see their wages and others’ wages going up and say “wages went up with inflation” where the starting wage or the wage normalized to seniority level actually hasn’t changed much at all. For example, in engineering like electriical (outside of silicon valley in the US which has its own economical wage ecosystem) has had entry level positions that have gone up around 20% since the 2008 while inflation has gone up almost 50% since 2008 and productivity has skyrocketed with CAD advancements.
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