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Video games don’t have to be this expensive.
Gamers have always understood that premium games come with a premium cost. For the longest time, that’s hovered around the $70/£60 mark. But in a year where hardware prices have gone crazy, are games going to become even more expensive too?
Nintendo is often the publisher to set new premium prices and was the first to take the blow in the US, pricing the Nintendo Switch 2 Editions of its most popular titles – like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Mario Kart World – at $79.99. Now, the upcoming Grand Theft Auto 6 has taken the plunge, also priced at $79.99 for console gamers in the US.
This leaves me with two questions: is this the new normal, and if so, will gamers accept it?
Unfortunately, I think that first question already has its answer. If the people want a game badly enough, they’ll pay nearly any price. In recent years paying a little extra to get “early access” to a premium game a few days in advance has become the norm. If you were excited about Forza Horizon 6, Halo: Campaign Evolved, or 007: First Light, you could pre-order the top-tier digital edition and play the game before anyone else.
FOMO is a powerful motivator too. GTA 6’s standard price is $80, but the Ultimate Edition is $100, and being pre-ordered at a higher rate than the cheaper version of the game. The Ultimate Edition packs in two weapons, five vehicles, several in-game businesses, in addition to missions and cosmetics that can only be obtained by parting ways with $100 instead of $80. Do you really want to feel left behind when you see friends and streamers with cooler gear than you? Of course not, and that’s exactly why FOMO is so powerful.
Even if game prices rise, people will still find a way to buy the games they want to play most. That’ll remain true as long as those people already have the hardware they need to play the game. RAM and other components have skyrocketed in price in the last year, leading the newly launched Steam Machine to retail for over $1,000, while both Sony and Microsoft have raised the prices of their PlayStation and Xbox line of systems in 2026.
سەرچاوەی فەرمی بە زمانی ئینگلیزی: https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/is-80-the-new-normal-for-video-games/
