AAA games moving to $70 base pricepoint? Reasonable or Greedy?

I saw MS announced its first-party AAA games are moving up to $70 starting in 2023.

The real question becomes is this a reasonable move given the amount of time that has passed since the previous increase, and the currenct costs of developing these games?

Or how does someone square the absolutely insane profitability games have at $60 right now. Does that extra $10 scream "give me more!", or is it reflective of smart RoI calculations and smart cost controls?

I think you could make arguements both ways. The amount of gamers has exploded since the 90's so the market is awash with potential buyers. In additional the DLC, MTX, and post launch revenue generation is light years from what it was.

I tend to lean towards this being an unnecessary price hike given all the information (and a multi-billion dollar deal with Activision-Blizzard in the works)

$10 isnt really breaking the bank for anyone, and this really only applies to AAA games, but overall the corporate speech on this isnt really reading the room well.

Not gonna buy a single game for $70 or 70€
Also that extra $10 could be a large amount of money for some countries

I think the last big game I bought at launch for full price was Portal 2.

There is such a vast library of amazing games I've never played, and tons of those are years old and dirt cheap on Steam sales.

Heck, my favorite game besides PoE I played last year was free on Epic games, Pray.

As much as people talk about how bad a lot of games have gotten, other than the graphics, I'd rather just play old games, or some small indie game.

I can easily see myself paying $90 for a supporter pack for a game I've played over half a decade, I can't see myself paying $70 for some new AAA game.

Its interesting to see other perspectives.

I mean lately if you wait 6 months or so, there typically are some pretty steep discounts. Also, for the non-AAA games, damn there are some great titles like Cult of the Lamb. So I don't know how this will land. If you train people to wait for the discounts or move away from AAA full cost games, at some point they will. Fomo is a real thing though, and people dont want to wait or feel like they aren't included on what's currently happening.

Me personally, I could justify all the way up to $99.99, given how its packaged. (Season Pass, Battle Pass, DLC, MTX), but admittedly price isnt a huge factor in my decision making here. Like I wouldnt disqualify a purchase on pricepoint alone.

*criesinAustralian* $70US is currently $104 AU.

Most Triple A titles here launch physically at about $100 and digitally closer to $125. And then there are the hilarious 'premium' editions that can clear 200.

I am apt to buy a 'niche' Double A game for full price ($70-90 AU) over a typical Triple A to show my support and send a tiny message to the devs that someone (outside of Japan) likes their game enough to pay full price for it.

Last Triple A I paid full price for was Elden Ring and that was only after being convinced post-release that the Martin/FromSoft collab wasn't pure hype and gimmick. Before that, the Ps5 Demon's Souls remake for which I would have bought the console were it not for the infamous shortage (which I eventually barely touched because it changed a little too much from the original for my likes). But typically, I'll wait for ridiculous PSN sales.

I am all but done with physical purchases due to physical space limitation and convenience. I might see a bargain at my local shop but chances are I'll double dip when I see it even cheaper on a PSN sale. For example, Fallen Order: got it for roughly 50% off physically, played it a bit and liked what I played but then got distracted -- and as I noted in the other off topic thread about gaming, I nabbed it for 10 bucks AU (so about 7 US) digitally so I wouldn't have to swap discs (No Man's Sky day one release disc lives in my Ps5, period).

Generally if a Triple A I've been eyeing for a while hits 50% off digitally I'll consider it (Tsushima for example). But I know my tastes and proclivities: I have God Of War Pre-Ragnarok sitting on there and still haven't touched it. Same with Horizon Zero Dawn. Spider Man. Great games, but not my particular flavour of compulsion.

And just to prove that point I'm off to play an indie game I bought for $5 on steam.

The price of everything else goes up; games aren’t special.

I'd say greedy, including the fact that most of those AAA games have lootboxes or other additional means to get money out of you. To not even mention how bad their quality is getting with each new release. Should they still be called AAA games?

Personally, I never buy full prices games; with the exception of some indie titles and other interesting AA games. As an exclusive PC gamer there are so many sales and bundles that there's practically no excuse to pay even 30 dollars for a game.

The whole AAA games thing is a scheme to pull money out of suckers. But hey, everyone picks their own poison so whatever.

If you followed the news a bit you would know central banks printed a lot of dollars/euros, making them less valuable, increasing production costs of pretty much anything.

Will I pay 70 bucks? Hell no, you can get games for way cheaper. Just need to know when and where.

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Reinhart wrote:

If you followed the news a bit you would know central banks printed a lot of dollars/euros, making them less valuable, increasing production costs of pretty much anything.

Will I pay 70 bucks? Hell no, you can get games for way cheaper. Just need to know when and where.

Yes, no one is disputing inflation or economic issues over the last 30 years since prices saw the last sorta universal jump.

The argument here is the record profits being being posted because the gaming market is well north of 200+ million customers in the US alone. There were only 250 million people in the entire US in 1990, now that's basically the video game market. That's crazy. Not to mention the global reach, digital storefronts, and proliferating live service DLC, MTX, and so on.

How do you justify "needing" a price hike given the profitability data on current games?

$70, and another $30 for a paid dlc, and another $x for more content patches which should be already included in the $70 game.
But yep the gaming industry is just extremely these days. Hard to ask for such a high price for a unpolished and unfinished game in first place. Cause thats also a thing with most games these days.