14 DAY TRIAL // The big video game sales of last year are behind us. Steam delivered two big sales in the month of December alone, there were offers for console titles for both Black Friday and Christmas. Even Nintendo slashed some prices. Every big publisher and every small distribution service sought to capture the attention of gamers by slashing prices, adding coupons, and making it as easy as possible to spend.
I sure bought a few games, including the original Raptor and the first two Fallouts, mainly because I was nostalgic for titles from my childhood. I might not actually play some of them at all. Most gamers complain about having a backlog that only grows, especially during sales season. Epic and others are giving away games and still failing to get people to log into the service every day or week.
Companies want to sell and re-sell experiences, especially digitally. So sales proliferate. And when there are no service-wide reductions in price, it is still easy to find a small number of video games that can be picked up for less than their original price.
At the same time, the cost of buying a game is going up and most players do not seem ready for that to become their new reality. First-party PlayStation 5 titles are 70 dollars or Euros now, up from 60, and the same is happening for the Xbox Series X and S. On the PC, the situation is more mixed, but most AAA experiences are getting pricier overall. This does not take into account the constant effort to get gamers to pay more by marketing overstuffed special editions.
As the base price is higher, cuts, mostly temporary but sometimes permanent, arrive faster and are steeper than before. A big release like Gotham Knights, a game with a big marketing budget and solid pedigree, was offered with a 40% cut three weeks after the official release date. And it is not the only major title that went from 70 to around 40 dollars or Euro quickly.
The weirdest part is that publishers continue to promote the game as normal. Sure, Gotham got middling and even negative reviews. But Warner Bros. never said that maybe the initial price was set too high and that the drop better reflected the quality of the experience.
Plenty of developers, analysts, and others, highlight the many reasons that justify the push to 70. Modern major video games are more complex and offer more hours of gameplay than their predecessors. There are bigger teams to pay, inflation needs to be taken into account, and innovation is tied to having solid profits.
There are also plenty of reasons to criticize the decision, including the limited increase in purchasing power for most of the audience and the need to get as many people into video games as possible. But I think that the move to a higher core price point is linked to the increased prevalence of massive sales and the industry’s lack of composure when it comes to them.
The combination of the higher initial price for video games and more big sales over the course of a year creates a classic vicious cycle. Gamers are habituated to waiting, especially given the ever-increasing backlogs many are dealing with, while companies want to see massive sales during the first week and are already preparing for cuts after that. Both groups are unhappy with the approach and consequences.
The big problem is that short-term thinking is overtaking long-term planning. Nobody really thinks another massive crash is possible but a slowdown is certainly a possibility, especially if the overall worldwide economic situation worsens and disposable income falls.
One possible solution to these issues: companies should publicly drop the price increase to 70 dollars or Euro while also announcing that they are limiting the scope and frequency of their big sales. Give gamers a reason to pick up the titles they really want without waiting for cuts while also making it easier for them to make that purchase.
This grand bargain could keep video games affordable and deliver volume increases in some markets. It would also limit the public criticism that both platform holders and big publishers have been attracting since the price rise to 70 was first introduced. It could also help with the often charged attacks on developers who, in the eyes of fans, fail to deliver experiences that are worth the new price.
If there are fewer sales and a clearer policy about when and why price cuts happen, players will be freer to pick up the titles they really want, rather than consider what might go on sale and how long they have to wait for that to happen. I will pay full price for Midnight Suns on launch, rather than relegate it to the back of my mind while I play System Shock 2 after picking it up on sale.
But the best consequence of a more balanced approach would be to reduce the complexity of the entire ecosystem for all those involved. I, like many other gamers, have spent plenty of time looking for the best deal for a game or thinking whether it’s a better idea to buy something as a bundle and with a price cut when a DLC launches.
That time and mental energy are better used thinking about the actual video games rather than about the economic aspects surrounding them. It would also enhance trust between the various actors and create more stability for the entire market.
Is there a chance that big companies will work to both limit sales and reverse the current increase in video game prices? It seems unlikely. The industry is consolidating, big sharks are buying small fish and even Activision Blizzard is being acquired (although governments might intervene to stop that move).
These big entities are probably satisfied with the situation as it is and their institutional inertia will make it difficult to change approaches. As often happens in the video games industry, big changes will only arrive if the players themselves apply pressure.
So, try to only participate in a sale if there’s something there you really want and have the time to pay. Pick up a title for full price if it gets solid reviews from people you trust and is in a genre you love. And keep an eye on your backlog before investing in new video games that you might not actually play.