The reason there's less money in making games today is because there's literally less money in making games today (not counting mobile F2P). $59.99 for ever always was not sustainable.
"But what about wages? what about cost-of-living?" Yeah those haven't kept up with inflation but you know what has? Concert tickets, movie tickets, netflix subs.
Why must games and games alone subsidize mass entertainment?
"But people don't have money for games" They have money for concert tickets?
There's albums you could listen to, videos of bands you could watch, DVDs of old movies you could watch too. But for the premium relevant current content these other industries have kept pace with the market, so why not games?
I'm probably not quite the ideal person to ask, I mostly watch older stuff and have recently purchased games (Schedule I and a bunch of boosters for Universus), and I don't have a Netflix account. Most of the 80CAD price point games just don't interest me. The last one of those I bought was
I think the inelasticity of game prices shows how much margin exists for many consumer goods and that price increases in response to inflation are often just about defending that margin, not remaining solvent or viable. Consumer bases who won't accept it aren't subjected to it.
If by industry you mean the rank-and-file devs, I don't believe they should either. I also don't believe that the higher price for games will result in more dev jobs with better pay. The issue isn't *solely* consumers unwilling to pay the price for something they can't afford.
I mean the entire game industry, if we accept that games should increase in price slower than the rate of inflation and slower than other comparable industries then we're decreasing the total value of games. We can argue how much of that pie goes to devs but we all suffer when the pie is smaller.
That's not what I'm saying. They should go up. They should have better value. The industry should be more sustainable. But I think implying people are acting entitled for being unable to afford more expensive games when EVERYTHING is more expensive and wages do not go up is misguided.
The audience isn't the one hording the wealth. Their inability or unwillingness to purchase $80 games is not bc they're entitled, and it's not what's causing the unsustainability. Just like everything else rn: It's wealth inequality due to the investor class siphoning value from EVERYWHERE.
With inflation Sega CD games were like $300 and some of the earlier Atari age consoles were like $800-2000 but we're not ready to have that conversation
There's no point in having that conversation because people don't have more money to buy games. If you raise prices people will just buy fewer games with the money they have. Their budget isn't going to go up any more than ours.
Only rich kids could afford to buy games for those prices back in the day. Steam sales and the like democratized games for everyone. If you want to go back to the bad old days expect software piracy to make a major comeback.
I didn't say anything about game quality. Great games are not worth a whole lot if no one except those with rich parents can afford to play them. I question your grasp if you think most people (especially around the world) could afford these prices.
108 and the entire game was on the cart. 108 and you didn't have to pay 100 dollars to *play online* aka use all the games features. 100 dollars without inflation, recession. And rising costs of EVERYTHING ELSE all at the same time.
Theres also game upgrade costs, Amiibo, collectors editions, etc
Now none of those last things are a part of the video games necessarily, but ARE a part of how they have sold more and make more by part and piecing content separately. Now you add 20 dollars to all of that and frankly, games are incredibly expensive.
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Why must games and games alone subsidize mass entertainment?
"But people don't have money for games" They have money for concert tickets?
Netflix still has no real competitor for breadth and UX; other services are things you ADD to your Netflix sub.
Concert tickets are a monopoly.
Movies lack that market capture but also attendance is way down
Theres also game upgrade costs, Amiibo, collectors editions, etc