Your games might become a little bit more expensive after next-gen consoles are released. A few weeks ago, 2K Games announced that NBA 2k21 will cost $70 for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. And as expected, the decision wasn’t the most welcomed one in the gaming industry. If one of the major publishers does decide to raise the prices of their games, it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to guess that other companies might follow suit.
Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox at Microsoft, also gave his views on the new possible price. He said that he is not against the companies that are increasing prices, however, he does think that in the end, it will be the consumers deciding the price. He didn’t reveal whether Xbox will increase the price of their first-party games or not.
"As an industry, we can price things whatever we want to price them, and the customer will decide what the right price is for them," Spencer said to The Washington Post. "I'm not negative on people setting a new price point for games because I know everybody's going to drive their own decisions based on their own business needs. But gamers have more choice today than they ever have. In the end, I know the customer is in control of the price that they pay, and I trust that system."
To be honest, the decision to raise the price of games isn’t even that strange. Prices of games have been stuck at $60 since the days of PS3 and Xbox 360. According to PlayStation boss Shawn Layden, the costs of developing games has increased drastically while the price of the base game is still sold for $60.
"It's been $59.99 since I started in this business, but the cost of games have gone up ten times," Layden said to GamesIndustry.biz. "If you don't have elasticity on the price-point, but you have huge volatility on the cost line, the model becomes more difficult. I think this generation is going to see those two imperatives collide."
So what do you think? Do you think $70 a game is not a big deal? Do you think that gaming would suffer from a price increase? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.
