Analyst says the games industry "hopes" GTA VI will cost up to $100, raising average prices

[Mokona]

$100 is a fair asking price for a AAA game of this size and scope. Not all games should cost the same.

People forget that almost all new games cost $60 in the 90s and a lot of them weren't even that good. $60 in 1992 is over $130 today. We're downright lucky that most new releases still cost the same and have resisted the effects of inflation.

Sure, wait for a sale if you don't want to pay $100 on day one. But don't go thinking $100 is some outrageous cash grab. The game cost over a billion dollars to develop and will likely give you hundreds of hours of entertainment.

In the 90's, a game was also sold as a finished product, and even an absolute blockbuster was lucky to sell over 100,000 copies. GTA V and its seemingly evergreen online playground have sold countless millions, and GTA Online has made them an honestly disgusting amount of money.

It was their decision to spend such a ridiculous amount on GTA VI's development, and they will likely still make it back ten+ times over over its operational lifetime, even if they sold it for $40 or less. Only a fraction of GTA V's revenue came from full-price purchases after all.

This is just them trying to take advantage of the fact that the average individual has no real clue how the economics of a game like GTA V actually work in order to justify a move that would be done out of pure greed.

 

[vicsrealms]

In the immortal words of General McAuliffe , "Nuts!"

I won't pay $60 for most games these days. I wait for Steam sales, and wait for the games to be fixed before I even think of buying.

 

[KnightSayNI]

I remember when Phantasy Star IV cost a 100 bucks on launch way back in 1993.

 

[Feng Lengshun]

pushing up average selling prices to offset rising development costs.

This sounds like an Induced Demand scenario if you ask me. Sure, you can increase average selling prices, but then you need even higher budgets to convince people to buy on day/week/month one over just waiting until discount, especially if you don't have the GTA brand to boost people's urgency of buying it NOW.

It would just increase risks instead of lowering it, especially if it drives more people to F2P, indie, and waiting for discounted games in the long run.

 

[Puiu]

I remember when Phantasy Star IV cost a 100 bucks on launch way back in 1993.

For those who don't know the story, it was priced that high because Sega US wanted the game to flop in the west. Sega US and Sega Japan used to have a weird rivalry and the game was not supposed to be released in the west.

 

[erickmendes]

I remember when Phantasy Star IV cost a 100 bucks on launch way back in 1993.

jRPGs are famous for being expensive... And if it's on Nintendo console AND a Square Enix title you can get ready to sell your house, your mother and your kidneys to be able to pay for it.

 

[erickmendes]

Breaking news: New AAA game will cost 100 dollars
Launch MSRP: 100 dollars vanilla edition, microtransactions and cosmetic items
30 days later: price with discount - 90 dollars
3 months later: price with discount - 85 dollars
6 months later: 80 dollars with in game items (so much value)
1 year later: drops 50 dollars DLC... also GOTY version for full launch price.
2 years later: Remastered Edition, 80 bucks.
3 years later: GOTY Remastered Edition, 80 bucks... also new DLC, 50 bucks.
4 years later: Remastered Edition Remake, 50 bucks
5 years later: Mobile Edition, free with 10 adps (ads per second)

Yeah, I'm talking about Skyrim, if it was launched nowadays.

 

[Stevo93]

Id only be buying it if it's free. Charging extensively for their add-ons and monetisation over the years im sure they've made quite a few $$$. When the new game comes out everything will be behind a paywall anyway so what's the problem?

 

[calvinblanes]

I don't care paying $100 for a top tier game. But games nowdays lack a lot quality, devs and pubs would charge u $60 (or $80 $100 if u want the full content) for the same recycled game every year, bugged af, badly optimized, etc. There are a lot of indies that are truly bad and they charge them up to $20 which is also insane. With a hand at my heart I have to say that if it wasn't for Steam return policy I would pirate most of those titles.

 

[yukka]

Ubi felt the pain when Star Wars Outlaws launched at $70. They cried about how the game isn't doing well with sales.

It also suffered because the additional content was priced so high (was it $140 for everything?) but it was included if you paid for Ubisofts subscription service. That had people look at the sub and consider the value, then if they weren’t interested (I think it’s one of the higher priced/lower value subs considering what you get for it) then they felt over a barrel and didn’t bother to buy, waiting for the eventual sales.