Last week Nintendo fully revealed the Switch 2 with an hour long Direct going over the console, the games, and its release date! Overall, it was a very exciting presentation! If you want to hear more of my thoughts on that though, feel free to give last week’s podcast episode a listen. However, something that damped that hype was the reveal of the price for Mario Kart World, the Switch 2’s big first party launch game. It was revealed that the game would cost $80 digitally and $90 physically. Quite the mark up from what games usually go for which is $60 to $70 with no difference between the price of them physically and digitally. And as you can imagine with any kind of price increase, people aren’t happy…

Now while I’m not a market analyst or an economist or anything like that, so I can’t provide much insight on what’s going on with these prices, I felt like I should still give my two cents on what’s probably the biggest topic in gaming right now! Again though, these are just my thoughts and opinions on things, don’t take any of this like I’m an expert or anything.

I feel like people are mostly upset by this because, beyond having to pay more money in general, it wasn’t that long ago that games went from always being $60 to being sometimes now $70. This started with the PS5 about five years ago when it was revealed that the Demon’s Souls remake would be $70. People were certainly upset about that but it didn’t have as many people freaking out about it as this $80 price tag has. And I think that’s because we were all pretty use to games being $60 throughout the PS3 to PS4 generation. But now it’s only been one generation later and we’re already seeing another price increase and it’s coming from Nintendo of all people! Nintendo has always been seen as the more affordable option of the big three game consoles. Their consoles are cheap and their games are relatively cheap too. For example, Tears of the Kingdom, the latest Zelda game, was the only game Nintendo published that was $70. The rest of their 1st party stuff stuck to $60 despite $70 being the norm throughout most of the Switch’s life.

Funny enough, I remember people being pretty upset that Nintendo was doing this despite it, again, being the norm of the game industry at the time. Nintendo actually went out of their way to further justify themselves and the price. They stated that they want to price games by what price they feel is right for that game. So for Tears of the Kingdom they felt a big, massive, open world game with lots to do and lots of quality cost $70. They even stuck to this idea by having future first party games, like Super Mario Bros Wonder, not be $70. And personally I think that this is a good philosophy to have. Pricing games depending on content and value over just going with the market trend at the time.

With that in mind, I’m not nearly as worried as most are about this $80 price tag for Mario Kart World. From what we’ve seen of the game it seems to be massive and jam packed with loads of content, way more than your typical Mario Kart game. Most Mario Kart games kind of just focus on the racing, which makes sense as a racing game. They have plenty of value and content but you’re not going to be doing much besides racing and battling in the Battle Mode. Mario Kart World is meant to be a big open world game where you can drive around anywhere in this interconnected world! All the characters have some customization, races now have 24 racers, and the race courses themselves are connected to one another. There is a lot too this game and I think the reason why Nintendo was so eager to show lots of this stuff in the Direct was to help justify that price. Granted, they clearly knew the price was going to be an issue, they didn’t reveal that during the Direct after all, but still!

I feel like one of the biggest factors in my own personal worry about this $80 price tag will come when they reveal the price of their other first party Switch 2 exclusive games. After all, Nintendo has yet to come out and say that this isn’t going to be the usual price for games on the Switch 2. Personally, I just feel like it would be a weird move for Nintendo to be the one bold enough to raise their prices like this.

That being said, a big reason why so many people are worried about this price isn’t because they don’t want to pay $80 for Switch 2 games, it’s because they don’t want to pay $80 for all games.

When Sony decided to raise the price of their games to $70, and more importantly saw that people were willing to pay that much, the industry followed. While it didn’t happen right away, lots of publishers followed behind them and raised their prices with them. Not all mind you, there are still plenty of games released for $60 and not just smaller indie games, but most big publishers do this. And that it what people are most afraid of with this price increase. It’s not really about Nintendo or the Switch 2, people just don’t want it to be the start of everyone else doing this too…

For that reason, I understand why people are upset with Nintendo. While I don’t think Nintendo will make all of their games $80, I could see other publishers trying this if it’s successful. And they probably won’t follow Nintendo’s lead and price their other games lower according to the value and how much content is offered. So yeah, in that sense I get the worry. Especially since even before this price was revealed people have been talking about the fact that Grand Thief Auto 6 is most likely going to cost $100 given how much time and money has been pumped into the development of that game.

And that brings us to the big question of the post. Are you going to pay for $80 games? Because despite everything else going on, that is the biggest deciding factor in all of this. For something like an $80 price tag to be standard, those games need to sell. If they don’t, then it’s far more likely we’ll see that $70 price stick around for awhile longer. Granted, some of these price hikes have to do with the economy at large with inflation still being on the rise. That and the cost for developing a lot of these big games being pretty high too. That was how Sony justified the price increase from $60 to $70 after all. But at the end of the day, it really is up to the consumer, us, to decide if that price is really worth it in the end.

For me personally it really depends. If we’re talking about Mario Kart World specifically, I could see myself maybe buying it at that $80 price. But that’s only really with the thought that Nintendo will hopefully not sell every single Switch 2 game for that price. But on the other hand, I really don’t want to be showing the game industry as a whole that I’m willing to pay this much for a single game… With that in mind, I don’t think I will be buying Mario Kart World. It looks fun and very high quality but I don’t want this price tag to be standard across the board for every game. But that’s just how I feel!

At the end of the day it’s going to come down to what we, the consumers, think is a fair price. If we want to get the attention of people like Nintendo, and the game industry as a whole, the best way to do that is with our wallets. That’s always been the hardest part of these discussions, most of the time even the people complaining about these price hikes are the ones still buying the game. Money talks way more than any online discourse. So if you feel that $80 is too much don’t buy Mario Kart World, and especially don’t buy GTA6 if that ends up being $100. Honestly that scares me way more than what Nintendo is doing right now since I know people will pay that much for a new GTA…

With all that being said, what about the console price? Sadly, for people in the US like me, that is currently up in the air. It was originally going to be $450 to $500 depending on if you got the version that was bundled with Mario Kart World. However, the day this price was revealed, Trump hit many different countries with tariffs, including Vietnam where the Switch 2 is being made. This prompted Nintendo to delay the preorder date of the console, which means that if these tariffs remain we’ll most likely see a price increase on the system. A massive shame since I feel like the current price is honestly pretty reasonable given all that the Switch 2 can do. Slightly less reasonable though if the games are all going to cost $80.

Currently, there’s a lot of unknowns when it comes to the Switch 2 and it’s prices. Both for the console and the games. But like I said before, the best way to state your mind is with your wallet. I understand this can be hard sometimes given that feeling of missing out can be a big motivator for dropping that extra cash to get something, but not buying something is the best way to send a message that a product needs to change. I’m honestly a little thankful this $80 price wasn’t on a new Zelda game or something since I know I would probably cave instantly if that was the case! Only time will tell if Nintendo decides that this price is too much even for games they personally feel justify that price. Here’s hoping we can work them down to $70 at the very least…

But those are just my thoughts! What are some of yours? Are you willing to pay $80 for a game? Are you worried this will become the norm? I’d love to hear your thoughts so don’t be shy!

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