More Publishers Pondering PS5 Game Price Hikes

I very very rarely buy games outside sales already - prices are just too high considering how little money everyone has. If they go up by about £5 like 2K, it shouldn’t affect things too much.

As long as the value reflects the price I dont mind paying extra. But NBA2K, MADDEN, COD. All pretty much the same game each year with a new skin and lootboxes those franchises need to justify the price hike. Now games like HZD2, Cyberpunk etc deserve the extra cash and justify the rise in prices

@nessisonett Be hilarious to see a GTA5 remake on next gen and a extra tenner on top. You just know they are going to do it. 2K are greedy F******

I can't even remember the last time I paid 69.99€ for a game. It doesn't change much to be honest, I'll still wait a few months for better prices, except if the game is called Cyberpunk 2077.

Weird. If game development is so expensive, why are all the AAA games bargain bin price after a couple of months?

And they don't mention that the rise of digital means that they're getting a bigger cut each year. So that factors into as well. And the micro-transactions. Expansion passes. Subscriptions. Countless overpriced editions. They've already found plenty of ways to increase the revenue. So yes, while price may not have changed that much over the years, revenue certainly has, but they're never going to talk about that.

If there gonna raise the price of these games they need to be better than what's been showcased so far. Everything so far looks like PS4 games.

Prices go up at the start of a generation for no other reason than to rinse early adopters who likely have more disposable income. Then as more people adopt, the prices come down. Don't believe publishers' sob-stories and selective wording around this matter.

Constantly being sold the idea that games are too expensive to make a profit from is impossible to believe when so many games are still being made and released. Taking the p*ss...

Can see this hitting the pre orders of new titles big style, we've already got $100 ultimate editions which I think is a ripoff if you want the dlc and season passes, I just can't see how offering anymore content will justify price increases like this.

Only games I can see me getting full price are truly special ones like Cyberpunk and Ghost of Tsushima, no more conveyor belt titles like COD and Assassin's Creed

I will not pay more, i will just buy less games.
I don't even buy games at launch anyways.
Why will i pay 70 USD for a game that will be 40~30 USD six month later? Or even lower than that on PC... Doom Eternal is 30 USD on Steam right now.

@Makina very true one thing that worries me about companies pushing for all digital as we've seen with nintendo prices never drop the same like physical copies do and I can see companies wanting to keep things full price far longer going forward

@avenovah when they add quality 1st party games maybe. But yh it's good value if you dont buy games but I also expect that to get a price rise as it's clearly not sustainable.

Despite the fact that the gaming industry is worth more than the music and film industry COMBINED. Games will still remain buggy and need patches, microtransactions will still appear, stripped content dlc will still happen and season passes/deluxe/super platinum editions will still exist. I get that price hikes happen, but this just smacks of corporate greed.

$94.99 CAD for a game, yeah that won't fly...

We are due a global resession from Covid 19.............. Game developers "Lets increase the price of games so it wont effect us to badly"

£64.99 $69.99 70.00 Euros for Ps5 games?.............. Thats for the base game, Extra for DLC, Season Passes?
SOOOOOOO lets say EA Battlefield 6 is £69.99 for the base game (Cause EA say "Fcuk you pay me"), £50.00 for the season pass?
£120.00 for all of Battlefield 6? YEAH RIGHT

I can definitely believe development costs have gone up a lot... but haven't game sales also gone up substantially? And don't all the micro transactions and special editions they sell at higher prices help out with that?

This sort of move won't help the shift to digital but will keep the used game market alive. Which obvioulsy means less for the publishers.
A much lower price point with digital only releases would actually gain them much more income and then when physical is dead they can fleece us all they like.
Long live physical.

PC games already have RayTracing and 4K support. And have looked better than PS4 games for ages.

Not like Control and Metro Exodus cost $70 on PC because they had to make both those options. And have "Ultra" settings you need 14.2 teraflops to run.

EA reporter $3B Profit for its Fiscal Year 2020. So they all making tons of cash at $60

@ankehuber yeah ebays great for selling recent games. I bought days gone for £50 at launch, got the plat and sold it on ebay for £55 😁

No way I'm paying 65 quid for a game. I resent paying £50 and it's very few games I pay that for...

@AdamNovice Unfortunately, that's only part of the issue. The sinister truth behind the business model that's been established is that for the most part, what drives up the price for games is an excuse. Sure, some games require higher budget and manpower, but not so many as we are seeing currently, especially when they turn out average to mediocre. The truth is that the reason prices keep getting higher and higher is just so execs and publishers keep getting more and more money. It's not like the workers are getting a better salary or better work conditions, they are still going to get treated like "code monkeys" or dogs and in this desperate market, if you can't/won't do it, someone else will. There are ways to have quality AAA games that justify a higher price and take longer to make and more people, this however is NOT a way to do it. All this does is that it keeps lowering the bar so people lower their standards and put up with it. You can't blame anyone who buys games on sale or with bundles anymore, no matter how much they want to support devs. It actually surprises me when people defend or say that it makes sense since it's harder to make games nowadays. It is in some cases, but for the most part it doesn't have to be and in others it's just an excuse, nothing more.

Greedy its not like development effort between platforms drives cist like it used to, every platform shares the same architecture type so modifying a game to run on each is likely days or even weeks worth of work rather than months.

Also, gaming as a medium is growing still, they recoop dev costs through volume of sales growing, this is just an excuse to double down and rake in profits.

And lets not even get started on the monitisation of online games, we pay for online services, then pay for dlc and or microtransactions often in addition to the core game price... This medium will be a shadow of itself if the industry continues to normalise this approach.

The idea of paying £65 for a game stuffed to the brim with microtransactions seems absolutely bonkers to me. People must be prepared to pay that though.

It always pays to be a few years behind the industry. Get games for much cheaper, patched or even completely finished (crazy thought) and with all the dlc in most cases. I usually go back to Nintendo for a year or so when I've caught up with the PlayStation side of things.

I think I might be talking myself out of getting a PS5 until a few years have passed and they give in and release a less 70s future tech version of the console.

@ankehuber Agree, i see a flood of TLoU2 at second hand stores right now, you can just got one of those for 40 usd, play it and resell it later for some cash. And thats for a.. 2 weeks old game?

The question is, if it's worth selling 500K pieces per £70, OR sell 3M pieces per £35?

Wait they want to make games "smaller" and charge $10.00 more? I have purchased about 200 Physical PS4 games over the last 7 years. About 60% were day one purchase, I will be forced to change my buying habits.

I will wait for a sale no need to buy those overpriced games.in ebay i trust once the games are cheap.plus theres always a sale on psn.word up son

No chance I’d buy a game for that! Sales it is..

I’d be happy to pay it so long as the money is going to the right places, like overworked staff and artists, and NOT executive pockets. What’re the chances that that would actually happen...? Probably zero. But man it’s great to dream about artists being properly compensated for their hard work.

I'm ok with it, wish my market was doing better economically though...

I might buy more digital Games as a result...

@CurryPowderKeg79 Is that $8.95 one game per week with GameFly? With Boomerang Rentals in UK I only pay £9.99 a month and can rent as many games as I want within that month, provided I send the current rented game back obviously. I’ve saved almost £9K since joining in 2014 and with this news it looks like I’ll rely on them now more than ever.

So, are all of these 'free upgrades' or 'smart delivery' titles gonna cost 69.99 on the current gen as well? If not then surely folks will just buy the cheaper current gen version and bump it up to a next gen version without the extra cost.

In canada we already pay 79.99 plus tax which comes to 90.39. Now we will have to pay 89.99 plus tax would be 101.69. I always got games at launch but at those prices I will start looking for sales. I get that production of games is getting more expensive but if people cant afford to pay for them till they go on sale why not just sell them cheaper to begin with.

HA! It makes me so happy that I dont like AAA/cutscene/movie games as much as the types of games that i play. And I'm never paying over 20 bucks for any game EVER!!! No micro-transactions either. And I'd argue AAA's arent nearly as fun. 70 dollar games are just waiting for suckers to take the bait.
I spend just as much sure but I have 5 or 6 cool games to every one of these.

@Link41x I feel ya, that’s not even considered the odd deluxe edition which’ll now be closer to $150 it just doesn’t seem reasonable for most consumers...its going to mean either PS Now or more sale pickups for me

Was bound to happen eventually so I'm not really surprised or upset by it. Very few things are the same price they were in 2006 and I rember SNES games going for $70 a quarter century ago. There are still a myriad of ways to get games discounted even at launch both physical and digital. Just be resourceful!

Considering how quickly prices drop after a game is released, it won't change much for me. I'll wait 2 months instead of 6 weeks to get a game under £30. And increased price might even mean quicker price drop

No, thanks. Unlike the US, in europe prices have gone up already. They go up to 70 euros.
Wich is pretty steep already and i tend to wait for price cuts, unless it's something i really want.
Besides, they are already doing dlc and season passes as it is. Not to mention sub fees and worst of all loot boxes.

In Canada they arbitrarily raised prices $10 when the PS4 launched. A new game is $79.99. Now if they raise the price $10 USD it will probably be $94.99 for a new PS5 game for Canadians.

@MaccaMUFC I use that boomerang, well worth using, just upped my sub to having 3 rentals on the go with priority but I think its good value for money.

@Weebleman I think we should assume that any game that gets an increase in price on new hardware won't be available as a "smart delivery" upgrade.
For starters, as far as I know, all points to NBA 2K21 having separate versions for PS4 and PS5.
I'm afraid most games won't opt to offer the free upgrade that Smart Delivery promises (or whatever is called in PS5 if it even exists)
Luckily Cyberpunk 2077 does offer a free upgrade and it doesn't have an increased price. For now, that's all I want.

Edited: In Japan (at least) Cyberpunk does cost around $10 more than other games (even though we will be getting a heavily censored and down-toned version).

Well, I will buy second hand used games and you will get ZERO of my dollars

I can't remember the last time I payed more than 30 of our fine English pounds for a game. I don't ever preorder and get games a couple of months after release. My pike of shame is so big I can continue doing this.

Funny how they say the PS5 is easier to develope for. That should make it cheaper 😁 A few must have a launch games then the rest can wait on the sales.

This is absolute nonsense as it completely ignores Microtransactions! Pubs are making money hand over fist in their games. Poor excuse, considering that the added Microtransactions won’t get any better, in fact, I’m sure they’ll get worse next generation.

I can't see this being anything more or less than understandable.

Personally I don't buy games at launch (FF7r was the exception to the rule). The catalog is too big for me to not find something I'll like/want or even stumble upon. £25-30 is probably my max. But then with PS Now, PS Plus and EA Access I'd probably only buy 1 or 2 games a year outside of those.

@Octane also they are selling much higher volumes than previously. So their profits are greater even if margins are the same.

For a game that looks as great as Cyberpunk, I would happily pay a bit extra. Really depends on which game it is.

@maruse it'll be interesting to see how it plays out. Sammy added a picture showing the pricing structure on the NBA article and what struck me is that, while the standard edition is $10 more on PS5, the 'ultimate editions' (or what ever they have called them) is $99 for each system. Which basically means either you get the additional content cheaper on PS5 or they are over charging for it on the PS4 version.

Thats a bummer that Cyberpunk is getting censored over there, especially seeing the price increase.

When they are not selling as many games because most people will wait till they are in the sales I can see that after a while they will start lowering the prices for launch.
They need good launch sales for the game to be seen as a success.

And neither of the two nayxt-jayne (bonus points if you read "next-gen" in Jim Sterling's trademark nasal voice) consoles have a known pricing. Hoo boy, I don't envy you folks.

They need to be careful here. Price increases are surely going to alienate gamers, especially the average consumer. However, if the value is equivalent to the price then I don't mind but they cannot make mediocre games for high prices. People will just stop buying eventually until it goes down considerably.

Hahahaha oh my god - any f****** excuse to gouge some more cash from gamers.
I’d respect these companies more if they were just honest and said we are raising costs.

Every generation the price of games go up, or at least that's what it seems to me. They probably will come down in price once more people have the new consoles, after a 6 months or a year perhaps. The one that gets me is why digital games routinely cost £10 more new than physical ones, but that's a different issue

Which is why they sell ridiculously overpriced dlc.

This is bull.

I purchase very few games at release so i mostly paid $40, $30, or less for games for my PS4. I see that continuing with my PS5.

Another thing is long plays and replays. The hours i put into Fallout 4 this gen, GTA 5 current and last gen, and Fallout 3/ New Vegas last gen make those games bargains at full prices, and the play times kept me from looking for less new games to purchase. Next gen will probably have at least couple of games i also play for hundreds of hours each.

Basically a game price hike will likely not affect how many games i purchase next gen.

This exactly why the PS5 is not needed. If cost are going up, that means you’re bringing the technology too early.
Nobody wants to be paying £60 for a single video game, it’s ridiculous. It doesn’t even bring you a better game or better experience. It’s all just so hardware manufacturers can advertise better graphics and trick graphics whores into shelling out new hardware again.
The PS4 Pro and XBox One X are absolutely fine for current console gaming and do not need improving on yet until somebody offers something that genuinely warrants a never generation console.

The console market is slowly turning into the graphics card market for PC gaming and it’s ridiculous. You don’t replace the entire hardware and peripheral set up just to squeeze more graphics out of a name which I my forcing the price of development up anyway that inevitably passes all the cost onto the gamer.

It’s disgusting.

Games have not gone up price to reflect the development costs or inline with inflation. I am surpised this has not happended sooner. I would like to see parity with the digital market with titles costing the same.

How many of you are older gamers? When NES and Genesis were out we had 100 dollar games. Not as a benchmark but we had game that hit that price way back then. Now its games are to expensive but you need to pay your people real overtime or they should unionize. You know what you'll pay for a game then? So tell me are you for paying these people for the jobs they've done or are you just talk like the twittwat crowd? You can't have both as you see in our lives you both need money from your employer and to eat/entertainment. So your now against the developer paying the staff then? Which is it? For me if a game is new and I like the sound of the ip I buy it new no reviews. If it's Tlou2 I get it used. Madded/Show on sale 30 to 40. Something established I've enjoyed new. Any dlc waits to see if I like the game anymore I used to buy packages and waste money. That's my long winded 2 cents anyway. I do got to say this site seems to have gotten more complainy lately though lets get back to the love of games huh. Or to disagree and have a nonconfrontational exchange to our sides. We are all human same blood same organs different shades of skin different thoughts thats all.

How many AAA games this generation were just flat out broken on release? Assassins Creed unity, Battlefield 4, Fallout 4, Anthem, just to name a few, and developers want us to pay more?
Not to mention that games companies have so much more secondary income through games now with loot boxes and skins and season passes and dlc etc, it's now more about share holders than the gamers who buy the games and expect a good working enjoyable product, it's all about that fat corporate bottom line.
The games industry used to have a heart, now it doesn't even have a soul or a conscience.

Everyone comparing this to the SNES/N64 game prices, it's not the same thing. Back then, the bigger games cost more because it cost more to produce the game carts with physical memory inside them. The bigger the game's size, the more it cost. When the playstation games came out on CDs, the prices were much lower than the N64 carts.

@Gr8VngnzN4esAngr agreed buddy - if this was the case and multiplatform games are so hard and expensive to make then why is almost every game that is released on all platforms released to like £10 cheaper on release day on pc then consoles - the answer is is that there are just a bunch of mugs that are actually willing to buy into the new prices so it is eventually becoming a 'norm' for pricing

Keep in mind that this is also during the time when we will be having "all digital" versions of consoles, selling video games directly to customers, cutting out the brick and mortar middle man, and actually saving publishers money. And off the back of the gen that popularised microtransctions as an easy source of income.

I don’t buy sports games so I could care less about nba 2k21 or madden 21nor do I buy call of duty or play them

Oh so games will be $90 here in canada, cool.

Of course they're going to try it on, look at Crash 4 at £59.99 and that's for this gen. All it'll take is people waiting for price drops and they'll soon get the message

Micro transactions and DLC and other revenue raising tactics make a ***** load of money already and offset the increasing costs of games. This price rise is a load of garbage.

Maybe it's the inflated development costs they should be looking at insteasd. Sports games have no excuse, there's nothing to justify that price hike, certainly not devepolment costs. But other games cost so much to develop these days because they're trying to make movies instead of enjoyable games.

2k is packed full of microtransactions that make it pay to win. They're not doing anything different with this new iteration and they're not offering a game update to go from ps4 to ps5 like other companies are. So you'll have to buy the ps4 version to play on launch and then the ps5 version to play on the new console. EA should be ashamed of taking advantage of their player base but it's nothing new for EA. So really you'll be paying $130+ tax for the base game because you'll be forced to buy 2 copies. And with the next gen consoles being much easier for developers to use they really have no excuse.

@Deadpool7532Troy yes but if they meet their sales expectations at that price point it will justify them and others charging 70 for other titles.

@Darthrau their staff gets paid just fine. It's the CEO that made 18 million last year. It's to line his pockets and the share holders. I seriously doubt theyll pay their developers much more if the price hike stays.

@Incarna RIP, then I guess.