Capcom president Harushiro Tsujimoto claims that the prices of video games need to increase to meet ballooning development costs.
Capcom president Harushiro Tsujimoto claims that the prices of video games need to increase to meet ballooning development costs.
I don't think he's wrong. AAA game prices have been basically the same for 20+ years, while the cost of making games has only gone up. I think this is why a lot of publishers push for progressively more aggressive microtransactions, which can often hide the actual price of the game's content. And greed but that's kind of their job.
The idea that BG3 and Overwatch 2 released at the same price point is actually ludicrous. With AAA games, the price is standard and if you don't like the game, oh well fuck you. And I would absolutely pay extra for games from developers which invested more, and had a higher standard of quality. Larian could charge $100 for their next CRPG and I'd be all in. Similarly, I don't think minimally viable cash grab titles or smaller, maybe more experimental titles should release for more than like $30.
I think the indie scene does this pretty well but it's a challenge for AAA, and consumers are somewhat to blame. I think people would balk more at an $80 standard price than a $60 half-complete game with $4k of microtransactions. So of course, studios are going to go with the latter strategy, even though plenty of people hate it.
What this CEO and you conveniently forget is the fact, that there are more Games sold every year. Since those are digital goods and copy costs are near zero, those companies are making more money each year already. They also pretty much killed the ability to sell used Games, except for Console Games with a physical medium.
Also: why should the consumers have to pay for the ballooning Overhead that those companies have? Don’t tell me you need a hundred million dollars in your marketing department to sell a GOOD/GREAT game. That is Bullshit.