It’s solely been about two years or so for the reason that online game trade started charging $70 for large video games as a substitute of the same old $60, because of recreation growth prices rising (and greed). This shift, understandably, didn’t go over properly with gamers as the price to remain up-to-date with fashionable gaming continues to rise, however which may not cease Take-Two Interactive (the mum or dad firm of Rockstar Video games) from making an attempt to push it additional with Grand Theft Auto VI—one of many few upcoming video games that would most likely promote for $80.
In 2022, the period of $70 video video games started. Since then we’ve seen WB Video games, Activision, Nintendo, Xbox, PlayStation, and different corporations start promoting their largest, fanciest video games for $10 greater than the $60 price ticket that had been in place for years. The response to those elevated costs wasn’t nice, however video games like Name of Obligation and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom offered properly even with the upper price ticket. And in Take-Two’s newest earnings name, CEO Strauss Zelnick appeared to set the groundwork for costs going up.
As reported by Gamespot, when Zelnick was requested about how Take-Two decides what to cost for video games like Grand Theft Auto VI and Borderlands, he didn’t present any particular costs and as a substitute shared the writer’s pricing philosophy.
“Look, there’s extra content material continuously being made out there, and we actually purpose to ship nice worth at any given time,” mentioned Zelnick. “We’re so targeted on delivering extra worth than what we cost. And that’s type of the rubric.”
He additional added that each time Take-Two establishes a recreation’s value, the corporate desires to be sure that it’s “excellent news” for gamers and that “the expertise vastly over delivers” in comparison with the worth level. “ That’s the purpose,” added Zelnick.
If we glance again at latest feedback from Zelnick, I’ve some critical questions on what he considers excellent news and good worth for customers.
Zelnick’s ideas on good worth and $70 video games
In August 2023, when followers criticized Take-Two for charging $50 for the great, however bare-bones Crimson Lifeless Redemption and Undead Nightmare PS4 and Change ports, this was Zelnick’s response:
“That’s simply what we imagine is the commercially correct value for it,” Zelnick advised IGN after an earnings name.
“[Red Dead Redemption] was a terrific standalone recreation in its personal proper when it was initially launched, so we really feel prefer it’s a terrific bundle for the primary time, and positively a terrific worth for customers.” I’d argue that $50 will not be an “correct value” for a fundamental port of a decade-plus previous open-world Xbox 360 recreation that, at launch a minimum of, didn’t help 60FPS and eliminated all the web multiplayer modes.
In Might 2023, Zelnick additionally indicated that there wasn’t any shopper pushback on publishers charging $70 as a substitute of $60 on some large video games, like Gotham Knights.
“What we’re seeing is customers are searching for to restrict their spending by going both to the stuff they actually, actually care about, blockbusters, or to worth, and typically it could possibly be each,” mentioned Zelnick.“And the excellent news is, we’ve got a bunch of blockbusters and we’ve got an exquisite catalog.”
All of this appears to recommend that Zelnick believes $70 video games work, customers don’t thoughts them, ports are value $50, and folks will purchase your blockbuster video games if they’re actually enthusiastic about them, even when they should handle their cash. That makes me marvel what Grand Theft Auto 6′s value will find yourself being when it launches in 2025.
If any recreation can cost $80 (or extra) it’s GTA 6
Wanting again in any respect his feedback and Take-Two’s latest historical past makes me marvel: Will Zelnick determine that GTA 6 is value greater than $70?
Will he take a look at one of the hyped video games in human historical past, the sequel to one of many best-selling video video games of all time, and a blockbuster open-world journey that may probably be huge, and suppose “Oh gamers pays $80 and even $90 for that!” I believe that’s an actual chance and if it occurs, I’d wager my subsequent lunch that he’d clarify on an earnings name that followers are getting a “nice worth” for that $80.
Certain, it appears foolish and even downright idiotic in 2024 or 2025 to cost greater than $70. We’ve seen numerous examples over the past 18 months or so of massive, costly video games failing to attach with gamers, critics, and fandoms, whereas smaller indie titles charging much less are exploding in reputation. I imply, one of many largest video games in 2024 is Helldivers 2 and it sports activities a $40 price ticket. In simply the previous few months, Manor Lords, Grey Zone Warfare, and Content material Warning have discovered large success on Steam and so they all value far lower than $70.
However Grand Theft Auto 6 is completely different. It’s the subsequent entry in one of many largest online game franchises on the planet, will probably have an enormous advertising and marketing push, and is the follow-up to GTA V and GTA On-line, among the most profitable items of leisure in historical past.
It additionally has an virtually unattainable quantity of hype surrounding it, with gamers and followers going feral over tiny updates to Rockstar’s back-end servers. These identical individuals make theories based mostly on birds in teaser photos and monitor down every bit of reduce GTA content material they’ll discover utilizing all types of strategies. These are followers who, if requested, would probably purchase GTA 6 at $80. And I believe there are many different individuals on the market who would shortly toss $80 to Rockstar and Take-Two if it meant they may play what is going to probably be the most important online game launch in 2025.
So actually, at this level, the one factor stopping Take-Two from charging greater than $70 (and providing customers a lot “nice worth”) is Zelnick and different executives taking a look at all this and deciding to not be grasping. And people, I’m not holding my breath, particularly as video games value an increasing number of to make and take longer and longer to create. I believe if Zelnick and Take-Two imagine GTA 6 can succeed at $80 they’ll cost that and promote you a particular version for much more.
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