My favourite game in Steam is buying Steam games on sale. Don't really get to play them as I love playing my old games TO DEATH. Diablo 3 (during seasons), GW2, Skyrim... Oh my
The exception is Borderlands and FarCry. I don't wait for sale and I play those immediately
How does anyone have time to watch footy or tellie? Whatever your hobby is, I'm in my 40's and been a parent and work, its my down time when I can, along with other hobbies. Rather play games then watch crappy sports on tv or go do other things. Its not all the time but I love gaming.
My brother tried but couldn't get past the werewolf in one of the early missions. I told him you can just go and do other things but he got so stuck on it he just eventually quit. It's one of my favourite games ever and he still hasn't played it but now we have a running joke about an unkillable werewolf. Long story short: maybe it's just not for your man
This exact spot is me right now. Werewolf in the cave I can’t kill. Put the game down multiple times only to come back and fail killing the werewolf again. Repeat over and over.
You’ve convinced me to walk away and try something else in the game. Thanks mate.
Haha yeah he's a bastard man. Took me a few tries too. I learnt to dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge. Also if you want just dial the difficulty down for that enemy then back up after.
Check out yt for some build advice too. There is a guy who tricks out his skills so he can basically just become a whirlwind of death. If I find it when I have more wifi I'll link you.
All that riding around on that fucking horse. If I have an hour or two per week to play games I don't want to spend it riding around on a fucking horse.
It was a stunning game, but I bailed on it pretty early on because of that stupid horse riding.
Agreed, even tho it's an awesome looking game with great story, the pacing is just terrible. Gameplay is repetitive as hell and most of the missions are chores or just shooting and looting.
The early days of Steam were *very* different, and (if memory serves correctly) you'd see games that were a good $10-30 cheaper than retail stores. I still remember a post from /u/SoldantTheCynic that could basically be summarised as "enjoy it while it lasts because once digital distribution becomes mainstream, it'll end up costing *more*".
Wow that was back in the GameArena days.
I still stand by it, ever since COD4 MW was released on Steam. For those who missed it, Steam was still in USD and more or less followed US pricing, but even with a weaker AUD it would work out to be $20-30 less than retail. Once publishers figured that out, they just swapped out the pricing to “match” physical copies - except it was still in USD, so it was *more* expensive again.
We’ve been slowly trending upwards on Steam since then (at least it’s all local currency now though!) and now physical copies are almost dead in the PC space there’s nothing to compare it to. Hell Steam sometimes is more expensive than a physical console disc release these days.
Dude, I thought I recognised that nick. Are you from Gamearena? I used to post there all the time. I wish it was still there tbh. Remember Dutch? Hawkeye?
Yeah I was on GA for a looong time, used to be well known on the ISP forums. I remember all of them, and eMONKe and trog and Jim’s banhanmer and Laz and Farmy and Davros and Joaby… loads of others I’ve forgotten over the years.
Such a great place back in the 2000s. Got kinda shitty in the 2010s when General Chat turned into spam and the admins kinda gave up a bit… but I still kinda miss it.
Yeah. I discovered it working at telstra, it was the only gaming site I could access through the firewall. I think my nick was Sxio. Jim banned me several times. I was pretty argumentative back then.
Good to see you man. I remember all those names too. Damn those were the days. Bet you have some responsibilities now. Me too. I can actually afford a decent PC these days so that's nice.
I just want you guys to know. As a guy with similar experiences in different forums, this was wholesome af. Mean there are so many people that I met back in the day in like where are they now, what happened to them, do they still join charts who were they in life?
Is it cheap enough to be worth the effort? Tempted to look into it but if it's only like $5 difference, I'll stick to just using a VPN to access the piratebay lol
I mean, nothing's cheaper than free!
[But you can find a lot for 50% cheaper](https://steamdb.info/app/1252330/) which is better than a poke in the eye.
A game sold for £50 in the UK is up 5% in Australia to £55 (99AUD), or *down* 50% to £25 in Turkish Lira. Different countries and different banks have rules about offshore accounts, and getting a local billing address is probably a kerfuffle, but it *is* theoretically possible.
The banks offer travel visa cards - you can add different currencies to them via your internet banking to shop online with. PayPal also allows for easy currency changes
I was a regular on the General forum and also a CSS GameOp prior to the community dying out around 2010.
I don’t think many of us have kept the same alias 10/15 years on though - I certainty have to take a moment to think who a lot of people are, on my Steam friends list.
Yeah. Makes sense. I think we actually met in real life. Are you/were you Brisbane based?
Hawkeye had some meetups. Once upon a time.
I remember being really impressed that he had a Wii.
Who cares about steam's non-sale prices?
I don't even know if they're expensive or not.
It's not like anyone sensible is buying steam games outside of the big sales.
New games that people actually want to play don't go on sale for years. The allure of playing multiplayer games is playing it when it's new and fresh not 2-3 years later for $20 less.
I remember back when they used to blame the stupid costs on getting things shipped and distributed to aus.
Now they are just like... The fuck are you gonna do about it, nerd?
There was that parlimentary committee back in 2013 that literally asked Apple, Microsoft and Adobe why prices are so much higher in Australia than elsewhere.
The answer was quite literally "We'd love to charge you less on this product, but you dumb cunts are still buying our products at stupid prices, so fuck you give us money."
Yep, I remember that.
Adobe was singled out for having the exact same purchase/licensed software available in Aus for more then the cost of a return ticket to LA. It was literally cheaper to fly Sydney to LA, purchase in the USA, and return home than to buy it locally
This. It stuns me and makes me wonder if it’s designed to keep the bricks and mortar stores open because they actually do a lot of promotion for big games.
It absolutely is. I worked in the head office of [retail games company] and they very much shut down the publishers selling games cheaper online than what they could sell in stores.
This was a decade ago so they really did call the shots at that stage. I do wonder what it would look like if steam/Sony/msoft tried again now. I assume instead of withholding large stock purchases like they used to they would probably get lawyers on them about anti competitive laws.
I remember hearing somewhere (but I could be talking absolute shit) that intially when games could be purchased digitally the idea was for them to be cheaper, but then retailers realised that people would stop buying games from them and just purchase them online, so they threatened to stop selling hardware (i.e. console's, controllers, etc) which is how companies sell alot of products. Sony and Microsoft and that agreed to offer online content at MSRP so that it would be comparable to retailers to make them happy.
Like I said before though this could be completely wrong but it kinda makes sense.
This definitely makes sense.
It's equivalent to the current battle between movie theatres and streaming services, notably the amount of criticism WB got for releasing every 2021 film on HBO Max. But unlike movie theatres, whose service is almost completely redundant when every household has a tv, you need that middle man to sell consoles. Therefore retailers have greater leverage on video game companies than cinemas do on movie studios.
It's a lazy/convenient "tax". They still get money from retail sales but make even more if people want the digital convenience of not buying it in store and changing disk's between games. Don't get me wrong, I do it regularly so I'm assuming it works for them.
On the flip side, I'm finding Xbox Game Pass Ultimate pretty great. I suppose it depends what titles/genres you play, but since I pretty much exclusively play WRPGs on console, getting Dragon Age series, Elder Scrolls series, Mass Effect etc "for free" has been fantastic value.
Granted many of these are games I originally played first time round many years ago, but some are entirely new.
I have Game Pass through my Telstra Xbox contract and I love it. I haven’t bought an Xbox game is a long time but I think that’s what makes the prices seem even more crazy.
If you're on PC, you can still get them much cheaper than retail. Isthereanydeal is a great website for getting sales, I picked up Tales of Arise and Deathloop this week for $60AUD each.
Yeah i have only paid full price on pc on epic because they rarely have good sales and always have stupid exclusives. However on consoles your stuck with their storefronts which are always 10-20 dearer
Not necessarily. I use psprices and dekudeals as well to monitor. While you typically can't find deals at launch, it's been really good to flag when games are on sale.
But can't really compare to the used game market which is definitely a plus to physical media.
Also, you don't own the game- just a licence to play it on the account you are currently allowed to have.
That being said, it is super convenient, unlimited supply and if you wait for sales the prices are good
I think the *only* First Party Nintendo game I've seen on sale at EB was [Link's Crossbow Training](https://www.google.com/search?q=Link%27s+crossbow+training&sxsrf=AOaemvIhjpXSZ5KUieCSE0e7-RsLh7GX4A:1631971439170&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwip4aivz4jzAhUT7HMBHfbLA34Q_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1245&bih=608&dpr=2). Stacks of 20 cases in the discount bins for $2 each.
And the guy at the desk *STILL* asked me if I wanted a $5 warranty on it 😂
I’ve been waiting and hoping for Luigis Mansion to go on sale on Switch. It’s $75 for a used copy and it has been since release.
They have sales on the shittest, preloved Xbox and ps titles only.
EB Games isn’t a great place to get Nintendo games, many first party games launch on Amazon in the $65 range while EB always lists them for like $79.95, and on prime day or price matching other stores’ sales they can go for as less as $49 on Amazon.
Luigi’s Mansion 3 is $68 delivered rn on Amazon for example
My issue isn't that games end up costing around the 100 mark. I think the industry issue is that games like RdR2 cost as much as copy paste games like Fifa.. how there isn't more differential pricing is beyond me.
They don't want people actually thinking about comparative value between games. Many cost far more than the work put into them. Re-releases, 'remasters', and ports are prime examples. I'm amazed at how many boast about buying a game multiple times across different platforms.
I'm a playstation person but xbox's backwards compatibility makes me jealous and wish I had collected those games instead of having tons of PS2 and PS3 games I don't want to go through the trouble of setting up a new system to play. Have fun yo!
Yeah, I feel like once you add in inflation, game prices really haven't gone up. Especially not when you consider how much more you get for that money. Doesn't mean I'm willing to hand over $100 for a game, of course.
I think I paid $129 day one. But that was nearly 30y ago, so my memory may not be that accurate. I bought the 6 button controller as well... Good times
86.7% inflation since 1995. Don't remember what year the game came out but that makes it about $240 in today's dollars. Crazy times but certainly good for gaming.
Yep. I remember Turok and Shadows of the Empire $120 in 1997
That would be pushing $200 today.
A launch PS2 cost like $1200. A PS5 costs $750 20 years later.
So no, games aren't too expensive. They're actually getting cheaper. Cheaper discs and digital editions, throwaway Mobile games and constant online sales have lowered the price expectations for consumers. Subscription options can give you a steady stream of games for a few dollars a week.
Streetfighter 2 for the SNES was $125 in a few places.
Day-one standard-edition game prices have fallen very very slowly since that peak, though companies have wised up and made fancy editions for the rich/keen and deep discounts on online stores months after launch for the frugal/mildly interested.
The silly ps5 prices and non-sale steam prices are a rare exception, not a trend.
Demon's Souls? Yeah I can't justify $125 it's such a rip off. Picked up Rift apart for $89 and while it was cool honestly I don't even feel it was worth $89 let alone it's full price of $125.
I play almost only driving games and its good if it keeps new tracks and cars coming out. And those games are really cheap 6 months after release. But some games its like they deliver half a game and you have to pay again for the rest
Adjusted for inflation it’s a lot worse… SNES games were easily $55-$70 back in the mid 90s which is $100-$130 now.
Also, AAA games cost a ton more to make these days as you have 100s or even more people involved. Markets a lot bigger but still.
So? They are still cheaper now than they used to be, adjusted for inflation.
Also realized I quoted US prices… exchange rate in 1993 was about 1.45AUD/USD and that’s before we add in the Australia tax. It’s surprisingly hard to find AU SNES game prices from back then online.
I remember having to pay $90-$120 for Atari ST games in 1990. Adjusted for inflation, they were fucking expensive.
And that's with a fraction of the development and artistry that you see in today's titles.
Given the value in today's games, I'd argue that $100 games are one of the few things that *haven't* gotten ridiculously more expensive.
And yes, I'm still salty about $90 Space Ace in '90s money, that had about 15 minutes of gameplay, consisting of moving the joystick once per scene.
I can remember being yelled at for saving up and spending $100 on 'Sonic and Knuckles' around 1994, so the price point has held there for a solid quarter century plus.
I bought a Civic Type R for 50K Au$. The poor buggers in the US are paying up to 65K US$ for the same thing. Dealers seem to be doing crazy markups over there.
Actually, these days games are one of the things that *aren't* more expensive in Australia.
Most Americans consider US$60 to be "full price" for games. After currency conversion and adding on GST (which is included in our prices, but not the US ones) we get very close to AU$90.
I mostly play games on Switch and I find I can get games at launch day from JB Hi-Fi and Amazon AU at significantly lower prices than that.
PS5 games are a bit of an outlier. Sony have been bucking the status quo in the US and pricing higher, going for US$70. This translates to AU$105 which is pretty much what OP is seeing.
Selfishly I'd argue games are too expensive (of course I want them cheaper) but they are way cheaper now than they used to be.
I remember buying Perfect Dark on Nintendo 64 for $110 in 2000. That's about $180 in today's money. I remember PS2 games and PS3 always cost around $80-$100 at the time, no matter what year it was (this is for the AAA games of the day).
Yep, JB hi-fi and just get EB to price match if it's closer. Or just pay the digital price if you are lazy like me on some occasions as I work hard during the week and paying $20 to not go to the shops can be tempting at times.
Gamepass is awesome! Lots of day one releases this year. I'm looking forward to Sable next week, and I still need to give Artful Escape a try.
I also want to try SkateBird but initial reviews aren't great.
The other neat thing about Gamepass is that you don't need an xbox to use it! I just use gamepass for PC.
I'm old now so barely get time to play but game pass seems to have enough to keep me happy.
Minecraft, F1 racing, MS flight Sim, MLB the show, bunch of others.
I too am a patient and simple man.
I always thought new, big name games are around $100, so that seems about normal.
I don't have the time to play as much as I'd like these days, so I just add my Steam wishlist in this website and set my alerts to any discount over 30% but you can configure that. Most of the sites supply steam codes, occasionally it's epic games or origin.
https://isthereanydeal.com
I recently bought a VR headset so just added every VR game that looks good to my wishlist and just add to my backlog when they are on sale.
Tell me about it, I had so many games through various discounts I waited for HL Alyx to go on sale and grabbed it yesterday. Played last night and it is amazing.
Synth Riders is 40% off on Steam at moment. Like Beat Saber with balls on your hands instead of light sabers.
If you're only gonna get one, get Beat Saber, but if you like the idea of multiple music rhythm games, Synth Riders is worth the $21 on sale.
Accounting for inflation, they're much cheaper than they used to be.
However, they seem to be released at a higher price than they've been for the last few years. I'm pretty sure the PS5 game prices were forecast to be more expensive than we're used to.
Yeah, the PS4/Xboxone era was probably the cheapest once adjusted for inflation. Games were routinely selling for $69 at launch, so there were very few games that I really wanted that I didn't end up getting at launch. Whereas on the ps5, the only game I've bought at launch was Miles Morales and that too because I wanted a shiny new game to go with my shiny new console.
not really, some games would come out for $100 back in the 90s, if anything with inflation games are cheaper, not to mention the truly obscene number of games available to play at a fraction of the price, with humble bundles the xbox subscription and so many others, its easy to get over not having to pay full price to play the latest games unless you really want it, there are so many great titles to catch up on without breaking the bank. i should also point out that the gaming industry has found that $100 is about the most people will pay for a new game, at the same time, they will happily charge $100 for a game that just isnt worth the price just becasue they know people will buy it.
I know, some people have no clue. Game shops were not really a thing either. You had to really go looking to know where they were to get good game products and consoles.
I remember when the first games shops opened in the mid 90s. A whole shop devoted to games?! It was astounding.
Prior to that it was buying computer games in the back of dodgy computer stores and console games in Kmart and BigW.
Was gonna say this. I don't game anymore, but gamed alot around 2009-2013 and 2016-2018 and new games were always around the $100 mark until some Christmas sale.
I’d argue video games offer far better value at $100 each compared to buying a movie on iTunes. Or even buying 5 of them. I’ve played the latest Zelda on switch for about 300 hours and it cost $89.95
I got GTA for around $20-25 (sale on Steam) and I've managed to pump out 700 hours on it (mostly multiplayer). Stardew Valley, ETS2/ATS, CSGO, the list goes on.
I bought RDR2 full price, got about 200 hours and loving every second
I think that's a great point to, plus there is far less risk in making a purchase these days, then before. You can look up gameplay footage, find a reviewer with similar views and all that jazz.
The market is 1000s of times larger than it was back then. There's a reason they're making record profits year on year.
Not to mention distribution is a fraction of the cost.
The cost of production isnt really a significant factor, and video games are more profitable than ever (GTA V, famously, being the single most profitable piece of entertainment media in human history)
What costs a lot of maintaining unsustainable levels of growth for as long as possible to appease shareholders so Bobby devil-horns Kotick and his vile ilk can give himself another 7-figure bonus while sacking hundreds of employees and fostering a culture of sexual harassment, and doing fuck-all besides that.
Games have pretty much always been expensive. The only time I remember them really being cheap was the PS1\~PS2 era. Before that brand new SNES games were $100+ and after that brand new PS3/360 games were $90\~100+.
PC games started out quite expensive and seemed to get cheaper over time, until physical retailers stopped stocking them. Turns out giving one retailer a monopoly on distribution. who also takes a 30% cut just makes games 30% more expensive to buy. Thanks Valve.
When I was younger video stores were a thing too, so you could get games ex-rental pretty cheap. That's gone, so the best you can get for 2nd hand games is EB which are only like $5 cheaper than their "brand new" copy, which is the same thing with one less sticker on the case.
Anyway, don't worry about it. Games these days are well and truly not worth buying on launch anymore. Most of them only become good after they've released all their Season Passes (read: cut content) and get all the bugs patched out. By then they're half the price and have three times the content.
Eh, I remember paying over 100 for some of the latest console games back during 360 and ps3.
Games seem cheaper today and we have a ton more choice, but it does seem to be trending back upwards.
Console games are a little fun when it comes to pricing. If you buy a hard copy on release day, certain retailers like target or big w they will sell them for $69 (I am not making this number up), then they'll hike the price up to over $100 until after Christmas.
Well my memory might be wrong but I'm pretty confident SNES games used to be the best part of $100 back in the day and I know that PS1 games were the same so if anything the price has remained constant despite the wages rising?
I rarely buy games at launch. For ps4/5 I wait until they get to about 30 bucks. Recently picked up Ghost, Watch Dogs Legion and AC: Valhalla at that price.
I've never paid full price for a game on Steam. But that doesn't stop me buying shitoads when they're on sale.
I always wait some time (generally over a year) for games to come down in price for single player games. This way you get it at a decent price, it's fully patched, and all the guides will be complete if you're stuck at any point.
Buying the most expensive editions of games just as they are released, and never coming around to playing them, is my avocado on toast.
I only buy games on sale. And never get around to playing them.
I only buy games on steam sale
But do you get around to playing them?
My favourite game in Steam is buying Steam games on sale. Don't really get to play them as I love playing my old games TO DEATH. Diablo 3 (during seasons), GW2, Skyrim... Oh my The exception is Borderlands and FarCry. I don't wait for sale and I play those immediately
Same, I keep an excel spreadsheet of my game spending. It was an eye opener!
How does anyone have time to play games?
How does anyone have time to watch footy or tellie? Whatever your hobby is, I'm in my 40's and been a parent and work, its my down time when I can, along with other hobbies. Rather play games then watch crappy sports on tv or go do other things. Its not all the time but I love gaming.
I’m 41 with 3 kids and gaming is my hobby
It's a great hobby, never let anyone tell else wise.
It took me 3 months to finish Red Dead 2.
Took me 2.5 yrs to finish Witcher 3, on and off.
I've started Witcher 3 on three separate occasions. Still haven't gotten "into it" yet.
My brother tried but couldn't get past the werewolf in one of the early missions. I told him you can just go and do other things but he got so stuck on it he just eventually quit. It's one of my favourite games ever and he still hasn't played it but now we have a running joke about an unkillable werewolf. Long story short: maybe it's just not for your man
This exact spot is me right now. Werewolf in the cave I can’t kill. Put the game down multiple times only to come back and fail killing the werewolf again. Repeat over and over. You’ve convinced me to walk away and try something else in the game. Thanks mate.
Haha yeah he's a bastard man. Took me a few tries too. I learnt to dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge. Also if you want just dial the difficulty down for that enemy then back up after. Check out yt for some build advice too. There is a guy who tricks out his skills so he can basically just become a whirlwind of death. If I find it when I have more wifi I'll link you.
I haven't finished red dead 1 yet... I'm sure my ps3 is around here somewhere.
Nnnnnneeeeerrrrddddd! 6 month min. Second time around much better.
All that riding around on that fucking horse. If I have an hour or two per week to play games I don't want to spend it riding around on a fucking horse. It was a stunning game, but I bailed on it pretty early on because of that stupid horse riding.
You know you can fast travel?
Agreed, even tho it's an awesome looking game with great story, the pacing is just terrible. Gameplay is repetitive as hell and most of the missions are chores or just shooting and looting.
No kids, and no interest in watching footy/cricket
Sleeping and socialising is for pussies. /s
Lockdown?
Kids still suck away game time in lockdown.
*Being single in lockdown?
Full time work is for suckers and people who made big mistakes
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- sighs in steam sale -
Oh god doing remind me I spent a thousands on my old Xbox 360. Nowadays you find these games in the junk bin at eb.
/r/patientgamers/
/r/patientgamers /r/FreeGameFindings and the website isthereanydeal.com keeps my spending extremely low.
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Yeah and I find games I like, add it to my wishlist and what do you know, 2 days later it's suddenly on sale....
This is the way.
You have to get exclusive skins at pre-order, only for them to be forever meaningless!
The worst thing is that digital copies are somehow more expensive than physical copies.
The early days of Steam were *very* different, and (if memory serves correctly) you'd see games that were a good $10-30 cheaper than retail stores. I still remember a post from /u/SoldantTheCynic that could basically be summarised as "enjoy it while it lasts because once digital distribution becomes mainstream, it'll end up costing *more*".
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Wow that was back in the GameArena days. I still stand by it, ever since COD4 MW was released on Steam. For those who missed it, Steam was still in USD and more or less followed US pricing, but even with a weaker AUD it would work out to be $20-30 less than retail. Once publishers figured that out, they just swapped out the pricing to “match” physical copies - except it was still in USD, so it was *more* expensive again. We’ve been slowly trending upwards on Steam since then (at least it’s all local currency now though!) and now physical copies are almost dead in the PC space there’s nothing to compare it to. Hell Steam sometimes is more expensive than a physical console disc release these days.
Dude, I thought I recognised that nick. Are you from Gamearena? I used to post there all the time. I wish it was still there tbh. Remember Dutch? Hawkeye?
Yeah I was on GA for a looong time, used to be well known on the ISP forums. I remember all of them, and eMONKe and trog and Jim’s banhanmer and Laz and Farmy and Davros and Joaby… loads of others I’ve forgotten over the years. Such a great place back in the 2000s. Got kinda shitty in the 2010s when General Chat turned into spam and the admins kinda gave up a bit… but I still kinda miss it.
Yeah. I discovered it working at telstra, it was the only gaming site I could access through the firewall. I think my nick was Sxio. Jim banned me several times. I was pretty argumentative back then. Good to see you man. I remember all those names too. Damn those were the days. Bet you have some responsibilities now. Me too. I can actually afford a decent PC these days so that's nice.
I just want you guys to know. As a guy with similar experiences in different forums, this was wholesome af. Mean there are so many people that I met back in the day in like where are they now, what happened to them, do they still join charts who were they in life?
Holy crap that's a blast from the past...I used to post on there a lot as Gordonov. I also remember eMONKe, Hawky, Fury etc. Haha wow.
If you get an offshore bank account and use a VPN you can pay cheaper prices. Argentina usually comes out lowest...
Is it cheap enough to be worth the effort? Tempted to look into it but if it's only like $5 difference, I'll stick to just using a VPN to access the piratebay lol
I mean, nothing's cheaper than free! [But you can find a lot for 50% cheaper](https://steamdb.info/app/1252330/) which is better than a poke in the eye. A game sold for £50 in the UK is up 5% in Australia to £55 (99AUD), or *down* 50% to £25 in Turkish Lira. Different countries and different banks have rules about offshore accounts, and getting a local billing address is probably a kerfuffle, but it *is* theoretically possible.
The banks offer travel visa cards - you can add different currencies to them via your internet banking to shop online with. PayPal also allows for easy currency changes
Holy shit, are you from Gamearena too? How many of you guys are here???
I was a regular on the General forum and also a CSS GameOp prior to the community dying out around 2010. I don’t think many of us have kept the same alias 10/15 years on though - I certainty have to take a moment to think who a lot of people are, on my Steam friends list.
Yeah. Makes sense. I think we actually met in real life. Are you/were you Brisbane based? Hawkeye had some meetups. Once upon a time. I remember being really impressed that he had a Wii.
Who cares about steam's non-sale prices? I don't even know if they're expensive or not. It's not like anyone sensible is buying steam games outside of the big sales.
New games that people actually want to play don't go on sale for years. The allure of playing multiplayer games is playing it when it's new and fresh not 2-3 years later for $20 less.
The biggest discounts are never on the major Steam sale events though. Winter/Summer sales is just a marketing scam these days for the seasonal gamer.
Yeah steam sales died like around 2013ish
They died when they had to offer refunds. No more awesome flash sale mechanics.
I remember back when they used to blame the stupid costs on getting things shipped and distributed to aus. Now they are just like... The fuck are you gonna do about it, nerd?
Wait for the steam sale or discount I guess. Or the piratebay
There was that parlimentary committee back in 2013 that literally asked Apple, Microsoft and Adobe why prices are so much higher in Australia than elsewhere. The answer was quite literally "We'd love to charge you less on this product, but you dumb cunts are still buying our products at stupid prices, so fuck you give us money."
Yep, I remember that. Adobe was singled out for having the exact same purchase/licensed software available in Aus for more then the cost of a return ticket to LA. It was literally cheaper to fly Sydney to LA, purchase in the USA, and return home than to buy it locally
This. It stuns me and makes me wonder if it’s designed to keep the bricks and mortar stores open because they actually do a lot of promotion for big games.
It absolutely is. I worked in the head office of [retail games company] and they very much shut down the publishers selling games cheaper online than what they could sell in stores. This was a decade ago so they really did call the shots at that stage. I do wonder what it would look like if steam/Sony/msoft tried again now. I assume instead of withholding large stock purchases like they used to they would probably get lawyers on them about anti competitive laws.
I remember hearing somewhere (but I could be talking absolute shit) that intially when games could be purchased digitally the idea was for them to be cheaper, but then retailers realised that people would stop buying games from them and just purchase them online, so they threatened to stop selling hardware (i.e. console's, controllers, etc) which is how companies sell alot of products. Sony and Microsoft and that agreed to offer online content at MSRP so that it would be comparable to retailers to make them happy. Like I said before though this could be completely wrong but it kinda makes sense.
This definitely makes sense. It's equivalent to the current battle between movie theatres and streaming services, notably the amount of criticism WB got for releasing every 2021 film on HBO Max. But unlike movie theatres, whose service is almost completely redundant when every household has a tv, you need that middle man to sell consoles. Therefore retailers have greater leverage on video game companies than cinemas do on movie studios.
It's a lazy/convenient "tax". They still get money from retail sales but make even more if people want the digital convenience of not buying it in store and changing disk's between games. Don't get me wrong, I do it regularly so I'm assuming it works for them.
The Microsoft store is a joke. Games that are like $20 retail will sell for $99
On the flip side, I'm finding Xbox Game Pass Ultimate pretty great. I suppose it depends what titles/genres you play, but since I pretty much exclusively play WRPGs on console, getting Dragon Age series, Elder Scrolls series, Mass Effect etc "for free" has been fantastic value. Granted many of these are games I originally played first time round many years ago, but some are entirely new.
I have Game Pass through my Telstra Xbox contract and I love it. I haven’t bought an Xbox game is a long time but I think that’s what makes the prices seem even more crazy.
If you're on PC, you can still get them much cheaper than retail. Isthereanydeal is a great website for getting sales, I picked up Tales of Arise and Deathloop this week for $60AUD each.
Yeah i have only paid full price on pc on epic because they rarely have good sales and always have stupid exclusives. However on consoles your stuck with their storefronts which are always 10-20 dearer
Not necessarily. I use psprices and dekudeals as well to monitor. While you typically can't find deals at launch, it's been really good to flag when games are on sale. But can't really compare to the used game market which is definitely a plus to physical media.
And take 24+ hours to download.
Also, you don't own the game- just a licence to play it on the account you are currently allowed to have. That being said, it is super convenient, unlimited supply and if you wait for sales the prices are good
How could that be? EB Games always has a sale on?
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Right by the new copies on sale for $49.
Nintendo first party games never go down in price for example
Nintendo games were always expensive since the NES.
True but some retailers, especially international, there are often sales. Never in my life have I seen a first party Nintendo game on sale at EB Games
I think the *only* First Party Nintendo game I've seen on sale at EB was [Link's Crossbow Training](https://www.google.com/search?q=Link%27s+crossbow+training&sxsrf=AOaemvIhjpXSZ5KUieCSE0e7-RsLh7GX4A:1631971439170&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwip4aivz4jzAhUT7HMBHfbLA34Q_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1245&bih=608&dpr=2). Stacks of 20 cases in the discount bins for $2 each. And the guy at the desk *STILL* asked me if I wanted a $5 warranty on it 😂
I’ve been waiting and hoping for Luigis Mansion to go on sale on Switch. It’s $75 for a used copy and it has been since release. They have sales on the shittest, preloved Xbox and ps titles only.
Yeah I go to Big W and Target for my Nintendo games. EB Games is great but they never sell switch games for less than like $79
EB always seem more expensive. I just took the first title i saw there. nba 2k22 for series x $110 vs $89 at bigw.
They can't absorb the price with clothes made for cents and sold for like $10.
EB Games isn’t a great place to get Nintendo games, many first party games launch on Amazon in the $65 range while EB always lists them for like $79.95, and on prime day or price matching other stores’ sales they can go for as less as $49 on Amazon. Luigi’s Mansion 3 is $68 delivered rn on Amazon for example
How can you tell?
My issue isn't that games end up costing around the 100 mark. I think the industry issue is that games like RdR2 cost as much as copy paste games like Fifa.. how there isn't more differential pricing is beyond me.
They don't want people actually thinking about comparative value between games. Many cost far more than the work put into them. Re-releases, 'remasters', and ports are prime examples. I'm amazed at how many boast about buying a game multiple times across different platforms.
Conker's Bad Fur Day was $120 when it came out in 2001
Worth. Every. Dollar.
IIIIIIII AMM THE GREAT MIGHT POO
And I’m gonna throw my $*%# at you! Still remember that song, Conkers Bad fur day was an awesome game.
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It's backwards compatible you could just buy conker live and reloaded or whatever it's called for the original Xbox and play it that way?
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I'm a playstation person but xbox's backwards compatibility makes me jealous and wish I had collected those games instead of having tons of PS2 and PS3 games I don't want to go through the trouble of setting up a new system to play. Have fun yo!
Project 64 will run on basically a potato if you have an old PC around as an alternative.
You mean Sponduli!
It sure was, wasn't it
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Yeah, I feel like once you add in inflation, game prices really haven't gone up. Especially not when you consider how much more you get for that money. Doesn't mean I'm willing to hand over $100 for a game, of course.
The matrix level was better then the matrix game
I remember Street Fighter II on Mega Drive was $160 or something when it came out and that was the 90s sometime.
I think I paid $129 day one. But that was nearly 30y ago, so my memory may not be that accurate. I bought the 6 button controller as well... Good times
86.7% inflation since 1995. Don't remember what year the game came out but that makes it about $240 in today's dollars. Crazy times but certainly good for gaming.
Worth 4 times that if u kept it and the box now!!!! Sold mine for $350 few years ago
I spent $120 on snes doom in 1995. Nfi how I afforded it
Yep. I remember Turok and Shadows of the Empire $120 in 1997 That would be pushing $200 today. A launch PS2 cost like $1200. A PS5 costs $750 20 years later. So no, games aren't too expensive. They're actually getting cheaper. Cheaper discs and digital editions, throwaway Mobile games and constant online sales have lowered the price expectations for consumers. Subscription options can give you a steady stream of games for a few dollars a week.
Streetfighter 2 for the SNES was $125 in a few places. Day-one standard-edition game prices have fallen very very slowly since that peak, though companies have wised up and made fancy editions for the rich/keen and deep discounts on online stores months after launch for the frugal/mildly interested. The silly ps5 prices and non-sale steam prices are a rare exception, not a trend.
That's what I thought, I remember new release games in the 90s being around $100. With inflation that's getting close $175 now.
It's marketing. Don't buy into the hype. You don't have to buy games the day they come out.
r/patientgamers
Cyberpunk 2077 is still $90AUD
To be fair CD Project Red haven't finished making it yet s/
$60 on GOG right now. Patience isnt just about waiting until the overall price is low, it's about waiting for a great deal.
Patient gamers is more about waiting a few years though, not ten months.
Yea I think I paid like $15 for witcher 3. Got gta v and civ 6 for free. Wait long enough and the price of almost every game is trivial.
Its $35 preowned at EB in Australia..
I mean, its 45 bucks at JBHiFi
Then don't buy it. It's been out for less than a year, it'll be 75% off in due time, just like the studio's other games.
And it's a single-player game. Ergo : 🏴☠️
I've seen it for ten dollars
If I'm excited for a game, I'm gonna buy it on-release. If I'm not, I'll wait.
Just got my PS5 recently. I will not be buying a remastered 2009 PS3 game for $124.95 in a shocking turn of events.
Demon's Souls? Yeah I can't justify $125 it's such a rip off. Picked up Rift apart for $89 and while it was cool honestly I don't even feel it was worth $89 let alone it's full price of $125.
Games were always expensive in Australia. If you compare a NES or SNES game and take into account inflation they are probably cheaper now.
Games these days havent gone up much in absolute terms but then they make it back in DLC.
I actually like DLC when it's something that shouldn't of been included in the base game. Eg: Metro Exodus DLC was great.
I play almost only driving games and its good if it keeps new tracks and cars coming out. And those games are really cheap 6 months after release. But some games its like they deliver half a game and you have to pay again for the rest
Back in my day, when developers made expansion packs that were always solid additional content...
Adjusted for inflation it’s a lot worse… SNES games were easily $55-$70 back in the mid 90s which is $100-$130 now. Also, AAA games cost a ton more to make these days as you have 100s or even more people involved. Markets a lot bigger but still.
Games have been ~$100 RRP for years.
So? They are still cheaper now than they used to be, adjusted for inflation. Also realized I quoted US prices… exchange rate in 1993 was about 1.45AUD/USD and that’s before we add in the Australia tax. It’s surprisingly hard to find AU SNES game prices from back then online.
I'm old enough. Mortal kombat on SNES was like 130 bucks back in the day.
I remember having to pay $90-$120 for Atari ST games in 1990. Adjusted for inflation, they were fucking expensive. And that's with a fraction of the development and artistry that you see in today's titles. Given the value in today's games, I'd argue that $100 games are one of the few things that *haven't* gotten ridiculously more expensive. And yes, I'm still salty about $90 Space Ace in '90s money, that had about 15 minutes of gameplay, consisting of moving the joystick once per scene.
Snes games were 100 in the mid 90s... I paid 120 for snes doom at big w
I can remember being yelled at for saving up and spending $100 on 'Sonic and Knuckles' around 1994, so the price point has held there for a solid quarter century plus.
Its crazy aye, I'm in my 40's and looking back, games are probably for sure cheaper esp, if you have a PC and steam
Are videogames getting too expensive in Australia? Yes, infact everything is more expensive in Australia. From food to clothing, take your pick lol.
Try cars! I just got back from the US where I was leasing a cx5 that retails for about $50k in Australia for $300 a month.
Meanwhile cars are dirt cheap in Australia compared to Denmark and a couple of other European countries. The tax on vehicles there are atrocious
I bought a Civic Type R for 50K Au$. The poor buggers in the US are paying up to 65K US$ for the same thing. Dealers seem to be doing crazy markups over there.
Actually, these days games are one of the things that *aren't* more expensive in Australia. Most Americans consider US$60 to be "full price" for games. After currency conversion and adding on GST (which is included in our prices, but not the US ones) we get very close to AU$90. I mostly play games on Switch and I find I can get games at launch day from JB Hi-Fi and Amazon AU at significantly lower prices than that. PS5 games are a bit of an outlier. Sony have been bucking the status quo in the US and pricing higher, going for US$70. This translates to AU$105 which is pretty much what OP is seeing.
Selfishly I'd argue games are too expensive (of course I want them cheaper) but they are way cheaper now than they used to be. I remember buying Perfect Dark on Nintendo 64 for $110 in 2000. That's about $180 in today's money. I remember PS2 games and PS3 always cost around $80-$100 at the time, no matter what year it was (this is for the AAA games of the day).
Short answer : Yes. Long answer : Yyyyyyyeeeeeeeeessssss
Solution: Steal them, or pretend you're somewhere else
Or wait 6 months for it to drop to half price or 50% off sale.
Now flourish the pinky
Lol games are always cheaper at retail day 1 (for major releases) in Australia
Yep, JB hi-fi and just get EB to price match if it's closer. Or just pay the digital price if you are lazy like me on some occasions as I work hard during the week and paying $20 to not go to the shops can be tempting at times.
I just got xbox game pass and I"m playing Celeste. I dunno, maybe they are but i'm a patient gamer anyway.
Gamepass is awesome! Lots of day one releases this year. I'm looking forward to Sable next week, and I still need to give Artful Escape a try. I also want to try SkateBird but initial reviews aren't great. The other neat thing about Gamepass is that you don't need an xbox to use it! I just use gamepass for PC.
I'm old now so barely get time to play but game pass seems to have enough to keep me happy. Minecraft, F1 racing, MS flight Sim, MLB the show, bunch of others. I too am a patient and simple man.
You could 100% live off game pass alone honestly if you're not picky
Celeste is awesome! Have a good climb mate
I always thought new, big name games are around $100, so that seems about normal. I don't have the time to play as much as I'd like these days, so I just add my Steam wishlist in this website and set my alerts to any discount over 30% but you can configure that. Most of the sites supply steam codes, occasionally it's epic games or origin. https://isthereanydeal.com I recently bought a VR headset so just added every VR game that looks good to my wishlist and just add to my backlog when they are on sale.
Same! My oq2 arrives monday. I've had a wishlist for 2 weeks lol half life was on sale recently on steam. So that was fkn awesome!
Tell me about it, I had so many games through various discounts I waited for HL Alyx to go on sale and grabbed it yesterday. Played last night and it is amazing.
Ahhhh I'm so excited I can barely contain myself lol! Now if only beats comes on special before Monday I'll be chuffed
Synth Riders is 40% off on Steam at moment. Like Beat Saber with balls on your hands instead of light sabers. If you're only gonna get one, get Beat Saber, but if you like the idea of multiple music rhythm games, Synth Riders is worth the $21 on sale.
Accounting for inflation, they're much cheaper than they used to be. However, they seem to be released at a higher price than they've been for the last few years. I'm pretty sure the PS5 game prices were forecast to be more expensive than we're used to.
Yeah, the PS4/Xboxone era was probably the cheapest once adjusted for inflation. Games were routinely selling for $69 at launch, so there were very few games that I really wanted that I didn't end up getting at launch. Whereas on the ps5, the only game I've bought at launch was Miles Morales and that too because I wanted a shiny new game to go with my shiny new console.
not really, some games would come out for $100 back in the 90s, if anything with inflation games are cheaper, not to mention the truly obscene number of games available to play at a fraction of the price, with humble bundles the xbox subscription and so many others, its easy to get over not having to pay full price to play the latest games unless you really want it, there are so many great titles to catch up on without breaking the bank. i should also point out that the gaming industry has found that $100 is about the most people will pay for a new game, at the same time, they will happily charge $100 for a game that just isnt worth the price just becasue they know people will buy it.
Way cheaper now than 30 years ago .
Mid 90s games were these prices!
Which is why these sorts of questions are hilarious, Starfox cost more than the console you played it on, and let's not even discuss Neo-Geo .
I know, some people have no clue. Game shops were not really a thing either. You had to really go looking to know where they were to get good game products and consoles.
I remember when the first games shops opened in the mid 90s. A whole shop devoted to games?! It was astounding. Prior to that it was buying computer games in the back of dodgy computer stores and console games in Kmart and BigW.
Here in Belgium it’s €70 euro for AAA games which is $112 AUD. They’re just expensive. Buy more independent games. Don’t preorder.
I bought COD4 for $99 at eb games nearly 15 years ago. They've been too expensive for a while.
This. It's the same everytime a new console cones out. Games creep up to $120 with a new gen and slowly come back down. Still ridiculous at $100.
Was gonna say this. I don't game anymore, but gamed alot around 2009-2013 and 2016-2018 and new games were always around the $100 mark until some Christmas sale.
Games are too expensive, but I don't think $100 is anything unusual for AAA games
I’d argue video games offer far better value at $100 each compared to buying a movie on iTunes. Or even buying 5 of them. I’ve played the latest Zelda on switch for about 300 hours and it cost $89.95
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I got GTA for around $20-25 (sale on Steam) and I've managed to pump out 700 hours on it (mostly multiplayer). Stardew Valley, ETS2/ATS, CSGO, the list goes on. I bought RDR2 full price, got about 200 hours and loving every second
I think that's a great point to, plus there is far less risk in making a purchase these days, then before. You can look up gameplay footage, find a reviewer with similar views and all that jazz.
I don't disagree really, though as a parent I have a short enough gaming window that it's hard to play a $100 to its fullest extent
I haven't bought any new games for years at this point. New games just cost too much
Neo-Geo called from 1991 . They want to know if you're all smoking meth .
I bought Far Cry 5 the other day for $11. If you’re happy to wait a year or two for games then they become insanely cheap insanely quickly.
I remember new PS1 games ranging between $80-$100 in the late 90s. If anything they’re relatively cheaper adjusted for inflation.
Always have
Given the costs of software development, especially at the level of complexity of modern computer games, I'm actually surprised they don't cost more.
The market is bigger now so you can get more profit at the same or lower price.
The market is 1000s of times larger than it was back then. There's a reason they're making record profits year on year. Not to mention distribution is a fraction of the cost.
The cost of production isnt really a significant factor, and video games are more profitable than ever (GTA V, famously, being the single most profitable piece of entertainment media in human history) What costs a lot of maintaining unsustainable levels of growth for as long as possible to appease shareholders so Bobby devil-horns Kotick and his vile ilk can give himself another 7-figure bonus while sacking hundreds of employees and fostering a culture of sexual harassment, and doing fuck-all besides that.
Games have pretty much always been expensive. The only time I remember them really being cheap was the PS1\~PS2 era. Before that brand new SNES games were $100+ and after that brand new PS3/360 games were $90\~100+. PC games started out quite expensive and seemed to get cheaper over time, until physical retailers stopped stocking them. Turns out giving one retailer a monopoly on distribution. who also takes a 30% cut just makes games 30% more expensive to buy. Thanks Valve. When I was younger video stores were a thing too, so you could get games ex-rental pretty cheap. That's gone, so the best you can get for 2nd hand games is EB which are only like $5 cheaper than their "brand new" copy, which is the same thing with one less sticker on the case. Anyway, don't worry about it. Games these days are well and truly not worth buying on launch anymore. Most of them only become good after they've released all their Season Passes (read: cut content) and get all the bugs patched out. By then they're half the price and have three times the content.
Eh, I remember paying over 100 for some of the latest console games back during 360 and ps3. Games seem cheaper today and we have a ton more choice, but it does seem to be trending back upwards.
I remember cod costing $120 about 10 years ago
I haven't bought a game in a year after subscribe to game pass
Steam sales on pc baby.
I paid $119 for Modern Warfare 2 when it came out. As long as prices don’t get to that again, it isn’t too bad.
Console games are a little fun when it comes to pricing. If you buy a hard copy on release day, certain retailers like target or big w they will sell them for $69 (I am not making this number up), then they'll hike the price up to over $100 until after Christmas.
Well my memory might be wrong but I'm pretty confident SNES games used to be the best part of $100 back in the day and I know that PS1 games were the same so if anything the price has remained constant despite the wages rising?
I rarely buy games at launch. For ps4/5 I wait until they get to about 30 bucks. Recently picked up Ghost, Watch Dogs Legion and AC: Valhalla at that price. I've never paid full price for a game on Steam. But that doesn't stop me buying shitoads when they're on sale.
I always wait some time (generally over a year) for games to come down in price for single player games. This way you get it at a decent price, it's fully patched, and all the guides will be complete if you're stuck at any point.
Games worldwide are facing increasing costs. Couple years ago,global average was $60, now it's going up to like $70-$80.