I was a bit surprised to find out today that the Xbox One and PS4 versions of Dragon Age: Inquisition and Battlefield: Hardline are listed as $69.99 on Amazon as well as at Gamestop. I have heard of price changes similar to this in Canada and the UK, but this is the first I have heard of this in the US (I live in California).

Do you guys think this is something that will go away, or will it stick and $70 will become the new $60 industry-wide? And are you willing to pay $70 for a single game? Personally I am not willing to pay that much for one game, I rarely am willing to even pay $60 for a game.

Those are both "deluxe" editions with extra content. Dragon Age and Battlefield both have standard editions that retail for the regular $59.99 USD.

It still shows as 60 for me for the standard game, but the "Deluxe Editions" show up as 70. Which seems to just include what looks like a preorder bonus of shitty in game stuff... that seems pretty scummy.

I hope 70 isn't the new norm. Digital stores like steam have spoiled my want to buy most games at full price.

@wemibelec90: Derp on my part. Both sites defaulted to the deluxe edition. They really seem to be pushing that deluxe edition of Dragon Age as the main version; the first $59.99 version of the game is the 9th result when searching "Dragon Age Inquisition" on Gamestop's site. It's also Interesting that the deluxe 360 version of Dragon Age is $10 cheaper than the other versions on Amazon.

$70 for a new game at retail in Canada has been the norm for a really long time, unfortunately.

Sounds like a stealthy way to move the standard up to $70. I have a feeling that there will be a statement next year saying "an overwhelming number of people purchased the deluxe edition, so we're making everything $70 from this point forward."

@rotnac: yup. Feel our pain Americans.

At least you're not in Australia, I think they are going to be paying $99 AUD for the regular edition of Inquisition. It's even worse when you do the conversion and find out it's $92 USD.

Yeah, as said by others that's the deluxe edition. Furthermore, the actual contents of the deluxe edition seem bad and worthless, consisting of a couple mounts, a unique throne for your keep, a soundtrack download, and some TBA digital goods. Not worth it in the slightest.

No it hasn't? The PS3 and 360 generation started off at $70, but then it quickly changed back to $60. It's only been a few months since this generation started that they bumped the price of games back up. Was around the time the console itself has gotten more expensive. At least that's how it has been in Ontario.

I pretty much wouldn't play any new console games if it weren't for mail rental services. I have no interest in owning games after finishing them so it suits me just fine, and the prices are reasonable as well.

Yeah, Austrailians and Europeans get reamed on game prices compared to NA, even with the markup Canadians live with.

@liquidprince: where are you buying games? Because every retailer I go to has new games at 70. It's why I mostly get digital now,

I too would like to know. Also, living in Ontario and upcoming new games like Destiny, COD: Advanced Warfare, WWE 2K15, and NHL/FIFA/Madden 15 for 360/PS3 are releasing at $69.99 for regular non-collector editions.

I wouldn't doubt if these "deluxe" versions for DA and Madden are some test to see if we are willing to pay ten bucks more.

Yup, but oddly enough the collector's editions are the same price so a little more incentive to get one of those.

There are a lot of apologists who have been clamoring for game prices to increase, and citing inflation and how games have been the same price for decades as justification. Of course, they completely ignore things like how games just went up 20% a few years ago (games are now $60 on PC instead of $50) and how while retail prices may have stayed the same, there is now a much larger audience buying far more games and many are now doing it in digital form, which eliminates all the significant extraneous expenses of manufacturing and distribution which mitigate other rising costs. Other products - especially technological ones - tend to lower in price as adoption rates increase and cost to produce decrease. Even extremely expensive things, like movies. You don't pay $60 to own a movie or an album or a book. However, you're expected to pay $60, plus tax, plus $30 season pass, plus tax for a few hours of entertainment with a game.

I think the idea that people are paying $65 for eight hours of entertainment is absurd enough. I'm in a high income bracket with no dependents and few expenses and I find the price obscene, as it is. (Sorry, I don't care if you spent half a billion dollars on your shitty game - find a way to do it cheaper.. there is literally no game on the planet that should cost half a billion).

I hope these assholes keep icnreasing prices, DLC, pre-order bonuses, retail exlusives, microtransactions, and other money-grubbing scum activities until it finally implodes and people stop buying and playing their games and a huge chunk of the industry which treats its product and customers like cattle are bankrupt. Sometimes a forest fire is the healthiest thing for an ecosystem.

I will be shocked if $70 is not a standard price by the end of this generation. If not more.

I wouldn't expect $70 to be the standard any time soon. Publishers would much rather avoid the outcry by continuing to charge $60 and instead find more and more ways to add additional revenue on top of that for each game (DLC, microtransactions, season passes, etc.) That way they get it both ways: they avoid the massive PR hit that a price increase would bring but still get to charge potentially $70 and far beyond for a game.

Agreed, but I think they are about to stretch the season pass/DLC thing to the breaking point, soon. They're already selling games for $60, plus $30 season pass (or $50 for COD/BF4). If they want more money, they have to make season passes as expensive as the actual game or they have to introduce a lot more DLC and microtransactions that aren't part of the expensive season pass. I don't think people are likely to be happy with either of those much more. If they increase the price of the *game*, then they raise the ceiling across the board, in the future.

That is, if the limit for games now are:

$60 game, $50 season pass, very little non-season-pass DLC/microtransactions

Then there's not much room to move on the price of season pass or introducing more transactions outside of the pass.

If they raise the games to $70, then a couple years down the road, they can raise season passes to $60 and it's still less than the game. Now they've boosted an extra $20 per game out of you within only a few years.

All this, while the purchasing power and salary of the average person (in America, at least) has decreased by something like 23%. People are and will continue to truly pay more of their money toward this form of entertainment -- both in raw dollars and in percentage of their income.

Keep an eye on Amazon.ca. They usually have stuff for $59.99 or lower soon after release or even leading up to it. Not to mention games go on sale all the fucking time nowadays.

If everyone changes their prices at once like they did here it's not like consumers can do much. Most gamers won't stop their hobby.

Games are getting more and more expensive. The prices will go up.

They don't accept Paypal though so whatever I would save is lost in shipping and prepaid card fees.

Hah! In Australia special edition cost $120+

@liquidprince said:

same thing here in quebec. i haven't purchased any new games recently because of the price hike

@liquidprince: Yeah. Hopefully this time it will drop back down soon, but honestly I'm skeptical that they will ever do it until they notice a hit in the numbers. I think the craziest thing is that rereleases are going for so much. GTAV has been priced at $70, hopefully this is just companies high balling it before release (this is online pre order pricing) and hopefully it will drop before release, because if not that is a game going for $10 MORE than when it was new, I don't care if they have improved the graphics or whatever, that doesn't make it okay. The Last of Us may be $15 less than new retail games, but it's a last gen game, going for $5 less than when it was a brand new IP. Diablo 3 is $65, so $5 more than it was on any other system, this one makes a bit more sense since it includes an expansion that is listed as $40USD on PC.

I have Tomb Raider and I love it but it's pretty bad about this too. Currently $50 new for a game that came out a year and a half ago. Sure it includes all the DLC but it's outfits that are almost universally bad and multiplayer maps, I have never once even heard someone say they played Tomb Raider multiplayer. (personally I got it for about $40, which is acceptable to me)

The prices have gone up NOW, but it's only been a fairly recent thing. At the PS4's launch, and even when Tomb Raider Definitive Edition came out, I remember paying $59.99. It wasn't until Sony announced that the price of the PS4 was goin up to $459.99 that the games went up with it. And to answer your question, I buy them from regular places such as EB Games, Wal-mart and online at Amazon.ca.

Games from Activision and EA on the new consoles are reaching $75-80 in the UK now. Yay for exchange rates!

In Ireland a new AAA game is going for about €70. This is common enough though at the launch of new consoles. When the PS3 and 360 released those games sold at that price range before coming down to about the €50-60 mark.

All this talk about international pricing aside, I have to admit that the first time I fired up Origin and saw The Sims 4 at $69.99, I didn't immediately notice the way they're defaulting to the "deluxe" edition and have made the regular game the "limited" edition. I just figured it was EA being EA and the time had finally come. I guess in a way it still has, what with giving incentives to buy more on top of the already convoluted pre-order exclusives ordeal which isn't exclusive to EA.

Maybe it's for early access

@stackboy said:

I was half-expecting a response like that, just to piggyback on it and say that price is the cost of "regular" edition games here in south america...