Over-priced consoles and sky-rocketing subscriptions are putting the squeeze on regular fans I t’s an expensive time to be a gamer. Last week, Sony revealed that the mid-cycle upgrade for the PlayStation 5 (the PS5 Pro) will cost £300 more than the original – and won’t even include a disc drive. Over at Xbox , the popular Game Pass subscription service has locked more than 40 games and all future blockbuster releases behind its new top-tier plan .
Add to that a similarly hefty increase to Sony’s online offering PS+ , a steadily increasing RRP for new games and the FOMO-inducing pre-order bonuses that most titles now offer and your monthly gaming budget will start to seem pitifully meagre. Do not get us started on in-game microtransactions either. So, what’s causing this sudden squeeze on gamers, who are the main culprits and is the industry at risk of pricing out anyone who’s not a millionaire? Fans are getting squeezed by corporate greed One big (and obvious reason) is inflation.
Basically, everything gets more expensive over time, including the cost of making games. Therefore, the cost of buying them should go up too. But the gaming industry has reported massive earning increases for the past three years, including another record-breaking year in 2023 .
The need to jack-up prices obviously isn’t just coming from a place of necessity anymore. “Inflation plays a part for sure, but I think gaming is also taking a lesson from the playbooks of streaming services.