Well Microsoft’s second iteration of their gaming console is finally out. And all I can say is that the pricing around it is just silly. Everything about it is too expensive.

• Console - $400
• Controller - $50
• Games - $60
• Memory Card - $40

Since when do manufacturers get away with a $40 memory card? How much memory is it? A gig?

I know that next generation games are going to cost more money to develop. With High Definition being focused on, the textures involved are going to take photoshop geniuses to create, and the 3d modelers will be working overtime on 80,000 polygon race cars. But $60? Who’s going to pay that. They’re totally pricing themselves out of the market.

Imagine if games were $25 instead of $60. Its a Friday night and you know once you get home you’re gonna just be bored all night. You pass by the game aisle and check out a few games. Chances are you’d buy a game to take home with you that night, maybe even two. I think they’d sell twice as many games and even more if the prices were way lower. Look at DVDs. How many times have you picked up two or three DVDs while at a store just because they’re $11.99. Its just a few bucks. Why not. Imagine if gaming was like that. It might even be fun again. Instead gamers spend 8 hours of their time researching a game to make sure its something they’ll like and it’ll be worth the $60. Because god forbid, you know you can’t return it if you don’t like it.

And when did opened games get to be excluded from return policies? Every other item can be returned to Best Buy when opened. Why do game distributors get to screw the customers?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 23rd, 2005 at 1:58 am and is filed under Video Games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.