Young Americans Are Spending A Whole Lot Less ~~On Video Games~~ This Year
this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2025
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Yeah no shit AAA games are $80 going forward, games from the past few years are $70 if AAA. $60 was the sweet spot for AAA games but then the greedy companies began littering paid games with macro transactions.
Indie is the way forward for gaming, the prices are actually fair and the devs are willing to support them far past when AAA companies will. That and modding for games has only been getting better and better. Last year we basically got a brand new Fallout game from modders, meanwhile Bugthesda can barely wipe their own ass.
Interesting, would be nice if they showed what the average increase in prices was on this graph too, I bet there could be a correlation...
Almost like there’s some kind of deeper generational economic divide, almost like all the people who own all the stock are retiring and starting to live off investments, and thus companies are pressured to payout ether in buy backs or dividends, so prices are rising while quality and pay falls, and only those benefiting from the record profitability can afford the new prices.
Sort of like the allocation of resources and labor are being redistributed to a retiring and wealthy leisure class and the burden to support that is falling on the younger generation.
Presumably the spending is adjusted dollar amount.
I mean yeah. Games are getting more expensive and we're not making more money to be able to afford them. Compound that with inflation of other more crucial goods (groceries, hygiene products, gas, etc.). It feels like anyone could've seen this coming lol.
I'm just at a point where so few new releases excite me anymore. The mainstream AAA industry has moved far away from my tastes, and when it comes to the niche stuff I like most, I've already got my favorite forever games so it's actually hard for something new to tear me away from grinding those.
Totally have nothing to do with game started selling for $70. Must be their own fault for not spending on game.
Tomb Raider on PS3 was $70. It's more people don't have money for entertainment.
More and more AAA game started to charge $70 today than in PS3 era, and $80 is coming.
expensive, 60-80$ per game+dlc. and Games are coming out half-assed for the most part. eg, switch game and the pokemon console games from swsh-current.
I mean everything is expensive and the price of games are insane
They're too expensive.
Food and housing is actually more important and, you know, shit is expensive.
Are there even any really good games coming out this year?
Further, didn't the Switch 2 already break sales records? 5.4 million consoles? 1.8 million of them in the US?
Looking at the roster of games that have come out so far this year, it looks pretty barren for genuinely quality games. Maybe people just haven't bought a lot of the kind of forgettable titles? The only games that seem popular that aren't remakes or re-releases of previous games are Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Blue Prince, Split Fiction, Death Stranding 2, Kingdom Come Deliverance II, Doom: The Dark Ages, and Elden Ring Nightreign. Of those, only the first four listed score above 90 on Metacritic. Even stuff like Monster Hunter Wilds has been deeply panned.
I think it's probably a mixture of high prices, lack of money, Switch 2 sales and waiting on better Switch 2 titles other than just Mario Kart World, as well as a lackluster roster of other quality games.
Games suck now. Movies too. Culture in decline. We (millennials and gen x) got to see the art form (gaming and at least short form video on youtube and vimeo and stuff) evolve from studios owned by people who were passionate about the craft to the current state of big business making “safe” investments. It’s not that only bad games will ever come out from now on, indie studios exist and some big studios take chances, but there will always be a sea of remakes, remasters, endless sequels, generic safe garbage, etc
Also data is about 18-24 year old spending. I bet a lot of switch 2 purchases were by people 30+ for their kids
On PC atleast, I hardly find it compelling to spend any money on games since you get a lot of stuff for free from promotions. I have a rule to spend only 1$~ on any one game and it has served me pretty well