Industry experts react to the Switch 2 reveal, including the $450 price point and $80 for Mario Kart World.
Mat Piscatella of Circana said this is an unprecedented and “chaotic” situation as it relates to tariffs and their impact on video games, so anyone claiming to know how things will shake out may be speaking out of turn.
“All anyone can do at this point is speculate. We are certainly in uncharted waters here, and no one really knows what will happen next,” he told GameSpot. “Obviously, the announced tariffs are having an immediate impact on the financial markets. And given the haphazard nature of how the tariffs are being calculated and applied, uncertainty is really the only certain thing at the moment.”
Piscatella said there is “absolutely the chance” that the new tariffs or any additional future tariffs might amount to changes for US consumer products, and not just for Nintendo but for all players.
Everyone talks about inflation but the reality is that people’s incomes generally have not risen to match it, so while I understand inflation, I also understand that I’m not actually making more money to offset it.
Declining real wages are an issue in the US predominantly, most is just stagnant but it also depends on how dependent you are on energy and how well did your country do to help out citizens with rising energy costs. There are also countries where real wages continued to grow consistently even through the pandemic.
Switch prices have always been crazy. I only bought a switch because of my nephew and the fact that an almost 10 years old mario kart is still at full price is crazy. The way they try to push their paid dlc on kids is disgusting. The only reason they fer away with it because they are wholesome nintendo with quite a weird fan base
Because of inflation, not just “because they can”. USD$60 in 2016 is ~USD$80 in 2025 thanks to the Covid money printing years of inflation. That’s a near 33% increase in costs across the board from the last time they released a console and priced their products.
As someone that grew up paying more for Atari games than I pay now for PC/console games, “GaMeRs” seem like the most pathetic crybabies who don’t understand much, especially economics.
We usually measure inflation by looking at prices, but price changes are usually a reaction to the core cause of inflation, which is an increase in money supply. Creating more money makes money less valuable, which means people expect more of it for the same product and service.
During COVID, we printed a ton of money in the form of stimulus checks, reduced production due to health-related restrictions, and screwed up the global supply chain. Part of that was transient (production and global supply chain), but the money printing permanently increased the money supply.
But the cost of oil increased and therefore the cost of producing anything using electricity or shipping items so it wasn’t like it created some massive surplus of money supply. Increased costs was the biggest driver of price rises in recent year and available money generally bought less than before.
Yes, supply chain issues were the largest spark of prices, but if it was just that, prices would’ve dropped back to where they were once supply re-normalized (i.e. inflation followed by deflation). That didn’t happen, and prices remained high, meaning money supply increased in the meantime as well.
Deflation doesn’t always follow inflation. Most countries fear it as it could spark recession. UK for example always aims for 2%, not 0%. It didn’t help that Opec limited oil supply to keep price high.
In the UK, we didn’t have stimulus check, but had inflation close to 10%, many countries in the EU too so the conclusion it was the money supply doesn’t hold up.
These sources show an increased money supply that strongly correlates with inflation figures: it increased dramatically as inflation kicked off, then slowed down but didn’t decrease as inflation dropped. I don’t know what exactly caused the increase in money supply in that era (would have to look into a bunch of policy changes in that period), but it happened.
If money supply wasn’t increased, we would’ve seen a deflationary period after the causes of the inflationary period (price shocks due to global supply chain) were addressed. But central banks don’t want deflation, so they increase money supply in some form to prevent it.
To be fair, most economics is purely ‘because they can’ with ‘they’ being shitheads in the owning class. if anything games (and most industries for that matter) should be going through a healthy period of deflation now (tariffs excluded) if not for said shitheads.
I hope they are because there’s no damn way I’m spending $70+ on a video game, and since Nintendo never drops its game prices, I might as well just wait.
Why not? Are games worth less now to you than they were a few years ago?
Game prices don’t adjust for inflation every month/quarter/year like other products do, they tend to set a price and stick at it for an entire generation. Only in the last few years have we seen a free companies start breaking this tradition and start increasing prices mid-gen.
As it is, gaming prices are still waaaaaaaaay healer than they should be given inflation over the last 30 years, especially when you take budgets into account where games used to cost $50k to make but now cost $300mill.
Pros: since you can’t import anything anerica will pull itself out of the massive hole it was pre trump, billions of jobs will appear out of thin air and america makes everything from mining titanium/lithium, building toyotas to manufacturing worlds best microchips on their home country, yeehaw!
Also no tariffs on russia cause they’re misunderstood and are saviors of the white race.
Cons:
Above is only true if you are mentally insane and live in an alternative universe without history.
The theory is that it’s supposed to encourage internal economic growth via domestic production of goods by making foreign made goods much more expensive. What the orange dip shit failed to understand is that America doesn’t have the internal infrastructure or resources needed to create most of the goods they consume. This is basically just a tax on the US consumer that ruined a lot of international trade deals and caused an irreversible decline in confidence with American markets.
I think there are people in the US who wanted tariffs because it could bring some jobs and they are not that concerned with economic consequences because their lives are so bad already.
If the tariffs do increase the price, it won’t be a flat 25% increase or whatever the tariff is set to.
A misconception I keep seeing people incorrectly repeat is that a 25% tariff on an item I can buy at the store for $100 USD today, means tomorrow it will cost me $125. This is wrong, and not how tariffs work. If you see a price increase like that, that is price gouging, using a tariff as a shield. You are getting scammed.
The 25% tariff is based on whatever the imported cost of the item is, not the MSRP or final sale price. Lets just say for simplicity that the Switch 2 cost $100 for us to buy it. But, for a store to import the product, they buy it directly from Nintendo for a cost of just $35 USD per unit (again, for simplicity). A 25% tariff would be a tax of $7.50 USD that the store would need to pay per Switch console. In this hypothetical, a 25% tariff on that item would mean you would only expect to see a final price increase to $107.50 due to tariffs, and not a final price of $125.
Please be informed, don’t let yourself be scammed.
This is wrong, and not how tariffs work. If you see a price increase like that, that is price gouging, using a tariff as a shield. You are getting scammed
Interesting. For games consoles, the markup for retail is probably like 10 percent or less. So the final price in your example would be between 122.50 and 125 anyway, right?
*Also, my source on the 10% is a random Reddit commenter so take that with a grain of salt
Correct, tariffs are not a consumption tax. That fact doesn’t mean prices will not increase, nor does it mean that small increases don’t have a big impact. We, the common people, will have have to go about our lives with less. Maybe wear your shirts an extra day because laundering more regularly consumes more soap. Perhaps it’s going without avocado on your lunch sandwiches. You’ll still have shirts and sandwiches, but you certainly wouldn’t be as clean or as filled. (See the “surplus” chapter of your high-school/undergrad econ books.)
Yes, the prices go up, but not like how people seem to be normalizing. The price increase is generally only likely to be noticeable on items where stores sell at an incredibly tiny profit margin.
A 10% tariff does not mean a 10% MSRP price increase, it means an increase but of a lot less. But people are I guess not intelligent or informed enough to know this and so incorrectly say a 10% tariff means a 10% MSRP price increase, which again, is wrong.
Yep. My consumer concerns are less of retail sticker-shock than people not realizing how dependent they are on consumer surplus. Even a few thousand a year in tariff related expenditure can be quite impactful on comfort.
Sticker-shock will happen with the tariff-adjacent removal of de minimis. Right now it’s China, but it was threatened against Canada and Mexico too (officially delayed, whatever that may mean). A $50 per-item charge is going to be quite a surprise to many.
E.g. if Canada is going to be levied like China, then my plan of getting a pair of oversized Cam-Lock kits for my Canadian-made Arkel bike panniers is gone out the window. There’s no way I’ll buy small parts when the total package cost is the same as getting a whole new set of panniers.
Yes, but that is what a tariff is designed to do. It is designed to encourage you, the consumer, to not buy imported products, so that you buy domestic products instead.
It can be frustrating for consumers in a nation that is extremely dependent on imports, like the United States, because the US does not produce the products its consumers want to buy. If the tariffs remain long enough, the idea is that domestic companies will begin making the products that the consumers want to buy instead of importing, which is obviously beneficial to the economy in many ways, but for the consumer waiting for that to happen, it is hard to see past the number.
Also doesnt help that wages have stagnated while inflation has gone up due to corporate greed. Paying 2025 prices wouldn’t feel so bad if everyone was getting 2025 pay, but instead most of us are paying 2025 prices on like, 2008 pay. Not a fun experience.
I think they might have a bit, but I dont think anyone was quite expecting this. I think prices may go up before release if tariffs aren’t changed. I could see the console being $500.
Why are they “so expensive”? Inflation. Rampant inflation for the last 5 years.
When you look at the gaming industry, prices have stayed basically static for the last 30 years, way out of step with regular inflation. Inflation at the target of like 3% means games and consoles should cost 3% more every year.
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Everyone talks about inflation but the reality is that people’s incomes generally have not risen to match it, so while I understand inflation, I also understand that I’m not actually making more money to offset it.
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Declining real wages are an issue in the US predominantly, most is just stagnant but it also depends on how dependent you are on energy and how well did your country do to help out citizens with rising energy costs. There are also countries where real wages continued to grow consistently even through the pandemic.
Trump Tariffs have nothing to do with the Switch 2 prices in Europe. Everybody incl. Nintendo is just hiking prices because they can.
Switch prices have always been crazy. I only bought a switch because of my nephew and the fact that an almost 10 years old mario kart is still at full price is crazy. The way they try to push their paid dlc on kids is disgusting. The only reason they fer away with it because they are wholesome nintendo with quite a weird fan base
True but at least with physical media you can buy used.
Because of inflation, not just “because they can”. USD$60 in 2016 is ~USD$80 in 2025 thanks to the Covid money printing years of inflation. That’s a near 33% increase in costs across the board from the last time they released a console and priced their products.
As someone that grew up paying more for Atari games than I pay now for PC/console games, “GaMeRs” seem like the most pathetic crybabies who don’t understand much, especially economics.
I’m no economist but I thought inflation was the measure of the cost increase over time not the cause of it.
We usually measure inflation by looking at prices, but price changes are usually a reaction to the core cause of inflation, which is an increase in money supply. Creating more money makes money less valuable, which means people expect more of it for the same product and service.
During COVID, we printed a ton of money in the form of stimulus checks, reduced production due to health-related restrictions, and screwed up the global supply chain. Part of that was transient (production and global supply chain), but the money printing permanently increased the money supply.
But the cost of oil increased and therefore the cost of producing anything using electricity or shipping items so it wasn’t like it created some massive surplus of money supply. Increased costs was the biggest driver of price rises in recent year and available money generally bought less than before.
Yes, supply chain issues were the largest spark of prices, but if it was just that, prices would’ve dropped back to where they were once supply re-normalized (i.e. inflation followed by deflation). That didn’t happen, and prices remained high, meaning money supply increased in the meantime as well.
Deflation doesn’t always follow inflation. Most countries fear it as it could spark recession. UK for example always aims for 2%, not 0%. It didn’t help that Opec limited oil supply to keep price high.
In the UK, we didn’t have stimulus check, but had inflation close to 10%, many countries in the EU too so the conclusion it was the money supply doesn’t hold up.
TL; DR - the process was something like this:
I’m not talking only about stimulus checks, but any increase in money supply.
Ok, but you still had an increase in money supply at the same time as inflation. Look at some sources:
The money supply absolutely increased along with inflation. The Euro also saw increased money supply as well in the same period as high inflation, and here’s another with similar data with a longer view (last link is a slightly different measure, M1 vs M2).
These sources show an increased money supply that strongly correlates with inflation figures: it increased dramatically as inflation kicked off, then slowed down but didn’t decrease as inflation dropped. I don’t know what exactly caused the increase in money supply in that era (would have to look into a bunch of policy changes in that period), but it happened.
If money supply wasn’t increased, we would’ve seen a deflationary period after the causes of the inflationary period (price shocks due to global supply chain) were addressed. But central banks don’t want deflation, so they increase money supply in some form to prevent it.
To be fair, most economics is purely ‘because they can’ with ‘they’ being shitheads in the owning class. if anything games (and most industries for that matter) should be going through a healthy period of deflation now (tariffs excluded) if not for said shitheads.
I hope they are because there’s no damn way I’m spending $70+ on a video game, and since Nintendo never drops its game prices, I might as well just wait.
No one is saying the current prices are due to tarrifs, there is however speculation that tarrifs may increase the price further.
So, $80 game may be $90-100 with tariffs.
If everything I’ve seen is true, then this explains the higher prices for physical over digital.
And that should make me feel better about spending $80?
Nope, just that the worst is yet to come.
Haha, thanks for stepping in!
Why not? Are games worth less now to you than they were a few years ago?
Game prices don’t adjust for inflation every month/quarter/year like other products do, they tend to set a price and stick at it for an entire generation. Only in the last few years have we seen a free companies start breaking this tradition and start increasing prices mid-gen.
As it is, gaming prices are still waaaaaaaaay healer than they should be given inflation over the last 30 years, especially when you take budgets into account where games used to cost $50k to make but now cost $300mill.
Yes, 100 bucks for mario kart that is basically same game as last mario kart is ridiculous.
I don’t really understand US politics but this tariffs thing seems stupid to me. What are the pros?
Pros: since you can’t import anything anerica will pull itself out of the massive hole it was pre trump, billions of jobs will appear out of thin air and america makes everything from mining titanium/lithium, building toyotas to manufacturing worlds best microchips on their home country, yeehaw! Also no tariffs on russia cause they’re misunderstood and are saviors of the white race.
Cons: Above is only true if you are mentally insane and live in an alternative universe without history.
The theory is that it’s supposed to encourage internal economic growth via domestic production of goods by making foreign made goods much more expensive. What the orange dip shit failed to understand is that America doesn’t have the internal infrastructure or resources needed to create most of the goods they consume. This is basically just a tax on the US consumer that ruined a lot of international trade deals and caused an irreversible decline in confidence with American markets.
I think there are people in the US who wanted tariffs because it could bring some jobs and they are not that concerned with economic consequences because their lives are so bad already.
And there’s no reason to produce those things here either, labor just costs too much.
💪🔥🇺🇸🦅💰🔥 <—That’s it, that’s the plan. Got it from the ultra maga patriot economists ONLY group chat 🔫 😎🎆
If the tariffs do increase the price, it won’t be a flat 25% increase or whatever the tariff is set to.
A misconception I keep seeing people incorrectly repeat is that a 25% tariff on an item I can buy at the store for $100 USD today, means tomorrow it will cost me $125. This is wrong, and not how tariffs work. If you see a price increase like that, that is price gouging, using a tariff as a shield. You are getting scammed.
The 25% tariff is based on whatever the imported cost of the item is, not the MSRP or final sale price. Lets just say for simplicity that the Switch 2 cost $100 for us to buy it. But, for a store to import the product, they buy it directly from Nintendo for a cost of just $35 USD per unit (again, for simplicity). A 25% tariff would be a tax of $7.50 USD that the store would need to pay per Switch console. In this hypothetical, a 25% tariff on that item would mean you would only expect to see a final price increase to $107.50 due to tariffs, and not a final price of $125.
Please be informed, don’t let yourself be scammed.
so expect to see $100 items at $125, got it
$135 for a game. Noted.
When entire industries are forming informal cartels, there is little individual consumers can do. That’s why antitrust authorities exist.
Don’t worry I’m sure they are working on getting rid of those too.
Interesting. For games consoles, the markup for retail is probably like 10 percent or less. So the final price in your example would be between 122.50 and 125 anyway, right?
*Also, my source on the 10% is a random Reddit commenter so take that with a grain of salt
Correct, tariffs are not a consumption tax. That fact doesn’t mean prices will not increase, nor does it mean that small increases don’t have a big impact. We, the common people, will have have to go about our lives with less. Maybe wear your shirts an extra day because laundering more regularly consumes more soap. Perhaps it’s going without avocado on your lunch sandwiches. You’ll still have shirts and sandwiches, but you certainly wouldn’t be as clean or as filled. (See the “surplus” chapter of your high-school/undergrad econ books.)
Yes, the prices go up, but not like how people seem to be normalizing. The price increase is generally only likely to be noticeable on items where stores sell at an incredibly tiny profit margin.
A 10% tariff does not mean a 10% MSRP price increase, it means an increase but of a lot less. But people are I guess not intelligent or informed enough to know this and so incorrectly say a 10% tariff means a 10% MSRP price increase, which again, is wrong.
Yep. My consumer concerns are less of retail sticker-shock than people not realizing how dependent they are on consumer surplus. Even a few thousand a year in tariff related expenditure can be quite impactful on comfort.
Sticker-shock will happen with the tariff-adjacent removal of de minimis. Right now it’s China, but it was threatened against Canada and Mexico too (officially delayed, whatever that may mean). A $50 per-item charge is going to be quite a surprise to many.
E.g. if Canada is going to be levied like China, then my plan of getting a pair of oversized Cam-Lock kits for my Canadian-made Arkel bike panniers is gone out the window. There’s no way I’ll buy small parts when the total package cost is the same as getting a whole new set of panniers.
Yes, but that is what a tariff is designed to do. It is designed to encourage you, the consumer, to not buy imported products, so that you buy domestic products instead.
It can be frustrating for consumers in a nation that is extremely dependent on imports, like the United States, because the US does not produce the products its consumers want to buy. If the tariffs remain long enough, the idea is that domestic companies will begin making the products that the consumers want to buy instead of importing, which is obviously beneficial to the economy in many ways, but for the consumer waiting for that to happen, it is hard to see past the number.
Also doesnt help that wages have stagnated while inflation has gone up due to corporate greed. Paying 2025 prices wouldn’t feel so bad if everyone was getting 2025 pay, but instead most of us are paying 2025 prices on like, 2008 pay. Not a fun experience.
Im really hoping the pricing already had the fed govts fafo priced in
I think they might have a bit, but I dont think anyone was quite expecting this. I think prices may go up before release if tariffs aren’t changed. I could see the console being $500.
Why are they “so expensive”? Inflation. Rampant inflation for the last 5 years.
When you look at the gaming industry, prices have stayed basically static for the last 30 years, way out of step with regular inflation. Inflation at the target of like 3% means games and consoles should cost 3% more every year.
the world is on fire and people care about a videogame console