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Why Are Nintendos So Expensive?

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There are many people wondering why they have to spend so much money in order to buy Nintendo Switch games. If you are also wondering the same thing or asking the same questions, you are not alone. 

So why are Nintendos so expensive?

Nintendo is one of the most expensive gaming studios, with the prices of their games remaining very consistent years after their release. Normally, as time passes after the release of a game, a lot of games become less expensive to buy, but with Nintendo, this is not the case.

On the contrary, the prices of Nintendo’s games stay just as they always were. Even though every year a new one comes out, people keep buying the product without complaining about the price. So if you would like to know more about this topic, you will want to keep reading this article.

After all these years, we are used to Nintendo being the brand that listens to only itself. While other game studios actually bring down their prices with a reduction in demand or even over-saturation, Nintendo does not. Obviously, this seems to be a pattern that’s working really well, and we have all gotten used to it. It is a very deliberate business strategy.

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How It Works

Here’s how the whole scenario works: You’re out in a game studio looking for a game you’ve played before. But, surprise! When you find the cartridge on the shelf, it’s the exact same price that it was all the way back last year when it was first released. When you turn around and find a PS4 game, Star Wars Battlefront II is a whopping $20 cheaper than it was last year, just the same way a lot of other games have now become a lot cheaper. But your favorite Nintendo isn’t decreasing in price, and there you are, asking all over again, “Why do the prices of Nintendos never go down?”

So why are Nintendos really so expensive? 

The price of cartridges switches sales, and the quality standards of Nintendo contribute to the high pricing. But apart from these, the biggest reason Nintendo actually maintains their high prices is the mere fact that they know they will still have a good customer base regardless of the cost. The thing is, Nintendo is the only company that delivers the products that they do.

There is no reason to give you lower prices, when you cannot get their products anywhere else. There is a high chance that if you are faced with their high prices, there really won’t be anything stopping you from buying the game. Seeing as it is not available for other consoles, you do not have a choice. They take advantage of this to keep you coming back again and again.

Nintendo’s style of operation is a lot different in wavelength from Sony, Microsoft, or anyone else. We are all just used to dealing with the fact that they do not drop their prices and we continue to buy their product anyways. If you take a look at Nintendo’s lifetime sales for all five of its most current consoles, they are all for Nintendo games, with most of them being first-party player games like Smash Bros and Mario, or second-party games like Pokemon.

Even though Nintendo does have a monopoly on their games, Nintendo does have to depend so much on the sale of its hardware, the Wii U. Now, if the whole world does not love this machine, there is really nothing that can actually save it. We are not forgetting that this was actually a thing that once was released and didn’t do so well.

Now, if you compare the Switch to the Wii U, the Switch has now sold a lot more units than the Wii U. As a matter of fact, it has sold 6 million more units. This definitely means that the Switch is in no danger of going extinct anytime soon. However, it’s always great to remember that Nintendo’s pattern of operation does not always work the best. As a matter of fact, it does not always work.

So the thing is, Wii U game prices did not drop any more than the prices for the Switch games have dropped. The original Splatoon is currently still on the market for about $45 which is close to its price when it was first released, even though the Wii U games have not been produced for quite a while now. Following Nintendo’s lifetime sales, Splatoon 2 has now sold more than 1 million units above Wii U. While everyone seemed to be very excited about this brand new franchise, a lot fewer people were willing to pay the price it took to own the new system.

In its whole lifetime, the Wii U system has not sold 15 million units, and not even the sales of its best-selling game, and Mario Kart 8, has been able to outdo the Switch’s top three games. The thing is, even though Nintendo’s strategy of taking advantage of their monopoly to keep their prices high is currently working, that strategy did not work with the Wii U. And seeing as the console had a really huge gap in third-party support, there was barely any reason to think of buying a Wii U one or two years after it was released.

The truth is, even the company knows this, at least to an extent. People who were not able to get a Switch when it was inaugurated now have a reason to actually get one. The reason is that there are other games coming out for the Switch, such as Undertale, Mega Man 11, and FIFA 19. Although these games might be neither deluxe nor exclusive, they are still being released, and that’s a lot more than the Wii U could boast of its games during its middle ages.

Conclusion

In conclusion of this article, a lot of people are still buying Nintendo exclusives and they will continue to buy Nintendo exclusives regardless of how expensive they are. Nintendo knows that it can’t simply depend on that to sell its games. No doubt, the company’s selling strategy is a top-notch one, and we all have to give them credit for that. But, that strategy is not always going to be the golden fish it currently is.

Just as was the case with the predecessors of the currently available games, things are likely going to change, and when it does, even Nintendo knows they will have to change in order to still have us all in the palm of their hand.