UK, Foreign Video Game Pricing Out of Control

Prices for video games outside of the United States are slowly spinning out of control. Where I live in Canada, with a 13% Federal tax included, new release video games are hitting the 90-100 dollar mark. In the United States, games continue to be sold for 59.99.

While we can begin getting into the gritty details of it all – cost of living, average wages, minimum wages, Canadian/US dollar values – the reality is that games are getting more expensive in some markets as average incomes plummet. While looking through twitter, I found these two very imformative pictures from user @JakeTWiiN:

Got to love the UK pricing! 😴 pic.twitter.com/Nx9QPhosIR

— Jake (@JakeTWiiN) May 2, 2016

For reference, 79.99 GBP is equivalent to 117.33 USD. This is an outragious markup for users in the UK who will pay almost 40$ more than their American counterparts for the exact same product.

As video game prices outside of the United States continue to rise, it will be interesting to see what impact this will have on the market. For me personally, the number of games I purchase in any given year has drastically decreased as my own cost of living has dramatically increased.

I have done two things to combat the increase in prices. First, I’m playing a lot more indie games than I use to. One of my recent personal favorites is Blues and Bullets from A Crowd of Monsters. A few hours of quality entertainment for an extremely low price. To be honest, there is no shortage of great indie titles available.

The second thing I have done is waiting on specific titles to decrease in price. I’m selective, knowing that Ubisoft titles plummet quickly. Far Cry Primal? I’m waiting. By Christmas 2016 it will be a 20-30 dollar title on sale.

What have you done to combat increased video game pricing?