This console generation has been completely unique. Instead of waiting for the expected price cuts on increasingly mass-produced and aging hardware, prices have instead continued to rise. Console gaming used to be a cheap and easy option for anyone who wanted to play, but those days seem to be over.
But things have to get better from here on out, right? No, unfortunately, it doesn't look that way. Kotaku has spoken with several analysts in an interesting article, who unanimously say that things are actually going to get worse. One of them is Rhys Elliott, head of market analysis at Alinea Analytics, and he doesn't deliver the news we know you've been hoping for either...
"The increases happening now are lagging indicators, not the peak. Platform holders and manufacturers run on long-term supply contracts and inventory buffers that initially shielded retail pricing. As those contracts expire, companies are renegotiating component costs at today's inflated rate, and that pressure is industry-wide."
Another highly knowledgeable voice is Mat Piscatella from Circana (who frequently appears in our reporting thanks to his encyclopaedic knowledge of U.S. game sales), who says that the gaming market "has never before been in this position," a situation that is forcing console manufacturers to make "very tough choices with long-ranging impact."
No one seems to believe that prices will ever drop back to what they used to be before 2026, and one analyst predicts that people will start being pushed out of the gaming world because it will simply become too expensive.
In short, expect things to get worse before they possibly get better again. Obstacles in the form of tariffs, war, and component shortages (largely caused by an AI industry that's buying up everything) mean the dark clouds on the gaming horizon are possibly darker than ever.