Take-Two boss Strauss Zelnick has discussed the hot-button issue of pricing in the video game industry, saying prices have consistently gone down over the years, adjusted for inflation, while also claiming the company is not attempting to nickel and dime players to maximize profits.
Speaking to GI.biz, Zelnick said his ambition is for people who buy Take-Two's games to feel like they're coming out ahead in terms of the value proposition.
"Our job is not to turn a consumer upside down, shake them, and see how much change comes out of their pockets. Our job is to create the very best entertainment. If we do that, the revenue will take care of itself," he said.
Not everyone would agree that Take-Two is executing against this directive, as 2K's annual NBA 2K franchise is criticized every year for its ubiquitous microtransactions. Despite that, sales of NBA 2K25--the newest entry--are strong, reaching nearly 10 million units, Zelnick said.
Take-Two currently makes most of its money from what it calls "recurrent consumer spending," which includes revenue from virtual currency, add-on content, in-game purchases, and in-game ads. For Take-Two's latest quarter, revenue from recurrent consumer spending jumped by 14% and made up 77% of Take-Two's entire net revenue. NBA 2K25 was one of the top contributors in this department.
Also in the interview, Zelnick discussed the current pricing environment for video games, with companies like Nintendo and Microsoft beginning to charge $80 for new games. Zelnick said when adjusted for inflation, pricing for new releases has declined for the past 20 years. Indeed, $60 in the '90s is about $80 today, adjusted for inflation.
Zelnick declined to say if Take-Two will follow suit and begin charging $80 for new games, but instead spoke about how his aim is to "maximize the value being delivered, and then offer that value at a meaningfully reduced cost."
"That's our job. I do think that the value that is offered is massive and growing, and that is our job," he said.
On the subject of Mafia: The Old Country bucking the trend and selling for $50, Zelnick said this was an intentional pricing decision made with the aim of getting the game "into as many hands as possible." The Old Country is a linear, non-open-world title that doesn't require a massive time commitment. 2K has said it believes there is an audience for just such a game.
Another upcoming 2K game, Borderlands 4, launches in September but has no price as of yet. Gearbox boss Randy Pitchford said even he doesn't know what the price will be.
GTA 6 launches in May 2026, and many are expecting it to sell for a higher price point, though not everyone agrees that it will be $100. According to industry experts, the data shows that people are already embracing paying more for video games, which may help explain why Nintendo and Microsoft were the first to move to higher price points. Sony has warned it might raise prices, too.
This guy is hilariously out of touch.
https://techraptor.net/gaming/features/cost-of-gaming-since-1970s
Idk seems accurate to me.
And yet our dollars buying power has fallen significantly in this time. Doesn't look as good for them when you take that into account though.
They also had much higher distribution costs and a much smaller audience back then, so even if prices have gone down since the late 70s, profits haven’t.
Pac-Man was the best selling Atari 2600 game and it sold 8 million copies. Mario Kart on the Switch, by contrast, has sold over 60 million copies. A mere 1% of PC game sales are physical and a mere 16% of console game sales are physical.
Development costs also vastly differ over time. We started with Atari games sometimes being shat out in a week by a single person, to at most 12 months of development time.*
To this, with MUCH bigger teams:
https://spritecell.com/bp12-video-game-development-time/
That's been their choice, not ours. Do we need games costing hundreds of millions in development? Does every single game need to be the latest and most advanced thing ever? No. But they chose to, and now this one is pissed that people don't like paying so much for games, well, suck it up, buttercup, spend less doing games.
I'm with this definite human on this one. Indie teams are putting out quality games for a fraction of the price and time. AAA games are stuck in the mindset that looking good = good game. If it isn't cutting edge it isn't worth it. That's on them.