'Inflation Is Affecting Everything': Nintendo Explains The High Price For The Switch 2 And Its Games

Nintendo explains the reasons behind the high price of the Switch 2 and its games, which may surprise you. After the release of the Switch 2, its starting price of $450 and its price of $80 for some games has caused controversy. Many quickly pointed their finger at the recent tariffs imposed by the United States, but in fact, the tariffs are not the only reason.

According to an interview with Bill Trinen, Nintendo’s vice president for player and product experience, this is a more complex decision based on multiple economic factors. First, he said, "inflation affects everything." This is certainly true, but perhaps more noteworthy, he also pointed out that Nintendo will consider the "local market environment" in the game distribution areas : "What is the market environment in different regions, what factors are affecting these market environments, and what options do we have to price appropriately based on the local market environment?"

Macroeconomic factors affect Switch 2 pricing

Pricing of Switch 2 is a complex decision

Inflation is undoubtedly one of the reasons; Trinen pointed out that the release of Donkey Kong Kingdom was $59 in 1994, and said that "the price of video games has been very stable for a long time." Even after the game price rises to the $70 standard, the game price seems to be more resistant to inflation than most goods and services: if you adjust the price of previous Mario Kart games based on inflation, most games will now be $80.

Similarly, when the Switch 2 price was first announced, tariffs were also a topic of discussion: after all, tariffs were becoming a hot topic at the time, and this seemed to be the first consequence of the tariffs being implemented. Nintendo's response, however, promptly indicated that tariffs have not yet been included in the Switch 2 price .

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Shortly after the tariffs were actually implemented, Nintendo delayed pre-orders for the US Switch 2 so that there was time to consider the impact of potential tariffs, and CEO Doug Bowser told The Verge that "no previous tariffs were included in the price itself." In other words, once the tariff is added, the Switch 2 may be priced higher .

How does Nintendo decide how to price each game?

Pricing becomes more complex

This explains to some extent the Switch 2 itself pricing. If anything, it is that it is not based on a single factor, such as tariffs or inflation, but taking all of these factors and more into account. But the prices of each Switch 2 game are also shocking , especially after the announcement of the $80 price of Mario Kart World.

Inflation is part of that, but again, it is not the only factor. Bill Trinen went on to explain that the Switch 2 game pricing comes from a more complex set of decisions that not only consider economic factors, but also the specific content of each game : "What is the experience, what fun will the player have from this game? The duration of the game - how big is the experience? How deep is it? Then we price it appropriately based on what we think is the value of the experience."

I changed my mind, Mario Kart World is a good choice to cut a signature feature

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In the article, he took Nintendo's first $70 game, "The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom" as an example. So for $80, his logic tells us that Nintendo promises that Mario Kart World will be as long, as big, and as deep as Tears of Kingdoms (or at least its Switch 1 version, as its Switch 2 version will also be priced at $80). Personally, I'm not sure about that. I do get a lot of time from Mario Kart games, but I usually only play it a few times a year on very specific occasions.

So that doesn't reduce the burden on our wallets (in fact, with tariffs, it could be a bigger burden), but at least we know it's not a casual decision. Still, rationalizing the explanation might calm the anger, selling the Switch 2 and its many games at such a high price would be a tough battle.

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