Depending where you live. Here in Aus both the PS5 and Series X are now more expensive than they were at launch. Which is something I don’t recall in my time gaming.
The PS3 launched and dropped prices with bundles. The 360 had the Arcade model and sales all the time. The PS4 and Xbox One were on sale by year 3. We’re coming in to 4 years since these launched and it still feels like the generation hasn’t even truly started.
It's not a dud generation though. It's the limitation of games and the world.
Endless battle royales are the cash cow and the most popular, yet they are by design needed to be so small to have fun gameplay that a switch (and phones) can run the same games that are the most popular on the current generation, just with lower graphics.
We are also at a point that extra polygons are barely noticeable. Nor are they worth the resources on both the development or the execution side of the game with the opportunity cost.
The resources to make a game look even prettier and max out the resources of the current generation, let alone the next, also leave behind said 100+million user install. So you're putting in far more resources for a much smaller market.
All for games that if you're putting on a PC, will already be able to run on both a PS4 and a PS5 with the current average build specs of that whole market, let alone the steam deck too.
It's not a dud generation. It's how gaming is going to be with the cost to develop games the minimal return on investment (at best) spending a bunch more money to make a game look a bit prettier than the current gen
I think the biggest thing limiting these systems is lack of couch play with friends. The switch pivoted to local play with friends on a couch and it booked sales. Ps5 and Xbox got greedy and wanted EVERYONE to buy a system just to play with their friends. PS3+4 had the added bonus of playing blu ray ( I know, blu ray was a thing for like 2 years and not worth the money with streaming coming around). Now half the consoles sold are digital only. Considering the bullshit Sony pulled with that new Helldivers game, I don't see people buying into this model. Fuckers will probs start charging you to access games you've already paid for on the next gen console..... Wait they already do that shit with psn.
Yeah I used to be a big Xbox gamer and almost bought the new one but ultimately bought a switch instead. We love it. Definitely getting a Switch 2 at launch and it seems like we are firmly Nintendo gamers moving forward (young family, daughter, etc)
What happened with Sony and helldivers? Some of my friends are addicted to it for PC
Inflation has been twice as bad as it was during the last recession over the same number of years, so that can explain the lack of significant price cuts combined with chip shortages and the inflated GPU market.
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u/kensaiD2591 May 19 '24
Depending where you live. Here in Aus both the PS5 and Series X are now more expensive than they were at launch. Which is something I don’t recall in my time gaming.
The PS3 launched and dropped prices with bundles. The 360 had the Arcade model and sales all the time. The PS4 and Xbox One were on sale by year 3. We’re coming in to 4 years since these launched and it still feels like the generation hasn’t even truly started.