[mxkopy]

Have you noticed that their old games are barely discounted from the price they were originally at when they released? Super Mario Galaxy is still $60, for example. I wonder if Pandora's box has been opened and everyone wants in on those insane P2W margins, or if the old way of doing things just isn't profitable anymore. And if the second option, why? Why don't they just charge $65?

[yamtaddle]

That's just Nintendo. Old games from other companies are still cheap, especially on platforms other than the Switch. PC in particular.

Nintendo's store also runs less-frequent and worse sales than others. Other stores, a two-year-old game might still be $50 full price, but it'll go on sale half-off multiple times per year. Not so much on Nintendo's store. Doubly so for first-party stuff. 20% off is a steep and rare sale for those, even older titles.

[mxkopy]

Well Nintendo also doesn't do microtransactions or DLCs. I'm sure if they did that they could afford more sales. I'm wondering if not having microtransactions is just not profitable anymore.

[yamtaddle]

Yeah, but other publishers that aren't heavy on microtransactions reduce prices more and have better sales, too. Though the other stores they sell through probably do get a lot of money through microtransactions, that's true.

I think the main factor's that Nintendo's got this weird cheap-on-the-hardware-side-premium-on-the-software-side thing going on. Which seems to be working for them—I'm not complaining, just observing, no other companies seem to have carved out a niche quite like that, so it's a distinctive characteristic of Nintendo.

[mxkopy]

> I think the main factor's that Nintendo's got this weird cheap-on-the-hardware-side-premium-on-the-software-side thing going on.

So do you think this is the weird economics that's responsible for Nintendo shifting more to the 'standard' model of DLCs and possibly microtransactions? Because selling the hardware doesn't make as much sense nowadays?

[yamtaddle]

Microtransactions are new and worrisome. DLC, they've so far treated more like traditional expansion packs (from what I've seen), rather than short-changing the core game so they can easily soak buyers for extra money for what should have been the full version to begin with, as has become standard practice in much of the rest of the industry. I didn't notice e.g. base Mario Kart coming with notably-few tracks or anything (we've paid for zero of the DLC for that, and have plenty of tracks, don't remember Double Dash or other older ones having more)

[bentley]

Mario Kart 8 is an interesting case actually, because 16 of the 48 courses in the base Switch version (a full third) were originally paid DLC when Mario Kart 8 was on the Wii U.

That doesn’t mean Mario Kart 8 is a bad deal! I think even the new paid DLC is a great value to keep adding high‐quality material to an existing game. It’s pretty fascinating to see how Nintendo has managed to keep a 2014 game going, and still succeeds at convincing people to buy it for $60—it still sells like hotcakes.

[bentley]

Nintendo has high‐profile DLC coming out this year for both Pokémon and Mario Kart.

[mxkopy]

Nintendo started doing DLCs after 2017. Which again makes me wonder if they're doing it because everyone else is, or some weird economics is making it unprofitable to not do it.

[pcstl]

I really don't see an issue with Pokémon moving to a DLC model. They're essentially replacing the updated rerelease they used to do (Platinum to Diamond/Pearl, Emerald to Ruby/Sapphire) with just releasing more content for the same game.

Mario Kart is also mostly course packs. Fun, but not vital.