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[Ponchito]

lol "gaming a luxury"... I thought you said "what income inequality in Mexico?!?!" A high school kid could probably buy a launch day title working a minimum wage job for a day in the US, Gaming is not suppose to be this exorbant luxury where you sell your first born child to enter.

When I say luxury I mean it’s not part of basic goods. Yeah, the kid you talk about can buy the launch title, but that title doesn’t come with the consoles, accessories, online suscription, HDTVs, etc.

Sure, there are “more” premium products within gaming (PS4 Pro, XOX, etc).

 

[PSqueak]

Mexico is not that bad compared to other LATAM markets.

Some prices on the eShop are even cheaper than the US store.

Amazon MX definitely has the best offers, Nintendo, Sony and Xbox titles. Got Prime and I buy all my games there.

I mean, still, a Switch for 150% the price on the US market is a really steep price.

One of the allures of the Switch is supposed to be cheaper than the competition, the fact that you can get amazing Xbone or PS4 bundles for much less than a base Switch SKU is insane.

 

[2blackcats]

That's why I buy everything digital in Argentina.

Physical games cost around 100 USD...


So much pain...

On an Américan account?

Obviously you have to at those prices but people buying out if region is part of the problem. When the companies are crunching numbers for support, etc. all those American digital purchases don't show up.

 

[Ahasverus]

On an Américan account?

Obviously you have to at those prices but people buying out if region is part of the problem. When the companies are crunching numbers for support, etc. all those American digital purchases don't show up.

Now it's our fucking fault we can't dedicate half of our monthly salary for a videogame that the rest of the world is having at a third of the price? Give me a break.

It's a self fulfilling prophecy. Steam did it right with regional pricing, why can't the other 3 do so goes beyond me.

 

[Ponchito]

No, I think you misunderstood my post. I'm not claiming videogame pricing is a matter of social justice. I was saying local distributors are stupid because they prefer to sell a small amount of consoles only to the hardcore audience knowing they will pay an absurdly inflated price instead of making a smaller profit but selling to a broader audience which in the long run will mean more software and accesory sales.

Paying $500 US for product that retails at $300 in the neighbor country (both countries united by a free trade agreement) is absurd, luxury or not. I don't know, seems like you don't like that I want a fair treatment for consumers? Do you work for a department store or something?

The thing is retailers in Mexico buy the product, pay importing costs, importing taxes (even with NAFTA, a lot of these products are manufactured in Asia), pay other taxes (VAT) to bring the product. To price them, they have to consider all that, operational costs (so they can pay fair salaries and keep the lights on) and make a margin. I understand it may seem unfairly priced, but it’s not that simple.

I applaud them that now all of these products are available on launch day-to-day with the US, availability and pricing is way better than it was before. Do you remember de N64/PSX era? Now, that was brutal. Plus there are tons of offers frequently. You know El Buen Fin is coming.

Retailers, trust me, and I don’t work at one, are selling tons of these things. Switch business is doing great in Mexico.

 

[Manu]

On an Américan account?

Obviously you have to at those prices but people buying out if region is part of the problem. When the companies are crunching numbers for support, etc. all those American digital purchases don't show up.

When I bought my PS3 in 2011 there wasn't even a regional store. And that was 5 years after the console release.

 

[MegaSackman]

On an Américan account?

Obviously you have to at those prices but people buying out if region is part of the problem. When the companies are crunching numbers for support, etc. all those American digital purchases don't show up.

We didn't have a PSN until a couple of years ago, people had no choice but to buy in NA store, when the local digital store opened prices were above $79 so nobody would swap accounts for that. Now it's a little better, a $60 game cost $72 in the argentinian store now so you actually see some people making local accounts especially new users.

Retail is a different beast, games cost close to $100, forget it.

 

[-Eddman-]

The thing is retailers in Mexico buy the product, pay importing costs, importing taxes (even with NAFTA, a lot of these products are manufactured in Asia), pay other taxes (VAT) to bring the product. To price them, they have to consider all that, operational costs (so they can pay fair salaries and keep the lights on) and make a margin. I understand it may seem unfairly priced, but it’s not that simple.

I applaud them that now all of these products are available on launch day-to-day with the US, availability and pricing is way better than it was before. Do you remember de N64/PSX era? Now, that was brutal. Plus there are tons of offers frequently. You know El Buen Fin is coming.

Retailers, trust me, and I don’t work at one, are selling tons of these things. Switch business is doing great in Mexico.

My point would be that there are many other tech products in Mexico (TVs, cell phones, etc) that are closer to their american prices, with taxes and all. It's not the end of the world, but it is undeniable that there are certain entertainment niches (videogames, or musical instruments, for example, my two hobbies, fuck my luck) that suffer from inflated prices because the few existing distributors know they run an oligopoly.

But I think we can agree that, even though the videogame market in Mexico is in good shape, the potential would be way bigger if all the companies had the same friendly approach as Microsoft or Steam. Cutting the middle man, local importers, to offer agressive pricing and retail presence. It's not that hard and I think I'm not asking anything extraordinaire.

Amazon is a great first step, but we shouldn't see it as God's gift. Fair prices should be always the norm and the consumer should be treated with the same respect no matter if the person is american, mexican, chinese, japanese, brazilian or whatever.

 

[WarRock]

Best part is how the prices never get reduced. It's always cute seeing USGAF talking about how a game bombed because one month later it dropped from USD60 to USD40 or whatever, while all my life I've seen games stay at their "launch" price (60-100USD) for years. Imagine paying full price for licensed movie games in the DS or Phantom Hourglass in 2012.

Yeah.

 

[kyo2004]

To PC gamers from LatAM, how are regional prices in the digital stores? In my case, Panama, GOG (and Origin in the past) gives us a fair price, usually. Games are much more affordable. Meanwhile, Steam continues pricing their games as if this was the United States. With our shitty salaries, it is quite hard to buy games at normal price.

One of the reasons GOG is seeing my money instead of Valve.

At least here (Colombia), Steam uses local currency (COP) and for the most part, the games are really cheap. Add that we've many options to pay (Visa, MC, PinValida, MercadoPago, Efecty, you name it)...

Lastest example: Cuphead on US cost $20, here cost 40000COP (like $13.3 USD).

The same applies with Origin and GoG (this one has an incremented price comparing with Steam, but without DRM is a fair exchange)...

 

[Ponchito]

My point would be that there are many other tech products in Mexico (TVs, cell phones, etc) that are closer to their american prices, with taxes and all. It's not the end of the world, but it is undeniable that there are certain entertainment niches (videogames, or musical instruments, for example, my two hobbies, fuck my luck) that suffer from inflated prices because the few existing distributors know they run an oligopoly.

But I think we can agree that, even though the videogame market in Mexico is in good shape, the potential would be way bigger if all the companies had the same friendly approach as Microsoft or Steam. Cutting the middle man, local importers, to offer agressive pricing and retail presence. It's not that hard and I think I'm not asking anything extraordinaire.

Amazon is a great first step, but we shouldn't see it as God's gift. Fair prices should be always the norm and the consumer should be treated with the same respect no matter if the person is american, mexican, chinese, japanese, brazilian or whatever.

All right. Hopefully Nintendo pricing will be more in line with Microsoft Xbox products in the future. This will depend on the parity with USD, NAFTA to a certain extent like you said and how Nintendo business performs in the following years with the Switch plus consumer demand.

Don’t forget that also eShop prices for indie titles and digital only content is priced to specific markets which is great. Last time I checked I think Stardew Valley was around 100-200 pesos.

When I was a kid you had to buy this stuff in the US because of pricing and availability.

Anyways, ✌🏻

 

[Manu]

Best part is how the prices never get reduced. It's always cute seeing USGAF talking about how a game bombed because one month later it dropped from USD60 to USD40 or whatever, while all my life I've seen games stay at their "launch" price (60-100USD) for years. Imagine paying full price for licensed movie games in the DS or Phantom Hourglass in 2012.

Yeah.

This feels too real.

 

[-Eddman-]

All right. Hopefully Nintendo pricing will be more in line with Microsoft Xbox products in the future. This will depend on the parity with USD, NAFTA to a certain extent like you said and how Nintendo business performs in the following years with the Switch plus consumer demand.

Don't forget that also eShop prices for indie titles and digital only content is priced to specific markets which is great. Last time I checked I think Stardew Valley was around 100-200 pesos.

When I was a kid you had to buy this stuff in the US because of pricing and availability.

Anyways, <span class="emoji-outer emoji-sizer"><span class="emoji-inner" style="background: url(chrome-extension://immhpnclomdloikkpcefncmfgjbkojmh/emoji-data/sheet_apple_64.png);background-position:6.25% 2.0833333333333335%;background-size:4900%" data-codepoints="270c-1f3fb"></span></span>

Well, the cartridge era was expensive here and everywhere else. It's no secret that using CDs was a big part of the original PS success. As I remember it, the golden era of console gaming in Mexico was the GC/PS2/Xbox generation. New games were $700-$800, consoles were $3000-4000, Gameboys were $1500-2000 with games at $300-400. Stores like Gameplanet had the latest games from all genres at good prices with no preorder harassment and Nintendo stuff was on par with Sony and MS. Starting with Wii, those Latamel thieves entered the picture and Nintendo games were priced the same as PS3/360, even though the american price was still $50 Nintendo and $60 for the HD games.

So I agree that the market today is way better than in the NES/SNES days but I think the latin american consumer had a much better panorama 2 gens ago. I learned english thanks to videogames many years ago, so the localized content is not appealing to me, good prices are.

 

[Ahasverus]

At least here (Colombia), Steam uses local currency (COP) and for the most part, the games are really cheap. Add that we've many options to pay (Visa, MC, PinValida, MercadoPago, Efecty, you name it)...

Lastest example: Cuphead on US cost $20, here cost 40000COP (like $13.3 USD).

The same applies with Origin and GoG (this one has an incremented price comparing with Steam, but without DRM is a fair exchange)...

Steam is the example to follow. PC gaming is far stronger than console gaming here for that reason.

 

[Alex_Mexico]

My inner child will rest happy if Namco gets the latin TV cast to dub Dragon Ball FighterZ

I'd give my first born to get the Latin dub of DB on DBFighterz. I can't believe it happened with a Knight of the Zodiac game first and has yet to happen with the even bigger franchise that's DB.

 

[Astral Dog]

All right. Hopefully Nintendo pricing will be more in line with Microsoft Xbox products in the future. This will depend on the parity with USD, NAFTA to a certain extent like you said and how Nintendo business performs in the following years with the Switch plus consumer demand.

Don’t forget that also eShop prices for indie titles and digital only content is priced to specific markets which is great. Last time I checked I think Stardew Valley was around 100-200 pesos.

When I was a kid you had to buy this stuff in the US because of pricing and availability.

Anyways, &#9996;&#127995;

i believe the digital prices will get worse with the Switch, new 3DS games are at 1100-200 pesos on Eshop

 

[PaulBizkit]

Argentinian here. The SNES classic edition costs AR$ 6500 which is roughly U$S 320 in Downtown Buenos Aires (Galería Jardin)

 

[X05]

I heard that Steam will accept Uruguayan pesos soon, that could lower the prices for Uruguayan gamers. Anyway, there is not so much of an gamer scene, I think because of the insane price of the consoles. I literally don't know anyone who have a current gen console/video card.

Where did you hear that? Do you have a link?

To PC gamers from LatAM, how are regional prices in the digital stores? In my case, Panama, GOG (and Origin in the past) gives us a fair price, usually. Games are much more affordable. Meanwhile, Steam continues pricing their games as if this was the United States. With our shitty salaries, it is quite hard to buy games at normal price.

One of the reasons GOG is seeing my money instead of Valve.

Here in Uruguay and Argentina for the ones I use:
- GOG: not all but a few games have good regional pricing.
- Origin: Most games have prices similar to the rest of the region.
- Steam: lol, everything is US pricing or worse.
- PSN: lololol, everything is more expensive than US.

I'd give my first born to get the Latin dub of DB on DBFighterz. I can't believe it happened with a Knight of the Zodiac game first and has yet to happen with the even bigger franchise that's DB.

Given that DBSuper is being dubbed and they went out of their way to dub Soldiers' Soul, I do think that'll happen.

 

[Ponchito]

Well, the cartridge era was expensive here and everywhere else. It's no secret that using CDs was a big part of the original PS success. As I remember it, the golden era of console gaming in Mexico was the GC/PS2/Xbox generation. New games were $700-$800, consoles were $3000-4000, Gameboys were $1500-2000 with games at $300-400. Stores like Gameplanet had the latest games from all genres at good prices with no preorder harassment and Nintendo stuff was on par with Sony and MS. Starting with Wii, those Latamel thieves entered the picture and Nintendo games were priced the same as PS3/360, even though the american price was still $50 Nintendo and $60 for the HD games.

So I agree that the market today is way better than in the NES/SNES days but I think the latin american consumer had a much better panorama 2 gens ago. I learned english thanks to videogames many years ago, so the localized content is not appealing to me, good prices are.

I think we can agree on you absolutely despise Latamel. Lol. Last time I heard they ran that company from a 2x2 virtual office.

And yeah, definitely PS2/GCN/Xbox era was the golden age of prices here.

 

[Eylos]

Where did you hear that? Do you have a link?


Here in Uruguay and Argentina for the ones I use:
- GOG: not all but a few games have good regional pricing.
- Origin: Most games have prices similar to the rest of the region.
- Steam: lol, everything is US pricing or worse.
- PSN: lololol, everything is more expensive than US.


Given that DBSuper is being dubbed and they went out of their way to dub Soldiers' Soul, I do think that'll happen.

Well they dubbed soldiers soul in ptbr too, but bamco already confirmed that at least to ptbr they Will not dub fighterz. Hope you guys are more lucky than us.

 

[Sickness702]

At least in Costa Rica, not much.

Stores literally take advantage of people.

Back when Sony had official stores here game sold at around $72-80, not $100

The only thing I play with in Costa Rica is at Hotel Del Rey

Spoiler

j/k..... or am I????

 

[mavo]

Best part is how the prices never get reduced. It's always cute seeing USGAF talking about how a game bombed because one month later it dropped from USD60 to USD40 or whatever, while all my life I've seen games stay at their "launch" price (60-100USD) for years. Imagine paying full price for licensed movie games in the DS or Phantom Hourglass in 2012.

Yeah.

In what country? Here in Mexico i feel like is with the US, everybody goes down except Nintendu.

Although in the case of prices going down there are many things to consider, like people not going as fast through their first batch as in the US, if you try hard enough you can probably still find brand new Bayonetta 2 first print editions for example lol.

And another thing to consider with the prices of videogames is the uncertainty around the USD, at least here in Mexico, if companies feel the dollar will go up or down they may start changing their prices accordingly.

 

[Alex_Mexico]

Where did you hear that? Do you have a link?


Here in Uruguay and Argentina for the ones I use:
- GOG: not all but a few games have good regional pricing.
- Origin: Most games have prices similar to the rest of the region.
- Steam: lol, everything is US pricing or worse.
- PSN: lololol, everything is more expensive than US.


Given that DBSuper is being dubbed and they went out of their way to dub Soldiers' Soul, I do think that'll happen.

I have little reason to think it will happen since a game as recent as Xenoverse 2 didn't have a Latin dub. Why should I expect any different from FighterZ?

 

[PSqueak]

I have little reason to think it will happen since a game as recent as Xenoverse 2 didn't have a Latin dub. Why should I expect any different from FighterZ?

Wouldn't FighterZ have much less volume of lines than Xenoverse?

 

[Alex_Mexico]

Wouldn't FighterZ have much less volume of lines than Xenoverse?

I have no idea but that was never the reason why we've yet to get one DB game with Latin dub. And I'm under the impression (I may be wrong) that FighterZ has a lower budget than Xenoverse even! So my bet is in it won't happen but I'll be happy to be wrong!

 

[Golden_Pigeon]

Where did you hear that? Do you have a link?

Here

really great news if it's true.

 

[Iva Demilcol]

Well, the cartridge era was expensive here and everywhere else. It's no secret that using CDs was a big part of the original PS success. As I remember it, the golden era of console gaming in Mexico was the GC/PS2/Xbox generation. New games were $700-$800, consoles were $3000-4000, Gameboys were $1500-2000 with games at $300-400. Stores like Gameplanet had the latest games from all genres at good prices with no preorder harassment and Nintendo stuff was on par with Sony and MS. Starting with Wii, those Latamel thieves entered the picture and Nintendo games were priced the same as PS3/360, even though the american price was still $50 Nintendo and $60 for the HD games.

So I agree that the market today is way better than in the NES/SNES days but I think the latin american consumer had a much better panorama 2 gens ago. I learned english thanks to videogames many years ago, so the localized content is not appealing to me, good prices are.

They were actually cheaper (at least in Mexico City) new games were about $450 - $550. Niche games from Atlus for example were the most expensive I remember from those years.

During the ps3/360 era prices increased to match the price of the dollar according to sellers (even for stuff they obviously had in stock) but when the dollar dropped its value games never went back to its previous prices. They kept increasing the prices until what we have today though (which is because of the actual value of the peso vs the dollar), but it was pretty scummy of those sellers to increase the prices almost at the same time the dollar went up in value.

Good thing that at least MS doesn't rely on the only distributor that regulates prices here.

 

[darknil]

Origin pricing for Latam feels good.

Steam on the majority of cases it's pretty good. Except, damn you Bethesda, for so long those games were way higher than other USD$60 releases.

Now I'm checking Wolfenstein 2 and the pricing seems ok, so the only offender I can think of is Konami with PES (currently stting at around $80USD)

 

[Jacqli]

I have to say that MS did pretty good with their store this time. They get a lot of valid criticism, but I have to say that making the store region free (with some limitations like Chinese store) was a good move, as good as the backwards compatibility.

I can buy using my normal account (no region specific region accounts I mean) from different markets, on web or from the console itself and usually you have to buy with gift cards (which can be bought from MS directly or somewhere else), but I could buy Halo Wars 2 Expansion for around 10&#8364; in the Russian market instead of the 20&#8364; they ask in my region market. And it works flawlessly with my retail EU copy.

 

[Moon Presence]

Is the PS4 still a luxury item in Brasil? My friends complained a lot. But I guess Nintendo is even worse.

 

[celsowmbr]

Is the PS4 still a luxury item in Brasil? My friends complained a lot. But I guess Nintendo is even worse.

Yes it is and yes
it is