Nintendo is making games cheaper with its new price policies

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Earlier this year, I wrote about how $50 is the new $80. Game companies, worried about price sensitivity among players in difficult economic times, are pulling back from the brink of increasing the price of games, something that was widely expected as little as a year ago. Parallel to this, sales of mid-priced games are surging on all platforms. Nintendo, which had broken the $70 seal by pricing Mario Kart World at $79.99 in 2025, was cast as the villain of the story — an out-of-touch player who had tried to predict pricing trends and jumped the wrong way.

What a difference a year makes. Shockingly, among console platform holders and major publishers, it’s Nintendo that seems to be listening most closely to what cash-strapped gamers are saying. This year, Nintendo is breaking down the traditional orthodoxies of game pricing on consoles, and on balance, it’s making games cheaper.

Part of this is a final rejection of “one size fits all” game pricing, even among high-profile first-party games. Nintendo seems to be bringing in a new, multi-tier pricing system. This week, Star Fox launches at $50. Next week, Rhythm Heaven Groove will launch at just $40. Yoshi and the Mysterious Book costs $60. Later this year, Switch Sports Resort and Splatoon Raiders will be priced at $50, and Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave at $70.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo

It’s a far cry from the early months of the year, when Nintendo asked $70 for Mario Tennis Fever and $80 for the Switch 2 Edition of Super Mario Bros. Wonder. There’s a clear sense that Nintendo is pricing games appropriately to their content and how much development effort has gone into them. $50 for a high-production-value remake of a classic game with a short runtime — or a single-player spinoff of a multiplayer hit, or a casual sports minigame collection — seems about right.

The other part of this is even more surprising. Apart from Rhythm Heaven Groove, all the above games are $10 cheaper on the eShop. (I quoted the eShop prices above.) Alone among the console shopkeepers, Nintendo has decided to pass the savings of digital distribution on to the consumer and respond to cheaper game pricing on all-digital platforms like Steam. Until now, undercutting the retailers they rely on to distribute and sell hardware has been taboo among the console platform holders. I would have thought Nintendo, which is even more reliant on retail than its rivals, and has by far the strongest physical game sales, would be the last to make this move. But it is the first.

Why has Nintendo made the change? Well, considering the rising cost of the memory chips in game cards that have brought about the sad era of the game-key card, Nintendo’s margins are probably getting squeezed on physical editions, so maybe it’s keen to push digital copies for pure profit. But it could have made physical editions $10 more expensive instead of making digital games $10 cheaper, and it didn’t.

I think Nintendo is looking at what competitors are charging, and what players are willing to pay, and has decided games need to be (a little) cheaper, and priced according to their value. Incredible. It may have only stumbled on this policy out of panicked self-interest, but that doesn’t make it unfair. Fair game pricing, in the year 2026? Who’d have thought! —Oli Welsh

eShop game of the week: The Drifter

Pixel art scene of a truck crashed against a staircase with a man standing next to it

Australian indie studio Powerhoof overhauls the classic 1990s point-and-click adventure game with smart controls (including mouse support on the Switch 2) and a fast-moving, meaty, mature storyline straight from a vintage VHS B-movie. “It’s a classic point-and-click adventure with mostly leisurely gameplay, but with the tone and speed of a guns-blazing action thriller,” says Adventure Game Hotspot in a 95% review. “With stunning production values, entertaining gameplay, and a brilliantly performed thought-provoking story, this is pulp sci-fi at its best.”

Nintendo Classics game of the week: Sin and Punishment

If Star Fox has inspired you to check out some other rail shooters — or if you want to lord it over the normies by playing a deep cut instead — look no further than this stylish Japan-only Nintendo 64 game by the ultimate shmup developer, Treasure (Radiant Silvergun, Ikaruga). Designed to be played holding the left side of the N64 controller (though it can be swapped around), on a Switch you control character movement with the d-pad and aiming with the right stick. A true hidden gem of the N64 library.

Nintendo Music track of the week: “Decided by the Eyes (Big Blue)” from F-Zero X

Nintendo just dropped a curated Nintendo 64 Selects playlist on Nintendo Music, and one of the highlights is this classic example of racing-game metal that matches the famously fearsome pace of the sci-fi racing series F-zero. With its stabbing riff, hard-charging drums, and wailing guitars and synths, it won’t fail to get you pumped up.

This week’s most interesting releases

Star Fox