35 years of console launch prices

[Q*ris]

From an article on Gamasutra sizing up Wii U's price tag against history.
The "unadjusted for infaltion" graph is also in the article by the way.

[Blanka]

Nice,
Put a 21 inch TV price, or a entry level PC next to it!

[Sonic 1992]

I definately remember Neo Geo,  The price was crazy, and the games were 300.00 each!!!     in 1991 !

[Blanka]

They all do much lower than that nowadays. Can't say that of my handheld games. They are often 2-3 times the original price.

[Geosword X]

I understand the 3DO being expensive, but a handheld like the NeoGeo!? What were they thinking!?

[level42]

Uhhhhhhh I don't think they mean the hand-held but this one:

[Geosword X]

Uhhhhhhh I don't think they mean the hand-held but this one:

Oh I see.....thanks for clearing that up.

[level42]

It's so strange how perspective of amounts of money have changed for us in Europe.

When we bought the Atari 2600 console BITD it was DFL 499.- This was after it's first big price cut. I am not 100% sure, but IIRC the original launch price in The Netherlands was a staggering DFL 799,-

Mind you, this did include the epic Combat game !  

I don't exactly remember what year it was we bought it, my guess is 1982. Just found that for 1 UDS you'd have to pay about 2,7 DFL then.

So....the actual launch price in the US was USD200 , converted to DLF that is DFL540 then. Add to that import duties, VAT (I think it was 21%) and the higher costs of retailing stuff in Europe (not one European market yet then, more languages for manuals etc..etc.) and you get to a pretty reasonable conversion of the price.

However, since we now have the Euro and it has been higher in value than the USD for years now (anywhere between 1.20 and 1.35) the perspective on stuff priced in USD is now so different....

If I hear USD200 today it's about €155 now...so a relatively low price in perspective. BITD it seemed like a lot more money simply because the amount was a lot higher in DFL.....andddddddddd of course we were completely screwed over when we joined the Euro. Prices raised insanely here, but wages stayed the same.

The rest of the story about the Euro is well known if you follow the daily news.......but that's a different discussion....

Of course I'm not including any inflation into all this because it's not really important for this "story".

[Etienne MacGyver]

i always felt that the only thing changed when we joined the euro was that only the symbol was changed;

to

there was one exeption though...  my paycheck