No. Every analyst I spoke to said that gaming hardware costs were only going to keep rising, with most analysts giving an estimate of somewhere between 2027 and 2029 before prices began to ease, if they eased at all. As Rhys Elliott, head of market analysis at Alinea Analytics, explains, “The increases happening now are lagging indicators, not the peak. Platform holders and manufacturers run on long-term supply contracts and inventory buffers that initially shielded retail pricing. As those contracts expire, companies are renegotiating component costs at today’s inflated rate, and that pressur
Analysts Say Video Game Hardware Isn't Getting Cheaper Anytime SoonYou’ve probably heard that the reason gaming hardware prices are shooting through the ceiling right now is because of the RAM crisis, brought about largely by companies suddenly buying up stupid amounts of RAM to power AI data centers and hogging all the supply for the next several years. That analysis is largely correct. But sometimes it’s good to confirm what we’ve sort of loosely heard on social media with someone who knows what they’re talking about, so here’s Joost van Dreunen, NYU Stern professor and author of SuperJoost Playlist, on that: “The rising cost of RAM is the main culprit, but
Analysts Say Video Game Hardware Isn't Getting Cheaper Anytime Soon… PlayStation and Steam’s ecosystems are still growing, and the PS5 generation will also be extended by a long cycle of cross-generation games.” It’s a little different for handheld gaming, though, especially with Nintendo just having entered a new console cycle. “While console manufacturers can and … …
… Unsurprisingly, US weekly unit and $ sales of PlayStation 5 hardware reached 2026 highs during the week ending April 4th, as price increases loomed. US spending on video game hardware for the week nearly doubled when compared to the same week a year ago. …
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… No other countries are yet being targeted for increases on older Switch models. Japan and Korea are also seeing an increase in the price of Nintendo Switch Online, jumping up 25 percent as of July 1, but again, there are no current plans to see this happen outside of Nintendo’s home country. …
… The increased prices go into effect on August 21, giving folks little time to plan ahead of the price hike. Folks now have less than 24 hours to try and buy a PS5 or PS5 Pro before Sony increases the price. …
… On May 27, as spotted by video game deals guru Wario64 , Valve has raised the price of both variants of the Steam Deck OLED . And not by just a few dollars. These are some massive increases. …
… The Corsair Vengence RGB DDR5-6000 32GB might seem like a good deal at $369.99, down from a recent high of $409, but according to the RAM price index at Tom’s Hardware , its lowest-ever price was just $87. When you put them in perspective, RAM prices are still very much out of control. …
… It’s become quite pricey and challenging for your average person to buy PC RAM, graphics cards, or even an SSD for a console. Even the prices on prebuilt PCs from companies like HP, Dell, and Asus will increase by 15 to 20 percent, according to PC World. …
… Analysts were already expecting a Switch 2 price hike, and following Sony’s lead, Nintendo’s new hardware jumping to $500 or beyond feels all but inevitable now. …
… Third, the email addressed the “hardware component crisis,” with Sharma saying that when she joined the company, the price it paid for console storage components was over twice as high as it had paid last fall, and it has since doubled again, with more increases expected into the 2027 holiday seaso… …