‘The Outer Worlds 2’ Director Claims $80 Price Tag Was Out Of His Hands: “Talk To The Xbox Folks”
The director for The Outer Worlds 2 has addressed the game’s $80 price tag. He admitted the decision was out of his hands, and squarely in those of Xbox. Yet, the excuses Xbox and others have made over rising prices are being doubted by some.
RELATED: The 7 Best Games You Can No Longer Play
During this year’s Summer Game Fest, per Games Radar, The Outer Worlds 2 Director Brandon Adler gave a frank explanation. “We’re a game developer. We love to make games. We don’t set the prices for our games.”
“Like, personally, as a game developer, I wish everybody could play my game, because that’s what I want out of this whole thing. But for the reasons and so like, why the $79.99 price point, you’d have to honestly talk to the Xbox folks.” Games Radar further reports that Adler avoided bringing his “own personal feelings” to the answer.
As developer Obsidian Entertainment is a subsidiary of Xbox Game Studios, it stands to reason they can set the price of a game; along with staff pay and far more. Even in cases where a publisher works with a developer they don’t own, negotiations dictate what cut the publisher gets, and where the thin line between “recommendation” and “order” sits.
After all, why would a publisher continue to support a developer that performs actions that reduce sales and/or profits?
The subject kicked off with Nintendo announcing Mario Kart World would be $80 — much to the chagrin of gamers. Many felt Nintendo had opened the flood-gates, especially with reports years prior that there had been “industry-wide” efforts to raise the price of games.
The idea of $80 were also given poor justification a few weeks prior to The Outer Worlds 2 price announcement. On the subject of Borderlands 4 potentially being $80, one fan pleaded to Randy Pitchford (co-founder of Gearbox Software) that consumers wouldn’t pay that much.
Pitchford justified it as “if you’re a real fan, you’ll make it happen,” such as how he bought a Sega Genesis for $80 in 1991 despite working a minimum wage job.In the same discussion, Pitchford also said it was “not my call.” Surprising, given he is a CEO of Gearbox’s president company, though one could only speculate shareholders demanding it.
On his personal X account, Pitchford would go on to share the comments he made during this year’s PAX East conference, where he explained, “It’s an interesting time, right? On one level, we’ve got a competitive marketplace where the people that make those choices want to sell as many units as possible, and they want to be careful about people that are price sensitive.”
“So there’s some folks that don’t want to see prices go up, even the ones deciding what the prices are,” he claimed, adding, “There’s other folks accepting the reality that game budgets are increasing and there’s tariffs for the retail packaging, and it’s getting gnarly out there.”
He further declared, “Borderlands 4 has more than twice the development budget than Borderlands 3,” reaffirming, “more than twice, so the truth is I don’t know what [The Outer Worlds 2] price is going to be.”
One review bombing of the entire Borderlands catalog later (albeit, partly due to a new EULA granting root-level access for anti-cheat software), and Pitchford took to social media to posted a lengthy statement addressing the situation.
“I am sorry there was a misunderstanding,” he prefaced. “The absolute sincere truth is that I don’t want anyone to pay any more than they should or are comfortable with and I always work with the intent and hope that a customer always feels they got the better end of the deal no matter what they pay.”
Pitchford insisted his “real fans” comment meant to show the game wouldn’t fail if it cost $80 — not a call of allegiance via wallets. The rest of the tweet had Pitchford bouncing between him insisting he wanted to entertain, and didn’t want to see prices going up though it was inevitable.
Gearbox would finally reveal Borderlands 4 is $70, with the Super Deluxe Edition at $130, and the Collector’s Edition, which does not even include a copy of the game, at $150.
YouTuber Sebastian Ruiz “The Other Frost” — formerly of The Escapist and Second Wind — highlighted the fallacies in justifying raising game prices a month before Xbox announced their price for The Outer Worlds 2. He dismissed inflation, as consumers would rather pay what matched the product’s quality (premium for premium, cheap for simple) especially as consumers were used to games beating inflation with “bang-for-buck.”
Ruiz noted how digital sales meant less costs compared to physical (manufacture, storage, shipping, etc.) — something EA, of all companies, cited as why they weren’t raising their prices.
“My coldest, closeted capitalist take is: it doesn’t matter the cost to develop a video game continues to rise,” Ruiz declared, adding, “That’s not my problem. That’s your business strategy — who asked you to, huh? I didn’t ask you to. And, that attitude is naive.”
Ruiz criticized how industry big-shots had rejected accountability, asserting, “It’s not ‘my costs keep rising’, or more accurately, it’s not ‘I keep spending more’ or ‘I’m trying to pad my profit margins’- it’s ‘the economy works in mysterious ways…’ “
The excuse of needing to meet “industry standards” was also rejected, Ruiz noting businesses should compete with cheaper products and undercutting. “If I was any more conspiratorial, I’d have anyone citing industry standards be investigated for collusion. Because ‘industry standards’ sounds like coded messaging for ‘let’s all set the price this high, and then we can say the price is the price, because the price!’ ” Ruiz mocked.
Ruiz noted the lack of competition and costs in other ways. “Who is Xbox elbowing for space at the Xbox Direct? And in their own storefront, on a digital-only Xbox? And you’re still outspending those savings — what are your rising costs? Labor? There have been thousands of layoffs.”
Ruiz also pointed to outsourcing and AI as further methods to save money on the labor front.
RELATED: 10 Best ‘Under The Radar’ Marvel Video Games
Ruiz noted that any serious change would need to come from console games. PC gamers have such a wealth of games and pricing options, they can wait for a game of any price to eventually go on sale for cheap — or even piracy.
“Why not acknowledge that this is where we’re at?” Ruiz rhetorically asked the gaming industry. “Quit with the tricks- ‘cuz they’re for for kids. Focus on quality and compete with each other, instead of collectively ganging up on the customer.”
Forbes’ Paul Tassi noted, in his report on The Outer Worlds 2, that Xbox Game Pass adds another wrinkle. “Subscribers don’t care whether the price is $40, $60 or $80 because it will be included day one there regardless.”
“Rather, the price exists for those outside the system, and is Microsoft wants to push more subs, it now can say simply ‘three games a year cost exactly the same as a year of Game Pass Ultimate ($240)’ when for the lower prices that wasn’t the case. Of course, Game Pass prices are no doubt going to go up again at some point, too,” Tassi forewarns.
Are Xbox driving consumers towards Game Pass by making their games $80? Is Game Pass merely a safety net for if gamers soundly reject $80? Are they playing both sides to see what works best, or are they having both their cakes and eating them? Let us know what you think in the comments below!
More About:Video Game News