Xbox One first party games to cost £49.99 at launch

Microsoft has just updated the prices on its official online store, putting to bed some of the £99.99 place-holder prices we've seen dotted around. Now the new – and presumably final – pricing for some of the console's first party games, including Ryse, Dead Rising 3 and Forza 5, are set at £50 a piece.

While a lot of people are up in arms about this – and my first thought was N64 cartridges, which I spent a tonne on back in the day – this isn't drastically different than Xbox 360 game pricing now, which often have an RRP around this level – it's just we're used to retailers and online stores giving us a nice discount to coax in early buyers.

Even Kinect Sports Rivals is getting the same high-price treatment, though ironically that might feature more “gameplay” than the quick-time-event filled Ryse. 

What is a little distasteful however, is the quote coming in from EA's executive, Peter Moore, who said during E3 (via CVG): “You see a $60 price for a next-gen game whereas we believe [with digital downloads] we can get $70, $80, $90 from the consumer, but it's a $60 price point.”

So from EA's point of view at least, retailers and publishers are being kind, because it's thought that they could easily milk us for another £10-15.

And think how bad it would have been had we not had a second hand market to make a few extra quid with? Nobody would be buying brand new games.

It's also worth noting that of course, we're getting screwed on pricing again thanks to import taxes and everyone's favourite price-hiker, VAT. In the US, games will be priced at $60 a piece, which works out at £39, a noticeable amount less than our £50 price tags. It's a similar situation with the console itself too, which we heard back in early June would be priced at £429 here in the UK and $499 in the US. That equates to around £100 difference in cost for British consumers.

The Xbox One is set for release in November in North America and somewhere between November/December in the EU. Sony has similarly confirmed a christmas period launch for its rival console, the PS4.

KitGuru Says: We always get screwed on cost. Unless you run your own business and are VAT registered, then you get to claim all that tax back every quarter. It's a pain in the ass doing it though.

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