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[IbizaPocholo]

Former Nintendo Sales Lead Believes Switch 2 Price Will Increase

A former executive discusses the recent decision to have different prices for digital and physical Nintendo-published titles on the Switch 2.

insider-gaming.com

During the latest episode of the Kit & Krysta Podcast, a former Nintendo employee, only identified as Sean, was invited to discuss concerns about Nintendo's hardware and software pricing. Nintendo recently announced that, starting in May 2026 with the release of Yoshi and the Mysterious Book, all first-party titles for the Nintendo Switch 2 will have a lower digital MSRP compared to the physical version.

Sean praised the change, calling it a consumer-first move. He also mentioned that he believes this is simply digital games becoming cheaper, rather than physical games becoming more expensive. However, he also thinks that the hardware price will likely go up eventually.

"Unfortunately, I think eventually the hardware price is going to have to go up. I think that there's things that they can and seem to be doing to try and mitigate that, but I also look at this move on software, if I'm reading it correctly, as a way to make a hardware price increase a little bit more palatable," he said.

 

[kazuyamishima]

It's only a matter of time, the question is if they'll go with a $50 or a $100 increase

 

[cireza]

Wow, that's a bold prediction !

 

[winjer]

You can blame this prick for the dram and nand flash crisis we all have to pay for.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Fucking, Scam Altman

 

[Sohurmk833]

Still saying no they won´t. Nintendo is probably the only company in the business smart enough to know when they have to eat (temporary) hardware losses to grow the userbase.

They did it with the N64, the Gamecube and the 3DS.

They simply cannot afford to shrink their audience. The actual money (long term) is made with software and most importantly: their future customers are now children who are already close to being priced out by the current MSRP.

 

[Kronark]

The hardware price isn't even the scam with Nintendo. The scam is bundling 15 year old games together and charging $80-100 for them as if they were new, because they've got a bunch of nostalgia and pokemon fanboys by the balls.

 

[Cakeboxer]

I can imagine that they won't raise the prices, but if they do, it will be moderate and not as drastic as Sony. At the moment, it's €469. In case of an increase, I'd guess it would go up to €499.

 

[Emmy Ator Best]

Fuck you Nintendo raise the price NOW! We're looking greedy here!
Signed: Sony

 

[Boy bawang]

I don't think they will.

Their whole strategy for the early switch 2 life seems to hinge on selling the console despite having very few tentpole games, and as momentum will begin to slow down, hit the market with the heavy hitters (2027 I guess...).

This can only work if the console isn't too expensive. The current price is already pushing it for two really good first party games (pokopia and donkey Kong; Mario kart kinda sucks), playing switch 1 games in better conditions, and a few ambitious third party games. At 550+, you'd have to be a chump to buy it.

 

[pqueue]

Let's Do It!

 

[squidilix]

Of course it will

 

[squallbr]

Matter of time

 

[Chukhopops]

I don't believe the price will go up but non-bundle versions will disappear very shortly in my opinion.

Code in a box for big games will help soften the blow for customers without impacting margins.

Anyone who wants a handheld should buy one while they can, it's not like you're going to buy a Steam Deck anyway.

 

[CentralScrutinizer]

Leave it to Kit and Krysta to have the best insight and hottest of takes.

/s

Their grifter arc is funny.

 

[Mr.Phoenix]

I am shocked.

No one tell MCH2024

I don't believe the price will go up but non-bundle versions will disappear very shortly in my opinion.

Code in a box for big games will help soften the blow for customers without impacting margins.

Anyone who wants a handheld should buy one while they can, it's not like you're going to buy a Steam Deck anyway.

I don't know why people think Nintendo is immune to price increases. That 12GB RAM the switch 2 uses, for instance, is going up from the $30 it would have cost them in 2025, to $75 in 2026. And even their 256GB storage will go up by like 60%.

But somehow.... prices won't change? Nintendo???? Ok then.

 

[MCH2024]

Yea off course nintendo is ok. They didn't go Bozo commodity maxing.

If they raise the price it's really about making sure they earn healthy profits on the Switch2 Hardware. Not to mention control demand since PS5 is dead at those prices so Switch2 will see an influx.

The best way to do it is still to introduce a Switch2 Pro Premium model to capture consumers that want more value.

 

[gerth666]

Well I've just bought one to beat any price increases.
Just had a good deal I think, from very.com, console and totk bundle for £445, plus a 10% back if you open a very credit account.
You need to pay back the amount before 12 months not to incur any interest. This is a good deal for any UK gamers if you ask me.
If you're on the fence, now is the best time to jump in

 

[Alan Wake]

The hardware price isn't even the scam with Nintendo. The scam is bundling 15 year old games together and charging $80-100 for them as if they were new, because they've got a bunch of nostalgia and pokemon fanboys by the balls.

And people buy them. That's the big problem.

 

[MCH2024]

The hardware price isn't even the scam with Nintendo. The scam is bundling 15 year old games together and charging $80-100 for them as if they were new, because they've got a bunch of nostalgia and pokemon fanboys by the balls.

If people buy them what's the problem?

A bundle of old games costing 79-99$ seems very fair to me for a console.

 

[Chukhopops]

I am shocked.

No one tell MCH2024


I don't know why people think Nintendo is immune to price increases. That 12GB RAM the switch 2 uses, for instance, is going up from the $30 it would have cost them in 2025, to $75 in 2026. And even their 256GB storage will go up by like 60%.

But somehow.... prices won't change? Nintendo???? Ok then.

I'm not saying they are immune, I'm saying they have other options before they increase the base price, such as removing non-bundle versions.

But anyone who wants a S2 should buy one now rather than later.

 

[Mr.Phoenix]

I'm not saying they are immune, I'm saying they have other options before they increase the base price, such as removing non-bundle versions.

But anyone who wants a S2 should buy one now rather than later.

The immune thing wasn't necessarily directed at you. I tagged the user who was directed at in the post.

But on the other hand, on the thing about the other options, sure, no doubt they do, all companies do. eg. Sony bought more RAM and storage than they actually needed to last year when prices were lower to delay raising their prices as long as they possibly could. But their stockpiles have run out and here we are.

I don't agree with the "bundle" thing, though. Or more specifically, a non-bundled thing. The Switch 2 costs $450. Their bundles typically cost around $520. If you take away the option to buy the $450 Switch 2 and force everyone to buy a bundled Switch... that is still effectively a price hike. And a disingenuous one. Because it just means you don't have to deal with the PR backlash of announcing a price hike... You instead just tactfully reduce non-bundled shipments to a trickle and make it look like they are just super scarce because people are buying them, when in truth, you are just forcing people to pay more for your hardware.

This would be like Sony having two PS5 SKUs, one without a game for $500, and one with Spiderman 2 for $600. But then all of a sudden, you can only ever find the Spiderman 2 bundle. Yeah, technically the PS5 would still be $500... but good luck finding it.

Anyways this is just speculation; they haven't done that yet.

 

[MCH2024]

But on the other hand, on the thing about the other options, sure, no doubt they do, all companies do. eg. Sony bought more RAM and storage than they actually needed to last year when prices were lower to delay raising their prices as long as they possibly could

Nonsense. Practically no company actually does this. They were all running on long-term supply agreements that the memory cartel basically shredded and forced renegotiations on, unless you were a big fish.

Sony's CFO said they had managed to secure "the minimum quantity of memory (DRAM+NAND) to last through 2026."

Translation: their LTA ran out or was shredded in 2025 and they're now on a 9-12 month agreement, at current memory prices, for the bare minimum to keep some minimal PS5 / PS5 Pro production going.

And this isn't just a price issue. Sony said minimum quantity. The price hike is also because Sony can't even sell that many PS5s this year due to memory shortage.

Nvidia had to cut GeForce supply 15-20%, and Nvidia is the number one memory customer, with deep pockets to prepay years in advance.

Right now there's probably only enough supply to meet 75% of consumer memory demand even with demand destruction due to the current higher memory prices.

 

[CentralScrutinizer]

Nonsense. Practically no company actually does this. They were all running on Long term supply agreements that the memory cartel basically shredded and forced negotiations unless you were a big fish.

Sony CFO said that Sony had managed to secure "the minimum quantity of memory (DRAM+NAND) to last through 2026."

Aka there LTA ran out or was shredded in 2025 and are on a 9-12 month LTA.

What legal standing would Nintendo and Sony have to sue these companies for cartel like behavior and actually win and come out unscathed? Or is this a strong arm from component suppliers telling them "know your place and sit the fuck down and wait your turn. If you do anything about it we will cut you off all together."

I am no business lawyer, but from what I understand about antitrust laws and historic business behavior like this, its obviously laws are not being followed here.

 

[MCH2024]

What legal standing would Nintendo and Sony have to sue these companies for cartel like behavior and actually win and come out unscathed?

Well the legal standing is you sue and you will get zero supply and PS5 is discontinued for 36 months. That legal standing.

LTAs aren't absolute, and everyone in the industry understands that. If the market price is widely higher than the agreed LTA price everyone renegotiates to a higher price to keep the supply. Similarly if the LTA price is much higher than market, you renegotiate to lower it.

Right now everyone is dealing with the issue that there is only a fraction of the old memory supply to go around. The only people who didn't have their memory supply reduced are Apple. Because they quite literally folded on price instantly and went hardball on quantity negotiations.

LTA is more about guaranteeing a certain level of supply than it's about pricing. RAM is a commodity like oil and gas, if LTAs were allowed to stand during hyper shortage times many companies would quite literally just scalp. Selling commodities at 3x markup is more economically productive than selling a PC at 1.05x markup.

 

[Fabieter]

Bought one last month because of it.

 

[Mr.Phoenix]

Nonsense. Practically no company actually does this. They were all running on long-term supply agreements that the memory cartel basically shredded and forced renegotiations on, unless you were a big fish.

Sony's CFO said they had managed to secure "the minimum quantity of memory (DRAM+NAND) to last through 2026."

Translation: their LTA ran out or was shredded in 2025 and they're now on a 9-12 month agreement, at current memory prices, for the bare minimum to keep some minimal PS5 / PS5 Pro production going.

And this isn't just a price issue. Sony said minimum quantity. The price hike is also because Sony can't even sell that many PS5s this year due to memory shortage.

Nvidia had to cut GeForce supply 15-20%, and Nvidia is the number one memory customer, with deep pockets to prepay years in advance.

Right now there's probably only enough supply to meet 75% of consumer memory demand even with demand destruction due to the current higher memory prices.

Ok great... but this all doesn't, wouldn't, and couldn't affect Nintendo, right? Which is actually what I am really talking about here, and that this thread is actually about.

Well the legal standing is you sue and you will get zero supply and PS5 is discontinued for 36 months. That legal standing.

LTAs aren't absolute, and everyone in the industry understands that. If the market price is widely higher than the agreed LTA price everyone renegotiates to a higher price to keep the supply. Similarly if the LTA price is much higher than market, you renegotiate to lower it.

Right now everyone is dealing with the issue that there is only a fraction of the old memory supply to go around. The only people who didn't have their memory supply reduced are Apple. Because they quite literally folded on price instantly and went hardball on quantity negotiations.

LTA is more about guaranteeing a certain level of supply than it's about pricing. RAM is a commodity like oil and gas, if LTAs were allowed to stand during hyper shortage times many companies would quite literally just scalp. Selling commodities at 3x markup is more economically productive than selling a PC at 1.05x markup.

LTAs have within them that you get as much as 80% of the agreed amount of RAM/NAND in the event of a price hike/change. Though that percentage varies between clients. Eg. Both, Apple, Sony, and Nvidia are all considered to be tier one clients. They don't just do LTAs, they also pre-pay to guarantee certain minimums.

 

[CentralScrutinizer]

Well the legal standing is you sue and you will get zero supply and PS5 is discontinued for 36 months. That legal standing.

Yeah thats why I brought that up. Even in a scenario where the manufacturers manufactured the conditions resulting in a mark up you'd think a sense of justice would prevail and governments would intervene in something so blatant; however, we have never lived in a world where accountability ever comes without strings attached. We are seeing the blatant reality of rules that exist on paper in a vacuum create an open and shut case here, but now that it's actually happening we are seeing every government turn a blind eye to it.

The reasoning is obvious. Governments want AI to exist so they can be the ones to use and control it to be used against their subjects. Something so economically destructive doesn't just happen unpoliced. This is all intentional. But I digress.

 

[ssringo]

Bought one last month because of it.

I'm heavily considering grabbing one myself. Not like they're going to get cheaper so it's not a bad investment for future games. Worst case scenario my Switch games will actually run well.

 

[Fabieter]

I'm heavily considering grabbing one myself. Not like they're going to get cheaper so it's not a bad investment for future games. Worst case scenario my Switch games will actually run well.

No i figured i would get one eventually and my so wanted to play pokopia so yeah it was a no brainer to go in now.

 

[Shifty1897]

$100 price increase in July is my prediction.

 

[Horseganador]

The only question is when and how much it will rise.

 

[Gambit2483]

Still saying no they won´t. Nintendo is probably the only company in the business smart enough to know when they have to eat (temporary) hardware losses to grow the userbase.

They did it with the N64, the Gamecube and the 3DS.

They simply cannot afford to shrink their audience. The actual money (long term) is made with software and most importantly: their future customers are now children who are already close to being priced out by the current MSRP.

Agreed. Now that they are by far the cheapest/most affordable hardware on the market they'd have to be fools to ruin that HUGE selling point. Eat some costs, let your install base explode for even more dev/pub support and sales. It will go much much further in the long run for this generation

 

[reinking]

I thought they were going to bump it up by $50 after the initial launch. That was part of my decision to go ahead and get one now instead of waiting. I will not be surprised if they do. Or do not at this point.

 

[Deerock71]

"Sean":

 

[Ebrietas]

No shit. Do people think switch isn't affected by rising costs? Or that Nintendo of all companies will just eat the difference?

 

[bumpkin]

Until they improve its value proposition with some big first party exclusives - a new Zelda, Mario or Smash - raising the price is going to (further) cripple its momentum. Nintendo execs have to be aware of this, hopefully cooler heads will prevail and they'll leave the price alone.

Hopefully.

At least they acknowledged the GKC problem and have slowly been introducing lower capacity cards for publishers who don't want to cheap out.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

But if Nintendo can hold the current price for one more year, it may give sales a welcome boost now that Sony raised their prices, even in spite of GTA VI releasing.
The next few months will be very interesting.

 

[MiguelItUp]

Of course it will, water is wet.

Fuck Sam Altman's hoe ass, lol.

If I end up buying a Switch 2 for Duskbloods I'll likely be going the used/refurbished route.

 

[S0ULZB0URNE]

IMO the wise decision IF raising the price... would be to wait till 30 million are sold and after the June/Summer Direct.
The Direct would have to have the big planned announcements and I would do $50 for the base unit($500) plus offer a $550 game bundle which looks good vs the digital only $600 PS5.

 

[Skifi28]

No shit. Do people think switch isn't affected by rising costs? Or that Nintendo of all companies will just eat the difference?

They're certainly trying to eat the cost right now as it's still very early in the system's life and growing the user base is paramount, but there's a limit to that and I feel we're approaching it fast.

 

[Cancer]

2 crackheads [citation needed] who got paid to repeat the line "I'm so excited about product" still leeching off their old job.