Nintendo Executives Tried to Defend Their Pricing
The community is still divided about it.
The latest Nintendo Direct announced the launch of the Switch 2, a new and improved version of the Nintendo Switch, which is set to release on June 5, 2025.
While it showed several improvements over its predecessor and it will release with various exciting exclusives, Nintendo soon had pushback from its players once they discovered the prices for the console and the games.
The prices were $450 for the console and $500 with the bundle with Mario Kart World.
We don't have the prices of all the games, but we know that Mario Kart World will cost $80 for a digital copy and $90 for a physical copy, and Donkey Kong Bananza will be $70 digital and $80 physical.
The community has been very vocal about its disapproval of these prices, and Nintendo tried to justify them, but the community is still divided about it.
Firstly, sent Bill Trinen, the Vice President, Player & Product Experience of Nintendo of America. In an interview with IGN, he tried to justify the price of Mario Kart World by saying the following:
Trinen insisted Mario Kart world justifies its price tag, and pointed to the upcoming dedicated Mario Kart World Nintendo Direct where fans will learn more about the game and what it has to offer.
“I would say it's less about the strategy of pricing Mario Kart World, it's more just whenever we look at a given game, we just look at what is the experience, and what's the content, and what's the value?” Trinen said.
“Mario Kart World, I think especially as you see from the Nintendo Direct, not to give you any hints or anything, but I did read your article this morning and I think you had mentioned that you didn’t find a lot to discover when roaming around. So I would say tune into our Mario Kart Direct to see what, maybe you'll be able to find out about that.
“But honestly, this is a game that is so big and so vast and you will find so many little things in it to discover. And there's still some other secrets remaining that I think as people end up buying and playing the game, they're going to find this to be probably the richest Mario Kart experience they've ever had.”
Secondly, the current president of Nintendo of America, Doug Bowser, did another interview with CNBC, and he tried to explain the reason behind the pricing of Switch 2 after its loud rejection by the community, and he said the following:
"As we look at Nintendo Switch 2 and you think about the feature sets that I talked about ... we believe that the pricing is appropriate for the value of the machine and the gameplay experience overall," he said.
"We recognize there are some people that may not be able to afford [the Switch 2's] price point. That's why we wanted to make the other Switch platforms available, so [people] still have an opportunity to come into our gaming universe, be a part of these characters in these worlds, and see value, if you will, in whatever rung of the platform they come in."
Despite these responses, Nintendo is still getting criticism from its community and players, as many of them believe that Nintendo is pricing their products out of their reach.
