Sit down, Gen-Z and younger, to listen to the old Millennial. You see, it used to be that our console games were only available on physical cartridges and discs, which wasn't always optimal, but it was nice to be able to boot up a game and simply play it. No patches or fixes, zero random updates, it just worked. With the rise of digital, physical game sales have steadily decreased (stores like GameStop expanded into a variety of markets to compensate). You can download a game to your console, and that can be great! If you can afford the console.
The PlayStation 5 was released in November of 2020. It has a digital-only version and a fancy Pro version, but is arguably a half-decade or so old in tech (with the Pro a bit fancier). As us Millenials who played consoles back in the day can attest (and GenX who played the even older consoles will agree), usually when a console is around for a while, the price starts to come down. It is older tech, a newer generation will eventually be on the way, and so forth. However, with computing power being gobbled up more and more for AI, those microchips and GPUs, and such, are being bought in large quantities and costing more. Plus, our moronic President's tariffs don't help, either. That is why Sony just announced a price increase on the PS5. Yep, a PS5 that cost $500 in 2020 is going to cost you $650 in 2026, a whole one hundred and fifty smackers more. All the various PS5 models are shooting up in price, with the PS5 Pro set to cost $900. Dropping nearly a grand on an already-outdated, "Pro," model of a gaming console sounds insane, but welcome to 2026! People are not reacting well to this news, obviously.
You might be saying, "Forget that noise! I want to play new games, but I'm mad at Sony for this increase and don't want to pay the higher price for Xbox Game Pass, either. I'm going to stick with my Nintendo Switch/Switch 2 and enjoy physical games on them, none of that digital mumbo-jumbo!" Well, Nintendo is going to start charging more money for the physical copies of their games as opposed to digital, starting with, "Yoshi and the Mysterious Book," running $60 for a download (that you do technically own at least) , but $70 for a copy you can actually, "Own," in the sense of holding it in your hands. Nintendo is saying this is a misunderstanding and, "The cost of physical games is not going up," but, uh, yeah, they are! Don't tell me your game is going to be sixty dollars, then put out information saying the physical copy costs more, followed by you acting like the $60 you already disclosed is some kind of, "Digital discount." That's the equivalent of peeing on my leg and telling me it's raining--then, trying to sell me an umbrella!
Back to you shouting out loud to anyone who will listen, "Alright then, screw gaming, I'm just going to stream Netflix and save some money!" Oh, you sweet Summer child, Netflix is raising its prices, yet again, and you can expect to pay $20 for the, "Standard," ad-free plan, which you may recall won't let you share your password with friends anymore. Again, welcome to 2026--everything is more expensive and less user-friendly! If things are getting to the point you want to dust-off your old Bluray or DVD player and just check-out movies from the library, I don't blame you. Hell, some libraries let you get games too. Maybe try that, at least until the government outlaws libraries because nothing awful our current administration could do would surprise me at this point. Now, if you excuse me, I have an idea to bring back the renting of game consoles like in the old days, but with an added twist, kind of like a timeshare. That idea may sound absolutely terrible, and that's why I say for a third and final time, "Welcome to 2026!" Let's all try to make it out alive.
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