Three things in life are inevitable: death, taxes, and price increases. Although that last one comes with caveats, for once.
A few weeks ago, Microsoft announced that the base price of its Xbox games at retail would hit frankly staggering $80, underpinning what has been an incredibly tough year for consumers and businesses alike with regards to spiralling costs. Whether it’s supply chains being impacted by arbitrary trade wars or sticky inflation from Covid quantitative easing, the market has been relatively unstable for the past few years for a variety of reasons.
In response, various businesses have put up their prices to varying degrees. Microsoft and Sony both raised the price of their Xbox and PlayStation hardware bundles over the past couple of years, and for a short while, it looked like the industry was poised to raise the base price of their mainline games to $80. It started with Nintendo’s Mario Kart World hitting $79.99 at retail, and then back and forth over whether Borderlands 4 would hit $79.99 as well — it ended up being $69.99.
Then, Microsoft announced it would also be targeting $79.99 for upcoming Xbox games, starting with FPS space odyssey The Outer Worlds 2. That is, until today.
Announced across Xbox social channels, Microsoft and Obsidian revealed that The Outer Worlds 2 will no longer be $79.99 at launch, returning to the current industry standard of $69.99.
“We’re focused on bringing players incredible worlds to explore, and will keep our full priced holiday releases, including The Outer Worlds 2, at $69.99 – in line with current market conditions,” an Xbox spokesperson explained in a statement to Windows Central.
If you’ve already pre-ordered The Outer Worlds 2 at the $79.99 price point, you will have to grab refunds at the point of purchase if you’ve already paid up. Microsoft says some retailers will light up with refunds today, but some will start accepting refunds from tomorrow. Then, you can pre-order again at the new $69.99 price tier.
Absolutely the right call
As good as The Outer Worlds 2 looks, I think $79.99 would have been a tough pill to swallow for gamers who are already dealing with rising costs elsewhere, who are also increasingly looking to free-to-play games to offset the rising costs of living.
Cynically, it wouldn’t be a stretch to think the $79.99 price tag was an attempt to push people over to Xbox Game Pass, which would’ve represented a significant saving for those wanting to play Obsidian’s new sci-fi epic. There have already been questions swirling around Xbox Game Pass’ viability as a business model, particularly for replacing the sales metrics cannibalized from internal studios.
In any case, it’s a rare win for consumers in a world where everything seems to get perpetually more expensive with no sign of stopping. Part of me wonders if Microsoft did some kind of analysis on what kind of sales impact $79.99 would have on the upcoming Call of Duty Black Ops 7, and decided they didn’t like what they saw …
The Outer Worlds 2 launches on October 29, 2025, for Xbox Series X|S, PC, and PS5, also for Xbox Game Pass and Xbox Cloud Gaming.
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