Xbox Marketing Head Calls $70 Games ‘Exceptions’

Xbox’s head of global product marketing Aaron Greenberg called the issue of game pricing “super-complex” in an interview with the Real Deal Xbox podcast on Tuesday. He also noted that Microsoft uses a wide range of prices for their internal studios.

When Greenberg was asked whether the company would increase the price of its games for next-gen Xbox Series X/S consoles, his answer was the following:

“Gaming pricing is a super-complex thing to answer because in the old days, every game launched at one price and that was it. But we launched Ori and the Will of the Wisps for $30 and Gears Tactics is a new title launching this holiday and it’s launching at $60. State of Decay 2 launched at $40. So there’s not a simple answer to that except to say that Tactics we’re launching at $60.”

Furthermore, he called $70 games “exceptions” and reminded everyone that Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Cyberpunk 2077 and DIRT 5 still cost the standard $60.

Sports simulators are an example of such an exception. They came out before the launch of new consoles and do not support Smart Delivery, so their next-gen versions are more expensive.

“It’s a different approach and they obviously have a right to do whatever they want with their products and pricing, but for us we’ve really taken a fan-centric approach [with pricing]. I’d say first with Smart Delivery, but most importantly you get all our games at launch in Game Pass, so does the price of the game even matter if it’s included in your Game Pass subscription?”