5/6/2008 9:13:13 AM Charles Hale
In a previous post I mentioned that video games are a ripoff at $59.99 when new. The prices are artificially inflated by market manipulation, therefore creating artificial demand that could have been satisfied by adequate supply.
The Wii comes to mind; when released they produced way too few consoles. This allowed some retailers to sell it for a higher price than they had negotiated with Nintendo (though they got their wrists slapped for that).
The same goes for Grant Theft Auto 4. I was out last night, and we stopped in 3 different "electronics" stores: Wal-Mart, Circuit City and Best Buy. The 45040 zip code is fairly affluent, one of the higher-income ones in the area. Guess what: none of them had it. Best Buy admitted that they were given 100 units.
I do not blame the retailers. They want the units so that they can sell them. I blame the distributors. It is a global conspiracy to prop prices up.
I would be that with sales the way they are, that they will raise the new game price to at least $64.99, and possibly $69.99, by the end of this year.
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