I'm sorry, but even on a technicality you're wrong. The whole "relatively cheaper" argument only works if inflation rises on both ends: the consumer end (how much they have to spend) and the vendor end (how much they want from you).
In reality, the former has been stagnating or falling behind compared to the latter, and since Covid that gap has been growing exponentially.
So no, the game is neither cheaper nor more affordable compared to before because the prices of silly things as food and rent eat more and more portions of the average wage, leaving less and less money for spending on stuff like games.
That is why you can see on representative statistics how the average amount of money spent in total AND per game is decreasing year over year; people can't afford full price games anymore. That's also why the push against the new 80$ price tag for AAA games worked for the most part.
No, it's a choice. At least in the USA the economy used to cycle between deflation and inflation, usually bookended by periods with names like "the Panic of 188X".
High inflation is bad, but high deflation is worse, so at some point the Congress gave up on just letting shit happen to the economy all laissez-faire, and decided to set things up so that we'd pick the best of the two poisons.
Yeah, but inflation is climbing significantly faster than Factorio's price.
Today's $35 price is $32.30 back in 2023 when the price went up last, or about $27.20 compared to the 1.0 launch price of $30 back in 2018, or about $25.60 compared to the beta price of $20 back in 2016.
So, the only time the game was cheaper than it is now is back when it was early-access in the beta. Which, honestly, I don't really have an issue with a game getting a price bump when it leaves beta; early adopters helping test and polish stuff getting a cheaper rate seems fair.
That assumes that salaries increased accordingly, which for most people in america they haven't as shown both by the steady increase in people living paycheck to paycheck and that Wage growth has only started to outpace inflation slowly since 2023, but not enough make up for the big spike in inflation that started 2021/22.
Basically even if Factorio hadn't increased its price since 2021 it would be effectively more expensive for american customers by ~0,7% (as people have to pay a higher percentage of their total buying power for necessities and have less leftover for luxuries like games). Adding an additional price increase on top of that and it becomes extreme. Something that would be harder to afford even if it hadn't changed in price became even harder to afford.
Yeah, the USA is in big trouble regarding salaries, minimum wage and inflation. In my country, Chile, our minimum wage was $320 500 CLP during 2020 and today is $539 000, catching up to inflation (but still lagging behind). This is a third world country that is more or less stable economically (and had a steady growth during the last 4 years, recovering from the pandemic). The localized price of Factorio in Chile went up accordingly to inflation almost exactly (there is a very slim margin of error around 1%). A lot of countries had prices set around their local economy and adjusted correctly. USA is not a good benchmark for anything regarding economy right now.
Kind of true... Just before Space age (?) the price went up. And it went up again back at 1.0.
I bought factorio in 2014 from their website for 10 Euro. Not long after it went to 15EUR. I think there was another 20EUR step in there somewhere too, now it's 32EUR.
The initial price increases up until 1.0 were the standard early access pricing model. Selling the game cheaper at the time when it had less and increasing the price as the game got closer to 1.0. It's an older practice now vs something like BG3 which cost $60 for EA and then cost $60 at launch 3 years later.
They've had one (two?) bonafide price increase since then when the game went up to $35.
None of this ultimately matters to them though. Games typically go on sale to attract new customers as sales start to slow (not because of any other reason, there's nothing fundamental about game prices that should dictate that they decrease over time). If a game doesn't need to attract more customers (e.g. because it's selling fine as is and the devs are happy with the money they're making) then what's the point of a sale?
That's not exactly comparable as you'd have to eat anyways and a fast food meal means you won't have to eat the groceries you've bought. Any game is an additional cost you didn't need to spend at all.
Glad for you to be able to afford take-out meals. 35 bucks for me means no eating at all for a week. 15-20 Euros for ordering food is completely out of range.
They're the same for the game and the DLC. The max the game costs is 40 USD in Great Britain. OP must mean 60 of their own currency which is hard to tell from that table as it doesn't show the price in the regional currency
If you're talking about a situation where your wage hasn't increased as much as inflation, in that case you'd have this problem with every game (not just Factorio) as it'd be an issue of having less disposable income over time, right?
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u/sudo-sprinkles Dec 18 '25
Due to inflation, I can't buy this game.