All of the cool stuff revealed in last weekâs Switch 2 Direct was quickly overshadowed by worries about its higher prices, including $450 for the console and Mario Kart World being Nintendoâs first $80 game. Then the company halted pre-orders in the U.S. in the face of unprecedented tariffs that could push prices even higher. Now Nintendo has gone on record to defend those prices and claim tariffs werenât part of the original arithmetic.
âPut [the April 2nd announcement] aside,â Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser told The Verge. âAny previous tariffs were not factored into the price itself.â Thereâs still no new date for when pre-orders for the Switch 2’s June 5 launch will begin. âThe news is fresh, and like many companies right now, we are actively assessing what the impact may be,â he added.
Bowser defended the Switch 2’s existing $450 price tag by pointing to its bigger, newer LCD screen, stronger GPU, better Joy-Con, and new features like GameChat, a Discord-like voice and video chat option gated behind a Switch Online subscription. âWe want to make sure that this is a device that is approachable, that consumers will see as part of their overall entertainment experiences and will understand that it has longevity to it,â Bowser told The Verge. âAnd all of those factors really go into the consideration of the price.â
An update from Nintendo pic.twitter.com/iygReQlBwl
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He did hint at something interesting, which is that the existing Switch models are part of the calculus. The 2017 edition has still never gotten a price drop and remains $300. The Switch OLED is even more at $350. If Nintendo continues selling them, itâs not shocking that the Switch 2, a generational leap, would be $100 more. âYou want to consider pricing relative to the Switch since we still have that in distribution,â Bowser said.
Mario Kart Worldâs $80 price tag is arguably whatâs been upsetting fans even more, and leading them to spam Nintendo Tree House Live demos of the game on YouTube with wall-to-wall âdrop the priceâ comments. Bowser confirmedto The Washington Post itâs not the new âbenchmarkâ for Switch 2 games, and the company will continue exploring variable pricing. But why make Mario Kart World the canary in the $80 mine right at launch? âWe just look at what is the experience, and whatâs the content, and whatâs the value?â Nintendo of Americaâs VP of product and player experience Bill Trinen told IGN
He also suggested that there are tons of new details about the game that havenât been revealed yet that will win fans over. âMario Kart World, I think especially as you see from the Nintendo Direct, not to give you any hints or anything, but I did read your article this morning and I think you had mentioned that you didnât find a lot to discover when roaming around. So I would say tune into our Mario Kart Direct to see what, maybe youâll be able to find out about that,â he said, referring to a deeper dive into the game slated for April 17.
Nintendo is livestreaming all its new games to over 85,000 viewers and everyone in the chat is just spamming "drop the price" https://t.co/Uzimk5p4I7 pic.twitter.com/wOmCbtWD7K
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He continued:
But honestly, this is a game that is so big and so vast and you will find so many little things in it to discover. And thereâs still some other secrets remaining that I think as people end up buying and playing the game, theyâre going to find this to be probably the richest Mario Kart experience theyâve ever had.
Trinen also confirmed Welcome Tour, the Switch 2’s Astroâs Playroom-style mini-game explainer for the new hardware, is a $10 digital-only download. Why not a pack-in for the console, like Wii Sports? âJust the amount of care and work that the team put into it, I think it was decided that, âYeah, this feels like $9.99 is not an exorbitant price. It feels like a good value for what youâre getting out of the product,â he said.
The veteran Nintendo employee also weighed in on why games like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will be $80 on Switch 2 for their upgraded content, despite having been released several years ago at this point. âWell, again, what I would say is that we just look at each individual game and we look at the content and the value of that game, and then we say, âwhat is the right price for the value of this entertainment?â What I would probably counter to some of that is that really what youâre looking at is for the Nintendo Switch 2 Edition, thatâs the physical price for somebody that has not bought the base game,â Trinen said.
Poor Donkey Kong Bananza. At just $70, Nintendo must not think itâs as good or just not the same âvalueâ as some of its other games. One big question remains, then. Is $70 the new $60 on Switch 2, or the new $50? I hope Welcome Tour has a The Price is Right mini-game.
