Steam Deck gets a major price bump, more than 40% increase for US buyers

deck.jpg

With very little in the way of announcement, Valve has today increased the price of the Steam Deck but some fairly considerable margins. Both of the available models, the 512GB and 1TB OLED systems, have seen an increase. You can find an overview of these changes below:
  • 512GB OLED
    • UK: £479 ➜ £649 (35% Increase)
    • EU: €569 ➜ €779 (36% Increase)
    • US: $549 ➜ $789 (43% Increase)
  • 1TB OLED
    • UK: £569 ➜ £779 (36% Increase)
    • EU: €679 ➜ €919 (35% Increase)
    • US: $649 ➜ $949 (46% Increase)
Unlike the recently announced changes to the cost of the Switch 2, these prices have already come into effect, delivering a serious blow to the value the Steam Deck previously offered. With the Steam Machine still on the docket for this year, it remains to be seen just how expensive it will end up being.

:arrow: Source
 
Difference there being that WiiU also had a very lackluster library, and the plan to quickly sunset it was apparent by the time Switch launched. 95% of what the casual audience would want to play will continue to release on Switch over the next five years, so it comes down to a couple killer apps to entice them. OoT remake and Pokemon can be enough to do the trick, as long as Winds&Waves actually do something interesting for mainline titles.
nah let's be real, Winds and Waves doesn't need to do anything but be a Pokemon game that isn't on the Switch 1 lol
 
  • Like
Reactions: Xzi
With modern hardware prices being what they are, maybe we'll see resurrection of old games on PC. They don't cost too much and can be run on pretty much anything these days.
 
Steam Deck, only for rich people !
Nintendo, only for poor people (will see) !!!
PC-ram ,only for rich People !
etc...

If you are lucky and own a NES-8bit, try it out and save your Money or use Retroid Pocket as fast as you can to reduce the damage of luxury prices.

These outrageous prices are forcing us passionate gamers to download games in ISO or NSP format instead of buying physical copies and play them on XX.

Only a fool does foolish things (Forest Gump)—gamers or customers certainly aren’t that stupid to by these expensive things or might ...

Robin Hood would definitely never buy a Steam Deck these Days.
Elon Musk might, but none of us here are Musks or the bald Guy.

The folks in marketing have only one thing on their minds: money to feed their little Chicken-eggs.
Somehow it works, though, because a (lot)of us can actually afford it.

Anyway, I’d rather buy a new toilet than a Steam Deck, because I need that every day for my Steam-Machine.
And you no longer need an account like the one for PS5 games that you don't own, since you're now using a new toilet and creating real Blu-ray hardware through your Steam Machine.

I love gaming, but I don’t want to be Santa’s sack, where everyone takes advantage of my passion and empties my wallet.
This lack of respect for their customers is outrageous.
Oh, and it’s the economy’s fault, not Steam Machine’s. No one else came up with the idea of quantity over quality.

Economically speaking, Steam Machine is completely blind in one eye; they’re just going with the flow instead of using their own brains and keeping prices in check.
 
Last edited by tomberyx,
Pfff all the increases all over gaming because of this entire war and tariff shit is getting out of hand ...
I don't think the "tariff excuse" even works anymore, as they all got refunds for it. Companies jacked up prices because of tariff's, got a refund, and kept the prices there. lol
 
  • Like
Reactions: Marc_LFD
nah let's be real, Winds and Waves doesn't need to do anything but be a Pokemon game that isn't on the Switch 1 lol
Typically yeah, but after Pokopia I think people will be hoping for, if not expecting a bit more from them. The teaser also alluded to that.
 
I don't think the "tariff excuse" even works anymore, as they all got refunds for it. Companies jacked up prices because of tariff's, got a refund, and kept the prices there. lol
Honestly as long as there is Trump, there will be a tariff's situation for Non US. No two ways about that really. And do some companies play into that? Of course, but where there tariffs under previous regiments ;)

Either way gaming is venturing into something it shouldn't be, it should be accessible and based on pricing determined by the market itself. Anyway my 2 cents.
 
Wasn't Nintendo or some other company being sued because they got tariff refunds already?
Suing under the assumption the companies got refunds, which they have not. And as @Citizen_404 linked, the pedo is trying to keep it that way.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Payne
Suing under the assumption the companies got refunds, which they have not. And as @Citizen_404 linked, the pedo is trying to keep it that way.
The funny thing is: even if Nintendo and other companies did get tariff refunds, the results would:

  1. likely have no impact on Switch 2 prices, but rather everything that Nintendo officially confirmed was increased in prices in response to the market conditions caused by tariffs (ex: Switch 1, Amiibos, Switch 2 accessories); and
  2. have absolutely no impact on any of the price increases performed in response to RAM/storage shortages, since that's a whole different issue mostly unrelated to the tariffs.
The point is the one's suing are doing it way too early, and they'll likely be sorely disappointed if/when it turns out they won't be getting any refunds on the Switch 2 even if they won the lawsuit, especially if it's the only Nintendo non-software product they purchased after tariffs.
 
It's interesting that they went with this insane increase over just letting the Steam Deck fade away on a relatively high note. It's also absurd that they clearly didn't have any sort of plan in place and are basically paying retail for memory and storage now. It *is* more like the Valve hardware division of old though as far as making odd choices.
 
It's official, PC handhelds don't make any sense anymore.

You can get a gaming laptop for less than this, and if a laptop is not to your tastes, there is no shortage of Android handhelds which are quite capable of running a large portion of the PC library through emulation, granted not at quite the same performance, but then you wouldn't expect that either for half the price or less. Unless you absolutely need to play a specific game that doesn't work through emulation and you're not willing to play other games while you wait for it to be supported, and unless a handheld is the only way you can play games due to life reasons, there's very little argument for PC handhelds.

I helped a friend of a friend shop for a gaming laptop only a few days ago, and I was surprised to learn there is not just one, but several pretty good deals on laptops right now ranging from a RTX 5050 to a RTX 5070. The cheapest of which were less than the new price of the 1TB Steam Deck, and all of which would be far more powerful than it.
 
It's official, PC handhelds don't make any sense anymore.
Honestly, the Steam Deck was the only PC handheld that really made sense. A good part of it was the price point, but also because it manages that delicate balance between power and battery life. Games like Monster Legends and Sonic Mania can last hours on it, and even more intensive games like WARRIORS Abyss at 60 FPS and Monster Hunter World can manage 1.5-2 hours on a full battery/80% capped charge.

Other PC handhelds do advertise stronger power and such compared to Steam Deck, but not only are those more powerful PC handhelds more expensive, they guzzle through their batteries at almost twice the rate for only marginal improvements. And now with Steam Deck inflated in price, you're better off buying a budget PC or gaming laptop. If you buy any PC hardware at all, given how insane consumer-level RAM and storage prices are right now.
 
dang, i just found out about this yesterday. i was just thinking of buying a steam deck last year or so but decided it was too expensive. now this is just an even bigger disincentive. i guess i'll just play the newer games i want to ~10 years from now when this technology becomes outdated and "retro", playing the long game
 

Site & Scene News

Popular threads in this forum