That said, I'm not personally a fan of the latest generation having price increases. I went from buying games when they came out to just waiting until the games are half off and only buying games on release when there's a vital story I don't want to have spoiled for me. But 90% of my purchases are now only when the game is 50% off or more.

The profits these publishers have recorded in last years are staggering - raising game prices is pure fleecing.

My curiosity is that there's some normalized change in game pricing, but it's really dependent on both inflation and increased size of gaming market.

Since unit costs are so low for digital goods, if you have +5% inflation over a period and +15% gamers, the price of AAA games technically should have gone down to maintain profits. (Assuming you hold development costs static, which isn't true but simplifies the problem)

I'm not sure what that inflation-TAM number would be. Maybe games are getting "more profitable" (at the same price point), maybe less.

You're right that more sales could mean lower prices, but I don't know the numbers. I would not have assumed CoD is so much more popular now than 10 years ago.

Things cyberpunk, BF 2042 in the same genre etc.