I was browsing around amazon and looking at games (not sure why) and is it just me, but there's an awful lot of new, pre-order games that seem to be below the $60 price mark. I guess I just get so jaded sixty bones being the norm. But I have to ask, are these just indie titles being released on disc? I'm not saying that to slight them or anything but I'm just curious about this. Is this a common occurrence these days; could you even call it a trend?

Anyhow, I'm so out of the loop with the modern consoles. Can anyone shine some light on this? Not that I'm complaining a game isn't $60, I just think it's nice to see a wider array of prices.

Got any concrete examples?
Most major games are still $60, so it's possible you're looking at physical releases of Indie games, yes, but it's hard to tell without any examples...

https://www.amazon.com/RiME-PlayStation … _i=desktop

https://www.amazon.com/Abzu-PlayStation … D9H4DCWA07

Ashley, you're spot on. Indie and other non-AAA games (which is mostly but not entirely indie) are typically $20-30. For example, the upcoming game Rime, which looks very promising, is priced at $30 on launch. The limited Shantae game (1/2 Genie Hero) was $30 on launch. I rarely will pay the $60 pricetag for a game, unless I really want it and in that case it's likely a limited edition. The only exception I can think of was The Witcher Complete Edition which I ordered because I wanted to support the publishers and it was $50 on launch (although I got a 20% discount through amazon). I was thinking of ordering Persona5 LE, but not sure it's worth the cost...

Yep, these are physical releases of smaller indie games!

It's not just indie games. It's actually really easy to get newish AAA games for less than $60 close to launch. Major publishers tend to aggressively discount these games because more and more games are now "games as a service" and having a community of people that play the game and buy DLC is more important to them in the long run than getting $60 up front. Critically acclaimed games such as Doom, Titanfall 2, Rise of the Tomb Raider, and more were easy to find at 33%-50% off soon after launch last year. I recommend following @Wario64 and @videogamesdeals on Twitter if you want to be alerted to price drops and sales as soon as they happen.