RiME up to $30 more Expensive on Switch than Other Formats
The Australian pricing for exciting, upcoming indie adventure puzzler RiME has thrown a surprise figure at Nintendo Switch owners. It's Double!
Update: The distributor just sent through revised pricing due to an error in the initial price release. New pricing is $79.95 on Switch, $59.95 on Xbox One and PS4, and $49.95 on PC. So the price gap is $20 to other consoles and $30 to PC. Still significant.
RiME is one of the more promising looking indie titles coming out in 2017 – one we highlighted in our sister site's Nintendo Switch Guide (see below). The game is like a cross between The Legend of Zelda, The Witness and Ico, mixing in puzzle-solving and adventure-like exploration with a more introspective tone and atmosphere. You play as a seemingly cursed young boy left shipwrecked and alone on a rugged, but beautiful island.
Your goal is to escape, which means discovering the secrets of this place. The action is less about combat and more about exploration and puzzle-solving, the latter using elements like light, sound, time and perspective. It’s all set in a large environment navigated to via an over-world, and it looks gorgeous - you can see the full trailer below.
The game, developed by indie studio Tequila Works, is multiformat, and not too far off release. We’ve just received an email from the Australian distributor of the game with more information about dates and pricing, but it’s a bit of head scratcher. Here it is:
“[RiME] has a confirmed release date of May 26 for the PlayStation4, Xbox One and Windows PC. It will arrive at Australian retail store shelves with a suggested retail price of AUD$29.99. Shortly afterward, RiME will launch on Nintendo Switch, allowing players to take the adventure with them anywhere on the go utilising the system’s portability, as a physical and digital release with a suggested retail price of AUD$59.95.”
Beyond that, there is no explanation for the variation in price and $30 is quite significant. In fact, it’s double the price on the Nintendo Switch than its competitors – hardly the look Nintendo is going for (or needs). With the “shortly afterward” suggesting perhaps a June release date, we cannot see it being chockful of additional content. And the portability “feature” changes nothing as the whole Switch console is portable.
We can only assume that the developer is looking to cover its costs of a last minute port of RiME to the Switch, or Tequila Works (or the game’s publisher) feels that the lack of much competition on the format allows it to aim for a higher price. We’ve asked for more information, and will let you know if we get a reply.
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