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The costs to build gaming hardware continue to rise due to ongoing RAM shortages and trade wars showing no sign of slowing down, but it’s not all doom and gloom, at least not according to Unity Technologies CEO Matthew Bromberg.
Of course, it’s worth noting upfront that Bromberg couldn’t have more of a vested interest in projecting an optimistic outlook on the future of the gaming industry, him being in charge of a publicly traded company that makes one of the most widely used game engines on the market. On the other hand, his unique position makes him privy to information unavailable to the wider public, so his insights can’t be ignored altogether, especially when they relate to the struggling console market.
What struggling console market, you ask? Well, Nintendo, PlayStation, and Xbox have all raised prices considerably, and in the case of the latter two, more than once in the last year. Console manufacturers are under immense pressure from component shortages driven by the propagation of AI data centers and an increase in memory-hungry devices, compounded by tariffs implemented by the Trump Administration in the US, and naturally those increased costs trickle down to the consumer. Meanwhile, PlayStation has announced plans to halt the production of physical game discs in 2028 and enter the new console generation in digital-only form, likely in-part due the above factors.
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In short, it’s a mess. Bromberg says it’s all temporary though. “It’s been a difficult time for console hardware, which is under genuine cost pressure,” Bromberg tells The Game Business. “It’s unprecedented and it’s wacky. The idea that things get more expensive is the upside down of how it usually works. But that doesn’t mean that great console entertainment isn’t going to be consumed in massive quantities, and we’ll see that with GTA.”
Ultimately, Bromberg believes “cost pressures” are “temporary” even though the demographic aging out of the console market isn’t being replaced by younger gamers, as it was before. “The platform is vibrant,” he says, and “We will get more hit console entertainment. Costs will come down. And the industry will make games that will attract younger consumers over time.”
Bromberg also implores you to put down your rose-colored glasses and prepare for a renaissance of great games that’ll make today’s offerings pale in comparison. “There will be better, more engaging games built over the next ten years than were ever built over the prior ten,” he says. “We’re just beginning to scratch the surface of the level of persuasion and the intensity of engagement that we’re going to achieve. It’s crazy to think that the best years of this business are not in front of us.”
You hear that? You don’t even know how persuasive and intensely engaging games are about to get, even if the PS6 and Xbox Project Helix could cost as much as $1,000 at launch. Hopefully, Bromberg’s bright-eyed predictions come true and we can avoid that dire reality before it’s too late.