In
early
August
I made the case that Canadian gamers would have to purchase whatever
games they wanted quickly, before retailers began marking their
prices back up due to the slightly lower Canadian Dollar. Much to my
surprise, the Dollar's drop did not lead to retailers instantly
hiking their prices back up to their former state. Instead, the
prices remained, even with the Dollar sitting five cents below the
American Dollar.
Today,
the Canadian Dollar is valued at over 20 cents less than the American
Dollar (one Canadian Dollar is worth approximately .782 cents
American). With the Canadian Dollar at a low it hasn't seen in about
three years, it is, once again, surprising that video game retailers
haven't begun raising their prices to the
old
formula
.
Even more astounding is that a number of media outlets are now saying
that the price hike won't happen at all, or at least not for a while.
How they have come to that conclusion is beyond me, but I am
certainly fine with paying less to purchase my video games. I'm not
complaining. I suppose it is possible that most analysts are
expecting the Canadian Dollar to bounce back once this major market
crisis is resolved – whenever that may be – but since I am not an
economist/analyst or anything similar, I can only go by what I've
been seeing and what I've been hearing.
Of
course, I'm not taking any of this from an economist's perspective in
the first place. I'm coming from the consumer's perspective, and
what's more important to most
consumers than a good deal on the
products they are already looking to purchase? With the American
Dollar back above the Canadian Dollar, Americans have the kind of
buying power they haven't had in some time, especially with video
game prices being the same in Canada and the U.S. With the holiday
season rolling in, this means that Americans, at least those living
near the border, can get some great deals on most, if not all video
games.
This
is essentially a reverse situation of my original complaint against
retailers who had not changed their prices to reflect the Canadian
Dollar's rise last year. Since retailers had not dropped their prices
to reflect the higher value of the Canadian Dollar, Canadian gamers
were paying a higher price for a product that was worth about 10
dollars less. With both Dollars at parity, Canadians were paying
$59.99 USD for games that were valued at $49.99 USD, $69.99 USD for
games that were valued at $59.99 USD and so on. The price difference
between consoles was even worse.
Now
that the Canadian Dollar has dropped so drastically, the situation is
essentially reversed. Canadians are still getting the same great
prices from after the retailers dropped their prices to reflect
higher Canadian Dollar, but for Americans, everything costs
approximately 20 percent less. For instance, an American purchasing a
recently release, regularly priced Wii game in Canada will pay $49.99
CAD, but because of the current rate, that means that they are paying
approximately $39.13 USD. A recently released, regularly priced Xbox
360 or Playstation 3 game usually costs $59.99 in both Canada and
America. An American purchasing that game in Canada will be paying
approximately $46.95 USD. That comes out to a savings of about 10
dollars or more per game.
The
deals get even better for the consoles themselves. An Xbox 360 Arcade
would cost approximately $156.52 USD instead of $199.99 USD in
America, an Xbox 360 Premium/Pro 60GB would cost approximately
$234.79 USD instead of $299.99 USD and an Xbox 360 Elite or
Playstation 3 80GB would cost approximately $313.06 USD instead of
$399.99 USD. The only things still worth purchasing in America are
Xbox 360 accessories, subscription cards or Microsoft Points cards,
as those prices were not lowered to reflect the higher Canadian
Dollar.
If
you live near the Canadian border and are looking to get some good
deals on video games for your holiday season shopping, it's probably
going to be well worth the trip. The only game that doesn't have this
advantage is the
Guitar
Hero World Tour
bundle.
The Game Only version does.
Happy
Shopping.