The Nintendo Switch 2, an upcoming video game console that costs $450, will be out on June 5.

You’ll probably see a lot of lengthy thinkpieces today pontificating about the machine, its lineup, its place in the market, all kinds of stuff. All of which you may or may not find interesting; it’ll depend on how into the industry you are. Some of those articles may even try to poke at the console’s price, how it compares to other machines on the market, whether there is good value to be had. The bravest among the internet’s legion of armchair analysts might even try to predict the Switch 2’s sales figures, based I’m sure on all kinds of very important video game-related metrics and historical precedent.

I’m taking the day off from all that shit. I woke up, saw the price and just checked out entirely. A video game console with those specs, costing $450 (AUD$699 here) in the Year Of Our Lord 2025, with games costing $80, is a hard pass from me. In the last two years I’ve lost my full-time job, my mortgage has gone up by 30% and the price of everything else around me, from groceries to insurance, has shot up by similar margins.

I can’t afford short holidays or a night out at the movies with my kids, and the new video game console is asking for $450? Nah. I know none of the above factors are Nintendo’s fault–this is the first major console launch to land after the post-pandemic cost-of-living crisis–nor will they likely factor into many analyst’s predictions, but they’re factors today, in my life, and no doubt the lives of millions of other people around a world that’s growing increasingly chaotic by the day.

I was going to end this blog by saying “Who knows what the future will bring, maybe I’ll just get it when it goes on sale”, before realising that the Switch was released in 2017 and didn’t officially get a price drop…ever.