Honestly, the way shit is going, get what you can while you can. Gaming is only going to get worse and more expensive by the week.

I can't imagine paying $1000 to play my backlog of under $5 games.

Sold out to whom, though... customers or scalpers?

Did it sell out to actual individuals or did scalpers buy up a bunch?

People are now conditioned to need INSTANT GRATIFICATION FOR EVERYTHING ALWAYS!

"I want a Steam Deck! I can't actually afford these new prices! I'm buying it anyways!"

Then retailers see the insane prices people pay for stuff without blinking. Steam Decks sell out after a 40% markup. RAM & SSDs & HDDs sell out at 4x what they sold for a year ago. So the prices never go back down.

And everyone goes full surprised-Pikachu-face when everything is now always goddamn expensive.

Show some fucking restraint for once, people!

Goddamn.

Scalpers gotta scalp.

This may be my pessimism talking, but I feel like PC and Console gaming are probably both going the same route as Disney Theme Parks. If you have to ask how much it costs... If you aren't willing to blindly shell out too much for too little... Gaming won't be for you anymore. When it boils down to it, these things are luxuries. They've found their latest "limited production" excuse (AI gobbling up SSD, GPU, and RAM production) to pump up cost and there's definitely excess demand. Or at least enough scalpers willing to take that risk. Sure the cost spike will probably come back down some once the bubble pops, but if they keep selling out, then why would they ever lower the price again?

I wonder if this just means the supply was really low.

Considering the current ebay pricing, it doesn't really make sense for any scalper to buy it unless they think it will become some weird coveted collectors item.

Either way rip steam machine. I hope they continue to fund Proton and Lepton because it really made a massive impact for gaming on Linux.

Where are all these people getting their money from??? And time to play video games???

In a more perfect world: Philanthropic scalpers buy up Steam Decks to sell back to regular joes at previously low price, taking a loss on the sale.

Jensen Huang bought them all because fuck you.

This article is untrue. I can literally buy one right now in the US. This is just fake FOMO hyping.

Not that surprising - somebody's always willing to spend money they don't have on stuff they don't need.

I got a Steam Deck LCD 64GB for $350 and then put a 1TB SSD in it, so like $430 total. I love the SD, but it’s just not worth double that. A gaming laptop with a 4050 goes for about $800 now, so the current pricing isn’t really that good of a deal even at today’s prices.

I love the Steam Deck, but it’s definitely not worth $1000. That’s absolutely ridiculous. I guess I’m going to find a new hobby, gaming is becoming way too expensive.

"Superyachts aren't expensive, Gaben owns several"

After reading so much hate on Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft for years, especially over their pricing, its somewhat hilarious to see only one or two comments out of dozens here calling out the high price of this handheld console.

Like Nintendo raised the price of the Switch 2 by $50 to a whopping $499 and people will mock and berate you if you say you bought one.

$950 handheld gaming device that I'd only ever use on a plane or long ass road trip in which I'm not driving.

Or, play games on my phone.

OR, gasps read a goddamn book.

Insert the “we aren’t going make it, humans I mean.” Meme.

Half these "sold out" stories don't tell you if it was 500 units or 50. Supply was already a mess before the price hike ... AI ate the RAM market and now everything downstream pays for it. The device is great, the timing is just bad.

If they have to sell it at this price I doubt they have many in stock to begin with.