When news broke last year that Microsoft would be selling Quantum Break in South Africa for almost R1,200, it raised concerns that this signalled a general price increase on games.

Fears that the price of games would skyrocket have been realised, with big new PC releases selling for between R600 and R1,000.

New PlayStation 4 and Xbox One titles sell for between R800 and R1,100.

Although most games have not reached the high price of Quantum Break, the pre-order prices for Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare are worryingly high.

To see whether the sudden increase in the price of games in South Africa is reasonable, we wanted to compare them to the exchange rate and inflation.

However, even among big-name titles which release in the same month, prices now vary wildly.

Call of Duty prices vs. Inflation

For a fair comparison, we would need a game series that is published and distributed by the same companies on a regular schedule — like Call of Duty.

Activision has released a Call of Duty sequel in November every year like clockwork since 2006, making it an excellent candidate for such a comparison.

The graph below shows how the PC and console prices of Call of Duty games have changed compared to inflation.

Click to enlarge

ZAR-USD exchange rate: October 2003 to June 2016

The graph above shows that between 2010 and 2014, the price of a new Call of Duty game actually tracked below inflation for awhile.

As the rand steadily weakened, and then suddenly dropped to new lows last year, the price of new games also spiked.

This means that even if your salary increased at the same rate as inflation every year, you are still paying relatively more for a new game than you were before.

More on the price of games in South Africa

Are expensive console subscriptions worth it in South Africa?

Game prices in South Africa: PC vs PlayStation 4 vs Xbox One

This is how crazy the prices of games are in South Africa