by
William D’Angelo
, posted 14 minutes ago / 87 Views
Executive Director & Video Game Industry Analyst at Circana (NPD) Mat Piscatella has stated that the new Donald Trump’s tariffs could put physical games at risk.
Piscatella suggests the tariffs could lead to some publishers to skip physical versions of games altogether and only release games digitally.
“Very small piece of all this, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see physical games that would be subject to tariffs simply not get made, with pubs moving to an all digital strategy,’ said Piscatella in a response to Niko Partners analyst Daniel Ahmad on the tariffs. “What a mess.”
Trump has imposed 25 percent tariffs on good imported from Mexico and Canada, and raised tariffs on China by 10 percent to being that up to 20 percent.
The vast majority of physical games in North America are produced in Mexico. This would mean a 25 percent increase on the price of physical games.
Very small piece of all this, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see physical games that would be subject to tariffs simply not get made, with pubs moving to an all digital strategy.
What a mess.
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— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) March 4, 2025 at 8:21 AM
The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) in a statement last month said, “Tariffs on video game devices and related products would negatively impact hundreds of millions of Americans and would harm the industry’s significant contributions to the U.S. economy.”
A life-long and avid gamer, William D’Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Bluesky.
