Different person here and I'm also not going to provide external information, only more perspective and I'm more so curious on what your first counterpoints in your mind would be, absent any source:
Video games are the cheapest form of paid entertainment for the amount of time that a single purchase occupies.
Despite their audience being extremely price sensitive (which has nothing to do with socioeconomics, just consumer expectations), all stakeholders recognize this and extract value in other ways.
> I'm more so curious on what your first counterpoints in your mind would be
Just some anec-data. I did not have any consoles growing up simply because we could not afford them. Eventually we got a single very old very slow machine that was shared among the family. I know a few other people in the same situation (usually 1st/2nd generation immigrants). Thus in my mind, video games are luxury products, which are not affordable to low income households.
A $500 PC/gaming laptop and pirated games can occupy a kid for thousands of hours over a course of years. Sure, it requires an up-front investment, but in terms of dollars per hour it's hard to beat.
Video games are the cheapest form of paid entertainment for the amount of time that a single purchase occupies.
Despite their audience being extremely price sensitive (which has nothing to do with socioeconomics, just consumer expectations), all stakeholders recognize this and extract value in other ways.