Or they could just release it on steam. 15 odd million users can't be wrong :P

Well it sounds about right. The game cost 47€ at retail, calculation out tax you would have 39,49€ witch means 10€ for the shops. I would say thats in the normal margin, its 33%. I don't think you know how much is normal in electronics: 50% (Yes, 50% on TVs and such stuff)

Oh, by the way, i just realized, that it's 1st party game we're talking about, which means that the publishers share is 30€ from the cost. 3rd party games would be more pricey because of licence fees. And, who pays the shipping to retail, is it Nintendo or the retailer?

@Kyros: Retailer is entitled to sell games at whatever price they want to, nobody is stopping them. The question is only about is it profitable business. Too high price and nobody buys the game and too low price you sell it at loss.
And Amazon sells in high volumes with low number of personnel, propably from centered location, so their actual profit margin may exeed the stores that sells the games off the shelves.

I would assume that a retail chain like MediaMarkt/Saturn actually gets a better price as a one man wholesale buying empire. Therefore, I would assume that the 50% you quote might be realistic (I assume they might get the unit for about 25 Euro, see my original post)

@Kyros: I am not angry, nor am I offended. Its just funny when you post on topic and then in your next post you are like: "ooooh, Wii games, then its ok" when it was clearly stated in the thread opener what example I used as a reference... But no hard feelings.

 Well I made a thread about this a year ago, in the time frame of the GC. No they don't. Nintendo was charging 28€ for galaxy, so I would guess, not not that much cheaper ;) The people between Nintendo and shops just not get that big of a cut, because they handle big masses and only get it through. They make the money with the mass, and have low cost/item. 

Well you've got to count the VAT, though if my knowledge of the VAT is correct that gets applied little by little through every transaction so their were already some VAT costs on the previous transaction.

That's different from the American model for sure though. 

@ben: it was just really interesting as I recall people stating that margins in retail were low and hence publishers got like 40 Dollars out of a 50 dollar game or some such...

clearly not the case.

Well, i do remember reading reports about it being different as far as the American model goes, it might just be that Europeon stores sell things for more expensive.

I mean 30 Euros = $47.80 dollars.  Basically full price of the game in the US.

So it really depends what the breakdown of the VAT is.