I do know about Anarchy Reigns, but it seems like there are much fewer of those than there used to be. Ten years ago, I was buying new games left and right without ever spending $50.
I was just talking with my uncle about this the other day. He used to have a huge C64 collection. (Oh how I wish he'd given it to me, instead of getting rid of it, but I digress.) He got one in '83 and kept buying games for it until around '91. And he is adamant that most games were $30 or less, a few were $35, and the only rare exception that was more than that would be something packaged with a bunch of extras, like Ultima IV. I clearly remember looking through his games some years ago, some of them did still have the prices on them. I remember looking at Tangled Tales and noticing its faded $29.99 price tag, I gave that one an extra long look because I had never heard of that game.
A disk was always significantly cheaper than a cartridge. I don't know what Sierra games you're talking about, but if they're from the tail end of the floppy disk era when some games went up to 9 disks, that would account for the increased cost. At the same time, there were still cheaper games around, i.e. smaller games.
I suppose I stand corrected on the number of stores. But it's not like that in my area at all. Here, there are malls that used to have an EB and a Babbage's, and now just have one Gamestop. Additionally, there are now much fewer independent game stores than there used to be. Game Crazy and Game Rush are gone as well.
Perhaps you live in an area with a lot of recent population growth / new development.
I thought Blu-Ray prices dropped because it's no longer a novel format, and it's been more widely adopted? New CDs look to me the same price they've always been, $10-15. The only change I've noticed is that now old releases are cheaper.
While there's no arguing that Steam itself is doing well, PC gaming sure ain't what she used to be. I can't help but feel that Steam has contributed to its decline.
I remember going to Fry's and being in awe at the racks and racks of PC games. Now, not so much. And I can't even be bothered with PC games most of the time anymore.