Tell your friend to go and study business. Its totally normal in matters of supply and demand.
I'll relate the message but I'm sure he'll see it as well.
Now this is just me; Business as in charge more simply because you can? I thought you were different, I must be misunderstanding this, I was under the impression you were one of the good guys, you know, fair is fair and all about the community. I can understand that if you are good at something, don't do it for free, absolutely without a question, but let's say I buy a cart, have it open and inspect it top to bottom and find that costs aren't but 50 bucks, then by all means let's have a mark up on materials of 100%, that's 100. Is the other 200 your brilliance fee? Maybe I'm way off base here, but I'm truly curious.
Now let's say NG: Dev Gunlord, the game is worth every penny IMHO, proprietary hardware, proprietary software, excellent game (that's besides the point though). This supply and demand philosophy applies to them simply 'cause it their game, CSII is not your game, you simply altered the software with what is already there, how can it be worth half what Gunlord is worth when so much more work went into it. Even the arts, I mean that insert is using poorly scanned art and on top of that you're deeming that as official art, a 300 tag should go along with better standards on that aspect.
I respect what you do, you've been doing it for a very long time and there's no doubt you're an asset to the hobby but I'm just trying to be objective, as you can see I was all excited at first and very willing to support this project, my only question was the rom release. I completely understood your stance on it although dubious about release still, I took it as you will eventually do it because I like to think you are a decent man and you do this out of love for the hobby and for the community, I'm sure this is just pennies for you and you must have a "real" job that supports your endeavors.
Another point is, maybe I'm just spoiled 'cause you shared the Uni-Bios with everyone and then you also provide the legit chips (I have a few) which I thought was not just proper but awesome all at once. Maybe I thought you would treat all your projects for the hobby as such. Truth be told it was because of this very reason that all my art reproduction work was free for all, it was your Uni-Bios work that inspired me to do it all for the love of it and share it with the rest of the world just because it seemed right. I does sting seeing others use your work for monetary gain, people have done it with my work left and right but karma is a bitch and they'll get theirs, plus, they truly don't know how to do it right anyway so whatever, after all it really isn't my work to begin with, it's owner is gone and all is left are the fans so in my eyes it belongs to them.