OS Neutral The $60 game

[tzhu07]

When does it make sense from your perspective to spend $60 on a game?

As a PC only gamer, I always wait for price drops since they happen so frequently and quickly, even with AAA games.

 

[deadwulfe]

It makes sense when you want to support the company.

I'm like you with games; I'll wait for a deep discount. However, if it's a franchise/company that I really like, then I'll seriously consider paying full price.

 

[Huntn]

If I perceive it be a worthy game. Elite Dangerous qualified, although I'm currently taking a break from it. Arms 3 is half that, but it was a huge failure for me and I've played many combat centered games previously. Just not focused enough for my tastes.

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If I perceive it be a worthy game. Elite Dangerous qualified, although I'm currently taking a break from it. Arms 3 is half that, but it was a huge failure for me and I've played many combat centered games previously. Just not focused enough for my tastes.

 

[xSinghx]

When does it make sense from your perspective to spend $60 on a game?

As a PC only gamer, I always wait for price drops since they happen so frequently and quickly, even with AAA games.

I take it you mean Steam since steep price cuts are what they count on to keep players locked into their ecosystem.

Few AAA developers release a quality product that really earns the sticker price of $60 up front. If you're a developer, reputation is everything.

As much as I may like Skyrim I didn't pick it up until they released the legendary edition (and it was on sale) because I've been soured by the buggy-ness of Bethesda games.

Conversely Rocksteady's Batman games have been extremely polished compared to their peers and CD Projekt Red's DRM-free policy makes me more forgiving and warmer to the idea of supporting them from launch on a game like the upcoming Witcher 3.

EA and Ubisoft could never warrant a full price for any of their games in my book. Not simply for the poor quality of some of their releases but also their past practices (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/07/30/ubisoft-respond-to-uplay-security-drama/) and current (forcing Uplay on Steam users). Their reputation is too tarnished by corporate greed and disrespect for their buyers to ever warrant paying for their games. Piracy then becomes a natural and fitting outcome for these products.

 

[saturnotaku]

Piracy then becomes a natural and fitting outcome for these products.

Or you could, you know, not play it. Piracy is merely the other side of the same thievery coin. Pirates can cloak their self-righteousness under the guise of "sticking it to the man," but the boardroom occupants get paid no matter what. It's the honest employees, legitimate customers, and sites like GOG who try to do the best for their customers that ultimately suffer.

 

[xSinghx]

Or you could, you know, not play it. Piracy is merely the other side of the same thievery coin. Pirates can cloak their self-righteousness under the guise of "sticking it to the man," but the boardroom occupants get paid no matter what. It's the honest employees, legitimate customers, and sites like GOG who try to do the best for their customers that ultimately suffer.

You seem to be removing context from what I said and mistakenly attributing me with assertions I did not make. (Unsurprising given the past argumentative interactions you've had with me on these forums.)

First I didn't say I, myself pirate games (rest easy valiant knight of straw men) - simply that piracy is the natural and fitting result of corporate greed and abuse of consumers (particularly when it comes to some DRM practices of AAA games). GoG only sells DRM free games by the way.

You can claim it's wrong or whatever you'd like - that's not saying anything about the likely outcomes of treating customers a certain way. I believe CD Projekt Red has gone on record (numerous times) stating their approach and respect for their customers through a non-DRM policy has been financially advantageous for them and to do otherwise is counterproductive.

You can imbibe the corporate blame shifting of thievery all you'd like but the reality is studios like Maxis didn't close because of piracy of their game. They closed because of a failed product that launched with a disrespect for their customers:

1. http://www.polygon.com/2015/3/4/8149791/ea-closes-maxis-simcity-the-sims

2. http://www.polygon.com/2013/5/7/430...city-server-issues-were-basically-inexcusable

Cheers~

 

[Dirtyharry50]

Personally, I think pirates steal for a variety of reasons ranging from obsessive collecting of free stuff they'll probably never get around to playing given how much they acquire torrenting away, to wanting stuff they can't afford to buy so they steal it, to simply enjoying a free lunch.

I don't buy the just cause argument at all. It sounds good sure. In reality though people who are going to steal need no excuses. They like to make them sometimes as has been pointed out here yet again but that's all a lot of talk with very little substance. People can justify any behavior when they want to. For example, genocide is made possible by deciding those to be killed are subhuman or not human, the rest is far easier once that decision has been made.

The honest approach as was also mentioned above I think is to simply not purchase games from companies you don't like if you feel that strongly about it. Problem solved. Stealing from them dirties your hands in a way that you must be morally okay with to begin with or it would not be possible for you to do it.

I've seen people go back and forth over this stuff again and again and again. The thing is that it really just boils down to stealing is wrong and there's no justifying it for something like this at least. Stealing food to feed a starving family is something I could understand. Stealing computer games is not in the same universe.

No amount of excuses, justifications, etc. can change the above. It is what it is, simple as that.

We return you now to the original topic at hand: The $60. game.

I think there are games well worth this amount of money. On the other hand, I have limited funds to spend on games so I try to make them go as far as possible. Therefore, it is quite unlikely I'd buy anything for this much money. I will wait for price reductions and sales the vast majority of the time. I have plenty to occupy me while I wait thanks to sticking to this way of buying.

I do not worry about supporting game companies. As much as I love both Feral and Aspyr I know they will be fine whether I wait for sales or not. There will always be people who buy right away and people who wait for sales. I like to think of myself as part of the high volume crowd who bring in money too.

 

[madeirabhoy]

no game for me is worth 60, especially since in europe we'd pay €60.

the options are...pay it. no chance..pirate it, rather not, so that leaves wait til steam sale or buy from legit sites selling eastern european keys. only done the latter for football manager (on principle as the € price is shocking compared to the£ price) and whilst i was there picked up watch dogs for buttons, just as well as its crap.

 

[foobarbazqux]

I rarely pay full price these days but I don't mind if I think it's worth it. On the PC side, I don't remember the last time I paid $60 for a game. I rarely go over $20 for PC games. There's just no reason to pay full price with all the frequent Steam sales and whatnot, regardless of how good the game is. Even on the console side I rarely pay full price because you usually don't have to wait that long to find a sale somewhere.

Nintendo games are the exception for me. I have no problem paying full price for those because the quality is usually top notch and I know I'll get my money's worth.

 

[kick53rv3]

no game for me is worth 60, especially since in europe we'd pay €60.

the options are...pay it. no chance..pirate it, rather not, so that leaves wait til steam sale or buy from legit sites selling eastern european keys. only done the latter for football manager (on principle as the € price is shocking compared to the£ price) and whilst i was there picked up watch dogs for buttons, just as well as its crap.

it really depends on how many hours of entertainment you can get out of it, i normally wait for a sale for single player games but I happily shell out $60 for fifa every year because i know I will put in hundreds if not thousands of hours in it every year, I rather pay the 60 and be able to play online

 

[fuchsdh]

I put everything in terms of movies. A movie ticket here is $10, and I can think of few games I haven't gotten 8-12 hours of entertainment out of.

I actually find $60 games effective as preventing me from spending *more* money, actually, based on anecdotal discussions with my friends who binge on Steam sales and the like. I don't want a digital library cluttered with games I'll never get around to—I've already got plenty of free old titles thanks to Games with Gold. So realistically I'm probably only buying one or two games a year at this point, and I don't mind paying full-price for the games I know will be worth the money to me.

 

[monokitty]

Depends on how much I anticipate I'll enjoy it. It's not a matter of waiting for a Steam sale because if I'm really anticipating the game beforehand, I won't have any patience whatsoever to wait 3, 6, 10 months down the road for 30, 40, 50% off or whatever it may be, and I won't pirate the game, either. A lot of games I've paid full price for have seen more than 50 hours of play time, meaning the price was worth it to me. Take GTA V for example that came out last Tuesday for $69--my Steam profile says I've put in 40 hours already - I expect it will add up to a few hundred by the time I'm done with it or the next one comes out.

For games I'm excited about, I'm a day-one gamer - no waiting for deals, and that works for me. However, I rarely pre-order a game. (In fact, I never have except for GTA V because of the bonuses included in doing so.)

 

[saturnotaku]

GoG only sells DRM free games by the way.

indeed

 

[xSinghx]

indeed

Your post:

...[it's] sites like GOG who try to do the best for their customers that ultimately suffer [from pirates]

So I don't see how (exactly) GoG suffers when they offer a DRM-free product people want.

-----
"Like all GOG.com games, the version of The Witcher 2 released in 2011 shipped without DRM – pirating it would have been little more complex than sharing the file. However, it was also published in the US as a boxed, on-disc game by Atari. This version shipped with SecuROM copy protection. “Most people in the gaming industry were convinced that the first version of the game to be pirated would be the GOG version (as it was DRM-free), while in the end it was the retail version, which shipped with DRM,” notes GOG.com’s Managing Director, Guillaume Rambourg..."

"But why, then, would the DRM-free version of The Witcher 2 be ignored by pirates, when it was an open target? Marcin Iwinski, CEO of CD Projekt Red, responded:

You would have to ask someone at the pirate group which cracked it, but I have to admit it was a big surprise. We were expecting to see the GOG.com version pirated right after it was released, as it was a real no-brainer. Practically anyone could have downloaded it from GOG.com (and we offered a pre-download option) and released it on the illegal sites right away, but this did not happen."
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(http://www.forbes.com/sites/danieln...he-truth-is-it-doesnt-work-cd-projekt-on-drm/)

Personally, I think pirates steal for a variety of reasons...

Agreed. (The Forbes link above touches on a lot of them as well.)

However the point is this tired PR narrative that constantly gets recycled about the morality of stealing is moot.

Is it wrong? Sure.

Should we (the public) care? No.

Why? Because AAA game companies make their own beds when it comes to this issue. They are not victims - they are the architects of their own fortunes. The piracy narrative becomes a lazy way to externalize the results of bad business decisions or a crappy product.

Which brings me back to the thread topic. What determines why we buy what we buy? Well in entertainment it has a lot to do with reputation, whether that's movies, music or in this case games.

 

[madeirabhoy]

Your post:



So I don't see how (exactly) GoG suffers when they offer a DRM-free product people want.

-----
"Like all GOG.com games, the version of The Witcher 2 released in 2011 shipped without DRM – pirating it would have been little more complex than sharing the file. However, it was also published in the US as a boxed, on-disc game by Atari. This version shipped with SecuROM copy protection. “Most people in the gaming industry were convinced that the first version of the game to be pirated would be the GOG version (as it was DRM-free), while in the end it was the retail version, which shipped with DRM,” notes GOG.com’s Managing Director, Guillaume Rambourg..."

"But why, then, would the DRM-free version of The Witcher 2 be ignored by pirates, when it was an open target? Marcin Iwinski, CEO of CD Projekt Red, responded:

You would have to ask someone at the pirate group which cracked it, but I have to admit it was a big surprise. We were expecting to see the GOG.com version pirated right after it was released, as it was a real no-brainer. Practically anyone could have downloaded it from GOG.com (and we offered a pre-download option) and released it on the illegal sites right away, but this did not happen."
-----

(http://www.forbes.com/sites/danieln...he-truth-is-it-doesnt-work-cd-projekt-on-drm/)




Agreed. (The Forbes link above touches on a lot of them as well.)

However the point is this tired PR narrative that constantly gets recycled about the morality of stealing is moot.

Is it wrong? Sure.

Should we (the public) care? No.

Why? Because AAA game companies make their own beds when it comes to this issue. They are not victims - they are the architects of their own fortunes. The piracy narrative becomes a lazy way to externalize the results of bad business decisions or a crappy product.

Which brings me back to the thread topic. What determines why we buy what we buy? Well in entertainment it has a lot to do with reputation, whether that's movies, music or in this case games.

good read and it hits the nail on the head. whilst there are people who will always pirate, whether for the kudos, or financial, or sticking it to the man, and there are people who will never pirate, most people pirate when piracy offers a better experience. and cost is part of that experience, but not the whole thing.

when nintendo wii pirating involved jumping through tons of hoops then burning discs the 'normal' person still bought their games. when it became having a hard drive with a cool menu it was a better experience than buying games, even though the hard drives and faster internet etc all cost.

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it really depends on how many hours of entertainment you can get out of it, i normally wait for a sale for single player games but I happily shell out $60 for fifa every year because i know I will put in hundreds if not thousands of hours in it every year, I rather pay the 60 and be able to play online

see based on that, the only game that should be 'worth' big bucks to me is football manager, but thats the one on principle that ill search out a cheaper legal way to get it. i wont pirate it because i love football manager, and ill get hundreds of hours out of it, but it p*sses me off that itll be €50 on steam, £30 on steam, or i can get a boxed copy off amazon for £25. one year i ordered a copy from amazon to my dads, so SI paid for a cover, box, disc, shipping to amazon, amazon's commission, then amazon posted it to my dad, just so he could rip it open, phone me and read me the serial number to stick into steam...

other than that, steam sales have delivered thousands of hours of gaming for great prices, whether deus ex, dishonoured, civ.....i might like the look of GTA IV but ive enough good games to get through (if i can drag myself away from football manger) to keep me going until one day GTA IV is 75% off

 

[garnerx]

You think $60 is expensive? This is why companies try to split their products into the retail 'box' and subsequent DLC that costs around the same price (e.g. Call of Duty, Destiny, etc).

Here in England, when the Nintendo 64 launched the standard price of games for it was £60.

Adjusted for inflation, that's roughly the equivalent of $137 in your American cash today.

 

[madeirabhoy]

You think $60 is expensive? This is why companies try to split their products into the retail 'box' and subsequent DLC that costs around the same price (e.g. Call of Duty, Destiny, etc).

Here in England, when the Nintendo 64 launched the standard price of games for it was £60.

Adjusted for inflation, that's roughly the equivalent of $137 in your American cash today.

im old enough to remember my parents buying me a whole 3 games for my atari 400. at £40 in 1979, im surprised i got as many as that. space invaders, asteroids, donkey kong, for the equivalent of £205 each
based on

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/...tion-calculator-value-money-changed-1900.html

 

[fuchsdh]

You think $60 is expensive? This is why companies try to split their products into the retail 'box' and subsequent DLC that costs around the same price (e.g. Call of Duty, Destiny, etc).

Here in England, when the Nintendo 64 launched the standard price of games for it was £60.

Adjusted for inflation, that's roughly the equivalent of $137 in your American cash today.

Not to mention a lot of N64 cartridges in the US were expensive too—Turok came with a $79 price tag in the US (and $129 in AU) aka $116.98 in today's money. The $50 price tag for the Xbox/PS2/Gamecube generation was an aberration from console software pricing. It's not surprising prices went back up as costs rose in the next-gen era.

 

[garnerx]

Not to mention a lot of N64 cartridges in the US were expensive too—Turok came with a $79 price tag in the US (and $129 in AU) aka $116.98 in today's money. The $50 price tag for the Xbox/PS2/Gamecube generation was an aberration from console software pricing. It's not surprising prices went back up as costs rose in the next-gen era.

You've always had it cheaper in the US - Turok was £70 here at launch, or around $160 today.

Every new console generation, they raise the prices in the early days and it drifts back down over time. I'm sure Xbox games were £45-£50 at launch before settling to £40, just the same as Xbox 360. EA Sports titles and Call of Duty were always at least £5 more than other games in the shops.

Cheap / "free"-to-play mobile games and heavy discounts on Steam / Humble Bundle and so on, I think these have devalued all games in the minds of consumers. I've got a Steam library and an iPad full of stuff I've only looked at once.

 

[Renzatic]

It's a rare thing for me to pick up a game at $60. I don't have any standing ethical concerns against anything at that price, just that I can only occasionally justify it. The sweet spot for me is anything within the $20-$40 range.

As for piracy, I won't do it because I can't afford it, and if a game uses a particularly cumbersome DRM scheme, like uPlay, I just won't buy it. Though I have downloaded cracked copies of games I already own before. Last time I did it was when I wanted to play L.A Noire, but the stupid Rockstar Social Club DRM wouldn't let me log in and play it, despite the fact I had just bought the damn thing. I felt perfectly justified getting the crack for that.

 

[fuchsdh]

You've always had it cheaper in the US - Turok was £70 here at launch, or around $160 today.

Every new console generation, they raise the prices in the early days and it drifts back down over time. I'm sure Xbox games were £45-£50 at launch before settling to £40, just the same as Xbox 360. EA Sports titles and Call of Duty were always at least £5 more than other games in the shops.

Cheap / "free"-to-play mobile games and heavy discounts on Steam / Humble Bundle and so on, I think these have devalued all games in the minds of consumers. I've got a Steam library and an iPad full of stuff I've only looked at once.

That I think is the serious cost of the devaluation of games—that it does essentially force more "disposable" experiences because even if you put the effort into it, the ecosystem isn't designed to support it.

Hence why I really hope consoles stick around—for now they're offering an outlet for producing and making money off AAA games, where that's not necessarily the case on PC.

I think you're going to see more expensive mobile games in the future, but they can only be well-established names and brands. A random schmo even with great word-of-mouth and a great game won't be able to demand even $15 for a mobile or iPad game.

I guess the tend to free to play is great for people like me; I haven't spent a cent on Dota 2. I'm uncomfortable with the fact that my playing is essentially subsidized by people who can't help themselves, though. It's like thinking about how my tax bill is smaller because of lotto fiends.

 

[Renzatic]

Hence why I really hope consoles stick around—for now they're offering an outlet for producing and making money off AAA games, where that's not necessarily the case on PC.

That's not entirely true. Console games do stay at higher prices for longer, but it's not like PC games devalue to the point of being profitable over the course of a couple of months. Steam sales only happen about 3-4 times a year, and even then you have a goodly chunk of newer AAA games that don't dip below the $40 mark until they've been out for awhile.

Actually, now that I think about it, I believe the $30-$40 mark is the prime "sweet spot" for AAA game prices. It's when games dip to that price that they start selling the most. If you were to ask me, the best thing to do would be to sell a game for about 4 months at $60 to get quick returns on the first day buyers and big fans, then drop it to around $40 to bring everyone in.

 

[Liquorpuki]

That I think is the serious cost of the devaluation of games—that it does essentially force more "disposable" experiences because even if you put the effort into it, the ecosystem isn't designed to support it.

Hence why I really hope consoles stick around—for now they're offering an outlet for producing and making money off AAA games, where that's not necessarily the case on PC.

I think you're going to see more expensive mobile games in the future, but they can only be well-established names and brands. A random schmo even with great word-of-mouth and a great game won't be able to demand even $15 for a mobile or iPad game.

I guess the tend to free to play is great for people like me; I haven't spent a cent on Dota 2. I'm uncomfortable with the fact that my playing is essentially subsidized by people who can't help themselves, though. It's like thinking about how my tax bill is smaller because of lotto fiends.

Pretty much agree with this, except for the part about mobile games getting more expensive. There are already 10-20 year old brands on mobile (Sonic, Mortal Kombat, etc) and they're maybe only a buck or 2 above standard commodity pricing because at $10, they'd still price themselves out of the market.

Only way for mobile games to get more expensive would be to have mutiple retailers. Back in the days you could download mobile games off Handango, buy physical copies at Best Buy, or purchase directly from the Developer and you had $20 pricepoints. Nowadays it's just one app store, it's crowded, everyone is trying to undercut each other on price, barrier to entry is only $100, and anything that doesn't show up on a top 100 list is invisible to most customers.