The Competition Is As Fake As The Blood: Why New Video Games Are Always The Same Price


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Video games have gotten ridiculously predictable. Not in stories, writing, or mechanics (although sometimes those, too) but in release, pricing, and distribution. When it comes to the big-budget blockbuster console-ready games, by now pretty much every player can recite the pricing timetable by heart.
 
First, the game releases at $60, maybe with a collector?s edition for somewhere between $70 and $100. Over the next 6-12 months, a couple of downloadable content packs drop, at $10-$20 each. Between 8 and 12 months after launch, an ultimate or game of the year edition ? a repackaged omnibus including some or all of the DLC ? shows up on shelves for between $30 and $50 before quickly dropping to $20, where it comfortably settles into the back catalog for as long as its console hangs around.
 
That very sameness is unnerving. As a rule of thumb, the pattern holds no matter what studio designed the game or what publisher marketed it. It doesn?t matter if you?re playing an Ubisoft game on a Microsoft console or an EA game on a Sony one. It doesn?t even matter if you?re buying it at Target or Walmart or GameStop or Amazon: the pricing, to within just a couple of dollars, is the same.
 
Since the launches of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in 2005 and 2006, that?s the track we?ve settled into. The still-new era of the Xbox One and PS4 is starting off in the same shape. But there?s one huge exception: players who tackle tomb raiding from their computers, instead of from their set-top consoles, can see enormous discounts that sometimes completely, if temporarily, disrupt the pricing pattern. So what gives?

 

 

Continue Reading @

http://consumerist.com/2014/03/15/the-competition-is-as-fake-as-the-blood-why-new-video-games-are-always-the-same-price/

 

 

Good article which illuminates what goes on with pricing. The consumerist is actually a pretty good website in general.

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Very good read, thanks for posting.

As a gamer i do feel like im just been milked for all the money its possible to get out of me now.

Games are having content held back to be sold at a later date. Buying all the DLC for popular games in the first year after release usually end up costing more than the actual game did its self. When buying this DLC usually all you?re getting is a few new maps, compared to the 8-10 hour campaign you paid the same amount of money for.

Note: I don?t actually buy DLC, however it annoys me how the multiplayer for games is split in half soon after launch, between people who buy the DLC and people who don?t.

Now maybe I feel like that because I used to play Unreal Tournament, Quake and Counter Strike? if you didn?t have the map it downloaded to your PC, you enjoyed the game, end of story. Heck you could even make your own maps / servers and have fun changing the rules of the game a bit. Impossible to do now as you will be classed as a cheater and banned.

Maybe been in my mid 20s now im getting ?old? and things will never appears ?as good as they used to be? however I do thing gaming is changing for the worst. It?s the indie games I find more fun these days usually you get a lot more fun for less money.

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Great article, it brings up many good points.

I think we are in an era where its required that we as consumers be more proactive in responding to these practices that are making it all worse. That means getting a mass of gamers to simply stop buying ridiculous dlc or overpriced games. Only that kind of behavior would wake up developers or publishers that think they can get away with such things.

I would disagree though that game pricing is so different from years ago. I remember games easily costing $60 or more during the NES days and beyond. Its the DLC stuff that is drastically different. Plus, while there are things to resist, there are also a number of things that are better now then they were in the past.

Maybe been in my mid 20s now im getting ?old? and things will never appears ?as good as they used to be? however I do thing gaming is changing for the worst. It?s the indie games I find more fun these days usually you get a lot more fun for less money.

:laugh: you think mid 20s puts you in the "old" section of gamers? Oh it gets worse later on. I feel as you do even though. It just seems like the young gamers today are growing up in a completely different gaming market and that market just isn't as focused or 'hardcore' as it was when we were younger.

'Gaming' is more mainstream then ever and that has dumbed it all down, making it less exciting for the 'enthusiasts' like us. Fortunately, there is sitll good content to be had if you are willing to seek it out.

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it would go a long way if consumers would simply not buy games at release. make a point and tell the companies that you dont want to pay $60 for a game. heck, i wont even buy CoD: Ghosts for $30 on a steam sale. that's too much for a 6hr fps! there are very, very few games of which im willing to pay full price.

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it would go a long way if consumers would simply not buy games at release. make a point and tell the companies that you dont want to pay $60 for a game. heck, i wont even buy CoD: Ghosts for $30 on a steam sale. that's too much for a 6hr fps! there are very, very few games of which im willing to pay full price.

 

 

I imagine with games like CoD the multiplayer is what people are willing to pay for. Some people probably play hundreds of hours of MP. The SP is just kind of ... there. I wouldn't be surprised if they ditched the SP in future games. 

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I imagine with games like CoD the multiplayer is what people are willing to pay for. Some people probably play hundreds of hours of MP. The SP is just kind of ... there. I wouldn't be surprised if they ditched the SP in future games. 

youre probably right. i dont understand the allure of multiplayer. you play a game for a year, level up your character, pwn a bunch of people, then have to pay $60 the next year to do the same thing over again?

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youre probably right. i dont understand the allure of multiplayer. you play a game for a year, level up your character, pwn a bunch of people, then have to pay $60 the next year to do the same thing over again?

 

 

I'm in complete agreement with you on that one, Jason. :)

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it would go a long way if consumers would simply not buy games at release. make a point and tell the companies that you dont want to pay $60 for a game.

 

Company would probably try to make the government pass some laws to send you to jail for not buying a game on release. Some sort of a new form of copyright infringement where being excited about a game but waiting for a price drop would equal to making an illegal virtual copy of the game in your head for your own njoyment while waiting the real deal.

I think we are in an era where its required that we as consumers be more proactive in responding to these practices that are making it all worse. That means getting a mass of gamers to simply stop buying ridiculous dlc or overpriced games. Only that kind of behavior would wake up developers or publishers that think they can get away with such things.

 

 

Not buying 200$ collector editions would be a great start. But considering the hate replies i got when saying the 200$ Titanfall collector edition was dumb i guess it is not happening lol

 

Anyway it's not like i care. As long as i can buy games on Steam for 5 to 20$ i'm happy. I don't mind waiting to play a game.

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it would go a long way if consumers would simply not buy games at release. make a point and tell the companies that you dont want to pay $60 for a game.

 

It will take a long time.

 

First, companies would start closing shop, laying people off, and killing IPs because their big huge AAA game "failed to meet expectations" and lost money. Then the surviving publishers and developers would use the lack of profit as an excuse to raise prices, claim they are losing money to pirates, and lobby for more DRM and copy protection legislation because dammit they aren't making money. Eventually the whole industry would come crashing down and be awful until it goes through another Nintendo-type revival like in the mid 80s.

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My pet peeve is the games that cost $60 out of the gate on PC.  It used to be that new top tier games were $50 on PC and $60 on consoles with the reason being that the console manufacturers took a cut (presumably that $10 difference) that doesn't occur on PC (Microsoft doesn't get a cut of Windows Software... well excluding Metro).  I could live with that.  Then all of a sudden some PC releases (not all) started matching the console price at $60 so apparently they just pocket the portion of the price that would have gone to the console manufacturer when the sell the PC version, i.e. they are screwing PC gamers.  I refuse to pay more than $50 for a PC game (unless it's a collectors edition with some sort of physical reward I actually want).

 

It's getting worse now too.  Titanfall is a multiplayer only game.  It's only 6 vs. 6 and while it's a great game, I'm not saying it's bad in any way a multiplayer only game, where their servers are even free (Xbox Live Compute hosted) should not cost $60 yet it's selling like hotcakes.  If consumers are willing to pay it then publishers are going to keep charging that much or even try more to see how much the public is willing to accept.  To me Titanfall is more akin to a "next-gen" version of Section 8: Prejudice (a game I liked a great deal) and that was only a $20 game.

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youre probably right. i dont understand the allure of multiplayer. you play a game for a year, level up your character, pwn a bunch of people, then have to pay $60 the next year to do the same thing over again?

The only multiplayer I need is TF2. Spent 40$ on it in 2007, got Portal 2 and HL2:EP2 in the mix, been set since then. Best investment of my life :p

 

That said, I completly agree with your point about not buying games on release date. Anyway, they all come out more or less buggy and you're stuck with the bugs and little help from the community.

 

The maximum I'd ever spend on a game is 60$ and the last time I did that was for Pillars of Eternity. Man, if that game isn't good I'm going to lose all hope in humanity.

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Most of us probably have backlogs which we could tackle before needing to go out and buy new games @ $60 a pop.

 

Patiently waiting nets you more content for the same price. Maybe if publishers want to tackle used game sales they should consider making new game prices less to make buying new a more attractive idea.

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I've stopped buying games off steam and origin because if they suck you can't return them.

You can't return opened software pretty much everywhere... Digital or Physical.

 

So, do you mean you stopped buying PC games and went Console?

 

My pet peeve is the games that cost $60 out of the gate on PC.  It used to be that new top tier games were $50 on PC and $60 on consoles with the reason being that the console manufacturers took a cut (presumably that $10 difference) that doesn't occur on PC (Microsoft doesn't get a cut of Windows Software... well excluding Metro).  I could live with that.  Then all of a sudden some PC releases (not all) started matching the console price at $60 so apparently they just pocket the portion of the price that would have gone to the console manufacturer when the sell the PC version, i.e. they are screwing PC gamers.  I refuse to pay more than $50 for a PC game (unless it's a collectors edition with some sort of physical reward I actually want).

 

It's getting worse now too.  Titanfall is a multiplayer only game.  It's only 6 vs. 6 and while it's a great game, I'm not saying it's bad in any way a multiplayer only game, where their servers are even free (Xbox Live Compute hosted) should not cost $60 yet it's selling like hotcakes.  If consumers are willing to pay it then publishers are going to keep charging that much or even try more to see how much the public is willing to accept.  To me Titanfall is more akin to a "next-gen" version of Section 8: Prejudice (a game I liked a great deal) and that was only a $20 game.

I agree. I have paid full price for a game very rarely in my life, including the dark days when I console gamed. I am not going to be harmed picking up the game after release and playing it... I now have a backlog so long I see absolutely no reason to ever buy a game a full price. I'll likely be unable to start playing it for months anyway...

 

Titan Fall is on my stay away list for now. It is vastly overpriced IMHO and it has too much risk for my blood. My understanding is it doesn't support dedicated servers in the traditional sense and instead runs solely in Azure. Hosted dedicated servers, on Azure or anywhere, costs money. Traditional PC games shift this burden to the game community by allowing us to host our own dedicated servers to power multiplayer. The best part about this is the game community can continue to play the game as long as there is interest... You can still play CS 1.6, for instance. For a game that is only MP being hosted solely on a "cloud" platform funded by a company who loves to kill MP servers quickly (EA) it just seems like a lot of risk...

 

But I have been saying this for a long time now... Today's gaming industry is my generations movie industry. Mediocre product is the norm being sold at inflated price points with a pattern of constant churn based on "franchises". Gamers are now seeking refuge in the Indy Dev scene just like how people who enjoy cinema seek refuge in the Indy film scene.

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The issue is that consoles don't have competitive digital distribution services, like the PC. Gaming on PC is cheaper than it's ever been in real terms. I remember when Half-Life came out I was happy to pay the ?35 asking price but now there are very few games I would pay that price for, as Steam usually offers substantial sales within 3-6 months of release. In fact I was able to pick-up Tomb Raider for just ?17.50 pre-release on GreenManGaming and I often pay a similar price for other new games.

 

Gaming on PC is competitive; gaming on consoles isn't. As always, competition dictates prices. The heavily controlled markets of consoles are unlikely to ever offer the sort of value that PC gamers are used to.

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it would go a long way if consumers would simply not buy games at release. make a point and tell the companies that you dont want to pay $60 for a game. heck, i wont even buy CoD: Ghosts for $30 on a steam sale. that's too much for a 6hr fps! there are very, very few games of which im willing to pay full price.

 

It would also help if people would stop pre-ordering just to get some lame "exclusive" DLC that will inevitably be put on sale later.

 

With Steam sales and indie bundles I'm practically paying pennies for games on PC these days. In fact, with Steam Wallet earned from selling trading cards I haven't spend real money on a game from the Steam Store since last summer.

 

The fact that Ghosts took a heavy price drop already is probably a sign that the tide is turning if even CoD can't sell it's recycled crap anymore.

 

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I don't bother buying new releases anymore, i can easily wait a few months and get it for a more appropriate price.

No brainer!!

Would be the intelligent thing to do! ;)

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Titan Fall is on my stay away list for now. It is vastly overpriced IMHO and it has too much risk for my blood. My understanding is it doesn't support dedicated servers in the traditional sense and instead runs solely in Azure.

This is correct.

Hosted dedicated servers, on Azure or anywhere, costs money.

This is incorrect. Microsoft is providing a custom Azure implementation to Xbox games called Xbox Live Compute for free. As a result Titanfall servers cost the developer NOTHING and since it is a multiplayer only game that's a huge part of the traditional cost of a $60 game... yet Titanfall is still $60.

Traditional PC games shift this burden to the game community by allowing us to host our own dedicated servers to power multiplayer. The best part about this is the game community can continue to play the game as long as there is interest... You can still play CS 1.6, for instance. For a game that is only MP being hosted solely on a "cloud" platform funded by a company who loves to kill MP servers quickly (EA) it just seems like a lot of risk...

Microsoft does not allow player hosted servers for Xbox games. That is one of the strengths of PC gaming over Xbox as you point out. (It IS possible to have player hosted servers for PlayStation games though it's almost never done... I don't know about Nintendo). As I noted though Xbox Live Compute is FREE so while you may not be able to set up a server yourself it is NOT EA hosting the servers and being free there is no reason to take them down. If that is your primary concern there is much less risk then you seem to think.
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