Page 1 of This will make me turn to piracy....

Bloody hell the bastards!
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/35209/Publishers-need-70-games-pricetag-says-Deering

Blimey, they`ll cost more than the console at this rate.

I remember when you could get a Mastertronic cassette tape for £1.99!


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he`s not saying he thinks they should be priced that high.

I can kind of see his point. Computer games are the same price, and often cheaper brand new than they were when PlayStation was launched. That and the Saturn being applauded for using discs which were cheaper to make than cartridges.

I worked for a small games company a few years ago doing PC titles (many budget titles) and we had 8 people working on a title. The Amstrad/Spectrum/C64 era was usually 1 or 2 guys over a few months.

Piracy again is 1 reason game prices need to go up. I don`t believe that if 5,000 people illegally download a title that`s 5000 sales they`ve lost, but at the same time I know there`s a lot of people that given the choice of paying £30 for a retail game, or less for a copy, or free to dl it themselves, they`ll go for the copy, but then that`s the same for music, and movies.

Ages ago the games industry wanted 2nd hand sales monitored so they could get royalties of them claiming that`s another problem they have, that some people wait to get a game 2nd hand rather than buy new. I don`t remember the book or music industry moaning about 2nd hand sales and that`s been happening for a lot longer.

My opinion is that sales would go up if games were cheaper. Some ppl will still obtain illegal copies, but if a brand new title was £20, I think more ppl would be tempted to take a chance on a game, or buy it new rather than wait till it was 2nd hand/budget release.

There`s still the problem though of quality which only the games companies can do, and their poor timing for releases. It amazes me they still haven`t learned that although some reviews are bought, if a games gets 5/10 ppl aren`t going to buy it. I know they don`t intend to make crap, and some titles are released early to try and cut losses, but that doesn`t work.

Also the fact that so many titles are release in the run up to Christmas, which means only a couple of titles get bought, and other good titles get forgotten about, which could have sold better if there wasn`t so much competition at the time.

Some ppl think game time should come into it which makes sense in theory. Arcade games, taking 5 or so hours to complete costing less than something like Oblivion, but then you need a sliding scale and it`s get tricky, unless anything not an arcade game goes the WoW route, but then ppl moan about feeling obliged to pay for a subscription.

Or there`s the EA Sims route where you release 1/2 a game on day one, then sell "added content" every 6 months later for next 5 years.

Mastertronic 1.99 and 2.99 were either old titles or budget titles, but saying that, It didn`t seem so bad spending my pocket money on 1 of those, getting home, playing it that afternoon, it being rubbish, and never playing it again. Not many budget titles were as good as Dizzy! full price games were about £10-£15, but that was 20 odd years ago!

Didn`t mean to ramble for so long!


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This item was edited on Wednesday, 5th August 2009, 07:30

To be honest I`m kinda getting fed up with the commercial games scene. I can`t believe this industry, that`s the biggest it`s ever been in it`s history, still thinks it`s OK to charge these kinds of prices. Yes gaming is a luxury item, but the days of it being a niche hobby are over, and it commands a mass market that rivals TV and cinema audiences. Hugely inflated prices for games just don`t wash anymore. Maybe when I was a SNES gamer it was understandable, but not now. So many poor quality and rushed titles out there too wanting full price. I always wait anyway for the price drops, since I can`t remember the last time I spent £30 on a game and got my money`s worth, let alone £70. Yes I can, Mario Galaxy! :D

I`m kinda liking the indie developers scene at the moment. World of Goo is a brilliant, unique and complete title that, outside of the Wii, wouldn`t have been considered by a publisher in the mainstream. Ditto the Penumbra series. I`d like to see more from indie developers, especially as (you know me Ad) I can play these on Linux too.

But £70 a game? It won`t happen. It`s just FUD, so that they can put prices up to £55 and it won`t seem so bad compared.

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I think it will just push people towards the rental services more.

For example, I pay £15 a month to receive up to 2 titles at a time from Lovefilm (actually I pay slightly less as I paid 3 months in advance). I receive some titles that are just rubbish (Far Cry 2 - PS3) and others that I really enjoy (e.g. Burnout Paradise) and end up buying.

There are still some games where I know I`ll definitely buy them at release (Uncharted 2 is one example)...but only if they`re at or below £40.
All others I`m happy enough renting out.

Quote:
But £70 a game? It won`t happen. It`s just FUD, so that they can put prices up to £55 and it won`t seem so bad compared.

I agree.

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Could someone please
Remove these cutleries
From my knees...

I`ve long maintained that game prices are ridiculously high. Even my Mrs commented on it the other day when we were in town, from the `how do parents keep up with their kids` demands?` point of view. Back when I was a lad the most I ever paid for a game was £85 for Super Street Fighter II Turbo on the Super Famicom. Now that was a cartridge and a Japanese release that was available in Japan much earlier than anywhere else, so you expected to pay more. Was I mental? Yes, but I was a kid and spent my pocket money on whatever I wanted. I wouldn`t spend anywhere near that level of cash nowadays.

I don`t know if it`s just perception, but new games seem to look and sound much better yet last half as long as the older titles I played in my teens. The average game can be completed in less than 10 hours it seems, which isn`t particularly good value for money at £55 a go. I never (well, very rarely) pay full price for games because they aren`t worth that sort of money to me. I tend to wait until they`re in the £10-£15 range, and then I only buy stuff that has received very positive reviews. It`s like Ghostbusters - it looks cool, but I`m not paying that much for a game that can allegedly be beaten in 7 hours.

Luckily most of the stuff I have bought for the PS3 has been worth the money. Prototype and inFamous both have fairly long campaigns and replay value, the Resistance I and II were long for FPS games, etc. Had I paid full price for something like Heavenly Sword I would have felt ripped off. Sure it`s a good game, but it`s over before it begins. I generally pick most of my titles up for around a tenner, which is good value. I have paid full price for some (Force Unleashed and Kill Zone 2), but I won`t do that very often. KZ2 burned me as well, due to the slightly heavy controls. Didn`t think it was worth the £40-odd.

What`s all this about getting a slice of second hand sales as well? Are they having a laugh? They`ve already had the money from the sale of the game at full price, what the buyer does with it afterwards is none of their f***ing business.

The only games I have ever bought which cost more than £40 come with a statue and extra discs, or a helmet! The price for Modern warfare 2 at £55 is a no go area for me. I`ll wait till next august to buy it. There`ll be dozens in the second hand bins then.. and the price will have dropped too for a new copy. .



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maybe then the only real answer for them is that technology where you "pay to play" via broadband connect to a server, sort of like rdp for games. That way if ppl play for 30 mins, and a game is cack, they`ll stop playing it so the games company will only get 30mins of money, if that`s how it works.

it does depend on the game, eg Final Fantasy 7, I had over 100 hours of entertainment out of that and was about £40, excellent value for money. On the other hand 7.50 to see a film at the cinema for 2 hrs seems quite poor, but is equal to a normal FPS of about 10 hrs for £30 assuming you don`t play online, don`t have anyone else your house who plays it.

£30 for Bioshock, I played it once (can`t remember how long it took), my missus played it through 4 times! Excellent value for money, as it was an excellent game.

Video games are like films, music and books, you pay your money, you take a chance, you hope it`s good and don`t resent the expense, it`s just that they cost a bit more so is more to lose, but in some cases gain.



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It`s a day for s***ty announcements from fat cat corporate types...

Some advisory group wants to end free OAP bus travel in Wales

And bookshops are whinging about Oxfam cutting into their profits.

It`s a charity you morons!

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