EA games decides they're not hated enough

[Alphawolf55]

Yeah an actual number with no citation and no method research, also with no proof that those people wouldn't buy the games anyways without the extra cash. Also it's not 20% of sales it's 7.

I would love to provide numbers but there's one problem, places like Gamestop don't release in their numbers whether the games people buy are new or used, but I will say that 46% of all their profits are used game sales, that they make far more money off each used game sold so they have vested interest in getting people to buy used games over new. In fact in every Gamestop I've been to, they will specifically tell you not to buy new and try to push the used copy.

Again you haven't provided anything that shows that the majority of used game buyers wouldn't buy a slightly pricier new version if they had to. Now I'm not saying that 100% of used game sales would've gone to new game sales, but to say that 30-40% of them would have I find realistic.

I really didn't want to use anecdotal evidence but have you ever worked in a video game store? Because I have (well the electronic section of a Target) and let me tell you something. One of two scenarios would happen all the time, someone would come up here and try to buy a game and would complain about the price, when I pointed out Gamestop was in the store and probably had it used they said "I already checked, everyone already picked up the used copy so I'm buying it new" or after seeing the price they'd say "I'm going to check Gamestop, if they had it used I'm buying it there if they don't I'll be back"

Edit: Though it's clear we're not going to convince the other of anything. Neither of us can truly prove whether the used game market would buy games or not changing the circumstances and until Gamestop and Gamecrazy release more detailed sales report we're never going to know the full story. But I will say this as I have before. Digital Distribution is the future and it will be good for game developers and possibly good for us depending on the model.

[Wing Commander MAD]

Would the whole first sale concept even apply? Last time I actually bothered to read a EULA for software, I'm fairly certain they made it (or at least tried to) rather clear that you do not own the product, you merely have purchased a license to use thier product. .

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the whole EULA thing for software shakey as it is, given you only get shown it after you've bought the product and are installing it and I expect most retailers would laugh you out of the store if you tried to return a game as you didn't agree to it.

Welcome to the crazy world of IT/Computing running headlong into the glacially paced legal world.

However, to anwer your question regarding the EULA, I really don't know. Some of the more legal savvy people might be able to tell you. I expect however the answer to involve some mish-mash of physical property and intellectual property laws. Mind you I'm in the U.S., so not only are there federal laws, there are also probably 50 different sets of state laws that cover areas that the federal laws leave out.

I honestly haven't the slightest clue regarding the return of opened software that the user didn't agree to the EULA, though I believe in theory your supposed to be allowed to do that. I imagine it be real fun trying to do that at a store like Wal-Mart. You may be better off eating the cost, if only for the sake of your sanity and blood pressure.

[General Zod]

Yeah an actual number with no citation and no method research, also with no proof that those people wouldn't buy the games anyways without the extra cash. Also it's not 20% of sales it's 7.

It's gradeschool math to figure out how many new sales are gained by trade-ins. Take the total number of new games purchased with trade-in credit, divide this by the total number of new games sold altogether. There's your percentage. Seriously, this isn't rocket science. If someone just doesn't have the cash to pay for a new game without trade-in credit, they simply won't buy the game.

Again you haven't provided anything that shows that the majority of used game buyers wouldn't buy a slightly pricier new version if they had to. Now I'm not saying that 100% of used game sales would've gone to new game sales, but to say that 30-40% of them would have I find realistic.

You haven't bothered showing anything that proves that they would.

[General Zod]

Ghetto edit: In any case the real question is, would that "30-40%" really be enough to offset the loss of new sales from people who can't afford new games unless they trade in their old copies? I doubt it.

[Starglider]

There is nothing stopping the publishers themselves from inventing their own "used games" model if they wanted in on that market,

They are; it's called pay-to-play. There are already various over-hyped 'cloud gaming' concepts, where you play the games on company servers and stream the video to your netbook / smart TV. MMORPGs make up an ever growing share of PC game revenues. Rental and flat-rate subscription (to a given publisher's back catalogue) models for games have been talked about a lot in the industry press, they're coming.

if only they didn't want to suck as much money as absolutely possible out of people

This is the basic goal of commercial enterprise.

instead preferring to prevent perfectly reasonable things like people selling stuff they legitimately own.

IP isn't 'stuff'. Most physical products are either immediately consumable or have a fixed useful life, e.g. a car lasts 100,000 to 200,000 miles. Selling the car just means the remaining useful life will be consumed by someone else. Games have an indeterminate number of resale cycles; in principle they can be resold indefinitely. People who resell the game after a few weeks are probably getting 80% of the value of people who keep it indefinitely; you effectively pay the second-in price (and convenience of not having to sell) for the pleasure of having a shelf full of game DVDs to look at.

Anyway, your quaint notions of games as physical property are rapidly becoming irrelevant. The games industry does not give a fuck what you think, because all the threatened nerd-rage-fueled boycotts of games have had negiliable sales impact. Digital downloads keep ramping up, online activation is getting more and more pervasive. The industry wants the 'you purchase a non-transferrable right to play our game' model, and the only real barrier to that is the state of the Internet infrastructure. As soon as the penetration of fast always-on broadband is high enough, publishers can ditch physical media and require an Internet connection to play the games. The opinion of developers is almost as irrelevant as that of whiny gamers, they will do what the publishers tell them to if they want to keep making mass market games.

[starfury]

The secondary industry isn't a problem for companies like Koei, because Koei's games sell millions of copies each and they generally sell the same game each time, but if you look at small-developers that try to make innovative games that last only 10 hours, yeah the secondary market is a huge threat to them. I don't think, you understand video games much. At the end of the day EA, Ubisoft, Activision and Nintendo all of them have to see a profit on each game. When games cost 15 million dollars each you have to sell a shit load of games, and anything that hurts into those sales hurts those games. What ends up happening is companies take less risk and shovel out more sequels.

Nintendo actually does not suffer nearly as much from the used games sales as the rests of the Publishers, their evergreen titles tend to stick around for a long time and don't see a massive drop in price several months later like the other Publishers/Developers, this applies more to the PS3/XB360 HD gaming which are the ones to suffer the most from the skyrocketing development costs and used games sales.

[Stark]

Anyway, your quaint notions of games as physical property are rapidly becoming irrelevant. The games industry does not give a fuck what you think, because all the threatened nerd-rage-fueled boycotts of games have had negiliable sales impact. Digital downloads keep ramping up, online activation is getting more and more pervasive. The industry wants the 'you purchase a non-transferrable right to play our game' model, and the only real barrier to that is the state of the Internet infrastructure. As soon as the penetration of fast always-on broadband is high enough, publishers can ditch physical media and require an Internet connection to play the games. The opinion of developers is almost as irrelevant as that of whiny gamers, they will do what the publishers tell them to if they want to keep making mass market games.

Moving away from selling a physical object is going to be waaaaay more effective than any sad-ass attempts to reduce people's property rights. People just need a reality check; digital sales prices are complete fiction because distributors know that's what people will pay. Oops, it's way cheaper to distribute that way?

Amusingly, things like EULA attempts to reduce individual rights are basically totally ignored in places like AU, because consumer rights are protected. I imagine most of the laughable terms are unenforcable outside America.

But yeah, in five years everyone will be paying $60 for a download version of old games instead of $20 for a used disk. This will be an improvement!

[Alphawolf55]

And on what plane of reality are you basing this on? There's no reason why online game prices won't go down in price just like regular game prices do when demand starts to fall.

[Stark]

Which is why steam games are cheaper, right? The lack of shipping makes it better for international customers too!

Except, not.

You have to prove it'll happen by magic Market suddenly working even though everyone is clearly price fixing.

[Alphawolf55]

Except for the simple fact Steam games do go down in price.

[Stark]

??? Are you talking to yourself?

You're claiming that DD only will lead to lower prices because distributors will kindly lower set prices even though they've been static or rising for decades and our only current examples don't do it.

The logical response is to point out that steam is still competing with stores so distributors don't want to undercut themselves. Not ... Whatever you said. You have to actually show this will happen.

[Alphawolf55]

??? Are you talking to yourself?

You're claiming that DD only will lead to lower prices because distributors will kindly lower set prices even though they've been static or rising for decades and our only current examples don't do it.

The logical response is to point out that steam is still competing with stores so distributors don't want to undercut themselves. Not ... Whatever you said. You have to actually show this will happen.

Wow everything you just said is patently false or at least in the US.

Except for small spike in game prices for the 360 and PS3, video game prices have been falling for the last few decades.

[Stark]

Except people in this thread have been talking about $60 games? Uh oh!

[Alphawolf55]

What the fuck does that have to do with anything. You've claimed game prices have been steadily rising, that's simply not true. In fact even the 360 and PS3 games are cheaper now then N64 games were a decade ago.

[Stark]

Quote me saying prices have been steady rising, please.

I can quote you saying prices have been falling. Would you like that?

[Alphawolf55]

You're claiming that DD only will lead to lower prices because distributors will kindly lower set prices even though they've been static or rising for decades and our only current examples don't do it.

You said they've either been static or rising.

[Jade Falcon]

Quote me saying prices have been steady rising, please.

I can quote you saying prices have been falling. Would you like that?

Stark is right about prices coming down. When I had a 486 DX2/66 (shows you how long ago THAT was), I remember that the store, Games Zone, or whatever it was called, were wanting £50 each for Pacific Strike and Rex Nebular. This was floppy disk version and were quite normal gaming prices at the time. Bar special editions or some overpriced titles, the average PC game seems to sell for between £30 - £35. There are exceptions, some higher, some lower, but thats pretty much the average.

[Starglider]

Amusingly, things like EULA attempts to reduce individual rights are basically totally ignored in places like AU, because consumer rights are protected.

Of course; legalities are only relevant for corporate customers (and even then, hard to enforce). Rampant piracy demonstrates how irrelevant the law is for consumer software. The whole point of DRM is to give publishers real control via technical means, rather than practically meaningless and/or dubious legal rights.

But yeah, in five years everyone will be paying $60 for a download version of old games instead of $20 for a used disk. This will be an improvement!

You will simply have to wait 6 to 12 months for the retail price to come down, instead of one month for the second hand market to saturate. Every game out now will be available as a cracked torrent of course, but I think we're going to see the 'single player MMORPG' solution making cracking of games impractical quite soon.

BTW for all the people whining about retail game prices, there's a fuckton of free or very cheap indie games out there. Iphone games and XBL indie games both experienced a race to the bottom that left the majority of titles at $1. It's often the same people who say 'gameplay is everything, I wish everything was still 2D, eye candy is a distraction', so STFU and go download those games instead.

[Stark]

'static or rising' isn't 'rising all the time'. If you'd bothered to read the thread I even mention the two or three hikes over time.

Others have mentioned the last jump from 40-50USD to 50-60USD.

Thus, since there is no history of distributors cutting buyers ant slack, your claim they will benevolently lower prices once they crush property rights requires evidence.

[Alphawolf55]

Umm yes there is. During the N64 days games would regularly be 70 dollars. So would certain SNES and Genesis games.

[Stark]

Aside from you never actually proving this, so what? We're talking industry average price points. I can spend $170 on a new release game if I want; is this relevant to a discussion of average price?

If (again) you had a brain you might try normalising with cost of living or inflation to prove your retarded point, but EVEN IF YOU'RE RIGHT this doesn't actually prove your point AT ALL.

[Stark]

BTW for all the people whining about retail game prices, there's a fuckton of free or very cheap indie games out there. Iphone games and XBL indie games both experienced a race to the bottom that left the majority of titles at $1. It's often the same people who say 'gameplay is everything, I wish everything was still 2D, eye candy is a distraction', so STFU and go download those games instead.

Nobody gives a fuck about sloppy indy games when they want their MMO fix or their coop multi fix or their cowboy simulator fix. There's a HUGE market for cheap games of this type (although for some lameo reason AU doesn't get the 360 XNA games) but it's not the same market as the full-price Bioware sextravaganza game.

I think most of the games I've bought on PC over the last few years are cheaper eastern-european games rather than 'AAA' megahype titles, but on console that penetration isn't really there. XBLA games generally pale before iPhone games which is a bit sad.

[Alphawolf55]

Aside from you never actually proving this, so what? We're talking industry average price points. I can spend $170 on a new release game if I want; is this relevant to a discussion of average price?

If (again) you had a brain you might try normalising with cost of living or inflation to prove your retarded point, but EVEN IF YOU'RE RIGHT this doesn't actually prove your point AT ALL.

And you haven't proven that games costs as much as you claimed they did. The difference is, I lived in the country that I'm talking about and you can go to any old school gaming forum and people will remember regularly paying the prices I'm talking about. I can't speak for Australian gaming prices but my point is that you're frankly wrong. You said game prices have been steadily rising (quit denying you I flat out quoted you saying it), I've pointed out that compared to inflation they're cheaper then they were 10 years ago. You said that game costs have never dropped when costs did, that's not true either. When cartidges were being used games were regularly 60-70 dollars, but once they moved to CD they dropped the prices.

[Stark]

LOL

I said prices had remained static or risen; this to counteract your claim that prices will fall. You can lie all you want.

Again, you talking about a few super-expensive games (especially on the notably expensive N64) is irrelevant to average trends (particularly regarding PC games). Did you even MENTION inflation until I clued you in?

You mean, the price of previously-cart games dropped to the price of all the other non-cart games on the market? AMAZING!

[Alphawolf55]

Oh my God....

I said game prices might fall, you said they've either remained static or raising, and now you've just said it again that prices have either been static or steadily rising. I pointed out that when you include inflation this isn't true and that there have been games in the past that were actually more then this.

Yes I actually did mention inflation first.

The fact that you can't get that the moment that we got rid of carts aka the costs of producing games fell (for the first and pretty much only time ever), that the price of buying games additionally went down goes against what you're saying how game prices have never fell astounds me.

Seriously games come out at different prices all the time based on the development cost, it's part of the reason why Wii games are cheaper then 360 games.

Why would PC games matter? PC games are only 16% of the overall market.