A View From The Road: The Perfect Subscription

[jasoncyrus]

snip

The difference between then and now is that back then you got MOUNTAINS of content, and even the collectors editions these days dont feature all the content they keep in reserve for DLC. Yes we all know they COULDVE put it in the game quite easily for EXACTLY the same price but they deliberately choose to keep it out to suck you dry for more and more money. As the saying goes a fool and his money are easily parted, and thats what the world of gamers has turned into a bunch of fools with too much money.

Prove it.

All I see is someone who knows nothing about software development.

Prove what exactly? That they are leaving out content just to milk you dry?

Hmmm every new game on xbox that has had DLC?

They've even stated before that they could've added more content if they didn't have to meet deadlines. What happened to the days where they'd push back a deadline to fit that extra content in? Now its get the bare bones out and charge you extra for the rest.

Project $10 or whatever its called is a perfect example of this.

I'll politely ask that you refrain from personal insults as you know nothing about me and are quite wrongly assuming DLC has anything to do with a development side of things in terms of DLC and release dates for bare bones games. That publisher business strategies, there is a difference.

EDIT: I've project managed party games development for private clients, so yes I do know enough about software development to know that the developers tell their higher ups how long it will take to make x amount of content for x game without any hiccups in the project timeline. So yes I do know that dlc is deliberately withheld to milk more money out of gamers.

Been there, done know, know how it works.

EDIT2: But whatever nevermind, clearly you are content with throwing away money that doesn't even live up to the capabilitis of the technology we have available. Crysis set a high bar for incredible graphics, heck even final fantasy the spirits within did more with the technology they had then than we have now. Forgive me for wanting them to actually put some real effort into games and making them incredible graphical and plot experiences as we've seen before. As apposed to inferior story, interfaces and graphics.

 

[John Funk]

snip

The difference between then and now is that back then you got MOUNTAINS of content, and even the collectors editions these days dont feature all the content they keep in reserve for DLC. Yes we all know they COULDVE put it in the game quite easily for EXACTLY the same price but they deliberately choose to keep it out to suck you dry for more and more money. As the saying goes a fool and his money are easily parted, and thats what the world of gamers has turned into a bunch of fools with too much money.

Prove it.

All I see is someone who knows nothing about software development.

Prove what exactly? That they are leaving out content just to milk you dry?

Hmmm every new game on xbox that has had DLC?

They've even stated before that they could've added more content if they didn't have to meet deadlines. What happened to the days where they'd push back a deadline to fit that extra content in? Now its get the bare bones out and charge you extra for the rest.

Project $10 or whatever its called is a perfect example of this.

I'll politely ask that you refrain from personal insults as you know nothing about me and are quite wrongly assuming DLC has anything to do with a development side of things in terms of DLC and release dates for bare bones games. That publisher business strategies, there is a difference.

EDIT: I've project managed party games development for private clients, so yes I do know enough about software development to know that the developers tell their higher ups how long it will take to make x amount of content for x game without any hiccups in the project timeline. So yes I do know that dlc is deliberately withheld to milk more money out of gamers.

Been there, done know, know how it works.

I'm not personally insulting you. I'm saying that you don't have a concept of how games are made.

Games have deadlines, yes. Features get cut for multiple reasons, and have been cut from games since the days of Super Mario Bros. They won't be finished, they won't be good enough, the developers don't have time to make them work in the context of the game, etc. Content has ALWAYS gotten cut, and there's no difference between then and now.

There comes a time when a game HAS to be feature-locked: You can't add any more new ideas, places, or whatever - or else you'd never ever ship a game since you'd keep adding more. And then there comes a time when a game has to be resource-locked: No more new assets, no more new models, nothing, because the game has to go to print.

The time between a game is feature-locked, a game is resource-locked, a game goes gold and a game ships can actually be on the span of several months. For those months, a developer has a few choices: Let the designers/artists/coders who literally aren't doing anything move onto new projects, fire them, let them do NOTHING, or... put them to work on restoring some of the content that couldn't fit on the disc before.

Because the engine is done, because the game systems are in place, because there's already a completed game and they're just working on extra content, it often takes much less time to complete than the full game - hence early DLC. But to suggest that it's content that's purposefully withheld is really a fallacy in most cases. I'm not saying that it's NEVER the case, just... most of the time it's not.

As for why it's not free, well... if they spend a month making extra content, shouldn't they be paid for their time?

 

[jasoncyrus]

snip

Yes they should be paid for their time, and yes I support that. HOWEVER, as with DLC its a different situation as to what it used to be. It used to be expansion discs where you got a GIANT upgrade to it.

An example of what I'm talking about is gears of war 2 DLC dark corners and all fronts expansions one extra campaign chapter and a seven multiplayer maps. for 1600 MP, (around £13.40) All fronts from what I've read simply has 4 map packs for £15.

Now with the old system of an expansion disc, you'd get all of that for around £20 on a single disc. Funny part is a lot of games give out the map packs for free, like the C&C series. So that in itself is a pretty big rip off.

But getting back to the original point.

Yes, you're right and there comes a time when resources run out, etc etc. HOWEVER as I stated in my last post the entire game usually mapped out before production begins, not in great detail no but content wise it is. They'll have everything mapped out and be good to go to have it all ready in time. The publishers however are now moving to a business model of saying "right how much can we shave off and still have a good basic game?". Studios never have programmers sitting around doing nothing unless something happens to mess with their schedule. People are always shifted from team to team as projects get completed to speed up the times on the remaining projects without comprimising the timeline.

Looking more closely at the strategies these companies are employing it a mutation of the pre existing microtransaction platform that usually went hand in hand with expansions, like what Guild Wars has and almost every free MMO has when they roll out.

 

[sir.rutthed]

You forgot to mention Blizzard's other brilliant subscription scheme, whereby when you purchase the game you get one campaign, and then if you like that you can buy the other two as expansions to see what happens next.

Standard for any RTS. Buying expansions is the nature of the beast. Besides, it's not like you have to buy the expansions to play the other races in multiplayer. Besides, I think for most people the main appeal of SCII will be the multiplayer, so it won't matter as much.

I have nothing against expansions. What I object to is leaving the ability to play all three races as part of a complete singleplayer campaign out of the full product. It's basically just cutting out what could already be put in rather than thinking up new content, which is what expansions are supposed to be about. And I'm well aware Blizzard has tried to justify it by claiming that they're crafting an epic story which is too big to fit in one game, but I don't buy it. It seems that Blizzard are determined to gradually siphon out what we can expect to get in a full-priced game, to force countless extra payments for things that were once considered standard.

I think we'll just have to wait and see how much content we get with each expansion. There's no question in my mind that it'll all be extremely high quality and balanced, so volume is the only real question. If they price them like full games, but only have expansion level amount of content there will be riots on the streets. I'm ok with paying full retail for a game as long as it has enough new content to keep me entertained for more than one weekend.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

snip

The difference between then and now is that back then you got MOUNTAINS of content, and even the collectors editions these days dont feature all the content they keep in reserve for DLC. Yes we all know they COULDVE put it in the game quite easily for EXACTLY the same price but they deliberately choose to keep it out to suck you dry for more and more money. As the saying goes a fool and his money are easily parted, and thats what the world of gamers has turned into a bunch of fools with too much money.

DID they have mountains of content? Really? As I recall the average game only took about an hour to beat from start to finish, and that's only if you didn't take any shortcuts. Yeah there was the occasional RPG that used the battery back-up so you could have a longer game, but that kinda thing wasn't really the norm until the PSX/N64 days.

Mario World got to an early start by being closer to the kind of game you'd have now-a-days, and if you were to compare that game to New Super Mario Bros Wii, I'm sure you'd find that both games have a comparable amount of content within them, though I honestly never thought to count the levels in either title. Otherwise though go load-up any old Castlevania game. Start-to-finish there's only about an hour's worth of gameplay. Compare that to today's average game having 10+ hours start to finish and tell me that there was more content in yesterday's games.

EDIT2: But whatever nevermind, clearly you are content with throwing away money that doesn't even live up to the capabilitis of the technology we have available. Crysis set a high bar for incredible graphics, heck even final fantasy the spirits within did more with the technology they had then than we have now. Forgive me for wanting them to actually put some real effort into games and making them incredible graphical and plot experiences as we've seen before. As apposed to inferior story, interfaces and graphics.

Are you referring to the movie that nearly sent Squaresoft into bankruptcy? Yeah... I wonder why we don't see more projects along those lines... >.>

 

[jasoncyrus]

snip

The difference between then and now is that back then you got MOUNTAINS of content, and even the collectors editions these days dont feature all the content they keep in reserve for DLC. Yes we all know they COULDVE put it in the game quite easily for EXACTLY the same price but they deliberately choose to keep it out to suck you dry for more and more money. As the saying goes a fool and his money are easily parted, and thats what the world of gamers has turned into a bunch of fools with too much money.

DID they have mountains of content? Really? As I recall the average game only took about an hour to beat from start to finish, and that's only if you didn't take any shortcuts. Yeah there was the occasional RPG that used the battery back-up so you could have a longer game, but that kinda thing wasn't really the norm until the PSX/N64 days.

Mario World got to an early start by being closer to the kind of game you'd have now-a-days, and if you were to compare that game to New Super Mario Bros Wii, I'm sure you'd find that both games have a comparable amount of content within them, though I honestly never thought to count the levels in either title. Otherwise though go load-up any old Castlevania game. Start-to-finish there's only about an hour's worth of gameplay. Compare that to today's average game having 10+ hours start to finish and tell me that there was more content in yesterday's games.

EDIT2: But whatever nevermind, clearly you are content with throwing away money that doesn't even live up to the capabilitis of the technology we have available. Crysis set a high bar for incredible graphics, heck even final fantasy the spirits within did more with the technology they had then than we have now. Forgive me for wanting them to actually put some real effort into games and making them incredible graphical and plot experiences as we've seen before. As apposed to inferior story, interfaces and graphics.

Are you referring to the movie that nearly sent Squaresoft into bankruptcy? Yeah... I wonder why we don't see more projects along those lines... >.>

Wow, you guys are going back to the stone age age of gaming arnt ya? You need only go far back as things like Black and white evil genius, age of empires, unreal tournament, total war, hell even the sims. The sims being the perfect example, MMASSIIVVEE content updates on one disc that quite frankly puts all DLC options today to shame, the sheer mass of content one of those expansions delivered is enough to make me wanna stop buying product from most studios these days because they're just plain lazy in comparison.

Off the top of my head, Devil may cry, prince of persia, GTA. All these provided days of enjoyment (assuming you actually had a life and didnt play for 8 hour sessions just to finish it as quickly as possible.)

Heck i remember getting high octane for the original playstation, i assume thats what you refer to as the psx, and it provided me with countless hours of enjoyment. Gran turismo as well, loaded was another one and heck even the smackdown wrestling games gave a decent couple weeks of thrill.

Honestly if you're one of those people who burn through games just to finish it as soon as possible...you don't know how to truely enjoy a game anymore do you? To take your time and imgaine where the story could be going, to marvel at the graphics and action. It's a lost art.

Oh and on the FF:TSW point. If it almost bankrupted them back then, imagine how much easier it is with todays technology and expertise. It was still quite frankly one of the best movie's I've ever seen (completely ignoring the final fantasy tag to it). Also, you subtly failed to recognise that the high bar crysis set isn't being hit with a lot of games. Mass Effect for example seems to only be hitting that high bar just now and yes its a huge difference in quality from the original, but crysis 2 seems to be pushing the bar even higher. If crytek can give such incredible quality why the hell isnt everyone else? Why arn't they making such good use of the technology? The only games that can get away with this excuse are mmos because of the sheer grunt mass of processing power thats required when you have a huge server load in one area and you're trying to load in 100+ people into a relatively small area.

But my point still stands, if you're willing to throw away money on something thats quite frankly over priced then you don't know how to judge quality.

Before you go onto the big rant about how companies need the money they charge etc etc. Programmers only get paid £30k a year, the highest paid are the adverting and marketing guys. Correct me if i'm wrong but I'm pretty sure programming is a lot harder to do than marketing.

So yeah, if they have enough cash to buy out other studios willy nilly whenever they like, then yeah, they're charging too much, and dont even mention the lay offs in the press. That happens all the time regardless of the state of the economy. Theres simply more drama revolving around them this time.

 

[Gunner 51]

I haven't played PC games in years. But I could never understand how PC games were being sold cheaper than console games. But the difference between them in Russia is huge, though I can see why you Russian's aren't too happy having to pay European rates for your games from what you said.

I can understand why Blizzard are doing all this, but I don't think I can condone it.

Game producers have to pay a fee to the console manufacturers for each product sold. I am not sure if the fee is big enough to account for the entire +25% price of console games but it is a big chunk of it. The reason why this is necessary is that the console producers are selling the consoles at a lose (when factoring in development of the thing) to recoup their loses they say that some of the money that you spend on games have to go to them. The producers of the games naturally pass this cost on to you. PC has no such problem. We pay that "fee" when we buy the computer. Your average gaming rig cost significantly more then a console so we get the games cheaper.

Ah, I had always wondered why console games had such a significant cost in comparison their PC brothers. But I do have one question, is DLC just as overpriced on the PC as it is for consoles?

 

[Steampunk Viking]

Sounds like a pretty good idea. A couple of questions spring to mind though John:

1) With your example of "Chuck", that seems pretty logical, and I'm sure there will be people who do this, but surely there'll be people who will tweak that they'll actually end up paying, say, 499 ruples more than they would if they just bought the one game? What would stop them from just doing as they do now to save money in the long term?

2) The pricing seems to make us pay more in the long run. Ok, sure, many people probably won't be playing Starcraft II past a year, and for a year that price is pretty reasonable, but let's say, for example, that about a year and a bit later I, as the consumer, might go "You know, I might play a game of Starcraft II" and I get denied unless I pay 1,200 ruples (which is more than the game cost originally), I might feel a little cheated by that, we don't always know how long we'll be playing for. In pounds, we'd be paying nearly £50 for a full-full copy of the game, that seems a little excessive for PC games nowadays (though I can see the appeal for short term players).

Anyways, maybe I missed something, just my two cent though.

 

[Lucane]

It could only work on PC unless it gets even ground or better compared to renting from GameFly/BlockBuster etc. Also it'd have to be targeted for Online mode enabled games right?

 

[Weaver]

For this to work it means every game would then need an online account.
No thanks.

 

[Rad Party God]

I do understad this model and I can see this applyed to the most popular games with single/multiplayer, but what about single-player only games? And you know wich ones I'm referring to, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, The Elder Scrolls games... I can't think of something similar in these cases, only to give them the regular price of $30-$50.

 

[Dimeinurear]

No no no and NO.

By accepting this derranged pricing model we are simply giving them even more encouragement to charge obscne prices for games.

Brand new games are $60-$100 now. WTF?! They used to be $40 or less. Anyone whos willing to pay THAT much for a game that barely uses the available technology of today has far too much money for their own good.

Yes, you have money, NO you shouldn't automatically spend huge amounts on normal things. Why? The same reason you don't do it in games. It screws up the economy for that particular item and then people on lower incomes like new players and say...most students find it harder and harder to be able to afford them.

Hell, the $60 price tag has put me off a LOT of games because for $60 I want something with 50+ hours game play MINIMUM. Final Fantasy so far is the ONLY game that would ever qualify for it because of the sheer mass of content. With $60 I can fill the tank on my car and more.

I completely agree, this charging system is outrageous. If you go by John's cost of $34.36 for a 1-year "subscription", then this runs out, but you don't want to just pay a subscription until the end of your days, then the 1200 ruble model (roughly 41.10 USD if Google is working properly), then the total cost comes out to $75.46, that's nearly $25 more than the cost of SC2 if it weren't subscription-based (assuming that the cost of just the basic game is $50 in the US, it might be $60, I can't remember and can't be bothered to look it up), that's nearly the cost of the collector's edition! the collector's edition itself would be 41% more (Again, assuming if Blizz doesn't change the price of the collector's edition). This would simply be just a way of Blizzard to be greedy: look at Valve, they don't complain that their users aren't paying subscription fees, and they're probably not even HALF the size of the mammoth Blizzard.

Blizz already gets huge amounts of money from World of Warcraft: merchandise, subscriptions, and new people buying all 3 (classic + 2 expansions) versions. It's just a cheap shot at more money, and honestly I can't see anyone supporting this.

 

[backlashhg]

No no no and NO.

By accepting this derranged pricing model we are simply giving them even more encouragement to charge obscne prices for games.

Brand new games are $60-$100 now. WTF?! They used to be $40 or less. Anyone whos willing to pay THAT much for a game that barely uses the available technology of today has far too much money for their own good.

What nonsensical reality are you living in? Games were MORE expensive in the SNES/N64 days. Not even taking into account inflation!