Bargains Are for Cheaters

[Atmos Duality]

"Shelf Life" for any other product is a near-linear process.
Start high, slowly decline; the irony here is that prior to 2005, GAMES USED TO DO THIS (in my market this was especially true).

I could purchase Warcraft 3 in 2002 for 50 bucks. In 2003, it was 40. In 2005 it was 20, and I just bought a BRAND NEW COPY last year for 12.
I can name the same process for unused (new) copies of older titles up until that point. What happened?
Well, for starters, the number publishers declined rapidly in number as the Big Boys in each region (Squaresoft for Japan, EA and Vivendi in the US, Ubisoft in Europe) ate up their weakened competition.

Now, Publishers indisputably control the industry; they commission the games, they OWN the developers, they own the names, copyrights you name it. Sometimes, they even dictate production against a developer's will (due to contract obligations).

In fact, there is only one part of the industry the publisher does not completely control or own; Distribution.
Gamestop has, over the course of the last decade, systematically eliminated its competition through strong business practices, luck, and possibly some underhanded tactics (why yes, I have watched over half a dozen local game retailers mysteriously turn into Gamestops in the last 10 years).
They can stand toe to toe with any other major video game retailer...but more importantly, the big Publishers.

This is an age-old problem that has already been dealt with in every other industry; every manufacturer of every conceivable product ideally would want to cut out the middle-man.

 

[lockeslylcrit]

So... which development house would you like to see end so EA can open it's own digital distribution service?

EA already has one.

 

[Therumancer]

-snip-

Well, A: I don't give a shit about penny arcade. The issue here is "retailers vs video game industry." They're using their position to pull a bit of punditry on something they feel strongly about. Go them. If not for the rest of the internet sucking their cocks, I likely would never see a comic or post made by them.

As far as everything in that last half of your post... bollacks.

All entertainment industries operate as such. Entertainment is a zero-sum game. You don't want to have to compete with a product set to sell 15 million copies even if your product is also set to sell the same amount. Most gamers only buy one or two games a month. Which means both titles split their sales. Lose-lose. So, wait a month and have a higher chance of selling to people who didn't give a shit about the last month's big title and the people who are already done with it. It happens in film, theater, music... everywhere.

Now, I'm not saying theres a clear-cut good guy in this situation. This is three generally shitty groups of people fucking each other over in every way possible while the consumer can do nothing but wait for games to occasionally fall out of the Looney Tunes style "fight" cloud. Three groups defined only by their contribution to the video game industry. Developers having the most, publishers having the middle, retailers having almost none.

I think your missing the bit about "illegal behavior" here. Again, I point to the gas/oil companies and rising prices and so on. Oh sure, other industries do it too, no denying that, but that does not make it right. We are talking about video games here, so I of course bring cartel behavior up since it's a legitimate point.

See, the thing is that I feel an industry that is behaving illegally and making billions of dollars has no reason to whine about anything, and act like the used market is somehow killing them when it's not doing any such thing.

While it's a seperate issue, I feel the same way about piracy. They make billions of dollars, and do so while operating illegally. I don't think piracy is right or anything, but when they use it to justify jamming DRM and stuff down my throat I call "BS". It's like the bloody Mafia asking for public support because some gang bangers are cuting into their profits and they can't dislodge them on their own. It's crooks against crooks, neither has a moral high ground, I only care because they are trying to bring me, a legitimate consumer into it.

My basic attitude is that the gaming industry needs to put a bloody sock in it in general. If the industry was in trouble and not making billions, then maybe I might have some concern, but right now there is no danger of the industry collapsing or anything like that. It's all about them wanting to make more and more money, and when they are doing it using dubious techniques to begin with, I think they lose the abillity to start yelling "foul".

The reason why the cartel behavior in the entertainment industry exists, is because the goverment has yet to turn their attention towards it. Some of it might have to do with political payoffs, but a lot of it is probably that it isn't big enough to get their attention quite yet. Sure movies, music, video games and related things do make billions of dollars but that isn't as big a deal as the gas/oil industry which is an actual nessecity, nor is anyone currently in the position of creating a monopoly that could challenge the goverment itself like in the case of Microsoft and it's stranglehold on operating systems, or Ted Turner when he was trying to basically become the god-emperor of all media on planet earth.

 

[Harkwell]

I agree on not lowering prices with time, Steam takes advantage of this with their brief 75% off sales. Definatly making some serious cash.

 

[Kollega]

This time, Shamus has really hit the nail on the head. This is EXACTLY what should be done: it's good for consumers, and it would incur MASSIVE damage to used game sales and maybe even to piracy! Really, are publushers that blind? I know that they are, but it's still unbelieveable that people know how to make millions, yet didn't even think of copying that practice from the movie industry! If games indeed had dynamic price reduction, i'd buy a lot more games.

By the way, as has already been mentioned: part of Steam's success is because of regular sales. Valve know that making a little money is better than making no money at all, probably because THEY'RE NOT RETARDS!

Really, the contrived stupidity of an entire situation and the simplicity of an ideal solution THAT IS ALREADY IN USE in the neighboring industry just makes me cringe. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

 

[Ashsaver]

This is really a great idea,Steam is already did a great job for PC/Mac games.

 

[Drexlor]

This is the best idea I've ever heard. I am tired of having to wait 2 years for the price of a new game to go below $40 (IF I'M LUCKY). If I don't have it by then, I probably don't care enough to pay that much. Getting $40 for a game is a lot better than not getting $60.

 

[instantbenz]

"not worth the hassle to save 10 percent of the purchase price on a $10 item"

if you can wait 3 months after a movie comes to dvd you can amazon a movie (originally $20) for easily <$3. and yes, another $3 shipping brings that to nearly $10, but $4x 10 movies is 40 .../6= another 6 (or more) movies.

or screw it all and netflix from a console or the net. and when it comes to games there's gamefly but i don't know the fees. and, of course, gamestop's freebie 'rental' system is too good to be true ... i'm sure it'll change within a year.

take advantage while you can

 

[Sephiwind]

I think that there is an issue that tends to get left out in this type of argument. The fact that not only are the prices ridiculously high, the price the publisher sells it to the retail leave very little room for profit on the retailer end. The profits off of new titles are very low to the retailer and I don't really blame Game Stop. This isn't giving them a pass though because I think they charge way to much for used games.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

The less you care, the longer you wait and the less you pay. Games should have been doing this as a matter of standard procedure years ago.

Steam's been doing it for quite some time....

And not surprisingly, is the biggest digital distribution service for PC. People who want the game straight away just buy it at the base cost. People who don't care quite as much wait for the game to to hit the Weekend Sale or Midweek Madness. Heck, I personally have probably a dozen games that I bought purely because they went on sale for under $10. That's money those developers made which they wouldn't have if they didn't change their price.

I've always agreed with what the article says about how prices need to go down with time. Sure I can definitely see the logic in keeping them at $60 launch when you can easily put over one million sales on day one, but eventually the demand at $60 just isn't there anymore. You've recouped the development and advertising costs, so at this point every sale is just profit, so why not push for more sales at a slightly lower cost than fewer sales at the higher cost?

I also find it interesting how shops like Gamestop have been around for nearly 20 years, and yet just NOW developers are taking exception to them.

 

[brunothepig]

I've been wondering this for ages. Hell, I see this sort of thing too much. I recently acquired a PS2. Now, if I go to eb games (here in Australia) there's hundreds of games, all preowned, for less than $15. The really good ones, like God Of War 2, might be about $20. In the same store I browse these games I look up and see GTA San Andreas for $50 brand new! $50? Why? Hell, I could have bought Vice City, Liberty City Stories, and GTA 3 preowned (unfortunately San Andreas wasn't there preowned) for less than that. It makes no sense.
In fact, usually after a year or so any good game should have recouped the cost of production, which means the y should have no problem lowering the price. It just means, as you said, the people who are more or less indifferent to the game might pick it up and send a little extra money to the studio.

 

[CheckD3]

It's all about the game itself. Especially in today's economy. If I could afford to I'd buy as many games from the get-go on release day to play them ASAP. However, because they're 60 a pop, I can't, and therefor wait for the prices to go down. Games that I get excited for, such as FO:NV, I preordered as soon as I could so I could get a copy ASAP, same w/ GoW3.

I feel locking the players from the full game is a way to drain our wallets more in rough times, especially because if we bought 6 used games with the $10 DLC thing that EA has, that's a brand new copy of Halo Reach, or whatever. But instead we have to spend it to get the full experience of a game, punishing us for wanting to get good games we missed late or trying something new. I'd rather NOT buy a game with the extra cost when I could get a game that's maybe a point less on the rating scale and get the full experience without paying more

If we all had the money, the $10 DLC full exp. wouldn't exist, but because they want to get ahead, they squeeze our wallets. I understand gaming is falling on harder times than it used to, but again, it's just stupid. DLC as a concept should be used to FURTHER expand our gaming experiences, not punish us for saving up for a new release we can't wait for, and playing something we heard through the grapevine in the meantime.

If companies were smarter, release a full game, and use DLC as expansions to get that money back, but make it worth buying. 5 maps, 3 recycled for $15 is a bad example of DLC used correctly, $10 for a new area, or even the MW2 pack 5 less would be a good example. Halo ODST for 30 is a better example, DLC to add onto a campaign or levels, meaning that gamers who buy a used copy for 20, but spend another 20 to get the extra experience, means everyone wins. Gamers get a full experience from the get go with add ons to add to a what is hopefully already great time. Retail stores get money from used games and stay alive. And developers get to make their money back, get buzz about their projects, and get more content out quicker at cheaper prices. Everyone wins that way

 

[Eruanno]

Actually, about Modern Warfare 2's pricing:
The other day, I was strolling about at Gamestop, poking around in the used-games shelf. What does a used copy of Modern Warfare 2 cost? 599 SEK (~59 dollars, lazy conversion from swedish kronor to US dollar... it's probably more like 65 dollars, but shut up), and a few meters to the left of that... Mass Effect 2, which was released several months later (and, in my eyes, a FAR superior game) , at 229 SEK (~25 dollars).
So in the six months ME2 has been out, it has dropped to somewhere along half the price (plus project ten dollar, which is another 10 bucks), whereas MW2 has, in 9 months... dropped 10 dollars in price?... And these are the USED versions.

I stared at that pricing for a second, cheered at myself for not buying Modern Warfare 2 yet, put them back in the shelf and walked away.

 

[mageroel]

I've raged about game prices too, Why can I still find Halo 3 for 50 bucks? The game is 3 years old. I'll repeat this for emphasis THREE years old.

You make a good point, old games should be cheaper. I'd definitely have a larger library and try at games I'd passed over when they were first released.

I do a lot of research before I drop 60 on a game. I just don't have the income and so I buy less, but if say a 3 old game is suddenly 10-15 bucks I'd definitely pick it up.

I agree on this, only they always remove the manuals from those games - just collect them, then read them after I've finished the game. So it's kinda sad. Understandable, but sad..

 

[Green Ninja]

Once again a very good article about a current topic Shamus. I need to think about this.

 

[Cgull]

I'm always puzzled as to why the games industry believes that it shold run differently to any other.

I understand that the primary concern is to recoup the loss made on developing the game and then make as much out of it as possible (DLC and so on) but (big one), once the game has been bought new then that's it surely? Game was made, game was sold, game now has nothing to do with them.

Using a different example, my car was bought second-hand for £2,000, obviously I'd prefer to have bought one brand new but I don't have the money for it. To my knowledge, the car manufacturer isn't expecting to make anything else from my car once it had been bought.

Why are games different?