David Jaffe Predicts Next Console Generation Will Be the Last

[Quantupus]

This is why I buy games new, to support the companies that make the games I like, and to prevent this shit from happening.

 

[Mrsoupcup]

The next great medium of communication shall be smoke signals. Trust me I am a "professional".

 

[Doctor Proctor]

Jaffe, along with a lot of other people in the industry, is missing the point. If a game got 300K in sales, WHY did it get 300K in sales? Piracy and used games aren't the only possible answers, since there are games that sell 10 million copies. What are the others then?

Well, there's the possibility that this is a niche title (think: anything by Atlus, EVER), or that it received poor reviews. In either of those cases, no one but the die hard fans are going to take a risk on spending $60 to find out if they like. So, they'll either skip or buy it used. Piracy is another possibility, but it's a thoroughly complicated issue since so many pirates download games that they never play and would never buy. You can't equate each pirated copy to a potential sale, whereas with used games, you can (honestly, given the choice between new and used, if you received the same price/perks, does it really matter to you which it is?).

So, the real issue is more one of price. So few games sell for anything other than that magic $60 price point, and the industry has spent years educating the likes of you and I to simply expect this. If we had some sort of tiered pricing that commonly understood and followed though, maybe we could correct this perception. If you had games selling at $20, $40 and $60, it because much easier to take a risk on games at the lower price points. We already have this in the form of XBoxLive games, which seem to be capped at $20 (don't own a PS3, so I don't know their pricing scheme...it's probably comparable though). Add in another price point somewhere in the middle and you'll have decent competition with used games.

Another area being explored is digital downloads for a lower price point that seemed to be designed to allow a player to catch up on a franchise, or just try out a well known game at a cheaper price point. Problem is, I don't have a lot of room on my 120GB hard drive that I payed a ridiculous amount of money for (a year before they started making 250GB drives for even less than what I payed for mine, of course). So this generation, what with a lot of people like me getting burned, those digital downloads might not sell well. Next generation though? If prices keep falling on drives, they could really give GameStop a nice run for their money by leveraging lower price points on digital downloads and appealing to my sense of instant gratification.

There's soooooooo many potential solutions to the problems of piracy and used games out there, but far too many are content to just sit around and bemoan the state of the industry. Instead of whining about used games, why don't they get out there and make some quality games at a lower price point. True, you can't compete with free, but you can compete with $40.

Edit: Also, to be clear here, I own well over a dozen XBox 360 games. I've only ever sold three back to GameStop (and one I got $1 for, so I don't think it was a high demand item that was raping the publisher's profit margin). Perhaps 20% at most of my games were bought used, and then perhaps 5% of the games that I've played were borrowed from friends (and in a few of the cases where I actually liked the game a lot, I supported the dev by buying their DLC). The rest were bought new. That means I've spent something on the order of $540 minimum (9 games at $60 a pop, but it's probably more...and it doesn't include DLC or downloadable titles) on a hobby. To sit there and say that console gaming is dead, or that the majority of gamers are free riders is ludicrous with numbers like that. I may be in the minority, true, but I'm not a minority of one. Cater to your hardcore gamers and deliver premium experiences at a premium price, and relegate the niche and mediocre games to mediocre pricing and you'll be fine. But continue to run the industry on the backs of your most dedicated fans and yes, it WILL cause problems for the future console generations.

 

[Zom-B]

So where 10 years ago someone could go to a game store (even a gamestop at that time) and be able to buy one or two used games And a new game with their money, now they would only be able to afford the new game or the used game. As long as used games are given a price so close to the new price and a trade in value that is so low, developers will lose money. Why? because gamers will have less money to spend on new games.

This is a common fallacy trotted out by people quite often when talking about game pricing. Unfortunately, I wasn't really able to find any info online of what common game prices were throughout the years, but my personal experience buying games over the last 2 decades is that game prices have only risen marginally and in some cases even dropped.

A few personal examples:

I have a Neo Geo Pocket colour and new games for it at the time ran about $40.
I distinctly remember shelling out $90+ tax for Eternal Champions on the Genesis.
I used to work at a games store in the late 90s that sold NES games at the original price (the owner was a weirdo. NEVER put anything on sale or lowered prices). The original price stickers were on the packages and they were all $70 to $80.

I never had a PS1 or even a PS2 so I can't say how those prices compare to the modern gen, but cartridge games from back in the days of Genesis and SNES were definitely more expensive if only because a cartridge was more expensive to produce than a CD/Bluray is.

I think that game prices have remained generally static in respect to income and inflation. It's just that games that maybe cost $50 to buy 5 or 10 years ago now cost $60, but at the same time, consumers are making relatively that much more money as well.

If anyone has the numbers or information to directly contradict me, I welcome seeing it. But I think for the most part we only feel like game prices have risen to unacceptable levels and it's only that they've become more visible to more people. When it's just a handful of nerds and kids shelling out 60 or 70 bucks for a game, it's not big deal, but when it's people across the whole strata of society including people that aren't as emotionally invested in gaming or its not a serious hobby, it becomes a real issue of accessibility and a barrier to a lot of gamers.

And I'd actually say that used prices have gone down as more titles for more systems become available. When all you have to choose from is PS1 or N64 retailers can easily charge more. Now, we can still purchase PS2, Xbox, Gamecube, PS3 and 360 titles in most used stores and there's even retail outlets to buy old cartridge games (those are now more expensive of course!), so our choices are greater and it forces retailers to make those old titles cheap or else they'll just be sitting on them forever. No one is going to pay $30+ for a PS2 title (maybe brand new). I've purchased PS2 titles for as little as $3 and regularly see dozens of titles for $10 or less. The used market is now so flooded with games, prices are way down on last gen titles. And current gen stuff often goes quite cheap too, as long as it's not less than a year old.

I won't flat out say that prices haven't gone up, but I don't think they've gone up tremendously across the board, I'd say it's mostly due to inflation and the concurrent rise in wages. Anyway, as I say, prove me wrong.

 

[The Stonker]

Since graphics has reached a pretty high point then maybe, maybe! We can start spending more money on writers and such and make better games, not just visualized orgasms.
The day of gaming has just begun...

Damn....I sure hope you are right.

Okay, then one thing.
What is your proof that the day of console gaming is dying?
Because we've had doom prophets everywere in every field, ignore it and keep on moving, because as long as there are gamers, then there are buyers.

 

[FarmerMonkey]

Thankfully the $60 model is already shifting. Check on Amazon for game prices sometime if you haven't recently. $60 might be the ENTRY price, but for those of us that don't have the free time to keep up to date anyway, there's plenty of great deals to be had on high-rated games that are less than a year old. Prices fluctuate, but at the time I got them (months ago), I got both Enslaved and Alan Wake new for $20 apiece, and Darksiders for like $13.

That was part of why I ended up going to the preowned trough so often over the years. eBay pricing tracks supply/demand. It was like retailers were colluding on prices to keep them artificially high.

 

[PureChaos]

didn't a load of people say THIS generation was going to be the last, too?

 

[Mitsozuka]

Like a Jam and Spandex sandwich, dude just isn't quite making sense yet...

 

[GonzoGamer]

So where 10 years ago someone could go to a game store (even a gamestop at that time) and be able to buy one or two used games And a new game with their money, now they would only be able to afford the new game or the used game. As long as used games are given a price so close to the new price and a trade in value that is so low, developers will lose money. Why? because gamers will have less money to spend on new games.

This is a common fallacy trotted out by people quite often when talking about game pricing. Unfortunately, I wasn't really able to find any info online of what common game prices were throughout the years, but my personal experience buying games over the last 2 decades is that game prices have only risen marginally and in some cases even dropped.

A few personal examples:

I have a Neo Geo Pocket colour and new games for it at the time ran about $40.
I distinctly remember shelling out $90+ tax for Eternal Champions on the Genesis.
I used to work at a games store in the late 90s that sold NES games at the original price (the owner was a weirdo. NEVER put anything on sale or lowered prices). The original price stickers were on the packages and they were all $70 to $80.

I never had a PS1 or even a PS2 so I can't say how those prices compare to the modern gen, but cartridge games from back in the days of Genesis and SNES were definitely more expensive if only because a cartridge was more expensive to produce than a CD/Bluray is.

I think that game prices have remained generally static in respect to income and inflation. It's just that games that maybe cost $50 to buy 5 or 10 years ago now cost $60, but at the same time, consumers are making relatively that much more money as well.

If anyone has the numbers or information to directly contradict me, I welcome seeing it. But I think for the most part we only feel like game prices have risen to unacceptable levels and it's only that they've become more visible to more people. When it's just a handful of nerds and kids shelling out 60 or 70 bucks for a game, it's not big deal, but when it's people across the whole strata of society including people that aren't as emotionally invested in gaming or its not a serious hobby, it becomes a real issue of accessibility and a barrier to a lot of gamers.

And I'd actually say that used prices have gone down as more titles for more systems become available. When all you have to choose from is PS1 or N64 retailers can easily charge more. Now, we can still purchase PS2, Xbox, Gamecube, PS3 and 360 titles in most used stores and there's even retail outlets to buy old cartridge games (those are now more expensive of course!), so our choices are greater and it forces retailers to make those old titles cheap or else they'll just be sitting on them forever. No one is going to pay $30+ for a PS2 title (maybe brand new). I've purchased PS2 titles for as little as $3 and regularly see dozens of titles for $10 or less. The used market is now so flooded with games, prices are way down on last gen titles. And current gen stuff often goes quite cheap too, as long as it's not less than a year old.

I won't flat out say that prices haven't gone up, but I don't think they've gone up tremendously across the board, I'd say it's mostly due to inflation and the concurrent rise in wages. Anyway, as I say, prove me wrong.

But I wasn't talking about new game prices. I'm talking about used game prices.
When I was buying used Dreamcast and used ps2 games I usually got them for anywhere from 1/6th-1/8th of the price of a new copy.
My complaint is that gamestop and other game retailer franchises have gouged the Used game market so that used games are usually only a couple of bucks cheaper than a new copy.
So where a gamer could at one point walk into a game store and walk out with a new game And a used game, said gamer with the same (proportionally) money has to now decide if he's going to get a new game Or a used game.
I still get the new copy because the savings wouldn't even cover subway fare but if I was poor still, I would save the $2.

 

[Nazrel]

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This in no way refutes my argument that we've reached the limit of what fiscally reasonable. Hell it supports it. The Wii didn't focus on graphics or processing power; it's technically inferior to the other 2. It focused on a unique interface.

P.S. David Jaffe only made the first God of War, he had nothing to do with the others.

Was that your point? Fiscal reasonabilty? Your right, diminishing returns is a shitty situation. But that isn't because the market or technology is limited, it's because the companies invest irresponsibly. They put more money into products that don't/won't benefit from more money, or they pump more money into the wrong parts of projects. My point is that Nintendo is fiscally responsible, and have had very few failures in regards to consoles. Jaffe thinks that the next console generation will be the last. What do you think he is basing that on? The fiscal misgivings of EA and Activision? No, he doesn't see things getting better than they are reaching a technical peak. Well that is not true. Back when all this back and forth first started, we talked about how technology doesn't progress by leaps and bounds every successive generation. But there are occasional instances where it advances by large leaps. He doesn't see it happening based on what? Current tech? That is poor vision. You don't see it happening based on what? Not based on EA or Activision I hope.

The one thing I agree with him on is that the $60 game model is broken. He is right, I've been saying that since this current generation first came about. EA and Activision have the balls to try and sell games for $60 on the PC. That is failing from the beginning. I can assure that the price tag of Dragon Age 2 has hurt it. The cycle will go like this:

-Pump money into a Triple A release like DA2
-try to sell it to customers for $60
-customers don't buy, so they will pump more money into future products and sell them for $60 at an even greater loss
-customers won't pay $60 for a product they don't see as worth that much.
-spend even more money, trying to make the products worth it, market it for $60
-People still don't want to pay $60 for a game they aren't sure they are going to enjoy.

On and on it goes. Each and every step needing to sell more and more units to break even/make money. They hurt themselves when the problem is they all they try to do is sell big titles at high price tag. That is nearly the definition of fiscal irresponsibility. No, they need to streamline the creative process. Produce more quality, less expensive titles more often.

And the tech, gets cheaper as it progresses. It all gets streamlined, making more advances easier. I bought my current processor for the same price I got my Pentium 4 back in the day. But it's light years better. It can do 10 times the work at half the heat. Now there it talk of I9 and I11 generation processors, which are light years ahead of my I5.

Ok, let me just clarify my standpoint.

Theoretically you could improve processors and graphics indefinitely, but the improvement costs increasingly more while impacting the experience increasing less.

The cost of a video game to make has moved from 1 to 4 million to up to 100 million in the last 10 years.

Add on the relative value of money and that becomes around 123 million.

We have reached the point where it is no longer worth it to improve graphics and processors for the purpose of game playing; we probably passed it awhile ago in fact, but nobody noticed.

The hardware has greatly outpaced what software can reasonably be produced.

Maybe in 30 years, we might reach a point where it might be viable for another generation, but I also think we've reached the apathetic point.

The difference is to little, people stop caring. Hell, I stopped caring last generation.

I look at Heavy Rain, then I look at Silent Hill 2. There is a distinct difference, true, but I ask myself "Would Silent Hill 2, have been noticeably improved by Heavy rain level of graphics." and answer "No, not really."

Don't be thinking that's nostalgia talking, I picked up the game 2 months ago.

The idea that perpetual improvement works is a technical and economic hubris, no one cared if their movies were on Blue-ray or HD-DVD; hell no one cares if they're on Blue-ray or DVD.

So yes, you can improve consoles; but it's a pointless and self destructive endeavor.

 

[Zom-B]

But I wasn't talking about new game prices. I'm talking about used game prices.
When I was buying used Dreamcast and used ps2 games I usually got them for anywhere from 1/6th-1/8th of the price of a new copy.
My complaint is that gamestop and other game retailer franchises have gouged the Used game market so that used games are usually only a couple of bucks cheaper than a new copy.
So where a gamer could at one point walk into a game store and walk out with a new game And a used game, said gamer with the same (proportionally) money has to now decide if he's going to get a new game Or a used game.
I still get the new copy because the savings wouldn't even cover subway fare but if I was poor still, I would save the $2.

Fair enough, perhaps I sort of misunderstood. I will agree that in some respects, used prices are high, but that's mostly for used copies of current games. I think it's absolutely ludicrous that Gamestop only drops the price of newer second hand copies by $5. I realize that a lot of people must be happy to pay $5 less, but for me, if I had the money to spend $55 on a used game, I might as well just buy myself a brand new copy for $60.

I think it's only when titles are out for 6 months to a year that we see any real price drops. I just don't understand why consumers let themselves be fooled into buying used merchandise for barely any savings. Sure, in most cases they are in perfectly fine shape, but something about buying second hand makes me want a bit more significant savings, personally. I'd actually rather wait till the retail price drops on new copes than buy and expensive used copy. But that's just me.

Aside from that, I still think that for the most part, used prices have not gone up substantially either, except for in the above case.

 

[githnaur]

What a load of tripe.

Recordable cassettes were going to kill the music industry. (A succession of bland "1 album" 'artists' are doing that job quite nicely)

Recordable videos were going to kill the film industry. (A succession of shite films are doing that job quite nicely)

Software piracy and now pre-owned game sales are going to kill the software industry.

Utter tripe.

Stop overcharging your bloody customers you prats - that's the only way you'll get increased sales of "new" titles.

Also, stop making insane piles of samey crud - just because you can make near-"cutscene" quality quicktime style games with the london philharmonic plinking out the tunes, doesn't mean you *have* to - since when was that the pinnacle (read triple A) of what is possible in game crafting?

Have said this before, but it's worth saying again... If a game costs 1/6 the totyal cost of the hardware to run it on, THE GAME IS TOO DAMNED EXPENSIVE YOU PILLOCS.


/facepalm

 

[Smooth Operator]

At first glance it seems like he knows what hes talking about, but blockbuster movies never died so why would blockbuster games?

It seems any developer who get's enough attention to get interviewed hasto make up some big apocalyptic gaming story... so very silly.

 

[Grunt_Man11]

Someone needs to check the water supply for the development studios because there must be something in the drinking water that causes the stupids.

What's with all the doom and gloom talk? These guys are like the Jehovah's Witnesses of the gaming culture.

What? Are they sick of their dream jobs or something? Are they so tired of their rewarding career that they have to declare every avenue of gaming "dead"?

If they hate their job others would kill to get, then they should just quit and fill out a job application at McDonald's.

 

[FogHornG36]

Hu... i guess my grandma was right, video games are just a fad... a fad that has lasted 40 years so far... well if she was right about that, then she might just be right about the internet.

 

[DanDeFool]

So here's an idea: how about you cut back your investments into graphics/cinematics/sound somewhat and focus on making games that have interesting stories and better game mechanics. I mean, there isn't anything fundamentally wrong with games like Devil May Cry or Mario 64, and most people would agree that FFVII (or even FF VI) was a hell of a lot more fun than FFXIII, and any of those could be produced today at a fraction of the budget.

I suspect that console games (and PC games), instead of going away completely or moving towards always-on services, will just shift back towards the previous generation's level of graphics technology, settling into a place where the investment barrier isn't quite as high as it is today, and release cheaper games that run on less-expensive hardware that's more widely available. In other words, we'll see the bigger developers settling into a technical half-way point between current AAA games and what the indie devs are putting out now.

Oh yeah, and sorry to bust your bubble Jaffe, but if you completely eliminated piracy and used game sales you probably wouldn't get from 300,000 sales to 850,000 sales. You might get to 400,000 or even 500,000 sales, but 350,000 of those sales still aren't going to happen because those people can't fit a $60 game into their budget. That's why they buy after-market or resort to piracy in the first place. And that's assuming that 850,000 people even WANT to buy your game at ANY price.

Stop blaming all your income woes on the consumers. It's not ENTIRELY our fault.

 

[Nurb]

Jaffe felt that pre-owned sales and piracy were two of the biggest threats to the industry, because they were both taking revenue away from the publishers and developers.

OH SHUT THE FUCK UP, JAFFE

You know what's hurting the industry more? Buggy games that need Day-One patches, publishers that won't listen to legitimate customer complaints, treating customers like criminals, and telling gamers to screw off and don't buy it if we don't like it (then complain about lack of sales and blame piracy or pre-owned sales), along with poor reviews about said games.

 

[cfehunter]

The games industry will only die if it refuses to change and even the most detached hermit of a share holder will realise that they need to change as soon as they feel the quake in their wallet. So nothing to worry about.

More importantly games would become much more profitable if games companies stopped trying to do photo realistic graphics.
Gameplay will always, always be infinitely more important than graphics and besides that, those games that decide to make their own art style tend to stand out way more than those that just build a world out of shades of brown. People appreciate style.
Designers, if your imagination is locked to reality, get a new job, designing gameing (not simulation) experiences isn't for you.

 

[eharriett]

Meh, just drop the price from $60 to $40 or even $30 and I'll buy a crapload more new games than I currently do now. As it is, I save a ton of money by buying new, but simply waiting a few months after release to pick it up.

 

[The Random One]

Yeah, he's right. I'd bet on a PS5 never coming out indeed. In ten years, any computer you buy in a store will be able to run a game you need a high-end console to run and any kind of internet you have will be able to download it quickly and with small to no cost. Unless you're like in Africa - then it'll take maybe twenty years.

Although he's got his reasons inverted here. Piracy and used games mean people manage to play games even though the value they expect for them is not quite $60. I find it hard to believe used games are that much of a problem when analysts in and out of the industry say that after a game is a month old if it didn't make as much money as it was expected to publishers shurg and damn it to hell.