Origin Boss Says Steam Sales "Cheapen Intellectual Property"

[wetnap]

I've bought a few games that were on sale on steam, its great, those would not have been bought otherwise.

I'm not sure what this guy doesn't understand about the simple wisdom that it is better to have a cut of something than all of nothing. I'm not going to buy an older game for 50 bucks. Games depreciate, just how it is, the new games sell for what they will because they are must play, the deep discount sales give older games a second life.

Furthermore they don't have to print a box, stamp a disc or keep track/store excess inventory, digital sales are pretty much friction free sales for them, so the complaining is just weird. Folks who only play games were never your customers anyways, some people are cheap, nothing will change that.

 

[Epona]

Yet another reason Origin will never be able to truly compete with Steam.

Well their servers are better than steam´s and don´t crap out when you don´t want them to.
Also the games launch faster.

Congratulations, your the first person I've ever heard say good things about Origin.

Here's something else: You can use key from a retail boxed copy of any game (on Origin) to get a digital copy (on Origin)

...yet you can't register a digital key for Mass Effect from Steam on Origin.

 

[Podunk]

'I might not want it in the first month, but if I look at it in four or five months, I'll get one of those weekend sales and I'll buy it at that time at 75 percent off',"

Dude, I felt that way long before I'd even HEARD of Steam. If it weren't for those sales I would never have bought those games. Not ever. I'm sure indie and download games have a somewhat longer shelf life than AAA retail titles, I'm sure that the most money is made within the first 4-5 months. Furthermore, Steam has released the data that even after the sale ends the interest in the title that was generated translates into more sales at full price. Seems like Origin just wants you to give them all your money because shut up, that's why. This 'cheapening intellectual property' business is just a smokescreen.

 

[rdaleric]

I have 76 games in my steam library, I think I paid full price for at least half of them. A lot of the others were games I was not that interested in at release (such as bulletstorm, far cry 2 and blood bowl), but that I bought when they were on sale to have a go. I got an email from origin giving me 25% of any game for my birthday.....I really hope that is not their new thing to attract customers

 

[Daemascus]

Yet another reason Origin will never be able to truly compete with Steam.

Well their servers are better than steam´s and don´t crap out when you don´t want them to.
Also the games launch faster.

Congratulations, your the first person I've ever heard say good things about Origin.

Here's something else: You can use key from a retail boxed copy of any game (on Origin) to get a digital copy (on Origin)

Thing is, the last time I bought a boxed copy of a game it was Wrath of the Lich King. All my PC purchases since then have been digital downloads. And having 2 copies of a game stuck using the same bad service does not sound useful or appealing.

 

[tehweave]

EA? You know how you were voted the "worst company in america?" It's stuff like this that made that happen.

 

[MLP Skye]

Typical EA. I made a forum account just to voice my opinions on this...

@EA

Games are suposed to be fun, not about how much money you can line your pocket with. Steam will always be superior to Origin because they understand what it is to be a gamer.

Every single game you have made so far has sucked ASS. I cant remember the last good game you made. Why? Because you pushed them out the door asap just to sell copies (example: mass effect 3, KoToR, NFS games, Dragon Age II, I could go on). No empasis on fun or gameplay. Just money.

Its the same with Origin. Only reason you made origin was the make abit more money, as you didnt have to work with steam (dragon age drama)

Only reason I have it on my PC is because you made me put it on there when I brought a DISC copy of Mass effect 3.

I wish I had enough money to buy out EA. Id fire everybody and replace every single one of them.

 

[orangeban]

I would not have bought the original Half Life plus expansions if they weren't on sale, or Batman: Asylum (which led to me buying the sequel day of release), Company of Heroes (bought expansions full price), the original Deus Ex (bought Human Revolution full price), the Grand Theft Auto games, L.A. Noire and a bunch of other stuff.

If I couldn't buy these games on sale, I wouldn't have bought them at all. As far as I can see, sales increase purchases, since £40 is an awful lot to pay for something you aren't too sure about, but £20 is an easier pill to swallow.

 

[Iosifavich]

I have been using Steam for years now and I have been using ORIGIN since it was launched. Most of the stuff that STEAM sells for 75% off is more then 6months old or older. Most of the sales of a game release are similar to a Movie you make 90% of the sales in the first 6-8 weeks. Offering Things like Crysis/Crysis: Warhead at 75% off each ($9.99) a few weeks before Crysis 2 is launched can generate more sales for a game that's older and probably not making much money in the first place. It can possibly attract people who were not willing to pay the $59.99 price tag but are willing to pay 10$ on steam also may attract gamers who "herd the game was good but never got around to playing the first game" and in either case it may generate even more sales for the NEW Premium Title. Most of the time I have decided weather i am going to pay full price on a premium title long before it is release because i have player it predecessors or I like the publisher (Blizzard/Bioware/Crytec). I impuls by on STEAM because 10$ for a game that i missed last year is worth the risk and on occasion i have become a fan of a game (Defense Grid, Batman, Torchlight) and bough DLC/Premium game when a sequel was released.



Steam: Pro
Large User Base,
Access to Indi-Games,
Access to Large Publishing House Games,
Good Interface Design,
Cross-Title CHAT that can be incorporated in to any game,
Store/Save Game to the "Cloud",
Play games without being connected online,
Manage CD/Product Keys,
All titles available for digital distribution
Great Deals/Sales on Near Current Titles (6-12months old),
Sells older/hard to find games (2-10 year old+)
Ability to add in Titles,
Ability to Gift/Give Titles to friends
Steam: Con
Servers could use some tuning,
Not being able to select install path is annoying.

ORIGIN: Pro
EA Titles?
ORIGIN: Con
Bad Application the locks up/crashes,
Web-based Interface in some games,
Only EA/EA Partner Titles,
No Cross Title Chat/Interface,
No Indi-Games,
No way to add in non-EA titles,
Not all games are available for digital distribution,
No way to transfer ownership of a game.


ORIGIN is a good 3-5 years away to catching up to Steam if they wanted to, based on the comments coming from EA they dont care about the users they only care about their profit margins.

 

[ElPatron]

As much as i hate to admit it training gamers to wait 3 4 months before buying a game is not good in the short run only in the looooooooong run.

Because it's that much different from training gamers to wait a few weeks to buy games for 50 instead of 60 at retail.

Reason number 347 that Origin can fuck itself.

I had that on my computer for all of 12 hours while playing ME3 and I felt dirty the whole time.

Reasons 1-346 being hate EA because everyone else does?

Perhaps you should have read "Origin", not "EA". Perhaps you should have noticed the hyperbole. Perhaps you should have paid more attention to what EA has done if you think that the hate is just a bandwagon.

 

[tthor]

Translation: GIVE STEAM ALL OF YOUR MONEY...WE DON'T TAKE NO HANDOUTS

*shrug* if you insist! *continues following Steam while throwing money at it*

 

[Zorg Machine]

EA like to pretend that they are top dog so they can squeeze out some more money...what else is new?

 

[Quakester]

It's hard to take a speech about fairness and equality for all developers when he is giving the speech from his solid gold throne stacked on a huge pile of money while twirling his Snidely Whiplash mustache.

This is coming from the company that thought buying exclusive rights to the NFL was fair.

 

[Aprilgold]

I swear i've heard this before...pretty sure the guys at GOG said the same thing...

...and I still don't think they're right...

Like it or not, there's no arguing that Steam [http://store.steampowered.com] sales don't offer tremendously good deals.

I think you meant "DO"...

If everybody buys games just because their cheap and not because their good,then yes that decreases value.
Also everybody waiting is not good for the dev´s who need money the moment their done with a game and not 5 months down the line.

To point this out, if somebody wants a game they will buy a game unless they can't afford to.

Anyways, GoG's president said that this hurt devs more but there was a study shortly after showing that a game sold more on a sale then it did within a week of release. I can't remember the percent but it was something like 80% more, once again I'm not quite sure and the story was pretty much buried after.

The question is, do things like Black Friday hurt K-Mart or Walmart or does it help them? People will buy more of something the cheaper it is, and as such, gaining 1,000 5$ rapidly is better then gaining 100 60$ over the course of two years.

------------------ -------------------- ----------------------- ------------------- -----------

Same thing I said before with the GoG idiocy thing.

"GoG [EA now] is just pissy because their not toppling the king. GoG [Origin in this case] as a service is OK, but just pales in the comparison of Steam's accessibility and business decisions. GoG may be DRM free, but it isn't when you think about it. For GoG to work, you need a account to get your games, that is still a type of DRM. The same applies for Steam but Steam has more options once you get your account set up and the service downloaded is just overall better then GoG's interface.

Overall, fuck GoG for making the obviously stupid statement. Stop being piss-poor sods and whining about the competition and take the bull by the horns and jab it through the competition."

 

[aaron552]

Yet another reason Origin will never be able to truly compete with Steam.

Well their servers are better than steam´s and don´t crap out when you don´t want them to.
Also the games launch faster.

Congratulations, your the first person I've ever heard say good things about Origin.

Here's something else: You can use key from a retail boxed copy of any game (on Origin) to get a digital copy (on Origin)

...yet you can't register a digital key for Mass Effect from Steam on Origin.

You can if you bought it after 2008, I think. That's what I've been told, anyway.

 

[MyNameIsNowNotMyName]

Can't believe I'm the first to post this video.

But I have to hand it to EA, they really are a HORRIBLE publishers, and it's awful how many decent developers work under them and ruin them. I'm actually totally freaking OK with Activision now.

I just wish EA would GO AWAY FOREVER!!

Stop posting that immature propaganda aimed at 13 year old teens

Alright, who the fuck are you? All you've done in this thread is deny how shitty of a business EA runs. Are you serious? This video is about accurate for some of EA's titles. This is the same thing EA is doing, except this makes sense. What they're saying here is "immature propaganda" that doesn't make as much fucking sense .
(Typed using onscreen keyboard.) Mah god.

 

[BeerTent]

This is so fucking transparent, I feel like I'm wearing a second pair of glasses.

"We want more money to go to the publisher, because 75% sales damage the IP's that the publishers muscle out from studios."

 

[Vigormortis]

I tried to post all of this yesterday but apparently the captcha/solvemedia broke and blocked me. Oh well. Here're my responses...

I actually addressed your point earlier in this thread. I should also have been clearer. What I meant was that steam sales are bad for AAA titles that are being released these days.

For indie titles they arnt a bad thing since most indie developers cant really afford to advertise their game. A steam sale however is a good way to get more then five people to know your game exists. You can then try and rely on word of mouth to actually make some profit from it.

Except that that too is bullshit. Triple-A titles are going to sell big regardless. (unless they're really poorly made; and even then they often sell) Namely because they have more than just word-of-mouth to sell them. Those games will still sell tens of thousands of copies in the first week or two, if not more in many cases. Namely to the "gotta have it now" crowd.

What the Steam Sales do is get people to buy the games who either couldn't normally afford the games or were only mildly interested in them. This is nothing but good news for developers as it helps them maintain a steady revenue stream. One that would have normally dwindled to nothing within the first month or two.

That doesn't contradict the refutation I made of your argument.

The reason there aren't many third party games on Origin is no one want to jump on a sinking ship, there are just as many titles that owned by EA on Origin as there are titles owned by Valve on Steam.

Most MMO games are NOT free-to-play, they cost money to buy the game and a high fee EVERY MONTH. You claim it's the same as "zinga". That's not an argument, that's a baseless assertion. You might as well say "Odin is the one true god" and expect me to believe you.

And it shows your ignorance, the player base may make some of the content but THEY ARE PAID FOR THEIR CONTRIBUTIONS if they get officially adopted and featured! The only unpaid content is the content distributed for free that gamers install on their own initiative on their own install. Are you seriously holding it at a negative that Steam games have an active modding community that keeps their games fresh and interesting.

You're new to escapist aren't you?

In fact, Valve has paid out over 3.5 million dollars to TF2 item contributors, last time I checked. Name me another company that has paid even half that amount of cash to its own player base...

In the case of TF2 valve is simply acting as the retailer for other people to sell their stuff. Except the difference is that they are taking that content and going see see look at us we are releasing free content to people.

You act as though Valve is pretending like it's all their content...

They specifically tell you that some of it is community generated content. Hell, in the main menu they even have the Workshop listed; telling people they can "submit their creations to the community to be voted into the game".

You seem to be grasping at straw to come up with complaints here. I'm more curious why your so fervent in defending EA over this. Why are you in support of a publisher saying they want to keep digital game sales at $60+?

Spoiler: Spoilered for space.

Eh, not quite $0, you still need to pay for bandwidth, and you're still paying to keep some copies sitting on a server somewhere. But, then again, that's nothing compared to the costs of producing and distributing another physical copy of the game...

Thing is, the Steam Sales do three things.

1) They inspire brand loyalty. I ran across a phrase once, "there's no brand loyalty so strong it can survive a 50% off coupon." Steam's taken that idea and run screaming with it, and upped the ante. "50%? BULLSHIT! We'll do 90% off!" And we're off to the races. Steam may not be a perfect service, but the (now constant) sales transform it into a very likeable one.

2) They generate revenue. The big sales, Christmas, summer, groundhog day, those sales actually get people spending money on things they don't even want. Show of hands, who here has come out of a major Steam Sale with a backlog of 10 or more games? How many of those games would you have ever considered buying under normal circumstances? That 75% off tag causes all of us to loose our goddamn minds. It's not something we blame Steam for afterwards, which is pretty important. But still, it's money they would not have gotten otherwise.

3) They underline just how bullshit the $60 price point is. And that's what DeMartini's freaking out about. The $60 price point is absolute bullshit. It is simply an attempt to squeeze as much money out of the dwindling "buy it release day" crowd. Of course, DeMartini is looking in terror at the prospect of having to cut prices, because he assumes lower prices don't equal more sales... which is, idiotic.

Expertly said. Thank you for typing up what are essentially my own thoughts on this whole affair.

 

[TK421]

A cheap sale is better than no sale at all.

Exactly. Anyone who knows anything about microeconomics knows that selling 100 extra units and 50%/%75 off is better than selling no extra units at full price. What steam does is create a larger market for games than they had in the first place. Those who really want the game are going to buy it for $60 when it comes out, but most of those who wouldn't spend $60 would definitely spend $10/$15 on a game that looks pretty good.

This is why Origin is going to hopelessly fail.