don't buy games!

[Summo]

And the US are generally known for suing everyone in a 3-mile radius if they become a little miffed.

Originally posted by nath
Actually, Britons are known for not complaining.

That's true! Generally I'd say we whinge about everything but rarely actually do anything about it.

Generally.

 

[whipped]

Originally posted by Summo
And the US are generally known for suing everyone in a 3-mile radius if they become a little miffed.That's true!

And for being fat as well.

edit : Touche

 

[Summo]

Hah! My post-editing skills lay waste to your weak joke!

Ha-HAH!

 

[lovedaddy]

My view

I don't think games are over priced at all, far from it. Back in the days of the Amiga/ST, production could be done in a small bed room, minimal cost with few people.
Today, the smallest team you get is about 20-30 people. Usually very highly skilled.

What I think is disgusting is the difference in wages between lower staff and managment. Work for a developer at present. After our last hit, the top 3 brass, none of who werre actually involved in the production (yet own the company and are brothers), collected a cool 1 million quid from royalties. The next biggest slice was 60k for the lead programmer.

Video games should cost the price they do, but the hard work that actually goes into making the games generally doesn't find its way into the hands of those that deserve it.

My view - cut out the tossers at the top, the ones collecting the millions and drivng the 911s. Distribute between the people that actually spend the time and effort making whats a quality bit of entertainment.

 

[Testin da Cable]

heh, I feel for you mate...but welcome to the world

 

[lovedaddy]

Its not just me that im concerned for. Take out the crap at the top, your left with more money to spend on resources, better equipment, more staff. Which, in the end, should be passed onto the consumer in the form of better gaming. I'm not in it for the money, but there are some people in the industry that are getting screwed on a regular basis, who just stay because of the love for their subject matter. Ho hum, rant over. Back to work.

 

[Testin da Cable]

*cracks whip*

upper management must do _something_ surely

a good manager / director can have his/her cut imo. it's the cunts who award themselves and their friends a larger bonus / extras package for no real reason who make my hair stand on end.

 

[Happy Go Lucky]

I guess I'd like the games to be cheaper, about the same as DVD's & CD's, but the upshot of this would be games would be shorter, and consoles, would be more expensive.

PC games are unlikely to get any cheaper, because I don't think I would buy more games if they were cheaper, and the increasing amount of effort put into these games, to make sure they get good reviews. will probably see prices go up.

 

[granny]

DVD quality thing: Did some tests lastnight to see for myself, looked at a few region 1 and region 2 DVD's (big widescreen telly) and the Euro ones definitely have better visual quality. The poor (*relatively*) US visual quality was most noticable on the Aliens series, was quite disappointed when I compared them to the Euro DVD's I have, but it's also not 100% consistent. I suppose the only way to tell for sure would be to look at the same DVD from both regions.

Actual thread topic: Someone said the unit cost for games is probably only about £1 - I think that's wrong. Sure, the *hardware* part of a game (box, manual, CD etc) may only cost that much but that's completely ignoring the development costs which can be pretty astronomical, on a par with the cost of making a major film sometimes. But then this is bringing us into the realm of the "problem with software" which has been plaguing disciplines like systems analysis for decades now - software, unlike almost every other marketed product, is intangible - you're paying for bits & bytes, not physical atoms, so the usual pyramid of distributed complexity reduction falls apart a bit.

 

[Skyler]

Releasing them at 29.99 sounds fine to me, but 34.99 or sometimes even 39.99 does put me off

 

[dysfunction]

Originally posted by Skyler
Releasing them at 29.99 sounds fine to me, but 34.99 or sometimes even 39.99 does put me off

I agree...the 29.99 price isnt too bad...

 

[.cage]

I've had about 70 hours play out of final fantasy x, and about 30 ish of smash bros melee (mostly multiplayer) in the last couple of months.

Compare that to most of my PC games, which I install, play for 10 minutes, get bored, and uninstall.

I think the former is the best investment tbh :/

 

[Insane]

£29.99 is reasonable, if you want to argue otherwise just look at John Carmack and his three ferarris. remember every quake game was sold close to the £40 mark over here

pity playstation2 games still cost £35.99+

and I was looking to buying Burnout 2 later as well

 

[Sar]

Well I'll be paying only £21-£24 for most new releases now.

 

[Sar]

Originally posted by Insane
£29.99 is reasonable, if you want to argue otherwise just look at John Carmack and his three ferarris. remember every quake game was sold close to the £40 mark over here

Nope, the first two were sold at less than £30, and the dearest I saw Q3 anywhere was £34.99, but it was £29.99 in most places.

I bought all 3 on their respective release days.

 

[whipped]

Penny Arcade have their say -> here

 

[Insane]

Originally posted by Sar
Well I'll be paying only £21-£24 for most new releases now.

so you got that job then

must remember to pop in on my way home a lot more just to irritate the heck outta you

sorry my wrong I was thinking of the Dixons Group pricing policy there. even if the games 3 yrs old, if we got excess stock we'll flog it at the original RRP
think the "local" PC world still sells Red Alert 2 for £39.99!!!

online retailers are handy enough for price, but you just cant hold the box in your hands and glaze longingly at the back of the pack wishing "my machine could run it that high"

 

[Testin da Cable]

Originally posted by Sar
Well I'll be paying only £21-£24 for most new releases now.

well done

 

[Sar]

Originally posted by Insane


so you got that job then

must remember to pop in on my way home a lot more just to irritate the heck outta you

Aye, I'll be the one saying:

"Excuse me sir, but I'm going to have to ask you to leave the store, company policy"

 

[Insane]

Originally posted by Sar


Aye, I'll be the one saying:

"Excuse me sir, but I'm going to have to ask you to leave the store, company policy"

ha! but then i wont buy an X-box from yourselves then! so you wont get commission on it!...

you DO get commission dont you???

 

[Will]

If they were on commision, would the staff all be standing behind the counter admiring the lastest console release? I think not.

 

[Sar]

I have no idea if we get commission tbh

Not really worried either, as long as I have a decent wage coming in then I'll be happy enough - better than £57 a week off the brew anyway

 

[Insane]

Originally posted by Sar
Not really worried either, as long as I have £57 a week for the "brew" anyway

potchene!

love fixing quotes

 

[prime1]

Hmm, the PAL/US quality thing is a bit weird, Im only saying what i read on a news report, maybe it only happens for some releases?

Comparing music CDs to games isnt fair, a music CD is over priced in comparrison. A game comes with manuals, sometiems multiple cds and more packages, so the raw content costs are highers. Cds sell to a MUCH larger audience than games, just about everyone has a CD player, so u potentially selling to everyone, games are more limited.

Music CD makers can also recoup losses through live shows etc

There is no way you could sell computer games on the same pricing scale as CDs, unless you get in to the MMOG genre, which has found a way to keep money coming in, and who typically charge less for the initial purchase (or they bundle a number of free months subscription with the game).

30-35 seems fair to me, for a quality game. Sometimes you buy a game, like battlefield 1941, wich seems unfinished and full of bugs, seems like the code was left un-optimised, and requries a patch imediately before you can se it online, in which case the 30-35 figure is rip off.

Anything more than 35 for a pc game is rediculous, most console games go tfor 40-50, but as said before, the consoles cost less, so its swings and roundabouts).

 

[Will]

And he does it again...

 

[Sar]

Lol Insane, yer it'll help pay for that wee habit as well

And Lol @ prime1 - fuck sake sort that aim out!

 

[prime1]

what i do?

 

[Will]

Originally posted by prime1
what i do?

Well, now I read up, you've just tried to drag the thread back on topic. But you can't have it, no.

 

[prime1]

o. sorry

 

[dysfunction]

Originally posted by prime1
o. sorry

Dont be sorry! Get even!