Is it me or are games becoming way too expensive for what they are?

[Grantorino]

Edit: I don't care about this thread anymore so just let it fade away please. Thank you.

[crunchyfrog]

Start_Running の投稿を引用：

Bishop の投稿を引用：

Yeah Nioh 2 is a prime example of that (its preorder costs 60€ against 50$ in US). There's not a single good reason to justify demanding from EU players to pay 10 euro more on top of 1 to 1 euro to dollar conversion.

DOn't y'all have that VAT tax that gets added to the prices?

There's also the matter of pricing parity with physical retailers which the publishers are LEGALLY obligated to maintain for a period of time.

There's one small thing I'd append to that (and I can't say this for certain).

The legal obligation for price parity is a weird one, or at least it is here in Britain (and I guess, by extension Europe). We have a thing called RRP (recommended retail price). It's not a legal obligation by any means, as it's just what the manufacturer recommends it be sold at.

This is tiny bit outside my wheelhouse (plus I may have simply forgotten, as I've been retired for a few years now), but the EU laws about this are quite odd - there's "narrow" parity and "wide" parity, and I'm buggered if I can remember the details about them.

But in general, I'm reasonably sure that there isn't much in the way of this parity that I'm aware of.

I know from back in the day during the PS1 era when I was doing that writing for certain magazines, I got to know a few store owners around the country, and these small indie shops would often bemoan that they were charged one price for retail games which only gave them around 50p profit on a £29.99 game, which was mad. I've no idea if that's the case now.

Of course, not only that, but to make matters worse, supermarkets were starting to race ahead and put these indies out of business because they were ordering shedloads and getting bulk discounts (so not price parity particularly) and they could therefore sell them a bit cheaper and make more profit.

So I'm not entirely sure that's the case today. I could be well and truly wrong though.

[Start_Running]

'Price Parity' As I recall the phrase is more meant as a protection/assurance for retailers. Basically, it boils down to a promise that the publisher will not turn around and undercut the retailers. Essentially telling the retailers the game is a RRP/MSRP of $60. Then after you've sold and shipped you turn around and put the game up for a base retail price of $40 on your site. Essentially making the retailers you sold to look overpriced by comparisson and fuunneling direct orders from your website. Meanwhile the retailers will either have to cut their price to match yours or they get stuck with a bunch of unsold units.

It still happens today. TYhere's a reason you'll never see much difference between the base price of a game on STeam, GoG, EGS, etc. There is literally a clause in the contract that prevents a publisher from doing that.

Mind you this only reflects on the *base* retail price. The sale price or discount is another thing.
That was actually one of the reasons EGS got in trouble in one of their early sales when they applied a $5 store discount to the base price without properly indicating it.

So yeah this price parity is a thing that still happens. BEtween any two retail stores however there needn't be any such parity. Though in some cases publishers/suppliers will put a clause limiting how low you can sell the product for. But gebnerally the store can set their own prices.

Things are more complicated on the sales/retail/distribution end of things than most people realize.

[crunchyfrog]

Start_Running の投稿を引用：

'Price Parity' As I recall the phrase is more meant as a protection/assurance for retailers. Basically, it boils down to a promise that the publisher will not turn around and undercut the retailers. Essentially telling the retailers the game is a RRP/MSRP of $60. Then after you've sold and shipped you turn around and put the game up for a base retail price of $40 on your site. Essentially making the retailers you sold to look overpriced by comparisson and fuunneling direct orders from your website. Meanwhile the retailers will either have to cut their price to match yours or they get stuck with a bunch of unsold units.

It still happens today. TYhere's a reason you'll never see much difference between the base price of a game on STeam, GoG, EGS, etc. There is literally a clause in the contract that prevents a publisher from doing that.

Mind you this only reflects on the *base* retail price. The sale price or discount is another thing.
That was actually one of the reasons EGS got in trouble in one of their early sales when they applied a $5 store discount to the base price without properly indicating it.

So yeah this price parity is a thing that still happens. BEtween any two retail stores however there needn't be any such parity. Though in some cases publishers/suppliers will put a clause limiting how low you can sell the product for. But gebnerally the store can set their own prices.

Things are more complicated on the sales/retail/distribution end of things than most people realize.

Ah that makes more sense.

I just couldn't for the life of me recall anything in law.

[Start_Running]

crunchyfrog の投稿を引用：

Start_Running の投稿を引用：

'Price Parity' As I recall the phrase is more meant as a protection/assurance for retailers. Basically, it boils down to a promise that the publisher will not turn around and undercut the retailers. Essentially telling the retailers the game is a RRP/MSRP of $60. Then after you've sold and shipped you turn around and put the game up for a base retail price of $40 on your site. Essentially making the retailers you sold to look overpriced by comparisson and fuunneling direct orders from your website. Meanwhile the retailers will either have to cut their price to match yours or they get stuck with a bunch of unsold units.

It still happens today. TYhere's a reason you'll never see much difference between the base price of a game on STeam, GoG, EGS, etc. There is literally a clause in the contract that prevents a publisher from doing that.

Mind you this only reflects on the *base* retail price. The sale price or discount is another thing.
That was actually one of the reasons EGS got in trouble in one of their early sales when they applied a $5 store discount to the base price without properly indicating it.

So yeah this price parity is a thing that still happens. BEtween any two retail stores however there needn't be any such parity. Though in some cases publishers/suppliers will put a clause limiting how low you can sell the product for. But gebnerally the store can set their own prices.

Things are more complicated on the sales/retail/distribution end of things than most people realize.

Ah that makes more sense.

I just couldn't for the life of me recall anything in law.

Yup. There's not Law that enforces it beyond contract law.
And given the penalties that can exist for such things...not to mention the rep you get for breaking contracts.

[crunchyfrog]

Start_Running の投稿を引用：

crunchyfrog の投稿を引用：

Ah that makes more sense.

I just couldn't for the life of me recall anything in law.

Yup. There's not Law that enforces it beyond contract law.
And given the penalties that can exist for such things...not to mention the rep you get for breaking contracts.

Ooh yes. You're dead right there.

The was one store back in that time I spoke of who decided it'd be a good idea to try and undercut those agreed prices and not tell anyone, on the basis it would attract more trade their way and in turn lead to them selling more, and being able to get better discounts buying in bulk.

Unfortunately for them once Sony found out, that was them black balled from any new games.

[Sorceress]

Bishop の投稿を引用：

Yeah Nioh 2 is a prime example of that (its preorder costs 60€ against 50$ in US). There's not a single good reason to justify demanding from EU players to pay 10 euro more on top of 1 to 1 euro to dollar conversion.

Nioh 2 is published by Koei, good luck seeing any discount if game sells well.

[Brian9824]

It's not just EA, Sony and Take Two among others are also doing so. Again its not surprising as game prices haven't kept up with inflation. The development cost for many big AAA games have increased and the price increase is nothing new.

Back in 1986 when the original Legend of Zelda first released it cost $49.99 which adjusted for inflation would be 118.77 today.

Welcome to the world of inflation. The same reason why gas costs over a dollar, and you can't buy a piece of candy for a nickel.

[Slim Shady]

brian9824 の投稿を引用：

It's not just EA, Sony and Take Two among others are also doing so. Again its not surprising as game prices haven't kept up with inflation. The development cost for many big AAA games have increased and the price increase is nothing new.

Back in 1986 when the original Legend of Zelda first released it cost $49.99 which adjusted for inflation would be 118.77 today.

Welcome to the world of inflation. The same reason why gas costs over a dollar, and you can't buy a piece of candy for a nickel.

most common ppl who even played then got it in a second hand bundle of 10 or more games for half the price tho didn they ?XD

[Start_Running]

Slim Shady の投稿を引用：

I think start running must be CEO of EA games, its either that or he is too braindead to understand there is no reason whatsoever to justify rising game prices. 2 weeks leater he is still in this thread fighing everyone xD

I think you missed the pointt. A developer doesn't really need to justtify a price increase. The seller can sell their goods or service for what ever they want.

The simple truth is, its more surprising that games have maintained a $60 price all these years when you cobnsider what you paid $60 for 10 20, 30, 40 years back.

I am too tired to argue witht the stupid, i found this vid on the web just now:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7kaK2-725w

Yeah and Jim Sterling has never actually developed a game in his life.
And he makes a point of parroting whatever's popular senttiment among his viewer base, because you know, thats where *his* money comes from. I'm quite sure he'd be the first to say he should be getting paiid more in ad revenue though ;)

I mean I'm speaking as someone who's amazed people pay even $50 for a single game. I've never paid more than $10 for a single game...And I've managed to get quite a few games in my library...

[Start_Running]

Slim Shady の投稿を引用：

brian9824 の投稿を引用：

It's not just EA, Sony and Take Two among others are also doing so. Again its not surprising as game prices haven't kept up with inflation. The development cost for many big AAA games have increased and the price increase is nothing new.

Back in 1986 when the original Legend of Zelda first released it cost $49.99 which adjusted for inflation would be 118.77 today.

Welcome to the world of inflation. The same reason why gas costs over a dollar, and you can't buy a piece of candy for a nickel.

most common ppl who even played then got it in a second hand bundle of 10 or more games for half the price tho didn they ?XD

Uhm.. that really didn't happen unless you picked it up in like a garage sale in 1995 or something.

[Brian9824]

Slim Shady の投稿を引用：

brian9824 の投稿を引用：

It's not just EA, Sony and Take Two among others are also doing so. Again its not surprising as game prices haven't kept up with inflation. The development cost for many big AAA games have increased and the price increase is nothing new.

Back in 1986 when the original Legend of Zelda first released it cost $49.99 which adjusted for inflation would be 118.77 today.

Welcome to the world of inflation. The same reason why gas costs over a dollar, and you can't buy a piece of candy for a nickel.

most common ppl who even played then got it in a second hand bundle of 10 or more games for half the price tho didn they ?XD

Not really, I mean there were used game stores, but it was about a decade later that they started to become more mainstream. Not to mention that people can use those same used gamestores now, and their "discounts" aren't very good on used games anyways.

People don't have to buy it at $70, games drop in price now far faster then they did back then in part because there is far more competition for people's attention and shelf space.

[AustrAlien2010]

No. I can easily justify this. The question is: Can you justify paying them any less?

You watch a movie. That is 15,- dollars for maybe two hours of entertainment?
You buy a game. That is 70,- dollars for hundreds of hours of entertainment.
That is still cheap.

[Brian9824]

Slim Shady の投稿を引用：

Start_Running の投稿を引用：

Uhm.. that really didn't happen unless you picked it up in like a garage sale in 1995 or something.

I am not going to argue with you again, your just too supid to understand I alreayd won the argument, excpet when I win you come here and start doing psychological profiles on me, stating the obvious and derailing the converstion or ignoring what I already epxlained to you. Like I said you must be EA's CEO xD Which mean you know nothing of making games probably even less than Jim Sterling XDDD

He is 100% correct, used games stores didn't get prevalent till the mid 90's, and even then their prices for new release games were and still are a joke. You'd be able to get a used game for $5 less then retail price.

It's not even debateable that games cost way more when you factor inflation in and haven't been keeping up with it for decades.

I mean heck - Streets of Rage 2 was sold for $65 at launch - https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/1993gp.jpg

Star Wars Shadow of the Empire and Wave Racer 64 were sold at $70 back in N64 days - https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/1997gp.jpg

Yet people keep forgetting this and ignoring facts.

[Crazy Tiger]

Slim Shady の投稿を引用：

Explain to the man how can you win an argument if it isnt a competition please ?XD Why am I even talkoing to you if you cant understand the basic communications XD

So basic communication is shouting that you "won" in an attempt to shut someone down? Odd, only place I see such things in the offline world is in politics. That too is a place where that type of debating can't be taken serious.

Also doesn't change in any way that the prices of sellers get justified by the people who pay the prices.

[crunchyfrog]

Slim Shady の投稿を引用：

I think start running must be CEO of EA games, its either that or he is too braindead to understand there is no reason whatsoever to justify rising game prices. 2 weeks leater he is still in this thread fighing everyone xD

I am too tired to argue witht the stupid, i found this vid on the web just now:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7kaK2-725w

No the issue is you don't understand how logic works.

Start Running has given you explanation of WHY they're doing it. That DOES NOT mean he agrees with it.

I don't get why so many people fall for that daft set of logic. By this weird reasoning, every history teacher must therefore be a nazi for exaplining the second world war. You see how stupid that is?

So please, be better, because that's not what was said at all.