What's the point of a 2-3 day free weekend for a game?

[Ghosty]

Hi guys,
I was just wondering what's the point of it.. I see these games having free weekends and stuff but I don't get the point because..
You get to install the game and download it which takes time by itself.
You finally got the game and can play a day or two.
You can't play the game anymore because the weekend ended.

I am not sure if it works like this but that's what I am guessing.. Wonder if I understood something wrong? I mean you pretty much get a tease from a game and you would probably save space and benefit more from a demo.

[Silicon Vampire]

demos cost a lot for nearly no return. Free weekends allow you to try it and see if you want to buy it. you do not have to participate.

[☯ Zeroxia]

It is there to bring new players into the game. The game on a free weekends gets a discount too during that. And during a free weekend you can try the game for a long enough time to decide if you want to buy it or not. It is better than a demo in most cases. A demo gives you a good part of the game to play and after that you have to stop and pay if you want more. During a free weekend you can enjoy the game as much as you want untill the free weekend is over.

[Silicon Vampire]

many demos end up not being representative of the final game...

[Midnight Sky ✨🌙✨]

Pretty much what everyone said.

It works, too. Free weekends sold me on Grid 2, Killing Floor, and Injustice among others. Can't think of one demo that did that.

[Kevin]

As my first comment was removed probably not polite enough, Please just try the game, companies spend a lot of money to offer free weekends/samples of their games, by ignoring a chance like this you are missing out on what they are offering which is a nice deal, you can pull a pretty fun campaign of total war rome 2 within the weekend

[Kargor]

Originally posted by |eG| Mr. Fantastic Fox:

companies spend a lot of money to offer free weekends/samples of their games

Are they? Does Steam actually charge them for a free weekend?

Demos do require some form of development -- the build system on the game has to be able to build another version of the game with a different overall configuration (like, for example, most levels and associated data not included, no achievements, no this and no that). While this needs to be setup just once, it's still something that someone has to do at some point if you want to make a demo, and QA should be looking at the demo as well.

[J4MESOX4D]

These free 'weekends' usually run from thursday until monday. If you cannot download, install and play the game in that period of time; you should probably get a better internet connection.

[Mu'Ammar of Carthus]

Originally posted by Silicon Vampire:

demos cost a lot for nearly no return.

<removed>

Besides, if demos cost so much money, why not just take the free weekend thing, make it like 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on the game, and make it permanent.

Like, you see a game on steam that looks interesting, you can download it and play it for free for 30 minutes at any time.

[J4MESOX4D]

Originally posted by The Bat:

Originally posted by Silicon Vampire:

demos cost a lot for nearly no return.

<removed>

Besides, if demos cost so much money, why not just take the free weekend thing, make it like 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on the game, and make it permanent.

Like, you see a game on steam that looks interesting, you can download it and play it for free for 30 minutes at any time.

That would obliterate the servers with an overwhelmed amount of traffic. People that pirate games have no intention of buying the product and that is no excuse to see if a game is good or not. Reputable user reviews and gameplay footage is more than enough to suffice for most gamers to make a judgement.

[Silicon Vampire]

Originally posted by The Bat:

Originally posted by Silicon Vampire:

demos cost a lot for nearly no return.

<removed>

Besides, if demos cost so much money, why not just take the free weekend thing, make it like 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on the game, and make it permanent.

Like, you see a game on steam that looks interesting, you can download it and play it for free for 30 minutes at any time.

that's nothing but a rationalization that thieves use to justify stealing what they don't want to pay for.

[Ghosty]

Originally posted by Hempest:

Get a real internet connection

Oh sure because 20-50gb games nowadays download in just a few minutes with a REAL connection.. Psh..

[Spawn of Totoro]

Originally posted by J4MESOX4D:

These free 'weekends' usually run from thursday until monday. If you cannot download, install and play the game in that period of time; you should probably get a better internet connection.

Just a correction. "Free weekends" last from Thursday (typicaly 10:00am PST) to Sunday at 1:00pm PST or 48 hours after the start of the download.