What happened to game demos?

[Ankido]

Do you guys remember those days when they had Demo's for PC's? You try out the game and see if you like it. It was awesome. If I didn't like a game I wouldn't buy it. It's really different from watching someone play on twitch and experience it for yourself. I guess they don't want you to know how bad their games are. Hmm...quite sad.

[kdodds]

Messaggio originale di Start_Running:

Messaggio originale di kdodds:

Market data analysis does not require a formal study. There is, in fact, no better data than actual, real world, numbers IN PRACTICE. Be that as it may, I do agree to some extent. For instance, perhaps the developers of those hot games rightfully assessed that their games did not need demos. Or any of dozens of other possible explanations that belie causation.

Well they do know that in th shareware era. The saw many people sticking to the free shareware as opposed to buying the full game.

Yeah, but there again you have a premier developer (id Software) that was literally born and raised on the shareware model (as well as full version "leaks").

[Start_Running]

Messaggio originale di kdodds:

Messaggio originale di Start_Running:

Well they do know that in th shareware era. The saw many people sticking to the free shareware as opposed to buying the full game.

Yeah, but there again you have a premier developer (id Software) that was literally born and raised on the shareware model (as well as full version "leaks").

Yup, but there were quite a few other developers that experienced similar effects but did not whether them so well.... I.,e If your demo is great... people will just play the demo and not bother with the game.

Make a bad demo and people won't buy the game and make a mediocre demo and well.. back to square one. It's why Shareware on a whole was abandoned, well until it re-emerged as F2p

[ByMrAlex]

:)

[helios]

Games are good but demo's are gg slayed

[Kill Switch]

It is widely believed that a catastrophic event occurred that wiped demos off the face of the planet.

[YoWutSup]

Pretty much the standards of your ordinary gamer has lowered over the past ten years.

It's no longer an issue if the game is to your liking but if it will even work on day one.

[Icedwhisper]

Messaggio originale di bumbinoguy:

Do you guys remember those days when they had Demo's for PC's? You try out the game and see if you like it. It was awesome. If I didn't like a game I wouldn't buy it. It's really different from watching someone play on twitch and experience it for yourself. I guess they don't want you to know how bad their games are. Hmm...quite sad.

There still are.. I mean why not just download the pirated version and then see if you like it and then buy the game? much better this way + if you do like it, When you buy the game you can just move the game to the steam install Dir and steam will detect the game and just update it to the latest version and "Uncrack" the game..

[Kill Switch]

Unless you want to be infected with malware, then I would advise against Icedwhisper's suggestion.

Weird, I can't quote him.

[Icedwhisper]

Messaggio originale di Kill Switch:

Unless you want to be infected with malware, then I would advise against Icedwhisper's suggestion.

Weird, I can't quote him.

Haha, Thats a thing of the past.. If you aren't a total noob, You wont get infected by malware.. But yeah, there are chances, But Black box and the "Official Sites" never really give you malware, They are 100% working, I know since well, I just know xD

[Kill Switch]

Messaggio originale di Icedwhisper:

If you aren't a total noob, You wont get infected by malware..

You're suggesting this activity to people who may be total noobs and have a high probability of becoming infected.

[Icedwhisper]

Messaggio originale di Kill Switch:

Messaggio originale di Icedwhisper:

If you aren't a total noob, You wont get infected by malware..

You're suggesting this activity to people who may be total noobs and have a high probability of becoming infected.

Windows defender will take care of that xD But yeah, I guess I should have stated that noobs shouldn't try this at home :P

[Kill Switch]

Messaggio originale di Icedwhisper:

Windows defender will take care of that xD

Not sure if you're toying with me or not. Fact: no anti-malware solution can defend you against some of the latest threats. Polymorphic malware is extremely difficult to detect. You could be infected right now and not even realize it. This isn't alarmist, it's reality.

Anyone who values their identity or financial assets should refrain from engaging in activity which is likely to compromise them.

[Tito Shivan]

Messaggio originale di Start_Running:

Well they do know that in th shareware era. The saw many people sticking to the free shareware as opposed to buying the full game.

I played the shareware version of Hexxen up to boredom back in time. So i did with the Doom shareware version.

Messaggio originale di kdodds:

Yeah, but there again you have a premier developer (id Software) that was literally born and raised on the shareware model (as well as full version "leaks").

We're long past that age. Shareware business model was a child of its time. Just like F2P is also a child of its own era.
You just can't swap them around in time and expect to work the same.

[Kill Switch]

Messaggio originale di Tito Shivan:

We're long past that age. Shareware business model was a child of its time. Just like F2P is also a child of its own era.

We're now in the era of paying to play games in their alpha stages or crowdfunding games that haven't even begun development. I can't even imagine what the next step in our evolution will be... or how it can be worse.

(I should say DEvolution.)

[kdodds]

Messaggio originale di Tito Shivan:

Messaggio originale di kdodds:

Yeah, but there again you have a premier developer (id Software) that was literally born and raised on the shareware model (as well as full version "leaks").

We're long past that age. Shareware business model was a child of its time. Just like F2P is also a child of its own era.
You just can't swap them around in time and expect to work the same.

Understood. Just illustrating that, for games that the market WANTS, en masse, the models of "partial giveaway" do still work. For those games, anyway. This is, in itself, illustrative of what seems to be fact, that good games sell themselves and bad games... well people just aren't as likely to be willing to pay for or invest money in them. Ultimately, what I'm getting at is that demos probably DO hurt sales for some games, while actually helping others, even to the point of "making" a developer. This implies that those games hurt or potentially hurt by demo releases aren't worth buying (to the "tryers") in the first place. This then leads to the conclusion that the decision makers, dev or pub, are more interested in selling their product to people they know will be unhappy with it than standing behind the quality of that product.