seven
N6
All the things.
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR, Anthem, Mass Effect Legendary Edition
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Post by seven on May 8, 2019 0:16:45 GMT
My favourite is the current top comment -
"No loot = No complaining about loot = Problem solved.
Bioware Magic."
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N5
Always teacher, sometimes writer
Teaching Mode Activated
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
PSN: LinksOcarina
Posts: 3,179 Likes: 4,063
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Post by linksocarina on May 8, 2019 0:35:25 GMT
It matters only to a point, as I said basic 101 economics like supply and demand really only works in theory, when in practice too many external factors change the parameters, from price of production, globalization, second hand markets, physical vs digital, all of that. Thats before DLC and other costs along with consumer participation. I'm not exactly sure how to say it any plainer than that, it's not as simple as you make it out to be. Thanks for your brilliant insight that there is more to economics than supply and demand.The ideal price though is a profit x people who will purchase calculation. If a consumer is only willing to pay $10 for your item the fact you paid $20 to make it is irrelevant to the consumer as they only see $10 of value. Finding that right price isn’t easy and there are multiple factors going into it but my costs aren’t going to change what people are willing to pay. For good or bad. If people are willing to pay $1000 and it only costs me $10 to make it, I’m still going to sell it at $1000. That kind of profit will motivate competitors to move into the market or copy my cheaper production methods so it likely won’t last. But you take it while you can. In a new market I’m probably going to set my price at a making a profit point though if that doesn’t work I’d shift to minimizing my loss. There are exceptions like where I’m expecting a loss the first generation of goods. But, Games aren’t a new market so they have more information to form a price. Their information is currently keeping it at $70. And yes I assume it will eventually hit $100. Personally I expect a $10 jump at the next console launch. It’s a psychological shift where people will be more likely to pay more for the games as they will perceive then as more advanced and therefore more valuable. But the game companies will be looking at competitors, marketing, focus groups etc to get a idea for how far they can push it this generation. Some will balk at the price but as the majority accepts it even holdouts will for the most part cave. That's all fairly true, the problem though is you assume a company or seller is really interested in what the consumer sees as inherently valuable. Or, that they have a concept of value to begin with. A game publisher was historically a massive loss leader in 90% of their actual products until recently, mostly due to the introduction of the service model, internalization of in house hardware, digital distribution and the like. So, yes, what people are willing to pay for that is all part of the equation. That's all true and I concede the point. But my problem is its artificially held below costs due to new revenue streams making up the difference, leading into the record profits despite less games actually being bought year to year. Both the indie and AAA markets are basically losing more than they gain due to straight up production costs due to consumer demand for features, graphics, and the like at the $60, we all agree on that. for every game that makes it", i.e, becomes GTA V or Call of Duty, you have a dozen or so more that dont, despite bring popular. Of course those two are the most egregious examples, but the profit margins for most games at the 60 price tag are fairly thin at best. The financial incentive for the extra stuff is why it actually exists, and is persistent despite the fact that you have many consumers who grumble about this. Either that, or we should just admit that consumers don't care because the product is serving their needs with those added costs. I am of two minds on that personally. The point I have been trying to make is that consumer threshold for cost is either non existent anymore for the gaming industry because the majority of consumers already pay more as is, so it's already $100, or its artificially at $60 for now because of alternative revenue streams by corporations, and has less to do with the threshold of the buyer in a state of equilibrium.
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Post by SirSourpuss on May 8, 2019 0:47:25 GMT
That's all fairly true, the problem though is you assume a company or seller is really interested in what the consumer sees as inherently valuable On the other hand, you assume that consumers are willing to pay up to 10% of their monthly salary on a single video game. People will simply not be able to afford it. A company's plan is always a wide target audience and price/performance. A $40 increase in sales price, right off the bat, for a product that you know will be in beta/early access for another year, will deter a lot of people off. You seem to have a giant disconnect with the general public. I don't think they are the cattle you consider them to be.
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Post by Pounce de León on May 8, 2019 1:05:04 GMT
100 bucks? For the current quality released on triple A markets? What is this? Wishful thinking? Spinning tales of poor AAA business? Dream on - as long as the market is oversaturated with yearly clones that's not gonna happen.
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N5
Always teacher, sometimes writer
Teaching Mode Activated
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
PSN: LinksOcarina
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Post by linksocarina on May 8, 2019 1:05:34 GMT
That's all fairly true, the problem though is you assume a company or seller is really interested in what the consumer sees as inherently valuable On the other hand, you assume that consumers are willing to pay up to 10% of their monthly salary on a single video game. People will simply not be able to afford it. A company's plan is always a wide target audience and price/performance. A $40 increase in sales price, right off the bat, for a product that you know will be in beta/early access for another year, will deter a lot of people off. You seem to have a giant disconnect with the general public. I don't think they are the cattle you consider them to be. And yet people find ways to pay $1000 for a phone every other year. Maybe I am being a bit cynical, but I think we underestimate the general public in making an informed decison here. If folks are already considered "whales" by companies through gaming as a service, I would not be surprised if folks also take that plunge to pay for a rising cost. I want to be wrong about that, but the problem with capitalism and consumerism is we buy into nonsense more than we admit we do. Two things will happen when that does occur too: lots of piracy, and less risks in the AAA market. Two things I personally don't want to see.
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Post by clips7 on May 8, 2019 1:36:50 GMT
I for one know that i won't be paying $100 for any game right off the bat. Now as its already been mentioned, some folks pay $100 bucks for special editions of games and there is a market for that, but charging $100 for games in general is not gonna gain any traction. Sure you will have idiots that will pay for that price jump, but the majority will not budge on that. Companies will just continue to do what they are doing now,...charge for dlc and extra content....and yes you can come back around and say "well you are paying 100 bucks for the game in that sense"...which is true, but that is still optional.
I agree that most firms today take a loss on the 60 market price, but as already mentioned, they make up for this through dlc and other micro transactions. I just like to go back to when the xbox 1 was being discussed and they mentioned something about "being online all the time" and "consoles not being able to play used games"...lol the backlash behind that was brutal and the xbox1 would have been DOA if they stayed with that marketing plan.
Sony was planning something similar as well, but quickly dropped their absurd strategy as well that was similar to microsofts at the time, (they was basically waiting to see the reaction to MS plans) but came back around and stated that they never planned for the ps4 to be designed NOT to play used games or your friends games....that was the industry completely trying to control the consumers product and it completely back fired.
My point is that companies will test the waters to see what consumers will pay for and i always knew that the whole micro-transactions/dlc would spiral out of control the minute they started charging for extra costumes in games when those aspects would normally be unlocked when you cleared the game...companies saw what folks was willing to pay for so they locked those features behind dlc/ micro-transactions....lol and now some want to complain when they have nobody to blame but themselves.....
Its probably why you rarely see GOTY editions anymore....i was waiting for ME3 GOTY edition, but lol that is never going to happen...i finally broke down and purchased "The Citadel" and "The Leviathan" DLC...just last year. (after a 7 year stretch) ..something i stated i would never do...but luckily the DLC's are pretty good and add significant backstory to the Reaper story....well Citadel was just a feel good moment, but still good...
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Post by OdanUrr on May 8, 2019 1:38:07 GMT
TweetOh, wow. You know, I had someone tell me, around the end of March, that Anthem sold about 4 million copies, as I was projecting somewhere around the 5 million mark. I was skeptical at first, but the more I thought about it, the more plausible it seemed to me, to be just off that 5 million mark. I didn't expect him to be this right, though. The game just crashed after the first week, didn't it? It says something when selling 4 million copies is considered a failure by EA. Then again, they've always had rather unreasonable expectations for their games.
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Post by Hier0phant on May 8, 2019 2:16:44 GMT
I remember when Dead Space 3 needed to sell 5 million copies in order to be considered a success when it's predecessor's lifetime sales hovered around 2 million.
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
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Post by cypherj on May 8, 2019 2:36:57 GMT
TweetOh, wow. You know, I had someone tell me, around the end of March, that Anthem sold about 4 million copies, as I was projecting somewhere around the 5 million mark. I was skeptical at first, but the more I thought about it, the more plausible it seemed to me, to be just off that 5 million mark. I didn't expect him to be this right, though. The game just crashed after the first week, didn't it? 5-6 million was always a big ask, not to mention there are other expectations they would have failed to meet like player drop off rate. I've always though 4 million sounded like a good guess frankly. Someone was running around saying Anthem would have sold half their expectations, which is just way too low a guess imo. I've been asking whose been doing the the projections since Andromeda. 6-10 million was the expectation for that game. 5-6 million in 5 weeks for Anthem, I mean those are a little off. I'm not surprised it didn't make it though. I wonder what the MTX revenue looked like, because that would be a big indicator form them as well. Origin access subscriptions. They probably had a lot of expectations past the actual unit sale total. Companies want that recurring revenue more then they want the up front investment nowadays. That's why they give game away for free. Look at Apex legends. They had nothing but good things to say about how that game was doing. It's why I could never see video game prices going up to $100 in the live services era. You're just limiting the number of people who contribute to the mtx revenue the more you charge. Would you rather sell a $60 game + $40 mtx to one million people, or just get $40 in mtx from 5 million people because the player pool is so much larger due to the game being free or lower priced?
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Post by masterwarderz on May 8, 2019 5:33:50 GMT
Yeah, I never denied that price change occurs, but if it isn't driven by inflation or dynamic economic shift then they are idiots who deserve their company to receive the scorn it will for thinking their production demands 18% mark up over literally everyone else. You speak like this is only about one company. The whole industry is going to eventually shift. Then you are merely echoing my point if it's simply pricing dynamic brought on market shift from one year to the next. Agreed upon market standard doesn't allow for it now in the capacity for it being increased by that extent anyway. Seriously this is just me repeating my remark on you over and over again and you ignoring it to suit narrative. I'm putting an end to the conversation if the reply to this doesn't actually acknowledge what my point was.
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Post by masterwarderz on May 8, 2019 5:34:54 GMT
My favourite is the current top comment - "No loot = No complaining about loot = Problem solved. Bioware Magic." It sounds like their corporate practice to be honest.
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Post by masterwarderz on May 8, 2019 5:37:48 GMT
100 bucks? For the current quality released on triple A markets? What is this? Wishful thinking? Spinning tales of poor AAA business? Dream on - as long as the market is oversaturated with yearly clones that's not gonna happen. I couldn't imagine spending 60 dollars even on most of the modern dreck.
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Post by SirSourpuss on May 8, 2019 8:40:10 GMT
I wonder what the MTX revenue looked like, because that would be a big indicator form them as well. $3.5 million, as of March 22. We've had no new info since. I doubt, though, with Anthem's ongoing problems, whether it increased dramatically since. On the other hand, Apex Legends, by the same date, had made 92 million in digital revenue.
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Post by SirSourpuss on May 8, 2019 8:56:13 GMT
And yet people find ways to pay $1000 for a phone every other year. That is not necessarily the same audience that buys video game consoles and PC hardware. Those are mobile gamers, at best, or social media junkies, most likely. Maybe I am being a bit cynical, but I think we underestimate the general public in making an informed decison here I think you underestimate how casual the public is, in terms of video games. No game is hitting CoD and GTA numbers in sales, because no game has CoD and GTA appeal to the wider public. If folks are already considered "whales" by companies through gaming as a service, I would not be surprised if folks also take that plunge to pay for a rising cost. Not everyone is a whale, though. Not everyone can afford to be a whale. If a game is too expensive for them, they won't buy it. Maybe you can subset that lost revenue with the whales, but you are most certainly walling off people from playing your game and in the case of multiplayer games, you're going to need the population playing to keep your whales interested, so they can pay more for your game. I want to be wrong about that, but the problem with capitalism and consumerism is we buy into nonsense more than we admit we do. Sure we do. All the fucking time. But a $100 game is going to dramatically decrease the number that buy into it. Unless it's CoD or GTA. Two things will happen when that does occur too: lots of piracy, and less risks in the AAA market. Two things I personally don't want to see. Can you define what you mean by "less risk"?
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Post by aglomeracja on May 8, 2019 9:42:19 GMT
1. hardly anyone is a "whale" 2. online games need all the players they can get so those whales have anyone to play with 3. since everyone is moving towards MTX, it's unlikely they will push for higher game prices at the same time IMO. If you want to rely on MTX, you can't block large amount of gamers from buying your product by setting too high initial price.
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Post by Pounce de León on May 8, 2019 10:27:51 GMT
The whole "development" got so expensive I don't buy. AAA has been led on a noose to enter arms race with graphic fidelity. A quality a good game not necessarily needs. Along comes management team bloat and red tape. Really good games are made by smaller companies that work more efficiently. Cost bloat is largely on the big publishers themselves.
Not talking about the huge shift of brick and mortar sales channel transitioning to online distribution. For AAA publisher even using their proprietary sales channels cutting out the middle men more and more. Online distribution has earned the big ones huge margins on their products.
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Post by SirSourpuss on May 8, 2019 10:48:59 GMT
PC gamer article where Andrew Wilson talks about the future of Live Service games for EA and the industry in general. Although this should be more DA4 prevalent, it still should interest the Anthem crowd, as it is an ongoing live service.
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Post by jclosed on May 8, 2019 11:47:43 GMT
The whole "development" got so expensive I don't buy. AAA has been led on a noose to enter arms race with graphic fidelity. A quality a good game not necessarily needs. I completely agree. The graphic "arms race" has shifted a big part of the games developments to the graphical side. Add to that using up lots of resources to squash in multiplayer in every damn game, and you get a game that's graphically stunning, has multiplayer, and has a hollow story because that part was developed with the left overs from the budget.
That's the reason I am now more into JRPG games like "Trails of Cold Steel" (yes you all get probably sick and tired from me for bringing those games up again and again). Graphically those games are "cheap" to today's standards, but they make that up by having an incredible world building where a whole lot of NPC's have their own story throughout the game, and on top of that a truly epic main story that spans four games.
So yeah - I rather have a graphically crude but story-wise great single player game, than an hollow and empty but graphically stunning multiplayer game, with somewhere a bit kind of single player duc-taped on it.
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N5
Always teacher, sometimes writer
Teaching Mode Activated
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
PSN: LinksOcarina
Posts: 3,179 Likes: 4,063
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Post by linksocarina on May 8, 2019 12:12:27 GMT
And yet people find ways to pay $1000 for a phone every other year. That is not necessarily the same audience that buys video game consoles and PC hardware. Those are mobile gamers, at best, or social media junkies, most likely. Maybe I am being a bit cynical, but I think we underestimate the general public in making an informed decison here I think you underestimate how casual the public is, in terms of video games. No game is hitting CoD and GTA numbers in sales, because no game has CoD and GTA appeal to the wider public. If folks are already considered "whales" by companies through gaming as a service, I would not be surprised if folks also take that plunge to pay for a rising cost. Not everyone is a whale, though. Not everyone can afford to be a whale. If a game is too expensive for them, they won't buy it. Maybe you can subset that lost revenue with the whales, but you are most certainly walling off people from playing your game and in the case of multiplayer games, you're going to need the population playing to keep your whales interested, so they can pay more for your game. I want to be wrong about that, but the problem with capitalism and consumerism is we buy into nonsense more than we admit we do. Sure we do. All the fucking time. But a $100 game is going to dramatically decrease the number that buy into it. Unless it's CoD or GTA. Two things will happen when that does occur too: lots of piracy, and less risks in the AAA market. Two things I personally don't want to see. Can you define what you mean by "less risk"? Less risk will translate to trend chasing, sure bets, less experimentation, more product focused. So we get less mass effects, more andromedas.
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Post by SirSourpuss on May 8, 2019 12:25:20 GMT
Less risk will translate to trend chasing, sure bets, less experimentation, more product focused. As we've seen, unless you hurry out your game out the game, chasing an emerging trend, like Fortnite, you're going to trail behind by a wide margin. Hence why trying to CoD the fuck out of Battlefield didn't work. So we get less mass effects, more andromedas. Isn't Andromeda a Mass Effect? Or do you mean in terms of quality and reception?
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N5
Always teacher, sometimes writer
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
PSN: LinksOcarina
Posts: 3,179 Likes: 4,063
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Post by linksocarina on May 8, 2019 13:04:39 GMT
Less risk will translate to trend chasing, sure bets, less experimentation, more product focused. As we've seen, unless you hurry out your game out the game, chasing an emerging trend, like Fortnite, you're going to trail behind by a wide margin. Hence why trying to CoD the fuck out of Battlefield didn't work. So we get less mass effects, more andromedas. Isn't Andromeda a Mass Effect? Or do you mean in terms of quality and reception? Quality and reception.
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Post by SirSourpuss on May 8, 2019 13:11:07 GMT
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Post by General Mahad on May 8, 2019 14:06:22 GMT
It never stops, it’s like a roller coaster that goes off the rails into a fireworks factory in the middle of an earthquake....and I love it.
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Post by PillarBiter on May 8, 2019 14:34:24 GMT
It never stops, it’s like a roller coaster that goes off the rails into a fireworks factory in the middle of an earthquake....and I love it. *Grabs popcorn*
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Shattered Steel, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR, Anthem
Origin: ShinobiKillfist
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Post by ahglock on May 8, 2019 15:00:12 GMT
That's all fairly true, the problem though is you assume a company or seller is really interested in what the consumer sees as inherently valuable. Or, that they have a concept of value to begin with. A game publisher was historically a massive loss leader in 90% of their actual products until recently, mostly due to the introduction of the service model, internalization of in house hardware, digital distribution and the like. So, yes, what people are willing to pay for that is all part of the equation. That's all true and I concede the point. But my problem is its artificially held below costs due to new revenue streams making up the difference, leading into the record profits despite less games actually being bought year to year. Both the indie and AAA markets are basically losing more than they gain due to straight up production costs due to consumer demand for features, graphics, and the like at the $60, we all agree on that. for every game that makes it", i.e, becomes GTA V or Call of Duty, you have a dozen or so more that dont, despite bring popular. Of course those two are the most egregious examples, but the profit margins for most games at the 60 price tag are fairly thin at best. The financial incentive for the extra stuff is why it actually exists, and is persistent despite the fact that you have many consumers who grumble about this. Either that, or we should just admit that consumers don't care because the product is serving their needs with those added costs. I am of two minds on that personally. The point I have been trying to make is that consumer threshold for cost is either non existent anymore for the gaming industry because the majority of consumers already pay more as is, so it's already $100, or its artificially at $60 for now because of alternative revenue streams by corporations, and has less to do with the threshold of the buyer in a state of equilibrium.
The issue is people aren't rational purchasers. Call it the starbucks effect people but small purchases as separate discreet purchases without looking at the whole.(seriously folks buy a coffee roaster, buy green beans and make your own, with a little planning it take 1 minute out of your morning to make coffee) So while a gamer may say hell no to buying a $100 game they will pay $60 and then may buy 30 suits of clothes for another $150. If you told them do do want to buy trendy game X for $210 but it comes with all the clothes they would have thought you were crazy.
On the company side its not an either or, and the $60 isn't being artificially held down by micro transactions. If cost jumped to $100 a game and people bought in, there would be no dip in micro transactions by consumers or sales by publishers. As the micro transaction is a separate sales decision. They may need to have micro transactions to stay afloat on their current expense model, I don't have their books so I don't know. They are making record breaking profit so it is clearly helping. Without the micro transactions they may have to spend less. Potentially be less innovative, but being innovative frequently pays off so I'm not sure on that.
As an aside EA and all companies very much want to know how consumers see as inherently valuable. They pay multiple people large sums of money just to figure those things out. They may suck at it, though I suspect a lot of it is due to changes in the market and how to adapt to it. It wasn't that long ago where generic hero template was 90% of the protagonists as they saw their market as mostly white males and that was fairly accurate. Moving to a more diverse market is difficult, is this adding diversity, is it pandering, is the character just a virtue signal or a real character etc. Pricing and marketing analysts might be giving great advice and the developers might be fumbling it.
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