EA Lowering Prices on Current-Gen Games

[Rakael]

It seems that EA is lowering the cost of current-gen games (http://biz.gamedaily.com/industry/feature/?id=11910&rp=1) from $49 to $39 in a move to boost sagging sales. Other publishers may be following suit.


Two of EA's most anticipated video games, The Godfather (March 14) and Black (February 28), will retail for $39.95 when they hit store shelves. This is a 20 percent discount on the typical $49.95 debut price, which should make a purchase more appealing to consumers. Many consumers have been sitting back, waiting for next-gen, but because of the Xbox 360 hardware shortages many customers have left stores empty handed, ignoring current-gen software in the process.
I think this would be a great move, and may even get me to buy some new games. Though, I still have my ban on all things new from EA.

[Bushido]

Two of EA's most anticipated video games, The Godfather....



lollerskates!

[The Continental]

lollerskates!

Don't count out the poseur market; 50 Cent has made a fortune off em...

[Maskatron]

"Poseur Gamers", now there's a hilarious concept. LOFL.

[MaiXu]

Lemme know when they're down to ten bucks.

[Rafer]

I heard Black was extremely short, too short to justify too high a price? The game looks great though.

[GrinR]

EA is not making enough money, so they LOWER the prices of their games?
So EA thinks LOWER PRICES MEANS MORE GAMES SOLD

Will anyone remember this day when the next anti-piracy thread happens?

Un-fucking-likely.

[crashedout]

How about not charging more for 360 games that deliver less content? That would be nice as well.

[The Letter 3]

I think this would be a great move, and may even get me to buy some new games. Though, I still have my ban on all things new from EA.
Too bad everything from Criterion is now grouped under EA. Not only am I sure that this is hurting their development team but now people look at the games they put out with an air of suspicion. I do the same thing, though, cause EA is all about making the quick buck. Careful attention to games is how Criterion made Burnout 3 a success. EA is why Burnout Revenge feels like a stylized rehash of the series and why Black is shipping as such a short game with no multiplayer.

Or maybe not. But if mega-corporations did not exist, where would I direct my wrath? I can only shout at my TV for so long before it gets fed up with me. :)

[mister_slim]

How about not charging more for 360 games that deliver less content? That would be nice as well.
Hey, it's hard to manage successful price-fixing without solidarity. They've only got a limited amount of time before the used market develops and the smaller publishers get involved.

[rjcc]

*whistles in the dark*

[Sazime]

I know Sony started doing this over a year ago, has it helped them?

[Megalith]

Sounds good to me.

As far as I'm concerned, Xbox is still next-gen, and 360 is from a parallel universe that doesn't even exist. Kind of like Earth-2.

[fitbabits]

I heard Black was extremely short, too short to justify too high a price? The game looks great though.
Six hours max, or so I've heard. And that's with sightseeing! Rental-tastic.

[LilAbner]

I heard Black was extremely short, too short to justify too high a price? The game looks great though.

Um...Black isn't out yet, nor are any reviews.

[JazGalaxy]

I bought Catwoman for $1.00 from best buy and traded it into EB for 2. I was going to start a whole exchange racket but decided against wasting any more time on Catwoman.

[JazGalaxy]

Um...Black isn't out yet, nor are any reviews.

The buzz is out on it being a short game. Watch Gamespot, they talk about it all the time.

[EternalGamer]

EA is not making enough money, so they LOWER the prices of their games?
So EA thinks LOWER PRICES MEANS MORE GAMES SOLD

Will anyone remember this day when the next anti-piracy thread happens?

Un-fucking-likely.

Your bolded capital letters and emphatic tmesis would all seem to indicate you are angry, but I have no idea what you are angry about. Are you saying that pirates don't think lowering prices will create more sales? I am very con-fucking-fused.

Dan

[GrinR]

Your bolded capital letters and emphatic tmesis would all seem to indicate you are angry, but I have no idea what you are angry about. Are you saying that pirates don't think lowering prices will create more sales? I am very con-fucking-fused.

Dan

I was unclear. Bigtime!

Basically, this is one of the big arguments for high-prices. Piracy! Whenever I argue that piracy could be very easily reduced by lowering prices (and getting rid of punishing copy protection), the argument comes back at me that "production costs demand higher prices" and lowering the price would lower profits.

Except now, apparently not! (so I'm excited - I bookmarked this post).

[EternalGamer]

Ah, I gotcha now and I agree with you. If game prices got down to the prices of other meda (DVDS and CDs) then I doubt there would be much problem at all. Sure the occasional person still downloads a film, but the majority of people are not going to bother spending hours downloading, recompiling and resynching the voice and audio tracks, and burning it when they can go buy it the day it comes out with the packaging and extras for $15. Getting the price down would also fix this whole "used game market" business.

I actually expect it to happen in the next 10 years as gaming becomes cheaper and more mainstream. The $50 model will be replaced with things like add on packs, downloads, and online service fees, which is cool with me since that stuff will all be optional. Games need to be shorter and cheaper. I'd gladly pay $25 for a good 4 hour game that I can enjoy multiple times the way I enjoy films and music. Right now games are so loaded with filler and repetitive actions just so they make that 20 hour mark that almost nobody wants to replay them. That's why there is such a huge used game business. Because all this filler crap makes games completely disposable one shot products. Once you play them once you very rarely want to go through the hassle of all the boring filler material to replay them again. You want to know why Hollywood doesn't have a huge problem fighting second hand sellers? Because (a.) films too cheap to bother trying to hunt down used copies just to save a few bucks and (b.) good fims are things you want to enjoy again and again so you are less tempted to resell them.

Dan

[EternalGamer]

I'll tell you what EA: You knock another 2 hours off of Black and and another 20 bucks off the MSRP and I'll gladly buy your 4 hour game for $20 because that means there is two hours less of filler material I have to play through every time I want to experience your A quality material. I'd even break my boycott of your company if you did that.

Imagine if everytime I wanted to watch Kill Bill Vol 2 I had to endure 3 hours of Uma Thurman "training" by breaking barrels and another 4 hours of her walking from place to place. If my favorite films were designed the way my favorite games are, I would never bother keeping them around to watch more than once either.

Dan

[JazGalaxy]

I don't understand this concept either.

I used to work at a grocery store and we would sell straberries in the spring. We would charge, like, 5 bucks for a small crate of strawberries and NOBODY would buy them. We would literally throw them away by the pallette full. Then we would occassionally drop the price to two for 5 dollars, cutting the price in half, and they would sell like hotcakes.

Whenever I pose this ridiculousness of this situation people always say "well they are only buying the strawberries becuase they're on sale and it makes htem want to buy them" and I say that's crap. We throw away FAR more than we sell, and people always comment that they are simply too expensive to buy.

I wonder how much capitalists would profit if they stopped being greedy adn started being smart.

[GrinR]

I often find it hilarious that when i started collecting DVDs, they were cheaper than they are now. Now that they are selling billions of them. Nice.

[Dr Quincy]

I heard Black was extremely short, too short to justify too high a price? The game looks great though.

Not as good as Red Faction though.

Imagine if everytime I wanted to watch Kill Bill Vol 2 I had to endure 3 hours of Uma Thurman "training" by breaking barrels and another 4 hours of her walking from place to place. If my favorite films were designed the way my favorite games are, I would never bother keeping them around to watch more than once either.

By implication is KB2 one of your fav. fillums? Oh dear...

[captainspankypants]

The price isn't dropped enough to make me want to buy the games new, just enough to make me excited that the used versions will get cheap enough for me to buy much sooner. They need to drop the price of new to $30 at most, though it would probably take a $20-$25 game (similar to DVD prices) to really get me to buy new.

[fitbabits]

Um...Black isn't out yet, nor are any reviews.
It was reviewed in this month's Official PlayeStation Magazine. And they criticized it for its extremely short length.

[Dr Quincy]

It was reviewed in this month's Official PlayeStation Magazine. And they criticized it for its extremely short length.

And then gave it 10/10?

[TKO]

II think this would be a great move, and may even get me to buy some new games. Though, I still have my ban on all things new from EA.
Why only new stuff? Think the game-karma gods won't notice? ;) I thought their product was (generally) crap enough that I'm not buying it at all. Even for 'good' stuff (like Battlefield) they will inevitably be really s**ty with support (eg: enemy-tagged friendlies) and throw out the developers who made it great.

*sniff* Thinks back to Racing Destruction Set, when an the EA logo had a bit of class. :) </old-gamer nostalgia>

[Kamalot]

Even though the games are cheaper, you can never wash off that 'not-so-fresh' feeling you get from buying Electronic Arts' games.

[EternalGamer]

Not as good as Red Faction though.



By implication is KB2 one of your fav. fillums? Oh dear...

And what exactly is wrong with Kill Bill 2? It's not one of my favorites of all time, but it's a great film, and one that I thought would have more resonates on this forum than if I mentioned say La Dolce Vita or The 400 Blows (two of my actual favorite movies).

Dan

[absolut taco]

By implication is KB2 one of your fav. fillums? Oh dear...
What's a fillum?

No one asked me, but if you mean favorite film, KB1 is in my top 5 and KB2 is in my top 20 of all times.

[laggerific]

I know...I just picked up Fight Night for the 360 today, and as I was paying for it I pulled out 3 $20's and then saw the price was $65...I bitched about it but I still payed. I am seriously leaning towards returning it and waiting for it to come down in price...this new price point really affects my usual habit of buying games on a whim, even new ones...I don't think I can stomach that at this price...especially knowing the money is going to EA. And I really want to open a new game for my 360.

[mister_slim]

I actually expect it to happen in the next 10 years as gaming becomes cheaper and more mainstream. The $50 model will be replaced with things like add on packs, downloads, and online service fees, which is cool with me since that stuff will all be optional. Games need to be shorter and cheaper. I'd gladly pay $25 for a good 4 hour game that I can enjoy multiple times the way I enjoy films and music. Right now games are so loaded with filler and repetitive actions just so they make that 20 hour mark that almost nobody wants to replay them. That's why there is such a huge used game business. Because all this filler crap makes games completely disposable one shot products. Once you play them once you very rarely want to go through the hassle of all the boring filler material to replay them again. You want to know why Hollywood doesn't have a huge problem fighting second hand sellers? Because (a.) films too cheap to bother trying to hunt down used copies just to save a few bucks and (b.) good fims are things you want to enjoy again and again so you are less tempted to resell them.
Nintendo has been hinting they want to do more short games for lower prices. They've done that a bit with the DS, but I wonder if they'll be able to resist high pricepoints. The Rev would be an excellent place to do that though, because I expect a lot of early games to revolve around simulating something with the controller and building a game around it. Putting out, say, a cooking game for $30, with maybe some recipes and educational bits, could work out pretty well. Maybe more people would learn how to properly handle a kitchen knife. And they could follow up with an expansion that teaches singles guys to create a meal and match wines. Then the "Nintendo helped me find a wife" PR would write itself. And then Nintendo could work on world peace.

edit: laggerific, have you tried GameFly?

[laggerific]

And what exactly is wrong with Kill Bill 2? It's not one of my favorites of all time, but it's a great film, and one that I thought would have more resonates on this forum than if I mentioned say La Dolce Vita or The 400 Blows (two of my actual favorite movies).

Dan


Not just that, but the KillBill series was quite excellent all together...

I have not tried gamefly...my problem is that I just don't game like I used to...while I'm hardcore at heart, I am not able to game as frequently, so I like to bounce around between games...so I can wait until it comes down and is at a used price that isn't userous...it's just I was hoping to add it to my list of games I'm bouncing around with since I am almost done with Ninja Gaiden...at least I should be...that game just keeps on going. NG is frickin sweet.

[absolut taco]

I know...I just picked up Fight Night for the 360 today, and as I was paying for it I pulled out 3 $20's and then saw the price was $65...I bitched about it but I still payed. I am seriously leaning towards returning it and waiting for it to come down in price...this new price point really affects my usual habit of buying games on a whim, even new ones...I don't think I can stomach that at this price...especially knowing the money is going to EA. And I really want to open a new game for my 360.
As far as I know, only one 360 game has been "on sale". The week before christmas, condemned came down from $59 to $49. I thought it was due to slow sales, but the next week it was back up to $59. If you are a CostCo member, their $59 games cost $54 and the $49 games cost $42.

[HardScores]

I was surprised when I bought Fight Night Round 3 and noticed the $10 discount. It's a lot easier to swallow especially if it's another mediocre EA game...