Are Games Too Expensive?

[drakkarim]

Originally Posted by Wyrm

Valve is smart, because they knew people would pay 50$ for it right out the gate. I did, as did many others.

but you're missing the point, what they're saying is they're losing out on volume of sales.

at $50 a hit, they're going to sell a lot less of ANY game, than if they released it at say $25.

but the important thing is in the details.... would they have sold MORE than twice as many boxes at $25 than at $50? if they would have, then they would have made more money for charging less.

you also have to figure in the gray/black markets:

those that saw the $50 and said 'screw that i'll buy a used copy' from which valve didn't make ANY money...

AND the ones that said "50 is too much, i'll wait a few weeks/months" ...and then forget about the game all together and never pick it up,

AND the ones that said "50 my ass, i'll get the warez and play it with my LAN buddies"...

money lost on 3 opportunities, a very good amount of which they would have MADE if they simply charged less from the start. a lot of those lost opportunities don't come back, even at these retarded 'sales' of theirs.

people move on.

[Suicidal ShiZuru]

Only if it sucks, whenever I have to pay full retail for a game its usually worth it and I feel fine about the price. When the game is horrible I would love to burn down a publishers building since I feel ripped off, I would feel the same even if it wasnt full price... Im in the group of "give me a demo or go to hell" unless I decide to go to torrents... Which if it turns out good Ill pay.

I finally got L4D thanks to the sale, It was still barely worth it for that price...

[TheBot]

L4D is definitely worth the $50 to me. But let me explain why. First, it's a stand alone game and offers single player, multiplayer co-op and versus. Additionally they will be adding content like maps and I'm sure they'll be adding weapons and new bosses and things of that nature. It will be worth the $50 with the extra content they'll be producing.

And one last point, think of all the hours you are getting out of the content they already put out. Have you hit the 50 hour mark yet? $1 an hour, think about it. It's pretty cheap entertainment when you think about it. You pay what, $10 for a movie now that's 2 hours. Renting movies is like $4 each.