There was a big stink earlier today over a rumor regarding the supposed prices of upcoming XBLA titles Braid and Castle Crashers, found on several Japanese blogs including Xbox Japan. The internet has been on fire over the high prices ever since. I'm sure I'll catch flak for it, but I don't consider $22.50 to be a ridiculous price to pay for Castle Crashers, a game I would have happily forked over $50 for.
Anyway, enough about what I think: apparently Microsoft has had direct contact with Shacknews and clarified that the aforementioned prices are incorrect for both international and domestic markets. The official prices will be announced the Monday before each game's release, which slates those announcements for August 4th and 25th.
Back to my soapbox. If downloadable content didn't exist, and these games were $15 and $22.50 in the store, you think of them as "budget" titles and think you were getting off cheap. You're not getting another $27 worth of content out of a box and a manual, believe me. I'm glad the prices aren't right, but consider what you are getting out of these types of games before you start launching the hate mail.
[Update -- The Behemoth has updated their dev blog to reflect their update on the situation.]
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For a download that I can only play on my 360 and never resell or let others play, the price is just way too high.
I think it's stupid that people are up in arms about the prices. I would have gladly pay $22.50 for Castle Crashers and I haven't even played it yet. There's a fuckload of content in that game, More so then alot of 60 buck games on the market. Most people were bitching about the fact that if they're going to pay that much, They want a case and a booklet. I don't want a case and book.
I hate keeping shit around. I converted my entire CD collection into mp3 (40 gigs later) and sold off the physical copies. I haven't regretted this one bit. I'd get everything on the HD of my Xbox or PS3 if I could. I'm a lazy fucker. I hate getting up and changing discs when I want to play different games or listen to different bands.
This all being said, I'm glad it's not $22.50. But even if it was, I'd have paid it. Hell, I'd have bought it for my brother and friend so we could all get in on the action.
{/tinfoil hat}
At any rate, I see King3vbo's point -- I do understand the desire to own a physical copy. I feel that way about a lot of CDs, and I know that physical CDs probably won't even exist in ten years. I think the OPTION to buy the physical copy should be there -- for the same price.
Somehow I don't think this was going to be a soon to be element but a test to see the markets reaction and if it was only light grumbles some time after the fall update prices would go up, but it seems by the flaming bitching, screaming moaning, and general chaos we'll see a vast majority sticking at 800 a pop.
Couldn't have said it any better myself, and I also agree with King. I like having my discs.
Do I really want to ask that question?
Seriously, I'll pay $20 for Castle Crashers and I'll be happy for having such a cheap game.
I also won't blink if I hear that Braid is coming out at $15.
I mean, I'd be willing to let Gabe Newell bend me over and make dirty butt-love to me on a weekly basis, if it meant more quality Valve stuff. But that doesn't mean that anal rape should be their standard fee. (Or something. I think I lost the analogy, if possible.)
As I said in the previous post, downloadable content pricing should not be anywhere near retail, physical-media pricing. This is about principles, and stopping rape before it starts. They will gradually inch the prices up, if we let them. Don't bend over for them, just because it's a good game. (I'm not saying we shouldn't buy it, just that we should protest in some form. Wahmbulance be damned.)
Dude, I hope you never have a hard drive crash. Or back it all up to DVDr only to find you bought a bad brand.
Hell, I lost over a hundred gigs of media once because the windows disk cleanup utility decided to do a little extra cleaning. Another time I lost nearly 50 discs worth of DVDr backups when they went bad 3 months after burning because Kodak's quality control is apparently ass.
Give me hard copies or give me nothing. I will not buy digital downloads.
The only problem I have that Castle Crashers coincides with both Harvest Moon games being released in the same week. I wonder if I can snuggle sheep and wreck medieval havoc at the same time.... :O
I think defining a passable price for these games is very much subjective to people's personal feelings about pricing. I shuddered when I paid $70 for BioShock, but I still bought it. Some people didn't flinch. If you can find a way to name a standard for downloadable games that isn't based on someone's idea of what they SHOULD be, I will totally listen to that argument, but before that comes into play, there is no factual definition of what's "too expensive" -- merely people's personal opinions.
I can promise you that many of the Wii titles out there, for example, are developed for less than the cost of Castle Crashers - probably a lot less. Same with a lot of the PC stuff (other than the top titles), DS, PSP, and PS2.
The distribution system - shop or download - has nothing to do with the game content. If you think otherwise, you've bought into some very strange marketing.
Don't ask about CC, it is not up yet.
That said, $22.50 doesn't sound terribly outrageous, but it is definitely getting to that "a little pricey" area. Ultimately, it really depends on how in depth the game really is. If I find it is a five stage brawler with Alien Hominid art direction, I would be pissed...but given the development time, it should clearly be more than that. But I still prefer it to be actually decent, so I'll wait for verdicts before I invest in it.
I think we need standards, otherwise Microsoft and their kin will try to wring as much money out of us as possible, over time. First, we say $20 is okay, then $22.50, then $25, and so on until we reach God-knows what price. It's dangerous. Why are gas prices so high? Certainly not because the big companies are experiencing losses. It's because we're so dependent on gas that they know they can rape us there, and they know they can make excuses for it.
@sillytuna
Notice I put "complete" in quotation marks. I know that they're full games, and I realize that Castle Crashers is probably better than 90% of recent retail, physical-media games. But it's a smaller game, let's say. If it wasn't, it would be in stores. It's an arcade game, hence its being DLC. You must be able to see the difference here. It's like the difference between Portal and Portal: Still Alive.
That simply isn't true. It's on digital DESPITE options to do it on retail for one very good reason - it's the best way for Behemoth to sell the game and allows them to avoid a publisher.
Games like this - by which I mean original IP without a big marketing budget - generally struggle at retail and suffer from many issues - price reduction, distribution issues, publisher issues, to name but three. Most games at retail lose money, often a lot of it.
I don't want to speak out of turn but I can promise you that Behemoth's experiences with Alien Hominid retail taught them that (they had no alternative at the time).
I hope yuo don't mind me pointing this out - as a game player you probably don't realise the business differences. Retail is a bad, bad place to be for an indie (and not just indies, but anyone without a brand and $$$ which is why shelves are stuffed full of sequels and licenses - most of the rest of the stuff loses money).
If you're going to compare GTA to other games then every game is going to be about $1 which is daft. GTA was hugely expensive to make but it was also predicted to make huge sales (and did).
The price you pay has to do two things:
1) Reflect value for money. Just because a game is huge or cost loads to make or has a Spiderman license does not make it value for money. It's about the game quality.
2) It has to compensate whoever funded it, usually a publisher, and the various parties involved in making it.
I find it very strange that people still think that - in the age of download music/tv/film - a download game is any less worthy than a retail game. I'd say that those of you who do believe this, and there obviously are a few, are in the minority.
I don't think anything I say will change your mind so we'll just agree to disagree I guess. As a game developer I know that I can't do titles like this at retail and I also know that I need to charge X amount in order to make a living (and trust me, us indies won't be getting rich). I have to go with what I know.
To put it another way, if games like Castle Crashers are to get made, the price needs to reflect what is needed to make it. There is no developer profiteering going on - you have no idea how hard going it is but I wouldn't expect you to.
So if you will only pay the lower price, either you can't buy the game - which is a shame - or it wouldn't get made anyway. Lower price will mean more sales, but there is a point where total revenue drops on either side of the curve (opportunity cost for the economists amongst you!). I.e. price too high or too low and you lose out. Price just right and it isn't top unit sales (people buying the game) but it is maximised revenue (business speak, sorry).
That is the harsh reality of it whether you agree or not. I guess you don't, but I can only give you the dev point of view so fair enough.
Fuck that shit - $10 is the absolute max that I will pay for anything digital. And yes, I still buy my music on CDs. Piss on lossy codecs, DRM, and paying full price for crap that never goes on sale or that you don't get to own.
$15 for Castle Crashers, $10 for Braid. There, standard solved. And you know it's good, because I'm always right. ;D
@sillytuna
I'm sorry, but I fail to see why pricing standards should change, just because XBLA is Behemoth's most viable release platform. Look at Xbox Originals. What is it for a downloadable version of a last-gen, retail Xbox game? $15, I believe? If MS wants to add a service for downloading full retail-style games, then fine. But releasing something under the banner of XBLA strongly implies that a game is not a full-on, 10-hour (plus), fully-featured retail game. It implies that the game is, well, an arcade game. I lack the vocabulary to properly articulate what I think and feel about this, but compare the details of Gears of War to Alien Hominid's. It's a terrible comparison, but Gears is clearly not an arcade game, where Alien Hominid clearly is, regardless of whether it previously saw a physical release or not.
Anyway, that's besides the point. I was saying that people are used to downloading content and - although I accept the "physical box" thing - content distributed digitally isn't seen as a lesser form unless it is indeed a lesser version (low resolution video for example) or rented (often the case with tv/film but not always).
I actually agree with you about being able to move songs between devices (heh, well you can't always...) because I believe download games should be able to be "lent" etc in some easy form, but MS et al will probably never allow it.
My disagreement is purely around you seeing a retail product as better or higher value *purely* because it's at retail. The only valid argument is that it has a box. I'm saying that the price you pay for having "that box" as a developer is way, way too high. You say it isn't.
Fair enough, but - with my gamer head on - I don't give a stuff about the box but I do care about the game. Is Alien Hominid GameCube worth more than Castle Crashers XBLA, give that it retailed initially at far more then the likely $15 or $20 CC price point? You will probably say yes, I'll say no.
As I said, we'll not agree ;)
i hate to break it to ya, but there is a HUGE difference between most DLC games and most retail games. Except for the PSN, where games like Tekken 5, Warhawk, SOCOM, and GT5 are showing up (and those end up being higher priced than most DLC games), DLC are always significantly smaller than retail games. Penny Arcade Adventures, the Strong Bad Game for Attractive People, and other DLC RPG games cannot begin to compare with retail games such as more or less any Square game, Bioshock, the elder scrolls, etc.
all the puzzle games that are coming out on the PSN (the various pixeljunk games, echocrome, elephunk, etc.) and all of the side-scrolling/double-analog-stick shooters on both systems (geometry wars, nucleus, bionic commando rearmed, etc.) cannot compare to any retail shooters that come out (uncharted, MGS4, GTAIV, Halo 3). A very obvious example of the difference between the two would be something like Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (the full retail game), and the newly announced quest for booty, which is only going to offer 4-6 hours of gameplay (as opposed to the 20+ the original offered). no matter how good castle crashers is, do you really think it'll offer you the same amount of content as too human or mass effect? i really don't think so. and no matter how cool the art style of castle crashers might be, 2D graphics are simply nowhere near as time intensive and demanding as full realistic 3D sprites are. if you can find me one DLC content on any system that offers more content than retail games (discounting wii/ds/ps2 games aimed at kids/non-hardcore-gaemers), i will be surprised. of course i don't mean games like geometry wars that might have a much longer lasting appeal than retail games, but DLC games that offer more content... my top 2 games that i am looking forward two right now are pixeljunk eden (coming out tomorrow!!!) and littlebigplanet (which i'm assumign is going to be DLC, or at least partially DLC), and i will probably play them more than i do most retail games, but that doesn't mean that they have more content or are bigger games...
pixel junk eden is an incredibly simple concept. point a stick in a direction and press any of the face buttons. the graphics are a very simple but elegant 2D. a team like insomniac could have probably created the game in a month or so. i will probably end up playing it with friends more than i did ratchet and clank... does that mean the game should sell for the $60? absolutely not. i wouldn't buy it, and neither would very many other people...
anyway, this whole post has turned into an essay, so i'm just going to leave it at that...
MS are now trying to shift XBLA from being one thing into another, with XNA Community Games taking the place of the cheaper content.
I do understand when you compare Gears of Ware to Braid or Castle Crashers. They are a completely different scope, but you know what? It makes no difference to me.
I pay the same price to see The Dark Knight as Donnie Darko. To me it's all about entertainment, not whether I'm paying more for a huge production. I don't feel ripped off if I'm enjoying my games, I *do* feel ripped off it the game is rubbish (and yes, I accept that price does contribute to how ripped off I may feel).
Digital distribution is the wave of the future, like it or not, and as high-speed broadband becomes more commonplace, so will this method of delivery. I agree with sillytuna on this matter, although I actually do care about the box/artwork/instruction manual since I'm a designer, and I care about that sort of stuff (I digress though, since most game packaging is fucking god-awful). The brick and mortar retail presence for digital media is becoming a redundant non-necessity; how the publishers will embrace this truth has yet to be seen however. It happened with music and it will happen with this.
@thisissami - you're quoting the very biggest games, but the games market is far, far bigger than those games. They are great titles, they really are, but they are almost besides the point. There are many, many titles that will be similarly priced yet not as enjoyable, whether 2d/3d/MMO/whatever. When these games come out, rarely do the publisher know whether they will be successful.
Anyway, as per my last post, it's about enjoyment and entertainment. I understand - but don't agree - with people who equate price with massive productions. However, I do agree that there is a flipping point beyond which people will feel a little aggrieved & won't buy. Perhaps we're just arguing over where that point is.
Don't worry about writing long comments, lol, at least one person reads them ;)
@Sharpless - Actually I agree with you about that standard so +1 from me. I would say that 1600 points should also crop up but not when it equates to a lot more than $19.99 in many places, including where I am!
Thanks all for the discussion and keeping it sensible.