Do gamers have the balls to force a crash???

[Vylox]

I personally won't buy a game for $60 that has micro transaction... But then again I'm used to those free to play games that run micro transaction models for support.

Aside, if folks want to pay for stuff, that's their choice, not mine to force.

Also, keep in mind that the base price of console video games has been stable at $60 since the early 1990s..... If the video game industry wants more money, they are quite capable and allowed to charge more for games or institute other policies to generate money.

 

[Robot Number V]

Wait...What? Why would anyone want to force a crash? Couldn't you just...you know...not buy microstransactions? Thus forcing the developers to tone them down? What exactly would "forcing a crash" (whatever the hell you mean by that) accomplish? You said another one, when was the first crash? What the hell are you even talking about?

PS: Your entire first paragraph is a single sentence. Come on, if want to people to listen to you, at least put SOME effort into what the hell you're trying to say.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

If you don't like the prices they're at, do what I do;

Wait.

Seriously, gaming drops in price stupid quickly. I have paid full price for two games this year (Last of Us because FUCK YEAH!!! and Madden 25 because it came with a DirecTV Sunday Ticket thing). For fun, let's look at the big guns of this year and what they're selling at (using amazon.com for source; all brand new):

Bishock Infinite; $20 (less than 8 months ago)
Grand Theft Auto V; $55 (less than 2 months ago; I've seen it much cheaper at Black Friday events however)
Call of Duty Ghost; $50 (less than 1 month ago; again, I've also seen it cheaper at Black Friday events)
Tomb Raider; $25 (less than 8 months ago)

I can probably stop now since I'm sure my point has been made...

Unless you want to play Pokemon. Those games tend to hold their value pretty well. Pokemon Black 2 is still selling for nearly full price ($35) on Amazon, despite coming out over a year ago. White 2, as well as Black and White (Spring 2011) are holding strong at about $28.

You think that's nuts, you should look into the GBA games sometime. Any time I come across one in the wild, it's somewhere between $15 and $30, with $20-$25 being fairly common. And that's cartridge only.

The GBC games are also pretty expensive these days, but I'm chalking that up to the bump in price a lot of games get right around the time the generation that grew up on them start graduating college and getting decent jobs. We'd have to check back in 5-10 years to see what they're really going to normalize to in the long run.

 

[Vivi22]

Next gen games will cost upwards of $100, why? Microtransactions, in a word, and if you think they can be 'ignored' your playing into their hands more and more of the core part of the game will be behind paywalls as well as the $60 starting price, of course it always starts off small and easily ignored little 'extras' but if you keep bending over for the publishers you deserve it.

So my question is this, when is enough, enough? Do gamers have the guts to force what is so greatly needed, another video game crash?...discuss.

No, microtransactions will not lead to games costing over $100. No, core game features will not be locked behind paywalls. The majority of gamers never pay a dime for DLC and would simply stop buying games if they became necessary purchases. And the people who do buy DLC aren't sufficient to make up for losing those that don't, and they also won't put up with being gauged for very long.

So many people try and act like the sky is falling because microtransactions exist and "everyone's going to use them to gauge us all and everything will be too expensive!" Except that won't happen. Gaming is an extremely competitive industry, and the more competitive the industry, the less power companies have to gauge customers. It's part of why no one pays $5 to buy some horse armour. People acted like the sky was falling then too, but here we are more than 7 years later. World still hasn't ended.

And no, even if some companies did try and get out of control, the industry wouldn't crash. We may see some AAA studios or even a large publisher or two fold in the coming years, but a gaming crash like what happened in the late 70's and early 80's will never happen. It is literally impossible given how low the barriers to entry are for new game studios. Gaming isn't going anywhere and AAA gaming isn't either.

 

[freaper]

100$ games? I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of all the 20$ quality games I'm installing. You can ALWAYS choose what to buy. Even if a game you'd like to play has a 100$ price tag you'll still be able to play it at some point, just wait it out. There are so many options at your disposal, there's no need to wish for a market crash. Jesus...

 

[shrekfan246]

True dat. It's a shame, I've been wanting to try out the Fire Emblem series for a while, and was hoping that Awakening would be a good place to start, having recently bought a 3DS... hopefully some day I'll seeit for less than £30

Awakening is pretty darn good, as it so happens. Friendly to new players, as well, what with all of the easy modes they allow you to select. D:

On Topic: I don't think gamers have the balls, look at what Valve are able to get away with on PC, despite everyone opposing DRM when it was first introduced, now the sheep just let themselves get dicked over.

You know, I feel like I just did this the other day... oh wait, I did:

every year the sheep buy it.

All right, I get how silly and fun it is to demean people who dare to enjoy games you don't like, but can we please stop referring to human beings as livestock now?

I seriously have a hard time believing anyone on the internet has any semblance of empathy anymore. Our own content creators from LoadingReadyRun have even stated that they get angry, frothing e-mails from people, respond to them rationally, and then get a subsequent response from the person saying "Oh, sorry, I didn't realize someone was actually going to read this!"

So, next time you feel like openly mocking another person over some incredibly petty thing like enjoying a sports video game, stop and remind yourself "Hey, that's a real human being on the receiving end of my post."

Am I going to just have to make a generic "Stop calling humans sheep" template for use in situations like this?

Yes, Steam is DRM. And obviously there is no difference between Steam and, say, the DRM that Blizzard used for Diablo III, or Ubisoft used for all of their PC games between 2007-2011. Nope, there's absolutely no positives to using Steam as a platform for purchasing video games, and it's all just people mindlessly consuming with no regards for anything ever because nobody else has the presence of mind to realize they're just getting "dicked over".

 

[clippen05]

No, a crash orchestrated by gamers will never happen. Why? Because the majority of people don't care about what is happening in the industry: they don't care about online passes, they don't care about microtransactions, they don't care about whatever bullshit some company tries to implement; all they care about is buying a game and playing it. People like us, on the forums voicing our opinions over 'injustices,' are in the minority.

 

[Something Amyss]

Really bad premise here. It's not about guts or balls, it's about comfort with the market, desire and gratification,

Microtransactions, in a word, and if you think they can be 'ignored' your playing into their hands

My not playing into they're hands. My not buying any game that practices such a thing.

But at the same time, until this actually happens, you're just crying wolf on a slippery slope. You need more than "WAKE UP, SHEEPLE!" if you want to actually convince people.

However, it also highlights one of the biggest problems.

*ahem*

It's not all or nothing!

I mean, Jeez Leweez, we don't have to crash the industry to see change. We just have to stop buying bad products. And you know what? EA has seen the results of their practices lower their profits, and they've responded. They're not perfect, but they're changing. Because companies don't need to be threatened with collapse to change.

So, let me get this straight: You desire the job loss and livelihood loss of potentially hundreds of thousands of people all because the boss of some of those people decided to follow a business model you just assume is wrong because you, personally, don't feel like paying as much money as they are asking for for all the content?

The well-being of employees who may or may not even be treated/paid well is a really bad argument to prop up bad business practices.

It may feel good to think it's all a matter of guts, but it's a matter of organization and the cost versus the reward. Lack of organization is generally a pretty good reason to not join in on something that requires many people since it suggests likely failure. If you need people all acting together you need organization or for things to be so bad they're all doing it on their own. I imagine the latter case is not very likely at the moment.

Also, you have to want the same thing. If the state of the market exists because people are satisfied with the service, you'll never get anywhere. And even the people who ***** buy the games, so on some level, they must feel it's worth the money.

I mean, unless EA and Activision and all those other companies are holding people for ransom to ensure game sales....

...OMG. They totally are, aren't they? It all makes sense!

But seriously, you can get as organised as you want. If people like what they're getting, it's not even cost vs reward anymore. and right or wrong, they feel the way they do.

People have to want change as much as they want anything else.

 

[The Enquirer]

Next gen games

Can we please stop calling this stuff "Next gen"? Its no longer next generation. It's current generation. It is out and on the marketplace. Ps3 and the 360 are previous generation now.

OT: Yes, they do. Sadly there will be people such as Pc gamers that don't pay quite such absurdly high prices for their games much of the time, or the used console market, which I suspect may get much higher use this generation than previously. So it is a matter of whether or not the used market can cause that big of a dent and gamers are just flat out willing to pay that much. I think they will go through cash much faster and be unable to actually pay for as many games if microtransactions become standardized.

EDIT: Do I think people will? No, nope, nada, no way no how do I think people will. All I think would happen is people buy less games. I mean these people in charge are smart. They make stupid decisions but people but the game anyway.

 

[Drauger]

Nope as sad as it sounds, the industry has been pushing and pushing and I don't see a backlash from consumers yet.

But hey, since I'm mostly gaming on Nintendo consoles and my PC I don't deal with this problem.

Ohh you ! of course you don't have to worry for Nintendo using microtransactions, they'll find out about microtransactions, and decent online play in a console generation or two xD

 

[Eve Charm]

Meh it won't crash, you'll just see more small developers get bought out or go bankrupt While if times get tough the bigger companies will just cut back or make cheaper yearly titles.

Not all games will do microtransactions, not all games will do dlc, And frankly they are going to be the ones that die off first when people rather wait to pay 20 or 30 for a game they were hoping to get 60 bucks for. Crash no, but the coming of paying for half a game then the rest later is already here.

Farewell rune factory.

 

[Trippy Turtle]

A crash is the last thing we need.
The is industry fine at the moment and gamers just love finding something to complain about for no reason.
Perhaps if the developers got feedback other than "you suck" and other forms of complaints they could make a positive change.

For all the use of fancy words, 'boycotting' things is just a way you people justify having a tantrum over nothing.

 

[Signa]

I don't want a crash as much as a reboot and reformat.

That said, I have the balls (read: backlog) for a crash, so yes, I do, but gamers don't.

 

[Something Amyss]

Yes, Steam is DRM. And obviously there is no difference between Steam and, say, the DRM that Blizzard used for Diablo III, or Ubisoft used for all of their PC games between 2007-2011. Nope, there's absolutely no positives to using Steam as a platform for purchasing video games, and it's all just people mindlessly consuming with no regards for anything ever because nobody else has the presence of mind to realize they're just getting "dicked over".

I'm steering wide away from the whole "sheeple" thing since I find it ridiculous, but keep in mind that a lot of people don't qualify that a certain kind of DRM is bad. They're all "down with Origin because it's DRM! Ooh, Steam sale!"

Hell, using Origin as an example (and Origin is a shitty service comparably, but that's not the point), people were bitching about Origin over TOU terms that exist within Steam itself. There may be positives to buying with steam, but that doesn't inherently negate his point. People who hate DRM almost to the point of militism will still jump on Steam sales. People hate corporate behaviour but will turn a blind eye when it's convenient to them.

 

[shrekfan246]

Yes, Steam is DRM. And obviously there is no difference between Steam and, say, the DRM that Blizzard used for Diablo III, or Ubisoft used for all of their PC games between 2007-2011. Nope, there's absolutely no positives to using Steam as a platform for purchasing video games, and it's all just people mindlessly consuming with no regards for anything ever because nobody else has the presence of mind to realize they're just getting "dicked over".

I'm steering wide away from the whole "sheeple" thing since I find it ridiculous, but keep in mind that a lot of people don't qualify that a certain kind of DRM is bad. They're all "down with Origin because it's DRM! Ooh, Steam sale!"

Hell, using Origin as an example (and Origin is a shitty service comparably, but that's not the point), people were bitching about Origin over TOU terms that exist within Steam itself. There may be positives to buying with steam, but that doesn't inherently negate his point. People who hate DRM almost to the point of militism will still jump on Steam sales. People hate corporate behaviour but will turn a blind eye when it's convenient to them.

Yeah, I realize that, I'm just sick of the cynical "Everyone else in the world is a bleating, brainless consumer, and I alone know better" mentality that seems so ever present within the internet. I'm tired of people using pointless, petty things such as "They use Steam" or "They buy sports games" to jump off and start demeaning great swaths of other 'gamers' with swift, broad strokes. I'm tired of simple preferences being turned against somebody so that someone else can scoff and feel superior because of reasons.

I should probably just leave the internet, thinking about it.

 

[Phrozenflame500]

Yes, Steam is DRM. And obviously there is no difference between Steam and, say, the DRM that Blizzard used for Diablo III, or Ubisoft used for all of their PC games between 2007-2011.

Well, Steam isn't always-online, actually works most of the time and doesn't force a shitty real-money auction house.

But yeah, Steam is DRM. Holding up the "Down with DRM!" banner and then praising Steam is at least a bit hypocritical.

 

[Neyon]

Boycotting micro transactions is one thing, crashing the market is another thing entirely. However gamers lack the motivation and organization to do anything like this.

 

[Robert Marrs]

We don't need a crash. We just need to show companies that we will not participate in micro-transactions, day 1 dlc etc. When those things don't make them money they will stop implementing them.

 

[Vylox]

Yes, Steam is DRM. And obviously there is no difference between Steam and, say, the DRM that Blizzard used for Diablo III, or Ubisoft used for all of their PC games between 2007-2011. Nope, there's absolutely no positives to using Steam as a platform for purchasing video games, and it's all just people mindlessly consuming with no regards for anything ever because nobody else has the presence of mind to realize they're just getting "dicked over".

I'm steering wide away from the whole "sheeple" thing since I find it ridiculous, but keep in mind that a lot of people don't qualify that a certain kind of DRM is bad. They're all "down with Origin because it's DRM! Ooh, Steam sale!"

Hell, using Origin as an example (and Origin is a shitty service comparably, but that's not the point), people were bitching about Origin over TOU terms that exist within Steam itself. There may be positives to buying with steam, but that doesn't inherently negate his point. People who hate DRM almost to the point of militism will still jump on Steam sales. People hate corporate behaviour but will turn a blind eye when it's convenient to them.

I seem to agree with you...

Thankfully, the only DRM stuff I ever deal with is for always online free to play games on my tablet......
No steam, no origins, nothing by EA, no Activision/Blizzard, no Ubisoft....

Beginning to think I'm weird here...



Long live recycled Pokemon!